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Great scientists series-5: Shuji Nakamura (Blue LED)

What a ride! What a life!

Unbelievable journey and endeavor. 

I just read the entire article as if I was gulping water after a marathon. 

Very interesting man and journey, how much goes behind a small LED light invention!!!

 

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2014/nakamura/biographical/

Why Blue LEDs are so important and they gave him ultimately Physics Nobel prize for 2014?

Blue was the last — and most difficult — advance required to create white LED light. And with white LED light, companies are able to create smartphone and computer screens, as well as light bulbs that last longer and use less electricity than any bulb invented before.

All of us in a way indebted to Shuji Nakamura's unbelievable toil and hard labor!!

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    • An alternate source of information, which is not so descriptive is at Wikipedia.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuji_Nakamura

      • What is the difference between a great inventor and an ant on the jungle floor who has to figure how to survive in a hostile environment?

        What is the proportionate difference?

        The challenges which a scientist successfully overcomes is like a competing boxer in a ring, where Nature's inconvenience is one boxer and the shrewd inventor is the other?

        Is it that the coreSelf (atma) likes to fight or to have an opponent?

        • Good point!

          2 birds analogy:

          In Uddhava Gita, Krishna says there are 2 birds, one bird (jivatma) is not bothered to touch the fruit (Prakriti) whereas the other fruit (Paramatma) is compelled to bite the fruit. 

          So, yes, Jivatma from time immemorial is going to keep biting the fruit (Prakriti/ Nature).

          With the same analogy of 2 birds, Srila Adi Shankara gives another perspective, the bird which does not touch the fruit is the core self/ atma (spiritual by nature) and the bird which touches the fruit (Sensual objects/ Prakriti) is Buddhi/ Intellect.

          So to be even more precise, jivatma's buddhi is going to keep biting nature's fruit.

          So anything in this world for jivatma is going to be with Prakriti/ Nature, whether it is struggle or inconvenience or benefits, everything has to do with Nature. Like a small fish inside the lake.

          Material scientists bending Buddhi to their will:

          One can just learn from how each jivatma used a set of tools from the same nature itself to fight obstacles of the same nature.

          Material scientists used their Buddhi to the highest degree and pressures from Nature combined with internal pressure made their buddhi shine at a very high degree to achieve an impossible task of their time.

          That is something spiritual aspirants can learn from material scientists in using Buddhi for their efficient completion of tasks and obligations and tame it to focus on higher spiritual goals for Atma.

          Atma vs Buddhi: The boxers

          So, yes there are 2 boxers. Atma always has the opponent face to face inside the head that is buddhi/ intellect.

          It is Atma vs Buddhi (a product of Prakriti/ Nature). Both are boxing constantly for a power struggle. All austerities are done to make Atma win.

          Either Atma tames buddhi and keeps it as its slave or Atma runs away discarding Buddhi to higher dimensions eventually as it never changes its retaliatory attitude towards atma's authority over it.

          If the battle is lost, then buddhi and his lover kundalini will make atma as its slave and drags it from one body to another aimlessly in samsara cycle. Losing the battle to atma is not a new story, just working to see if an Atma can turn the tables on buddhi. 

          I don't see much difference between the scientist and the ant both have the same challenges except in different settings and psychically a different battle but the intensity is the same. Eg: Bxing match is visually trading punches and chess is the same except psychically they are trading punches in the chess board. So, both ants and scientists from a perspective are similar in their struggle against nature. 

        • To be clear. I am not suggesting that one should not take on the challenges nor work to remove the inconveniences. My dig is to show what is down under in the psyche? When will this scratch between man and Nature come to an end? Obviously, it never will!

          • The biography at Wiki highlights his difficulty when like a dog with a bone, he fought other dogs to keep and eat his bone. Is that part of being a great scientist? Of is their life trouble-free in most cases? Once you invent something, and it shows as a commercial potential, what happens next?

            • The wiki article was new to me. Thanks for posting.

              The article I posted showed his techniques and hands-on approach and the struggle he went thru to invent something amid intense competition from bigger and richer companies. 

              He was an underdog from a local unrecognized university on a small island and worked in a small company with almost no funds or support and dragged his idea all the way from scratch to completion, whereas his peers in the field of research in other big companies and big universities enjoyed great patronage and fate made it that he shared the Nobel prize with some of them which is good as they contributed to the science. 

              I liked his journey in which he went to invent the Blue light LED and the politics surrounding in inventions and fighting for patents is common. I am surprised he went to this extent to win, that is great news.

              It is a sad story for Corporate Scientists unlike University Scientists because many corporates treat them like crap as revenue-sucking leeches who do no fruitful research and make no contribution to the company's bottom line.

              It is true to an extent and more prevalent but this invention of this magnitude that made the company millions of dollars deserves something more than just a $180 cheque and 0 royalty.

              Corporates were greedy and took for granted his work and it is good news in a way that he won in Japan, the courts ordered the family corporate to pay 200 million USD but they settled at 8.5 million USD. It is a good victory in my view that forces corporates to appreciate contributing talents and hard work and not generalize and penalize the whole group of corporate researchers as good-for-nothing people.

              I am not discounting there was some hidden agenda among corporates to sue other corporate for patent rights and royalty and try to tarnish the name, that is part of the game but Shuji Nakamura went to that extent which is atypical for nerdy scientists, and winning the legal battle in Japan itself makes him even more special and fate was in his side, not many would end up in right side against these Asian corporates in their home country, especially in patent-related battles.

            • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AF8d72mA41M

              This is an amazing video on the inventor.

              That shows what kind of the warrior he was and he is.

              At the end, he is interviewed which was awesome and also discusses why he sued them for money and did not take the money after he won, just took some money to pay attorney fees.

              Steel Man! Persistence and he won the nature’s secrets, he defied primitive nature and transcended to higher secretive states of nature

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