The story of technological progress is one of drama and intrigue, sudden insight and plain hard work. Let’s explore technology’s spectacular failures and many magnificent success stories.
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Listeners of Engines of Our Ingenuity that love the show mention:Episode: 2932 Monopoly games for POWs and the creation of myths. Today, Monopoly games and mythology.
Episode: 2929 The treacherous Goodwin Sands give up the last Dornier-17. Today, the Goodwin Sands.
Episode: 2925 The wreck of the Francis H. Leggett and the question: What makes history interesting? Today, Oregon's worst shipwreck.
Episode: 2940 Polio and Mathematics. Today, mathematicians ask, "should we rid the world of polio?"
Episode: 2831 Reading the Long History of Cosmopolitan Magazine. Today, a great American magazine.
Episode: 2765 The Mechanical Turk. Today, the chess playing automaton.
Episode: 2921 The development of Italy's Reggiane 2005 fighter plane from the American P-35 as genetic analogy. Today, airplane genetics.
Episode: 2911 A very big spool: The Quincy Mine No. 2 Shaft Hoist, the largest in the world. Today, a very big spool.
Episode: 2896 In which Nadezhda Popova beats off the Wehrmacht in a crop-duster. Today, Nadia Popova.
Episode: 2892 Steampunk: An exercise in writing science fiction without predicting the future. Today, steampunk.
Episode: 2939 Getting Power Inside: Alternative Power Transmission Systems. Today, why electricity?
Episode: 2909 Hydrogen Fuel Cell Providing Renewable Energy, A Comparison of Hydrogen Fuel Cell and Lithium Ion Battery. Today, a neat way to get energy.
Episode: 2829 Cesare Lombroso and his Museum. Today, a head in a jar.
Episode: 2880 Glacier Bay as seen by John Muir before 1885 — different now. Today, Glacier Bay, in another time.
Episode: 2877 What do bees and other creatures see with their unimaginable eyes? Today, technology, engineering, and art.
Episode: 2876 In which engineers and scientists assess their work in 1945. Today, scientists speak as WW-II ends.
Episode: 2874 The ground effect in the service of birds and human vehicles. Today, the ground effect.
Episode: 2938 Andrew Carnegie's The Gospel of Wealth. Today, the gospel of wealth.
Episode: 2946 Man or Monster? The Legend of the Golem and the Age of Technology. Today, what can an old legend tell us about the future?
Episode: 2621 Giovanni Gabrieli and the Venetian School of Polychoral music at St. Mark's Basilica, Venice. Today, a marriage of sound and space.
Episode: 2871 In which Samuel P. Langley talks about solar powered engines in 1884. Today, an idea, long before its time.
Episode: 2867 Augustin Fresnel, light, and lighthouses: from the science of light to the saving of ships. Today, Fresnel and his Lighthouses.
Episode: 2866 How many wings on an aeroplane — How many strings on a violin? Thoughts on the maturation of technologies. Today, How many wings or strings on an aeroplane or a violin?
Episode: 2849 Fern Andra and Lothar von Richthofen: One lived, one died. Today, Fern and Lothar.
Episode: 2936 George S. Parker and the Parker Brothers. Today, for the love of games.
Episode: 2539 Define technology? Why, it's as easy as riding a bike! Today, medical historian Helen Valier offers us a new look at the language of technology.
Episode: 2823 Gilles de la Tourette and Hypnotic Crimes. Today, hypnotic crimes.
Episode: 2827 Dimensionless groups, helping us to deal with the similarity of often very different situations. Today, dimensionless groups.
Episode: 2825 In which our lack of fluency with numbers (innumeracy) threatens our national well-being. Today, innumeracy.
Episode: 2812 poised to begin transatlantic flight in 1938. How it came out in 1945. Today, we fly the Atlantic.
Episode: 2807 3D printing provides the latest view of the downward diffusion of technology. Today, technology keeps diffusing downward.
Episode: 2933 Math and The Dreyfus Affair. Today, courtroom drama.
Episode: 2905 Imagination's Contributions to Science and Technology, Developmental Psychology and Imagination. Today, the gift of imagination.
Episode: 2820 A Spectacular Series of Spectaculars: Remaking Ben-Hur. Today, remaking Ben-Hur.
Episode: 2800 Two information revolutions: 2800 years ago, and surrounding the 2800th Episode. Today, 2800 years ago.
Episode: 2792 Glorious revolutions - which we see only after they've passed. Today, silent revolutions.
Episode: 2788 Measuring and testing our machines — not yet as electronic as it might seem. Today, an old book on testing machines harbors a surprise.
Episode: 2787 Doolittle's Tokyo raid: Much more than the mere gesture it seemed to be. Today, a costly gesture that may've saved America.
Episode: 2931 G. H. Hardy, mentor and apologist. Today, a friendship and an apology.
Episode: 2018 The Chamberlen family secret: the invention of forceps. Today, guest historian Cathy Patterson reveals family secrets.
Episode: 2691 What Happens to the Human Body When Exposed to Vacuum? Today, the body at vacuum.
Episode: 3290 In which Technology and Engineering reveal themselves as Liberal Arts. Today, technology, engineering, and art.