- When Dr. Bentley asked me to come up with a name for a new project we’ve been working on, I had to stop and consider it for a second. Because of the nature of the work it reminded me of the writings of someone I first read as a young student. Martin Gardner. It was his books that first got me interested in subjects like mathematics and scientific questions. I recall vividly a brief summary he wrote about a paradox that has stumped science philosophers dubbed the “Tachyon Telephone.” Unlike stuffy dry journals, these books were written for all ages. As a youngster they really grabbed my attention and fired up my imagination. Probably one of the early influences for me pursuing engineering. The great thing about his books is that he would take fascinating paradoxes, puzzles, logic challenges, and mind benders and make them easy for anyone to understand.
- Here’s what Gardner wrote in his easy guide to understanding a paradox he called “The Tachyon Telephone”:
- Google books has the full book online to read and I highly recommend checking it out.
- And if you really want to wonder about a paradox, consider that the time traveling professor in Gardner’s example is named “Dr. Brown.” Is that from Martin Gardner’s customary cheeky humor? No... the book was published in 1982, 3 years before the classic 1985 time-traveling comedy movie with Dr. Brown and Marty McFly. Or just maybe Zemeckis read the book too.
- So what is the name of the project that I finally decided on? You’ve probably already guessed it... “The Gardner Project.”
|
