My Inventions, Autobiography of Nikola Tesla

Tesla in his own words is a humble, but thorough exploration into the life, thoughts, and methods of this remarkable person. His earnest desire was to alleviate the suffering of humanity no matter what creed or country, and his inventions were all conceived in the service of that noble aim. He describes his beloved machines in some detail, as well as the visions that were common throughout his life, usually preceding a breakthrough. This book is a fascinating account of Tesla’s life and his work through his own eyes.

A great read for getting into reading, easy to process. You get a full course of Nikola Tesla, his inventions and his view of the world. Nikola literally predicts the internet, war drones, bluetooth and a real source of continous energy almost 100 years before it came to be!

An absolutely fascinating mind and a delightful autobiography. The reader guy (I have the audio version) does a good job reading, that plus the many interesting anecdotes make for an enjoyable autobiography. A good one.

I felt it was too self serving which led me away from a page turning read. It took away the genius of this man.

I feel like some pages were missing.

Our greatest scientific inventors

Una vida llena de brillo y un fin tan turbio y oscuro

The book is GREAT. HOWEVER... there is something really weird going on here. I got the Watchmaker paperback version of the book. I am also listening to the Waxkeep edition of the book as an audiobook. And there are some disturbing differences in the two editions. So far I’ve noticed a date, some parenthetical statements, and a lot of numbers. The strangest thing is the difference in the inclusion of god and the Bible. The Watchmaker paperback seems to be the less accurate as it gets something as easily checkable as Tesla’s magnifying transmitter wrong, written magnifying transformer in the book, while the Waxkeep gets this right. This is particularly apparent when Tesla comes to a revelation seeing the interaction between lightning and rain on a mountain. In that moment he comes up with his spectacular dreams of harnessing this power. In the Watchmaker paper back, this revelation is prefaced with a paragraph about bible studies. And similar revelations are prefaces with bible studies. There is zero mention, so far, of the Bible or god in the Waxkeep edition. I’m not a religious person, but I am reading this book because I am curious about Tesla and his OWN ideas in his OWN words. I don’t know if someone is omitting words or putting words in his mouth, the latter seeming more likely due to the evidence, but it is disgusting and absolutely immoral.

Tesla possessed an unusual method of thinking, with a very high capacity of invention. In this book, we could learn a lot from him.

Mistakes such as "Guest" instead of "Guessed", "Tho" instead of "Though" are found in this book. I am surprised to find such elementary issues in Tesla's autobiography.

Boken tycks ha skrivits / sammanfattats av något AI verktyg. Sakinnehhållet var ok men det fanns referenser i texten till sidor/stycken som inte fanns med i boken. Även en del mycket konstiga formuleringar.

É interessante ver o modo de pensar de Tesla.

What I love most about this book are Tesla’s recollections from his childhood and the interesting moments of his life that are not found in other books about him. In many ways Tesla was amazingly unique. For example, he talks about flashes of light and visions he had beginning in childhood similar to hallucinations that he could barely distinguish from reality. These visions caused him great anguish, though in time he learned to use them like something akin to a virtual workshop, his greatest asset as an inventor. He also discusses the superhuman senses he experienced as a young man, like being able to hear a watch ticking from several rooms away, and how these afflictions also were eventually turned into assets. Many readers will scoff at some of his recollections and Tesla admits that, especially the time he split a jumping fish in half with a rock, but I take him at his word because his inventions were just as unbelievable if not more so, and they were obviously very real. I also love the subtle humor in his words. Tesla was a master at languages and was as thoughtful as one can be. He had an old-world way of explaining things that is very enjoyable such as this example about boys fishing for frogs: "When my comrades, who in spite of their fine outfit had caught nothing, came to me they were green with envy. For a long time I kept my secret and enjoyed the monopoly but finally yielded to the spirit of Christmas. Every boy could then do the same and the following summer brought disaster to the frogs." Tesla brushes upon his inventions mostly with memories of how they came to be and brief descriptions of how they work or would influence humankind. The book is a very quick read, therefore not enough to go into much detail for each invention. Here’s what he says about the Wardenclyffe Tower shortly after its destruction: "The tower was destroyed two years ago but my projects are being developed and another one, improved in some features, will be constructed." (Unfortunately that prediction did not come to pass, or at least not yet.) The other thing that stays with me about Tesla was how spiritually advanced he was. There are traces throughout his writings and quotes that carry profound truth; he’s a combination of geeky scientist and hippie preacher all it one. Here’s an example: "Peace can only come as a natural consequence of universal enlightenment and merging of races, and we are still far from this blissful realization." While I’m in awe of Tesla and the things he did, I’m not 100% in agreement with him, particularly on the concept of free will and humans acting as automata. Perhaps I don’t completely understand his points on that, but it’s worth noting. In addition, I admire Tesla for his optimism that war could become obsolete if all humans had access to weapons and machinery of greater destructive ability, but I feel strongly that we as a species are still many decades from behaving in a way that takes the highest good for all into account. Still, Tesla is my hero. I cannot think of any individual who had more influence on the world yet was stifled along the way in almost every regard. If only he had been given more cooperation, the world would be a much different and much better place.