for a moment I thought this was going to be about arc-lights in the 1800s that mechanically touch electrodes and then draw apart

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_lamp

it's amazing how far we've come

think about Benjamin Franklin twenty-five years before Declaration of Independence naming the first "battery" (out of the concept of lined-up artillery) by connecting a series of lynden jars (basically capacitors) - he also invented the concept of +/- positive and negative

now we've got space telescopes and probes leaving the solar system

imagine what's coming in another 300 years