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Inventions

"Numbers are a human invention, and they’re not something we get automatically from nature," says Caleb Everett.

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How Humans Invented Numbers—And How Numbers Reshaped Our World

Anthropologist Caleb Everett explores the subject in his new book, Numbers and the Making Of Us

Playing the flute isn't easy even for some humans, but in the 18th century, inventor Jacques de Vaucanson figured out how to make a machine play it.

This Eighteenth-Century Robot Actually Used Breathing to Play the Flute

It was one of a trio of automata that had functions like living creatures

The first "phone book" (really a one-page sheet) came long before phones like this, but it was an important step towards the printed directories that were ubiquitous in the twentieth century and are now often considered outdated.

The First Telephone Book Had Fifty Listings and No Numbers

It came out less than two years after Alexander Graham Bell invented the device

Iowa State University scientists modeled their artificial leaves after cottonwood leaves.

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Are Artificial Trees the Future of Renewable Energy?

While a new device’s flapping leaves can generate a lot of energy, extracting it is far from a breeze

A solid state radio frequency oven would allow you to cook a whole meal at once.

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This Oven Could Change How We Cook

By using radio frequency technology, it can prepare all the components of a dinner, at the same time, just right

An 1817 illustration of a draisine.

This Wooden Running Machine Was Your Fixie’s Great-Great Grandpa

The draisine was invented as a potential replacement for the horse during a shortage

Benjamin Montgomery succeeded despite being refused a patent.

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With Patents or Without, Black Inventors Reshaped American Industry

American slaves couldn’t hold property, including patents on their own inventions. But that didn’t stop black Americans from innovating in our country

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The Patents Behind the Roses You Receive on Valentine’s Day

You probably never thought of the perennials as inventions, have you?

Smart Glasses

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These “Smart Glasses” Adjust To Your Vision Automatically

The glasses’ liquid lenses change shape according to the distance of objects, making reading glasses and bifocals unnecessary

This is the 517th Xerox model 917 ever made, donated to the Smithsonian in 1985.

Watch the Original 1959 Ad for the First Office-Ready Xerox Machine

When the Xerox 914 entered offices, the working world changed forever

As 19th century urban living became more cramped, some women began to reinvent the domestic sphere with technology.

Women Who Shaped History

These Four Black Women Inventors Reimagined the Technology of the Home

By designating the realm of technology as ‘male,’ we overlook key inventions that took place in the domestic sphere

Preening automaton

Cool Finds

This Robotic Silver Swan Has Fascinated Fans for Nearly 250 Years

It preens, fishes and impresses

One of 50 rooms in the Colonial Revival mansion in Rochester, New York, where George Eastman lived for 27 years.

Visit the Homes of America’s Greatest Inventors

Within these walls, our nation’s most brilliant tinkerers once ate, slept and imagined

Astrolabes were astronomical calculating devices that did everything from tell the time to map the stars. This 16th century planispherical astrolabe stems from Morocco.

Think Big

The Story of the Astrolabe, the Original Smartphone

Prosperous times likely paved the way for this multifunctional device, conceptual ancestor to the iPhone 7

Part of a 1949 ad for Scotch tape, which was billed as a "thrifty" way to make repairs around the home.

Scotch Tape Can Create X-Rays, and More You Didn’t Know About The Sticky Stuff

People have used it to repair everything from curtains to ceilings

While it has some kinks to work out, this sleek new device could help in the bid to limit landfill-bound waste.

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Can This Trash Can Turn Food Waste Into Garden Treasure?

The Zera Food Recycler may not transform scraps into ready-to-use soil, but it could still help take a bite out of landfill-bound waste

LG exhibited a new levitating speaker.

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Seven Wild Gadgets Unveiled at CES 2017

From a levitating speaker to vibrating jeans that help you navigate city streets, these innovations offer an interesting glimpse of the future

The device that reinvented the phone

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Happy 10th Birthday, iPhone! So What’s Next?

Based on patent documents, here are eight innovations that could become part of the iPhone of the future

Harry Houdini by unknown artist, 1920

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Escape Artist Harry Houdini Was an Ingenious Inventor, He Just Didn’t Want Anybody to Know

More than just a magician, Houdini was also an actor, aviator, amateur historian and businessman

A daguerreotype portrait of Samuel Morse by his student, Mathew Brady, circa 1844-1860.

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The Inventor of the Telegraph Was Also America’s First Photographer

The daguerreotype craze took over New York in the mid-nineteenth century

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