I meant to include this part, which is wonderfully well expressed. Wright was a brilliant writer, and a genius inventor for the reasons he described; he knew how to ignore the nonessentials and concentrate on the heart of the problem.
. . . When the detailed story is written of the means by which success in human flight was finally attained, it will be seen that this success was not won by spending more time than others had spent, nor by spending more money than others had spent, nor by taking greater risks than others had taken. Those who failed for lack of time had already used more time than was necessary; those who failed for lack of money had already spent more money than was necessary; and those who were cut off by accident had previously enjoyed many lucky escapes as reasonably could be expected. . . . That is what I think to myself whenever I see these gigantic scaled-up reactors such as Rossi's. This is misguided. It is solving the wrong problem, at the wrong stage of the research, by the wrong methods. It is spending more money than is necessary. In aviation, it is very similar to the mistakes made by Maxim and Langley. - Jed
