Kamen on Colbert. We need more innovators like Kamen

[alfredo]

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/03/colbert-and-kam.html

There has been much buzz about the water-purifying machine that Segway inventor Dean Kamen demonstrated on the Colbert Report last week (even taking on the bag of Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos that Colbert added). Everyone has been trying to find out more about his claim that "you stick a hose into anything that looks wet ... and it comes out ... as perfect distilled clean water."
So far as I can tell however, it's true. (Note: I still haven't worked out if it can handle volatile organics like gasoline and benzene.)
So what follows are the numbers behind the hype. True to form they are distilled from a number of articles and interviews over the last six years. The most informative being Kamen's talk at TED in 2002.



~~~~~~~~~~~
the inventor of a device that threw the chimp to the ground can't be all bad.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Pure water will become scarcer, I fear

glad to know that we have people working on machines to more efficiently purify water.

[underpants]

3. If you think we are crazy about our gas wait until we really need water

Darfur is a water related problem-they ran out in the North so everyone went south and THEN... well you know.

[alfredo]

8. I was in Eritrea at the beginning of the big drought. There were

water riots all over the city.

[alfredo]

4. It's a much better plan than having the multinationals buy up

our water supply and then post guards at lakes and ponds to keep locals out. It's better than punishing people for collecting rain water because Bechtel owns the rain from the sky.

[alfredo]

9. I lived in the Sub Sahara. You will learn how to do without.

You can bathe in a gallon of water if you have to.

[dysfunctional press]

2. dean kamen also invented the IBOT, in addition to segway and the slingshot water device

btw- even though the chair is balanced on two wheels- you can't push it over very easily at all.

[alfredo]

6. That's a wonderful machine.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

5. I'm sure we'll have to redesign cities.

:eyes:

[alfredo]

7. that will happen after our herd has been culled by famine and disease.