Who was the greater scientist/inventor: Leonardo da Vinci or Thomas Edison?
TLT Sounding Board October 2010
Leonardo da Vinci Thomas Alva Edison
In Round One of TLT’s Great Science Smackdown, we pit Leonardo da Vinci against Thomas Edison. Comparing two titans, particularly given their different eras, is a daunting task, but in the end TLT readers gave the nod to Leonardo, 60% to 40%. Both men have their admirers, but readers gave the edge to da Vinci for the enormous breadth of his endeavors and for the fact that he lived in essentially a pre-scientific age and had a smaller body of work from which to build. In next month’s Smackdown, we pit science’s two greatest physicists: Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. We’ll also reveal the ranking when we asked readers to evaluate the contributions to Mankind of all four giants.
Tale of the Tape: Leonardo da Vinci vs. Thomas Edison
All evidence supports that da Vinci’s work was done for the love of science.
Edison had a never-say-quit attitude and was very thorough in trying things.
Leonardo—because of the prescientific time in which he lived and the sheer scope of his work. He didn’t have people helping him as Edison did.
Edison was the greater inventor/scientist because he brought more of his inventions to fruition than did da Vinci. Some of da Vinci’s visionary works are obviously unsound, something he would have discovered using a more rigorous scientific method—the hallmark of great scientists.
da Vinci lived at a time before many scientific principles were widely accepted, yet he created many of the concepts upon which scientific principles were later based.
While da Vinci was brilliant, he was ahead of his time. Edison was the man of the moment, and he was responsible for moving technical advances quickly into an environment that needed the immediate impact his inventions provided.
da Vinci was ahead of his time and set the table for future innovators like Edison.
Thomas Edison was more of a hands-on type of guy. He worked with physical items and not just theories or ideology.
In every era there is a forerunner for which we cannot comprehend. Without light there only remains darkness.
Leonardo wins overall because his knowledge expanded to all the sciences and construction at a time when it was outright dangerous to think the way he thought.
Although da Vinci’s ideas eventually came to be, Edison’s inventions were useful within his lifetime and gave birth to an ongoing enterprise, GE.
Leonardo da Vinci was the greater inventor because he was advanced in knowledge for his era.
Leonardo’s thinking was revolutionary. Just look at his paintings—they are truly a sign of this.
da Vinci. Flying machine
Da Vinci mastered all the sciences and invented things that spanned many more fields than those of Edison. Even though many of his ideas were shunned at the time, decades later their importance was recognized.
Edison’s inventions changed the way people lived during the time he was working. His work had immediate impact during his lifetime and laid the groundwork for future inventions.
Edison had more inventions to be used by the masses.
Much of da Vinci’s work outside of anatomy was not reduced to practice and was speculative in nature. Edison, while not given to theory, reduced a substantial amount to practice.
da Vinci’s mechanical mind was way ahead of his time.
da Vinci visualized many designs that he never built but which worked when built by others. Edison often built hundreds of models to develop one that worked.
Both of them were great inventors. I can say that Thomas Alva Edison patented more than a thousand inventions. He contributed to America’s and Europe’s technological profiles: electricity industry, the phone system, the phonograph, films, etc.
Edison gave us the principles of mass production.
da Vinci triggered a great era. His contributions cannot be replaced.
Edison was a hard worker, but he was more of an empiricist than a brilliant thinker. Someone would have invented the light bulb and the phonograph eventually. Da Vinci brought many useful concepts to life.
da Vinci envisioned ideas beyond his time, allowing others to make practical use of them. Edison, although brilliant, took ideas and made them practical. Da Vinci was a creator, Edison a maker (inventor).
Leonardo had no contemporaries who were close to what he was doing, while others were close to what Edison was doing.
Neither da Vinci or Edison were scientists. Edison was an inventor. Da Vinci was in today’s terms an engineer who specialized in military fortifications. He recorded and analyzed the technology of his day.
Leonardo made great discoveries while being hounded by the Church. Edison did not have to struggle with religious idiocy.
da Vinci, as far as conceptual thinking is concerned, was way ahead of his time.
Edison is credited with over 1,000 inventions leading to telecommunications, batteries, power generation and electricity. His work led to the society standards and industrialization that we know today.
Thomas Edison was more akin to P.T. Barnum than a scientific giant. He gypped Tesla, one of science’s greatest minds, to make a buck and push his ill-conceived DC systems. Simply no comparison to the far-reaching concepts of da Vinci.
Leonardo was under a lot of pressure due to the times he lived in. He was ahead of his time with adventurous thinking. Helicopter, catapult, biology, etc.
Although da Vinci was a genius and much more well-rounded as far as what he thought about, he was more of a dreamer. Thomas Edison was more task-oriented; he created devices to solve a problem for a specific application.
da Vinci’s contributions were diverse and done at a very high conceptual level. Edison was more focused on cranking out new products and doesn’t seem like he was as concerned with the science behind them.
Edison is credited with over 1,000 inventions leading to telecommunications, batteries, power generation and electricity. His work led to the society standards and industrialization that we know today.
da Vinci's had wonderful ideas, but he never got them to actually work. Edison often said that invention is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. He had the 99%, da Vinci did not.
Edison. Electric lamp (light bulb)
da Vinci had very little reference information to provide a basis for his ideas. He acted by creativity alone.
Leonardo had broader knowledge and seems to have been less of a jerk than Edison.
Both were great men. I give da Vinci the edge for his aeronautical theories.
Da Vinci conceived many new ideas. Edison experimented or refined existing ones.
Da Vinci was an innovative thinker. He had no contemporary equivalents. With a more pragmatic nature and an eye for commercial gain, Edison had numerous contemporaries, such as Tesla. Edison’s work was evolutionary rather than revolutionary.
Leonardo was more ahead of his time than Edison.
da Vinci imagined and explored without the tools available to Edison. He laid the foundations for future science.
da Vinci innovated. Edison invented.
Leonardo had very little human knowledge upon which to build and developed his models under the religious threat of torture and death.
We use more of Edison’s inventions today.
da Vinci. Mona Lisa
Tough pair to select between. Da Vinci was conceptual and insightful, Edison was doggedly determined and insightful. The choice is between developing the concept and making it a practicable application. Although I prefer to support those to make something happen, I have to lean slightly more toward da Vinci on this one.
Leo developed concepts and made crude machines. Edison took concepts and developed working models.
da Vinci’s insights and contributions to anatomy, civil engineering, optics and hydrodynamics have broader benefits today than the inventions of Edison.
Edison’s inventions had more immediate and lasting impact. The incandescent bulb that turned night into day and the first practical picture system for sustained movies changed the way mankind perceives reality, the past, etc., and there were many, many more. Edison is out of fashion now due to his personality and titanic clash with the great genius Tesla.
There were no machines remotely similar to Leonardo’s concepts.
Edison provided useful applications of his theories.
Much of the work that da Vinci did was totally new and without any history to drive it.
Edison. Phonograph
Other than inventing, Edison was also an entrepreneur. He persevered through his handicap and worked long hours to realize his dreams.
Leonardo due to his broad areas of expertise (fine arts, biology, mechanics, etc.)
da Vinci had many of the same ideas about hydraulic theory as Pascal, but Pascal got credit because his were published.
Ideas were more developed in the 1800s and therefore easier to develop for Edison than in the 1400s for da Vinci.
Leonardo’s repercussions for civilization were deeper than the inventions of Edison.
Edison solved practical problems.
Edison’s invention of the light bulb was the most important invention after the discovery of fire.
Edison seemed to do more with his ideas. He put more of them into action.
Leonardo created both exceptional art and the precursors to many modern inventions.
Tough call but it seems to me that Edison developed more things that were (are) used in everyday life and which have had a life-improving effect on more of the masses of the world’s people.
Da Vinci was into almost everything.
Edison’s inventions were derivative.
My answer was based on the starting point each had. Leonardo did not have the contemporaries and past to draw from.
da Vinci’s inventions were based on past human experience. Edison’s inventions set up future human experience.
Who was the greater scientist/inventor: Leonardo da Vinci or Thomas Edison?
Leonardo da Vinci
60%
Thomas Edison
40%
Based on responses from 129 TLT readers.
Editor’s Note: Sounding Board is based on an e-mail survey of 7,200 TLT readers. Views expressed are those of the respondents and do not reflect the opinions of the Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers. STLE does not vouch for the technical accuracy of opinions expressed in Sounding Board, nor does inclusion of a comment represent an endorsement of the technology by STLE.