The Press Saturday, May 3, 1930. Time and Space.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19918, 3 May 1930, Page 14

The Press Saturday, May 3, 1930. Time and Space.

It must have struck some of our readers during the week that the man who wishes , to keep up-to-date will soon be afraid to go to bed. On Wednesday morning Mr Ramsay MacDonald spoke round the world to Mr Scullin, and although he had not heard it for 24 years, "recognised the voice "at the first word." An hour or two sooner or later —it is impossiblo to keep a . .check on these people—an "eminent French scientist" ' was solemnly assuring " a gathering of in- " ternational scientists " that it will.be possible soon ("well within five, "years")- to make the journey from Paris to New York in 24 minutes. In both cases there are . some financial difficulties—£2 a minute to address Mr Scullin from London, and £400,000 to be shot from Paris to New York; or is it to the moon? It does not matter much, since, there is no guarantee yet that passengers or parcels shot at this rate across the Atlantic will hit the Statue of Liberty or the State of Wyoming. There is the further trouble also that M. Pelterie's costs do not include the probable bills from the earth for compensation for broken windows an if anyone would have enough mathematics to make them out. Of course the moon to science is, not so very far , away, and it has this obvious advantage over America as a target that retaliation is not so likely. One may expect, however, that if M. Pelterie is not shouted down, m<km-protection societies will spring up, especially in China or Turkey, where the moon, travellers still tell us, is regarded as a sort 9? local Britannia.

" But the danger spot in, all this progress is ranch closer than the moon. If Mr Mao Donald at 12,000 miles can hear Mr Scullin as if he were in the •next room, it will be impossible soon to be safe anywhere. If men can hear round the wofld, aiid seeround the world, they will soon be able to touch and be 'toubhed roond the world, and we sliallhave one of jtfr Ramsay Mac- , Donald'* i successors shaking- hands frpm -Loridim anottoo distant Btfto"Mr Scullin. Teletaction cannot be much'more marvellous scientifically than television. In Firdausi's epic poem, the Shahnameh, there is a cup that mirrors the whole world, and in the 271st Tale of- the Arabian Nights,' Prince Ali travelling to Shiraz meets a man who has an ivory tele-scope-which clearly shows'all distant objects or persons its owner* wishes to see, ..and which bears their voices also 'f clear and sweet." It is. pusillanimous to think that we shall not soon be as wonderful as Ali.

; We are indeed queer creatures. With little provocation almost any boy' will stand on bis head. Thirty years later he will be an inventor like these rocket and telespeech men who disturb peaceful folks' slumber. Or if he is especially exuberant, he may join that group of physicists who delight to staiid the world on its head—men like the famotts'recipient of the valentine:

The way of all space is . curved, The way to my Heart, is straight: Shall we meet in the Fourth Dimension On a Timeless, Relative Gate?

Tho' Time stands still while I whirl

fast, Tho'/Life's an algebraic sign, I'll meet you somewhere in the past My Ein, my Stein, my Valentine.

However, we owe it to Herr Einstein that Space is now like a concertina which we can push out or in just by thinking about it; and if it is not so easy to know what has happened to Tiihe, we not be impatient. We must either believe the cables Or doubt the men of science, and it would be very ungrateful to do cither.