Old aspects, of renewable energies, from cucumbers

[Catfish]

At the grand academy of Lagado

" ... I was received very kindly by the warden, and went for many

days to the academy. Every room hath in it one or more

projectors; and, I believe, I could not be in fewer than five

hundred rooms.

The first man I saw, was of a meagre aspect, with sooty hands

and face; his hair and beard long, ragged and singed in

several places. His cloaths, shirt, and skin, were all of the

same colour:

he had been eight years upon a project for

extracting sun-beams out of cucumbers; which were to be put

into vials, hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air,

in raw inclement summers.

He told me, he did not doubt, in

eight years more, that he should be able to supply the

governor´s gardens with sun-shine at a reasonable rate; but,

he complained that his stock was low, and intreated me to give

him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially

since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers: I made

him a small present, for my lord had furnished me with money

on purpose; because he knew their practice of begging from all

who go to see them. ..."

[Eichhörnchen]

Again, there's of mushrooms than of cucumbers about this story. Or am I the one hallucinating?

[Tango589]

What did I just read?

[Wolferz]

Originally Posted by Tango589

What did I just read?

A journal entry of a deplorable speller?

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by Tango589

What did I just read?

According to google, part of Gullivers Travels...

[Eichhörnchen]

[Catfish]

Oberon is right, it's from Jonathan Swift:

Gullivers Travels, Part Three, Chapter V;

published in “Everyman´s Library” by J. M. Dent & Sons LTD

London, 1940, reprint 1960, text taken from Faulkner´s

editions of 1735-8.

I find the ida of extracting sunlight from cucumbers scientifically .. challenging.
Think of what would be possible, with sunflowers ..

And a good argument to p. off notorious environmentalists

[Oberon]

I dunno, if you were to eat that cucumber, you would absorb part of the energy from the cucumber and convert it into energy of your own, which is then used to power your body which can be used on a treadmill for example or operating machinery.

Thus the sunlight absorbed by the plant during its growth is transferred from plant to human, and eventually through waste back into the soil and plant again. Of course it's not a closed system, and entropy strikes along the way so that only a small percentage of the energy that the plant absorbed makes it back into the ground at the end of the process.

A better example really would be rapeseed, that absorbs energy from the sun and is converted into rapeseed oil which is converted into biofuel which is then burnt for energy.

It's all about releasing the energy stored in objects in a manner which is as waste-free as possible and with minimal environmental side-effects.

Yup, Swift at his usual satirical best. 'Projector' in this context meant 'inventor'. These days, the projectors work with 'energy catalysers', 'hydrinos' and 'Tesla fee energy generators', and have about as much success as they would with the cucumbers. Some things never change....

[Tango589]

Originally Posted by Oberon

According to google, part of Gullivers Travels...

If those were Gullivers travels, maybe the git should have stayed at home!

[Eichhörnchen]

Originally Posted by Tango589

maybe the git should have stayed at home!

Yes it sure is a bugga, that there Entropy. Everyone everywhere I guess will run out of energy eventually, and even the Almighty will be scratting around for the last few pieces of chairleg to burn. But until then we have boundless energy to put into the various threads on this forum, don't we? Naming none in particular of course...

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Oberon

According to google, part of Gullivers Travels...

In one