Introduction

It won’t be long before the Inventor’s ideas start to change the world, probably just after this book comes out.

The Inventions

The Vibrational Electric Generator (VEG) will change energy production. GE found it when Elana Dorchester, a summer intern hired to review Google’s Project 10^100 contest for overlooked ideas came across the VEG entry and the supporting YouTube video. By the time this book is published there should VEG transducers all over the world. (Elana is now a lead engineer on the VEGs project.) We’ll be getting electricity from swaying trees, shaking roads, undulating water, bouncing bridges – the up and down movement of automotive suspension systems. Instead of turning blades, wind will vibrate electrically conductive chords which in the presence of VEG transducers will generate electricity (no more mangled birds). Electricity production will become ubiquitous, a cottage industry. Anything that vibrates (or that can cause vibration) will be a natural resource. “Wasted” energy will be reclaimed.

The Tetra Triangular Building System (TTBS) will probably be next, although it might be Planes Without Wings (PWOW). It depends on how fast TATA (the Indian company that is developing these ideas) moves.

TTBS will change housing. The system replaces rectilinear building elements (bricks, blocks) with triangular components that form both roofs and walls. Unskilled labor can assemble dwellings in days from mass produced TTBS modules. The appearance of a TTBS house can be a as varied as a house from bricks. Depending on the market, modules can contain just minimal electrics (or not even that) or complete HVAC elements. In regions of high vibrational potential, TTBS structures can be packaged with a VEG. (TATA is aware of GE’s work and there have been rumors of collaboration.)

PWOW might revolutionize transportation, maybe even space flight. It is the most radical of all the inventions. It should not work. The Inventor did not think it would, but could think of no reason why it wouldn’t . According to sources in TATA R&D, he was right (or wrong depending on which of his assumptions he actually believed). Whereas he was too lazy and mechanically unskilled (or maybe too afraid of what he would find) to build a prototype, TATA investigators have constructed working models of planes that actually fly without visible wings. Boxes (and various fanciful shapes – e.g., representations of Shiva and Buddha) have hovered in labs with no apparent support. There are even unconfirmed stories of some sealed models “flying” in vacuum chambers, which the Inventor definitely believed was impossible. If this true, it means that the staple of science fiction, the space ship with no visible means of support, is about to become a reality.

The Theory of ULOM

Prompted by association with the Control Theory Group in the 1980’s (a precursor to the Perceptual Control Theory group), the Inventor wrote a paper called Universal Law of Mind (ULOM). In this paper, he explains how minds work – not just the minds of people, but animals, machines, even God (who in terms of ULOM is a “meta entity” that might or might not be self-aware).

Ignored for years, this paper and the ULOM it described are now discussed in cybernetic and philosophical circles. The Cybernetic Research Labs in Bangalore has developed a new generation of thinking machines based on algorithms which express the rules of ULOM. There is even talk (probably fanciful) of a Pulitzer.

Following is the Inventor’s introduction to ULOM:

The Universal Law of Mind (ULOM) describes mental events. Because it makes a testable statement, it is scientific.

The ULOM offers these premises:

• Mental events are physical events.
• Mental events are performed by mental atoms. Borrowing from Perceptual Control Theory, a single atom compares perceptions to goals and makes changes in the environment to get the two to match. Mental atoms are joined to create mental molecules. Different kinds of mental atoms create different kinds of mental molecules which create different kinds of minds.
• Mental atoms work the same way for all types of minds. This includes the minds of humans and non-humans, living and non-living things, physically diffuse and physically coherent entities, God, and Dog (which, for a dyslexic, is the same thing).
• Mental atoms create islands of order in the normal flow of entropy.
• Mental atoms are about information.
• Mental atoms are information processors and Turing Machines. .
• The self is an interior artifact created by a special “I” atom.
• The "I" atom arises out of conflict as an agent of intention and free will.

The ULOM is reductionist, mechanistic and dehumanizing:

• Reductionist - because complex mental systems are reduced to collections of elementary mental events.
• Mechanistic - because the minds of living and non-living devices are said to obey the same physical laws.
• Dehumanizing – see above.
• The ULOM is also poetic. Although capable of being described in scientific terms, the true significance of the physical events which make up minds is not the physical events, but what they represent. Testable theories can be devised to describe mental events, but not their symbolic meaning. The observer would have to enjoy the same status with respect to the tested mind as the owner of the mind.
• The ULOM does not recognize the term “artificial intelligence”. To the ULOM, it is all the same.

This Book

Before he disappeared on a snow-covered dirt road going up the mountain to Burkes Garden Virginia, the Inventor had written a wealth of material – blog articles, stories, reminiscences, impressions, fiction, non-fiction (sometimes it was difficult to tell which was which). In addition to the textbooks he co-authored with Claud Hunter in the 1980’s, he self-published several memoir books and one book of fiction (mostly).

My book “The Inventor’s Life and Times – A Grand Guy Who Would Change the World” is a collection of the Inventor’s own writing. He explains himself (or doesn’t) in his own words.

Deciding what to include and in what order has been a challenge. Naturally I have included his descriptions of his inventions – even though they are typically less about the inventions and more about him. In many cases I relied on Allie, his granddaughter, who though still a child had definite opinions about the content– telling me to “put that in, leave that out”. Much of what she said makes sense. Her mother Yancie gave me permission to use and when necessary edit the copyrighted material (although most of the Inventor’s writing was tossed carelessly into the public domain - still available on Google - who never gets rid of anything). The ULOM paper is included in its entirety.

Except for names, his words appear pretty much as they were written. For reasons that are not clear even to me I refer to the subject of this biography as the Inventor. Perhaps I think he would like it, think it was grand (which he so desperately wanted to be). When use of that sobriquet becomes too awkward or odd (for instance in third person dialog that he has authored) I use the name “Tommy”. Also if he has used the name of a living person in a way that might be offensive (or get me in trouble) I have come up with other names. (Of course by the time this book is out, some of those living people will have entered what the Inventor referred to as the realm of the “conveniently dead”. )

As for me, I have decided to adopt the pseudonym “Ennui Pidawee” for this book. It is the name the Inventor assumed in his own book “The Life and Times of Professor Ennui Pidawee.” (Readers can find an explanation in his book.)

I should also note that I am splitting royalties for my “Life and Times…” book with the estate. The Inventor’s “Life and Times of Professor Ennui Pidawee” book didn’t make any money. And the rest of his work was given away, not because he was a philanthropist but because he simply didn’t believe it was worth anything.