Reuben Lucius Goldberg for Dummies

Reuben Lucius Goldberg is actually a person's name, and it refers to a man who was famous for his incredible ability to create complex and imaginative machines that performed simple tasks. Think of it like this: imagine you have a puzzle where you need to knock over a domino with a marble, but instead of just pushing the domino with your hand, you design an elaborate machine with all sorts of gadgets and contraptions to achieve the same result. That's the kind of stuff Reuben Lucius Goldberg was known for!

Now, let's break it down a little further. Reuben Lucius Goldberg was an American cartoonist, sculptor, author, engineer, and inventor who lived from 1883 to 1970. He was especially famous for his cartoons, which showcased these overly complicated machines to achieve simple tasks. You might have seen some of his drawings, where there are all these interconnected gears, levers, and pulleys, all set up in a bizarre and convoluted way.

Goldberg's machines are often referred to as "Rube Goldberg machines," which is another way of saying complex, over-engineered contraptions. People sometimes use his name as an adjective to describe anything that is unnecessarily complicated. So, if you were to see a machine that took a bunch of convoluted steps to do something simple, you could say, "Wow, that's a real 'Rube Goldberg' machine!"

In summary: Reuben Lucius Goldberg, or just "Rube Goldberg," is the name of a clever and imaginative person known for creating intricate machines that accomplish simple tasks. His name has become synonymous with these complex contraptions and is used to describe anything that is overly complicated. It's like calling something a "Rube Goldberg machine."