# Famous scientists who are overrated. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 29, 2019, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-scientists-who-are-overrated/841004 "2019-09-29T17:18:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![TimfromNapa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d26b3c/32.png) [@TimfromNapa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TimfromNapa)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2019, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-scientists-who-are-overrated/841004/81 "2019-10-03T19:25:26Z")
Lee de Forest did not invent the vacuum tube (valve). What he did invent was the triode valve. I’m not an electrician or physicist, so I can’t pretend to understand just what the thing is, but, among other things (I presume), it makes amplification possible. That should have earned him a place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. As has usually been the case in the technical world, there was litigation contesting de Forest’s credit for the invention. Additionally, Edwin Armstrong seems to have detested him and talked enough smack about the man that it continues to sully his reputation. Whether any of this was justly earned or not is up to historians. As far as I know, de Forest’s patent was upheld. If he was a shameless self-promoter, well that put him in good company I’m sure. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2019, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-scientists-who-are-overrated/841004/82 "2019-10-03T19:40:02Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > No, Crafter-Man’s correct. Technically, you can transmit information by transmitting power but practically speaking, nobody does that. If you’re transmitting energy to be used as power, you want to do it as narrowly as possible. It would be insane to try to simply broadcast enough energy to go everywhere with the knowledge that less than one percent of it would ever be received and used. You can broadcast information this way because it uses far less energy. Note the using of the expression “If you can do X you can do Y.” E.g., if you can run a mile in 4 minutes you can run a 1/4 mile in 1 minute." This is no way implies you have to slow down to run that 1/4 mile in a minute. If you can transmit power you can transmit information is 100% correct terminology. _It in no way implies you have to use the same power level._ But it is weird that someone denies Tesla was also working on transmitting information when it is so obvious that the same (hypothetical) mechanism for power transmission effectively includes it as a special case. And specifically, in terms of Tesla, we was experimenting with quasi-radio telegraphic [transmission](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla#Wardenclyffe). He was very much competing with Marconi. (And was doomed to lose.) \*\*Crafter\_Man’\*\*s claim otherwise is factually incorrect. ---
**Author:** ![TimfromNapa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d26b3c/32.png) [@TimfromNapa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TimfromNapa)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2019, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-scientists-who-are-overrated/841004/83 "2019-10-03T19:46:37Z")
I’m sure the “general population” has not heard of Emile Berliner, Chichester Bell, or Charles Sumner Tainter either but that does not diminish the importance of any of them or their contributions to sound recording. Lee de Forest is well known to anyone who has been curious about the history of radio. Where science and history are concerned, knowledge among the general population is not necessarily a good gauge of importance. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/famous-scientists-who-are-overrated/841004.md?page=4)