Complex Numbers

Out and Invention

Another from the same source as yesterday; this time, about inventions of the more tangible kind.

    5 Products Invented By the Last Person You’d Expect  
Sometimes, people venture into fields they have no business in, with beautifully mixed results

5 Mark Twain’s Bra Straps

No doubt, they phrased it that way deliberately.

Missouri’s favorite literary son was also a celebrated inventor, but you probably didn’t realize he had a hand in your over-the-shoulder boulder holder.

Definitely deliberate.

4 Roald Dahl’s Brain Shunt

Roald Dahl is best known for writing children’s books...

And promoting racism.

...but his arguably more significant contribution to society was saving their lives.

Oh, then, that totally makes up for the racism.

After his infant son was hit by a car, he was left with a condition that causes fluid to build up in the brain, and finding the valve meant to relieve it insufficient, Dahl invented a new kind of brain shunt with the help of a neurosurgeon and a toymaker that wound up in the skulls of thousands of children.

A neurosurgeon, a toymaker, and a writer walk into a bar...

3 Marlon Brando’s Drumhead-Tightener

No, this wasn't a kid Brando hired, with or without innuendo, but another invention.

2 A Dentist’s Cotton-Candy Machine

Now, look, this is supposed to be about unexpected inventors. A dentist inventing a thing sure to give dentists more business is hardly unexpected.

1 Penn Jillette Invented a Vibrator

And I'm just going to leave this sitting there, untouched.