Nuculus the Stoic

Nuculus the Stoic made virtually no contribution to stoic philosophy; today he is known as one of the earliest challengers to Democritus’ atomic theory. Physics, such as it was in the Hellenistic era of the late 3rd century BC, acknowledged the possibility that there was a small indivisible unit of matter referred to as an ‘Atom’, derived from a greek term meaning ‘cannot be cut’. Nuculus, however, held to the view that there was no such lower limit on the size of matter, believing instead that the universe could smoothly be cut, down to an infinitesimal level. In an assertion that had more to do with intuition than real knowledge or experimentation, he suggested that cutting at a very fine level would release large amounts of energy.

While quantum mechanics, developed in the first half of the twentieth century, has demonstrated to a very high level of accuracy that Nuculus was wrong about the nature of the universe, his theories still dog us today, not in the domain of physics, but in the world of linguistics. When Rutherford discovered that the atom was mostly empty space, and that its mass was almost all concentrated in a small packet at the centre, he referred to this as the atom’s ‘nucleus’, using a latin term meaning ‘kernel’ or ‘nut’. A better physicist than classicist, Rutherford thus trod roughshod on the stoic’s much earlier assertions.

From this has arisen one of the more common debates in pronunciation, one that has purists on both sides up in arms. The classical model, that of Nuculus, was known for centuries as ‘nucular physics’, the ‘nucular theory’, and the energy Nuculus supposed would be released was called ‘nucular energy’. Rutherford’s discoveries earnt him the title of ‘The Father of Nuclear Physics’. The confusion between ‘nuclear’ and ‘nucular’ continues to this day, in the mouths of schoolboys and U.S. presidents alike. Had Rutherford known of the work of the stoic, he may, perhaps, have chosen a different name for his discovery.

Dick Pane

Every so often, an invention is named after a corporation, and the inventor is unjustly given scant recognition. Not so with Dick Pane, born on October 5th, 1968. Justifiably, he decided that his name should never be associated with any contribution to human endeavour, and it is for this reason that the display bus he invented in 1999 while a member of the Digital Display Working Group bears the name of an elderly neighbour, Donald Vine.

Pane was born in Glendale, California, at the time a relatively quiet town, separated from Los Angeles proper, and still untouched by the horrors of the Hillside Strangler for which it became known in the 1970s. Pane had an idyllic childhood, playing baseball with his friends after school, or hiking with his father up in the nearby Verdugo mountains, and playing cribbage with the old man who he would remember years later when naming his elegant digital serial connector.

Pane was part of a generation who were too young to have been seized with the excitement of the atomic space age, but who were just the right age to make their way in the explosion of high-tech industry in the pre-internet age. This was as much about developing innovative hardware solutions that could cope with higher and higher specifications as it was about the design of the software that would make a billionaire of Bill Gates, who had already established Microsoft by the time Pane reached the age of seven.

After graduating from CalTech, Pane went on to work at Xerox PARC for much of the 90s, before being headhunted to collaborate on the Digital Display Working Group. It was there that his reliable, durable 24-pin digital bus, a long-awaited replacement for VGA, was devised. Comparing it in his head to the cribbage board of his neighbour, and sure that naming it after himself would bring him only derision, the D(onald) V(ine) I(nterface) was born.

Not long after, Pane went missing while hiking in the Sierra Nevada, and never lived to see the invention, just three years later, of the HDMI, a bus that would replace his standard almost immediately.

Nomplos of Lesbos

Of the birth of Nomplos, there is no record; of his life, records are scant. He is believed to have been born on the islet of Aspronesia, in the first century BC. The earliest account of his life has him rescuing a herd of goats from a hillside during a wildfire. Though he attempted to take the goats down a well-established path, he found his way blocked by fire. Turning, he led the goats back up the mountain, and down a more circuitous route. Not a single goat perished in the flames.

Nomplos became leader of his local area, and shortly afterward, de facto ruler of the whole island. Legend remembers Nomplos’ rule as a time of peace and prosperity, during which the people of the island were twice besieged. On both occasions, Nomplos showed great steadiness and an immediate preparedness to act.

Nomplos would, perhaps have died in obscurity, were it not for the fact that in 79 BC, the island was acquired by Rome. The orator and writer Cicero visited the island on his tour of Greece, and met with Nomplos, recording that they sat in conversation for many days. Cicero particularly noted the character of Nomplos as one which could not be bought, could not be persuaded, and could not be riled. It has been suggested that Cicero’s imperturbable manner in the fluctuations of fortune that struck him over the course of his life were down to the constancy of temperament that he learned from Nomplos.

When Cicero became consul in 63 BC, he was often heard to insist that the senate behave in a way more like Nomplos, or, in the Latinised version of the name, Nonplusius. As Cicero fell from favour, the term became a pejorative, hurled at anyone who displayed opposite characteristics, such as confusion or indecision. It is from this that we inherit the participle adjective ‘nonplussed’.

Nomplos, meanwhile, died suddenly in 75 BC from an unknown cause. The annals of his reign record, with a simplicity and dignity that are a tribute to the spirit of the man, ‘In this year, on [October 3rd], we lost Nomplos.’

Isaiah Bock

Isaiah Bock was born on this day in 1900, the third son of jewish shopkeeping parents in north London. While his brothers continued the family trade, Isaiah had entrepreneurial bent. At 16, he had established a courier firm in Golders Green, principally taking letters and messages between businesses in the area, and occasionally ferrying items into central London. By 1920, this had grown to a parcel delivery and removals company.

Finding the latter service more lucrative, Bock soon turned over the entire business to domestic and commercial removals. Key to Bock’s success was the innovative use of materials that saved time and money for his removers. Hitherto, removals had been a time-consuming business, in which removers would pack, transport, and unpack the belongings of a household in an end-to-end service that could take days. Bock happened upon an invention of scotsman Robert Gair, the pre-cut paperboard container, made of a material that we now call corrugated cardboard. These containers were produced in vast quantities, and were so cheap that Bock soon found it paid simply to leave the containers with the moving households.

He began to offer an economy service, in which his business supplied the containers in advance. His workers would then arrive on an arranged date, transport the belongings to the new address, and leave without unpacking. This transformed the fortunes of the company and allowed him to expand well beyond the jewish community of north London.

Capitalising on movements of population following the First World War and increasing urbanisation of the British population, Bock’s removal company was soon expanded as a franchise, supplying vehicles, packing media and recruitment to removals firms all over the South East of England. His brand, Bock’s, was instantly recognisable, emblazoned on the side of his vehicles, and later, the corrugated cardboard containers that now bear his name.