Saturday, October 18, 2025

The Autobiography of Ben Franklin: Part 18

 The Autobiography of Ben Franklin: Part 18

Bonus: 

TV Bumpers are cool

Summary: Franklin's experiments get published and appreciated (Eventually).

Commentary: Ben Franklin says don't waste time arguing with people who don't appreciate your stuff, just keep making more:

I once purposed answering the abbé, and actually began the answer; but, on consideration that my writings contained a description of experiments which anyone might repeat and verify, and if not to be verified, could not be defended; or of observations offered as conjectures, and not delivered dogmatically, therefore not laying me under any obligation to defend them; and reflecting that a dispute between two persons, writing in different languages, might be lengthened greatly by mistranslations, and thence misconceptions of one another’s meaning, much of one of the abbé’s letters being founded on an error in the translation, I concluded to let my papers shift for themselves, believing it was better to spend what time I could spare from public business in making new experiments, than in disputing about those already made.

 

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The Autobiography of Ben Franklin: Part 18

 The Autobiography of Ben Franklin: Part 18 Bonus:  TV Bumpers are cool Summary: Franklin's experiments get published and appreciated (E...