Natalie Foss
The French inventor Jacques de Vaucanson is remembered for, among other things, producing three curious automata in the 18th century. A poster from the time advertised them all side by side: a figure that played a real flute, another that banged a tambourine and a duck that gobbled up corn and seemingly turned it into pellets of… well, use your imagination.
For physicist , based at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Maryland, these antiquated automata have a resonance with some of today’s most cutting-edge technology. Vaucanson’s inventions prefigured the industrial revolution, during which mechanisation…
