THE ELECTRIC EYE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 12 February 1927, Page 9

THE ELECTRIC EYE

fTPVHE greatest of all the world’s wonders I 1 presaged by the advent of 192< is the JL electric eye” (television), by which we shall eventually be enabled to see objects thousands of miles away, according to L. Garvin, the editor-in-chief of the Observer, London. He contributes to his paper an editorial declaring that J. L. Baird, the young Scottish inventor of television, may become as famous as Marconi himself. Mr Garvin’s editorial is taken up almost entirely by those sensational inventions (transAtlantic wireless telephony and television), which have burst suddenly upon mankind and bid fair to annihilate distance and revolutionise the world. , “Little more than 30 years ago, in the minds of most middle-aged people born in the earlier half of the 19th century,” writes Mr Garvin, “we were passing through what we may call the dead water mood. Civilisation, they said, was slowing down. “Then dawned the new era of amazements. X-rays were discovered. The whole age of radio-activity began. Amid scoffs the motorcar appeared, destined to have a sweeping effect on life. The Niagara was harnessed. Young Marconi began the practical development of wireless telegraphy. By airplane and airship man began to master the air as surely as he had mastered the land and sea. “Scientific transformation in the last few decades has been brought about by such continuous gradations that no one in our time can appreciate all its magnitude and significance. “And all this.” continues Mr Garvin, “may .be eclipsed by the discoveries of the next 30 years, when telephoning between London and New York is a commonplace and people can see other people across the entire world. “The facts of the moment and their promise for the future,” he concludes, “surpass all the fairy tales about wishing caps, invisible cloaks, magic carpets and seven league boots.” Mr Garvin had an interview with Mr Baird, who corroborated the story circulated that he would soon have a television apparatus on the

SEEING ACROSS ATLANTIC

WONDERFUL SECRET RAYS

market, costing about .150 dollars. Asked Avhether one might hope soon to see across the Atlantic, Mr Baird said: “There is no scientific reason whatever why it should not be done.”

He declared also that soon there would be a central broadcasting station, where actors would give a show which would be visible on a screen at television theatres some distance away. It was while he was trying to eliminate a too brilliant light, which interfered with the results of his experiments, that the idea occurred to him to use rays outside the visible spectrum. First he experimented with ultra-violet rays, but these also proved hard on the.eyes, so he tried intra-red rays. The idea of doing this, he said, came to him one day when he observed the rays of the setting sun turning to red, which was due to the fact that all the rays except the red rays arc absorbed by the atmosphere. “The dissipating effect of light is very much greater with violet rays and rays at the upper end of the spectrum,” said Mr Baird, “and it occurred to me that the infra-red rays could be turned to advantage in television. These infra-red rays are, of course, well known to scientists, and their properties have been investigated, but their application to television produced the somewhat startling result that it is possible by means of the immensely sensitive electric eye of the televisor to see an object in what appears to the human eye to be pitch blackness.” Mr Baird said that infra-red rays would prove useful in Avar for observing enemy movements. “Has anyone else the secret?” he was asked. “Nobody else has so far demonstrated it, either with or Avithout light,” he answered. “And Avoifld an enemy have no way of escaping the invisible ray and overcoming it?” was the next question. “There is no Avay at presertt,” replied the young Scotsman, “but somebody Avill probably invent one.”