Evening Star Newspaper, March 10, 1935, Page 82

12 THIS WEEK March 10, 1935 NEW Mirac1.E MAKERS Billions of New Slaves —Electrons — That (Can “See,” “Hear,” “Yeel,” “Smell” and “Taste” Are Beginning to ‘Do the Drudgery of the World. Will They Jree Us Entirely of the Need of Human Toil? - 3, DAVID SARNOFF President of the Radio Corporation of .dmerica E EARNED our bread only by the sweat of the brow, for we had only our muscles to do the work of the world. Then came crude mechanical devices, then water power, then steam, then electricity. Each brought great changes in life; each in turn seemed to work miracles. Now there are electrons. They are the new miracle-workers of our day, and thé term is not exaggerated. Because of them, this age is beginning to be called the Electronic Age. So strange ard so great are the possibilities in the little electron that again life may be made over. And perhaps in a deeper sense than ever before. ] The development has been stealing upon us, appearing now here. now there, at scat- tered points. We hear of some marvelous new robot, some electric eye that does weird things like opening doors without a touch, or starts machinery going with the wave of a hand or the light from a distant star. It is just something to wonder at a few moments, and promptly forget. Few realize that these things are only the more sensational marvels of electronics. that infant prodigy of science and engi- neering that is now subtly reaching into our homes, our factories, our railroads, our ships and airplanes, our hospitals and clinics, our laboratories, and even the lonely watch- towers where men study the stars. Some of the keenest work of our day is being done by those who are working on and experimenting with electrons. And many of them are young men, because electronics it- self is so young. They are eager, on their toes; they have an adventurous sense of being pioneers in a strange land; for them, this tired old world is full of lively new dreams. The existence of electrons had been sus- pected, but it was not until 1909 that ‘Mil- likan, by ingenious experiments with tinv drops of oil, actually got them to working one at a time and calculated the amount of the minute electric charge carried by each single one. When scientists got as far as the atom, they thought they had reached the end of small- ness. Now it is known that every atom of matter contains one or more electrons, which in turn are so very minute that they rattle Photographs by Halbran With Electric Eyes a Turn of the Head Switches on the Radio or Turns Book Pages for the Sick around in the atom like a pea in an empty barrel. They are the wayward sons of matter and energy, these electrons. They dart hither and thither at appalling speeds. They are always breaking away or being knocked away from the atoms they belong to and going some- where else, meanwhile banging into whatever is in their path and creating new combina- tions, new forces. The world is full of footloose electrons. Since they are indestructible, those that existed in the beginning of time must still be in the universe somewhere. The room in which you are reading at this minute may contain electrons from the smoke of the fire made by some Egyptian slave thousands of years .ago beside a half-built pyramid; or for that matter, from Cleopatra’s lipstick. All this is interesting; but the point is that it is also practical. For scientists have learned to control these minute and violent trifles, to some extent at least. They can be loosed from atoms at will; they can be directed and made to do their stuff for human pur- poses. Electronics has made mattér and energy Electricity and Light Beams Now Guide the Blind all one. Many separate phenomena were seen to be just different forms of the activity of electrons. And as a result, the scientist is now beginning to juggle sound, light, electricity back and forth from hand to hand. as it were, changing one to the other with uncanny effects. ] Out of this jugglery, devices have begun to appear like rabbits from a hat. They are new slaves, electronic slaves that can ‘‘see’’ light, ‘‘hear’’ sounds, “‘feel”” the presence of objects, *‘smell’” gases, “‘taste"” acidity, and what not; perceive these things, in many cases, with far greater subtlety and delicacy than is possible for human senses; and act on what they per- ceive instantaneously and surely. They start electric currents, set machinery going, tum lights on and off, sound alarms, transmit mes- sages and pictures, make invisible things A Dummy Plane to Teach Aerial Navigation by Radio visible. measure unbelievably small differ- ences in size and do many other things so numerous and varied that I shall not attempt to list them here. Scores, perhaps hundreds of these devices could be listed. Many more are still in the experimental stage. Radio, television, talking motion pictures, ultra-speed photography, electric eye, cathode ray —- these are among the better known fields in which the new knowledge of electrons is either the whole story or plays a vital part. Put into human terms, these things mean new knowledge, new safety, new ease, new entertainment, and tireless automatic control of many operations. And still much remains to be done and there is still much to be found out. It is more than likely that we have seen only a small part of the electron’s whole bag of tricks and box of wonders. Some men believe, for example, that we shall yet convert the vast store of energy in sunlight into usable electricity; others that we will do undreamed-of things with the energy still locked in the atom, which we have scarcely touched. This leads inevitably to visions of eliminating the need for any human toil whatever, except as men want to spade gardens or dig ditches merely for the fun of it. But it is not necessary to be visionary about what may happen in some distant future. Al- ready the Electronic Age is coming to be a well deserved name for our time. What has been done by finding out how to put electrons to work is startling enough and promising enough to rouse a whole flock of new dreams, even in this troubled world. Playing an Electric Organ That Has No Pipes