We All Still Love You Harry 

                                             Ed Sharp grooves Bill in 

     "I'm going to have to cover a lot of ground very quickly William. We simply haven't enough 

time to waltz around what's been going on or why we believe it's as we think it is." Ed Sharp 

had a slightly reddened complexion, almost like he'd just returned from a few days fishing. He 

took a  couple of quick breaths and got  right back into the 'machine gun' rat a tat he started  

with.

   "Harry Adelman has apparently make good on his thesis and work about holographic 

living transport. Either that, or he's doing a great job at pretending he did. If he was off on  

some desert island, playing around, who would care? But, when people start to disappear - 

not just  any people - but when beautiful movie stars and four of the  highest dollar models in 

this  world just zip out without a hint or a word, it makes you wonder. Then, look at these 

others -  million dollar sports  cars with attaché cases full of money - nearly completed 

mansions from  southern California - gone - no trace - where? - how? - tankers full of 

gasoline. Bill started to laugh. "It's definitely  Harry". "He always talked about it - I remember 

when we were roommates at school. He'd shoot  this stuff by me and I'd laugh and laugh, and 

he would too. Leave him alone, he'll cool off. He  would never hurt anybody, I know him. He 

wouldn't."  

    Ed Sharp wasn't laughing though, he wasn't even smiling. He'd been with the FBI since

 Vietnam, chasing draft dodgers and peaceniks - not just anybody - bomb throwers -  fire

 starters. Nasty people. He saw Harry as an anarchist, someone who wanted to bring down 

the  whole system. Injured feelings or serious losses or simply just actually crazy, he saw 

people  like Harry as serious threats to our society that had to be reined in and tamed like 

you  would a wild animal. 

      "Bill, I know it seems funny to you, and it is, but it can also get out of hand. He's kidnapped

 these girls. Who knows what he's done with them. We need you to go in - you're his friend. 

I'm  sure he trusts you. Just put it to him how it affects us and assure him that it's OK - we

 understand - he'll get credit for his discoveries and inventions - no harm done - assuming no

 harm has been done. Return the girls - and whatever else and he'll be the national hero that

 he should be. That's more or less what we need and want from you." He took a few more 

breaths.  "No, I won't do it". 

     Bill was really upset at being asked to betray his friend. "How would you  feel if someone 

grabbed your girlfriend, daughter, sister, for fun?" Ed looked right at him. "Not  so good," Bill 

answered. "He'll straighten it out - he would never hurt anyone". Bill repeated. 

    "We're going to set him up with another model - send her in with a note to get back to us -

 and we'll take it from there - I'll be in touch." 

     He left as abruptly as he'd left himself in to the apartment. Bill didn't like him. "He'd already 

worked out all the details, without knowing Harry or himself or Evelyn or anything at all about 

the work they'd put into this,  a  lifetime of dreams and little pilots, deep into the night study, 

and for what? He understood exactly why Harry walked out of his presentation and how he'd 

felt about their snide cracks. And now this cop comes crashing through his door with his plans 

to trap his best friend, right or wrong, 'the FBI gets their man'. 'It's gonna happen see'."

     Bill resented Ed Sharp's attitude and his disrespect for Harry. Harry stood to be one of the 

greatest scientists that ever lived. One who'd already built a system that worked, that would 

revolutionize transportation on our world almost beyond belief, and being treated like a 

common criminal for it. All these things flashed through his mind and he decided that if 

anyone had his help here, it would be Harry.. 

                                          Origins of Technology

     Real research looks very much like we witness today in the struggle to defeat the threat of

the deadly Coronavirus to the health of mankind on this earth. It's highly organized. The

methods of development of an effective vaccine are well known, yet involve an enormous

amount of careful and exhausting research. It also demands a deep theoretical and practical

understanding of the subject being researched. I don't want to bore you, about a subject that

is as intensely interesting .as the origins of technology, nor do I wish to see you get lost in

the seemingly endless processes of trial after trial after trial with not even the slightest trace

discovery that characterize real research. I will, however. enlist the help of the ancient method'

of story telling, which worked, I understand to help earlier peoples to bear the everyday

near impossible challenges of simply surviving on the deserts of the Middle East, and which,

in fact, became the very structures supporting the hope and patience of most of the western

world still today.  

     It was the summer of 1960. I had just graduated High School and was on my way to the

 University of Pennsylvania in the Fall. It was a long way to work at the Bartol Research

Foundation of the Franklin Institute. A bus, and then the elevated train all the way to the end of

the line, and then another long bus ride and there it was, on the same grounds as Swarthmore

University. Dr. Metzger introduced himself. He turned out to be quite an accomplished

 

physicist  in the field of nuclear radiation. Swiss, and the reason the "Swiss never suffered in

 any war was that they were so carefully trained and prepared." Well, the boy scouts knew 

that too. A lot of grass and singing birds outside, and me and a console full of electronic 

devices designed to count and keep track of the amount of nuclear radiation falling on a 

sensor. Different electromagnetic "shields" had been configured to surround our radioactive 

sample, and this was the basis of our research. Did changing the current or shape or 

distance  from the sample alter the amount of radiation passing through the shield - or not.

     Every morning, I would take a short trip down a floor and carefully extract a sample of

Cesium 137 if I recall correctly - radioactive Cesium. It was in a lead lined box with a string

above with which you could pull out the small vial of sample and hold it at arms length, "lest

you lose the ability to reproduce" walking back upstairs and setting it carefully again, down

into our apparatus for the experiment. If I dropped the glass vial, "they would have to shut

down Bartol for 50 years", explained Dr. Metzger. Yes, of course, I was careful. But, remember

I was eighteen years old and at a new job and I had a lot of confidence in atomic scientists. In

this case as most, it was well deserved, You know, thinking about it, in about 1997 or so, we

had a conference at Broward Community College with many of the participants in the first

detonation of the atomic bomb at Alamogordo, NM, who confided that they slept up on the

platform with the bomb to prevent sabotage! Also I have experience with nuclear missiles

which I am not free to discuss. Interesting how these things occur. Yeah, Alamogordo was a

different kind of research. 

    

     The point of all this story - and it lasted all summer - every day pretty much the same until

we did a special job tor an Israeli physicist who was in charge of this enormous Van de Graf

generator and who sold me a 1955 Chevy which I used to drive to school that first year! 

     You know, this little story was supposed to cushion the effect of day after day of no

significant changes. Which, by the way, is not necessarily bad results in any way. Still, very

very boring, to the extent that I did tell Dr, Metzger that I thought "we might have something" in

an attempt to justify all those readings -see? It was then that he warned me about subjective 

bias damaging objective research. At any rate, I find now, that this was a particularly exciting 

 

period of my life and especially accelerated significant education. Go learn!...

     

                                               Origins of Technology 

                                               Stumbling onto Answers

        In about 2003, I had the honor of working with my former freshman chemistry teacher at the University of Pennsylvania, the Nobel prize winner, Dr. Alan MacDiarmid  

       Way back in 1960, when I first started at Penn, his lectures were full of interesting demonstrations as well as insights into his research then into the element silicon. I remember all that, and I remember his ideas about mankind's progress on this earth following closely along the discovery of workable materials for his use at different times in his development. Silicon, you might recall, is currently highly useful in our society as a primary material for electronic circuits, probably being used by yourself right now to read this! Interesting eh? His Nobel prize though, was for the development of conductive polymers (plastics), which we were working on at the Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter at the Univ. of Penna. around 2003. The School District of Philadelphia had invited science teachers to participate in a teacher outreach program and I was lucky enough that Dr. MacDiarmid introduced me to a large meeting in the auditorium as his former freshman chemistry student. I really felt great about that. We worked on a paste that would help damaged nerve tissue regrow. It simply needs to conduct electricity see, otherwise it simply wouldn't regrow. The hope was that Dr. MacDiarmid's material would help it along. He passed on in 2007, i believe, may his memory be a blessing, and I read earlier that there had been some measure of success in nervous tissue repair. Most research takes a long time. 

     It's the research about research though that we're doing here, and the relationship of the need for answers as well as methods to success in finding valid solutions to problems. Do we just stumble onto answers? The "eureka" method. "I dreamt i was fighting a huge covid-19 motecule and my tears killed it - the next day - I thought - Yes! - salt water - tried it and it worked - wiped out the entire jar of these viruses! - or - do we employ more logical methods - like - things that worked in the past: "My mom always gave us chicken soup and told us to dress warm" - which does work often you know!  What's important here is that the entire world has received over 300 million shots of 99% proven workable vaccine so far - starting from scratch less than a year ago - and already touching the "R" (reproductive) number of less than one - means it's all over for the covid-19 virus. This is an amazing result. It's like "we'll put a man on the moon by the end of the decade" - and we did; We sure did...RIP JFK. Mankind certainly has enemies - all kinds...

     

 

Origins of technology

I worked several years counselling people for all kinds of things. Unwanted problems, upsets, attitudes - you name it. Many study problems as well. One of the things you learn when you help other people effectively, is how incredibly bright people actually are. I learned this as a high school teacher too - very early on. Kids are smart. Here's a tip: "you're stuck on some problem, don't know what to do? - ask someone - they'll tell you what it is." The human search engine is out there just waiting to be used.

New kid on the block. "Here's how you hold the ball to throw a curve." Then they watch you till you get it right. It's an entre technology - baseball. I spent an entire lifetime learning engineering in two languages. You'd be surprised how important fresh water is in Israel - or the number of tests you have to run on a camera that went to the moon on the Apollo shot and still sits there today! Different technologies - each, easily as important as winning a world series. You see how quickly they came up with a vaccine for the covid-19 virus? - and got about 300 million shots in people around the world already? Impossible - it's like watching the parting of the Red Sea - can't be done - and yet it does get done. i find myself asking - "why all this?" - what am I doing here? Yet, we're, all of us. on this same voyage. You see this when you teach it. What's going on? We are! we are going on...

I can recall finishing my studies of Chemical Engineering in Israel and getting caught up in the study of communication and scientology while still living in the student dormitory in Be'er Sheva. It was summer and I had been busy manufacturing little souvenir brass plates with little wooden table legs that were miniature tea tables that are so common in the middle east. I was able to etch the plates rather than work them with chisels and bang out patters, which allowed them to be completed very quickly. i tried selling them at a local souvenir shop and was surprised at how much money the proprietor gave me for them. Another Chemical Engineering student from Chile helped me find brass and acid I needed to make the little tables and volunteered to help me finish the little leg sets as well. In time he started asking me about scientology and I told him what L had heard on the radio where they had scientologists talking about e-meters and word clearing. I had a negative impression about it and let him know. I was invited to a party and told that a scientologist would be there. The scientologist was a math professor for the university and asked me about my opinions of scientology and invited me to try out the e-meter which I had been critical about and give me a demonstration "session'. I was highly impressed by the accuracy of the session and the care about definitions and the end result was a sensible way to handle problems and upsets in life which was very new for me at the time. The other student went on with his wife to England to study and I followed about a year later with my own wife and child. My brother had moved to London about two years earlier than us. I often wonder about that as well as moving to Israel. These were both life changing large moves. There was lots of social motion in the 60's and 70's in the US and world. LSD and marijuana and even wide usage of much more serious drugs, Hippies and flower children and the Symbionese liberation army and Patty Hearst. But, hey, the generation before mine went through a lot more motion than we did, tens of millions died horrible deaths in the war - millions in gas chambers in Europe. They had psychoanalysis and Freud. We had yoga and L. Ron Hubbard and Dianetics. I could have become an orthodox Jew - there's wisdom there that's lasted thousands of years on this Earth - it's all documented - the good and the bad. You wonder about causes and events and where to spend your money and who to vote for. And there's answers in Scientology and there's answers in Judaism and psychoanalysis. We don't really have a national religion here. In fact, we're probably successful because we don't take sides here and just let people be whatever they like to be and stop killing each other for differences of opinion. When you get right down to it, you, yourself should be master of your own destiny and your "way' is the right 'way" for you! Every person is unique - absolutely different - perfect in themselves - infinitely fine. How in the world did that happen?

                                   We All Still Love You Harry 

Harry Adelman was a computer hardware engineer who had worked out a digital coding scheme that would replicate real biological tissue using molecular scanning techniques which he protected for his own use and which he developed into a three dimensional reconstruction system which he claimed could "copy and paste" real biological specimens of living tissue". The paper had resulted in dozens of senior technicians at AGH nearly choking to death due to laughter. His presentation at AGH totally fell apart due to the reactions of the audience - all senior technicians mind you - and he left abruptly leaving only what appeared to be two "eggs' and a 'cucumber" on the lectern. "Forget your lunch Harry?" - to screams of laughter and the sound of a slammed door.

   Harry was no fool. He knew exactly what he was doing and why they were laughing at him. Sure it hurt. These were the guys who were supposed to be his friends. He grew up with them, went to school with them, played with them on the beach and sailed with them out on the ocean. He was born in Miami before things fell apart in the US, was in High School when the President was shot. What a shock that was. Cuba and Oswald, live on TV. The world had turned into a TV show. What was real? He watched Apollo 11 lift off at Cape Canaveral: 

He was totally exhilarated. This was real! This was good. The ground shook. The engines roared and the ship rose.

Few people realize how much development there has been in the field of electronic computing. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGk9W65vXNA

...watching the above video might give you an idea of where the electronic computer started and what it looked like. I studied my first circuits course at the Moore School. I think the ENIAC is still in the basement somewhere. I know one of Edison's first successful light bulbs is. Our High School Class went to Exide Battery and saw the Eniac in action, Amazing - whirring spools of tape - buzzed and spun - an entire large room - air conditioned to handle the heat generated by thousand and thousands of vacuum tubes. Incredible. Your iPhone does way more today. In fact, a simple calculator can out perform the ENIAC. Things have changed that much. I worked for UNIVAC in Blue Bell, PA on third generation random access memories. Magnetic wire. So we had something like a large wide book case about seven feet tall as opposed by the large air conditioned room for the ENIAC. UNIVAC is now Unisys and they make the bar codes and machinery that is used to check the prices on the items you buy in the supermarket and other places. Time flies when you're having fun. Still - compare the iPhone with the first apple computers that could handle - what - 120,000 bytes of data or somethin like that. Your cell phone handles giga bytes - that's about a billion bytes - or about a billion words.

     Harry Adelman not only knew how a computer was made, he designed their uses. He designed and set up programs that even the public could use. One of the earlier problems that still exist today is storing and retrieving data. Pictures, and particularly videos, like the one about the ENIAC above need a storage capacity that's really enormous - so the storage area must be close to as small as it can get - like molecular scale - which is as small as we even know about. This was Harry's area of expertise and what he would give his famous lectures about - till he disappeared. Some really feared that he did actually disappear into one of those tiny universes until he started sending notes back to us. "It's alright - don't worry - I'm OK - we're all OK - I promise you everything will be alright. I just don't want to be bothered right now!" H. A." What did he mean - "We're all OK"? - and that's where the real trouble began. 
 

Setting up Shop on Mars

                                                  Setting up Shop on Mars

You may not remember learning how to walk, but most of us do learn this and it is not always so easy at all. You fall down a lot and if you're lucky, you'll have parents around to help you get up and start all over again. You take one step at a time, and darn it, you find yourself further along than when you started. This is one of life's great lessons and it can't be overestimated in importance! 

Imagine - looking up at the planets and deciding to get on up there somehow and not quitting until you were there! Try jumping up three feet. Mars is 50 million to hundreds of mjllions of miles "up", depending on what year it is! There's no air up there either. Carbon dioxide atmosphere. Can't breathe it! So what? We're going to colonize it.

 

                                                 The World's First Recount

   This had never happened before - certainly not at Heston Elementary School. This was new. 

You had to be there. I had been elected President of my class every term now for two years. 

There was absolutely no question that I would be elected again. My little girl friend assured me 

with a wink of her pretty little eye that it was in the bag. She had a lot of pull. She was very

pretty. 

   I began our weekly meeting as usual - old business - new business, and of course our new 

election came up. No problem. I requested by show of hands how many of our classmates

preferred myself as President of our class again. A much smaller number than usual raised

 their hands. "Hmmm", I thought as I counted perhaps 12 students. Next. I asked by show of 

hands who preferred my opponent as our next President. "Whoosh", there was .an audible 

excitement and what seemed a small breeze created by hands reaching high up into our 

classroom. I counted carefully about 16 hands. "What", I thought, is going on? I didn't know 

what to do.

   Surely, there was some kind of mistake. I reached for an answer and said: "I think I counted

wrong - let's try that again". I actually said that or something very close to that - right off the 

top of my head. Don't forget, this was fifth grade and, as far as I could tell, totally uncharted 

territory. I learned something that day. Something I will never forget, and I'm writing this so 

you don't make the same mistake. Not ever - ."Don't ever question the way people vote".

   I asked the students who wanted me to be class President to raise their hands again. This

time about 8 students meekly raised their hands.You guessed it, my opponents votes were

about 22 - including my girlfriend. They all made the nastiest faces at me you ever saw - no 

winks - no smiles and that was that. 

   I won the rest of the elections till sixth grade was over and we graduated. I found out later 

what it probably was. The boy who won was a really good guy and deserved a term to be 

President of the class. He really liked that. I should have known better.