The Language of Science

Abstract

This chapter is devoted to the background information necessary to understand scientific arguments. Geometry is basic to locating things in space. Trigonometry explores geometric relationships. Much of our knowledge of our planet is presented on maps, but showing a spherical surface on a flat sheet of paper is not so simple. Different map projections have different uses, but some have distortions that give false impressions. Measurement in science involves the ‘Metric System’ where all measurements are based on the numbers 1,10,100 etc. It was developed in France around the time of the Revolution, and was spread throughout Europe by Napoleon. The United States is the last holdout, still using the old English imperial system of inches, feet, miles, etc. Describing things in terms of powers of ten (‘orders of magnitude’) allows us to conveniently describe things on the level both of atoms and of the universe. Very different sizes are easily expressed though using the shorthand of exponents and logarithms. Understanding the implications of exponential growth and decay is essential to making rational decisions, but tends to be poorly understood by the general public. This chapter also introduces the reader to the precise definitions of many words in common use.

Intermezzo II. Undergraduate Study: Three Universities and One Degree in Four Years

I graduated from a private high school (St. Mark’s School of Texas) in 1951 when I was 16 years old. I was the youngest member of my graduating class. There was never any question where I was going to college, our family had close ties to Southern Methodist University, and my father was a Trustee. However, when I applied to SMU there was some concern that I was too young to enter, but that problem got solved. I might even have received an award for financial aid because I had been Valedictorian of my high school graduating class, but that was ruled out by my father. As far as he was concerned, financial aid was for those who could not afford to attend otherwise. Anyway, I would be living at home, and so all we had to worry about was tuition and ‘incidental expenses’.

I started off taking a pre-med curriculum; that was regarded as the most rigorous set of courses for a biology major. During my freshman year I joined the photography club, and here is where serendipity enters the scene. One of those in the club was an exchange student from Germany, Heinz Just. He was considered a junior at SMU, and had come from the University of Munich. He wanted to learn how to develop film and make prints, and I already knew all about this because my brother and I had transformed the hall closet in our house into a darkroom so small that only one person could fit in at a time. SMU had a fine darkroom available for the photography club. I taught Heinz not only how to develop film, but the tricks of how to make prints even when the negative wasn’t all that good. We would talk, and I learned that his family had lived in the Sudetenland, which before the war was a largely German-speaking part of Czechoslovakia. During the war he had been sent to Bavaria, far from anyplace that might be bombed. At the end of the war the German population was expelled from the Sudetenland. In the chaos at the end of the war, Heinz and his parents had to search for each other. I introduced him to my family, who were interested to discover that the people we had been fighting were, after all, humans too. I tried to find out what ‘exchange student’ really meant and found out that Senator Fulbright had set up a program, but it was only open to Americans for graduate study. Again serendipity steps in. When my father was a boy, the Hay’s used to vacation in Arkansas, and they stayed at the Fulbright’s rooming house, so dad and the Senator were childhood friends. My father figured that if Senator Fulbright thought these exchanges were a good thing, they must be. Heinz went back to Germany at the end of my freshman year.

In those days, if you were interested in what was happening in Europe and particularly the inside history of World War II, SMU was a very interesting place to be. Robert Storey, who had been Executive Trial Counsel for the United States at the Nuremberg Trial of major Axis War Criminals, was the Dean of the Law School. Hans Bernd Gisevius was also on the campus. He had been a surreptitious member of the German Resistance, and as Vice Consul in the Germany Embassy in Zurich had acted as intermediary between Allen Dulles and the Resistance in Germany. The Resistance was responsible for the July 20th, 1944 attempt to assassinate Hitler. There were interesting and insightful lectures from time to time.

During my sophomore year, I met another student from Germany, Peter Trawnik, through the German Department’s club. Peter had been invited to come for a year by his uncle who lived in Dallas. The Trawniks lived in Gräfelfing, just outside Munich, a village untouched by the war. But he described one night in 1944 when there was a devastating air attack on Munich. The Trawniks climbed up onto the roof of their house to watch the city burn.

Halfway through my sophomore year the German Department at SMU announced an interesting opportunity. Wayne State University in Detroit intended to reopen their “Junior Year in Munich” program (hereafter JYM) which had been shut down in the 1930s. The first group of students would go for the 1953–1954academic year. Serendipity strikes again. That was the year I would be a Junior, and I already had two friends in Munich. I asked my parents if I could apply. My mother was skeptical, but my father thought it was a great idea. Then Tom Cranfill, the uncle of my best friend in high school, who was a professor of English at the University of Texas, and who had just been to Europe weighed in. He strongly urged my parents to let me spend a year in Munich. He thought it would be a great educational experience. We realized that living conditions would be very different from the peace and quiet of Dallas. And the cold war was heating up. There was always concern about whether it might turn into another war in Europe.

Peter Trawnik convinced me that the most interesting way to travel to Europe was on a freighter. Before I left, I received some really good news. Heinz had managed to get me into the first student dormitory built for the University of Munich—a brand new building, with all the comforts of a dormitory in the US. Well, almost, anyway. It turned out we had warm water once a week.

I sailed from New York in June, 1953, on a freighter which took almost two weeks to reach Hamburg. There were five other passengers and no entertainment other than reading. We had meals with the Captain. Everything went well until we reached the North Sea and encountered huge waves. It was while I was at sea and ‘out of touch’ that the June 17th workers uprising in East Germany occurred. It was a huge event in the US, considered by many a prelude to war. Fifty years later I was to learn that our Junior Year in Munich was almost cancelled because half of the students had withdrawn for fear they would get caught in a crisis. For me ignorance was bliss, and fortunately my family never expressed any concern.

Heinz had a friend in Hamburg, Horst, but I had been told that he worked all day. I was to go to his family’s home and would stay there for a couple of days. When the freighter docked, I took a cab to the address. It looked rather bleak, and I can still remember hauling my suitcase up the decrepit stairway in a building that still showed many of the scars of war. I knocked on the door and was greeted by Horst’s mother, who made me instantly feel at home. After unpacking I went out for a walk. Hamburg had been virtually destroyed in air raids, and many of the houses were simply shells. For someone who had never seen the destruction of war, it was a very sobering experience. That night we went to Planten un Blomen a huge park near the city center. There fountains and lights played to classical music provided by a symphony orchestra. I had never seen anything like it. Here in the midst of rebuilding from the destruction was a new unique art form—water, light and music. The next few days I wandered about the city fascinated by the modern buildings built (or rebuilt) of dark red bricks and at the ruins which still remained.

I took a train (changing successfully several times), to Neuburg an der Donau, where Heinz met me at the station and took me to his parent’s apartment. After a couple of days I went alone to Bayreuth for the Wagner festival. I had managed to get tickets before I left the US. It was the year that there were radical new stage settings by Wieland Wagner. Again I had never seen anything like it. The Festival Opera house in Bayreuth was built especially for Richard Wagner’s operas and had many special features. For one thing, you cannot see the orchestra pit; it is under the stage, and no light comes out from it. I had tickets for a complete performance of “The Ring”—four operas. The first “Das Rheingold” is performed without intermission and starts in late afternoon. You go in, take your seat, the lights go out, and it is pitch dark. The music begins in total darkness. The first part of Rheingold takes place in the Rhine River. In it. Rhine maidens are swimming about, singing. You only see these ladies appearing from time to time in the gloom toward the front of the auditorium. You can’t see where the stage is, but gradually the faint rippling of light coming through the water covers the whole front of the space. After the performance, I had dinner in an outdoor restaurant on top of the nearby hill. The next day’s performance was “Die Walkürie.” It is in three acts, with a hour or more intermission between each, so you can go to one of the restaurants and have a meal spaced out over the evening. Walkürie ends with Wotan putting Brünnhilde to sleep surrounded by a ring of magic fire. Those were the biggest, most impressive flames I have ever seen on a stage. I think it was done with a motion picture of flames projected onto a wall of steam. However it was done, it seemed unbelievably real. I was astonished at the originality of everything. The third opera, “Siegfried,” was performed the next day, again with long intermissions. The fourth day was a pause, for ‘light entertainment’ in the Festival Hall—Beethoven’s 9th Symphony conducted by Bruno Walter. And finally, on the fifth day the performance was , “Die Götterdämmerung,” the ‘Twilight of the Gods’ complete with the rainbow bridge leading to Valhalla. At this point I was seriously considering scrapping the idea of becoming a paleontologist and thinking that stage set design would be a lot more fun.

The next day Heinz arrived about noon with the Volkswagen beetle we had rented for our grand trans-alpine tour That evening we saw Tristan und Isolde. It was when going to dinner between the second and third acts, that I had an unexpected encounter with one of Hitler’s more valuable deputies. Heinz was walking in front of me, and I was looking down at the path to the restaurant and thinking about what I had just seen, when I walked straight into an elderly gentleman, very nearly knocking him completely down. I caught him and helped him back up. Heinz had a shocked expression on his face. As the gentleman walked away with his friends, Heinz asked me “Do you know who that was?” I turns out I had bumped into Hjalmar Horace Greeley Schacht. Of course the name meant nothing to me. Heinz explained to me. Hjalmar Schacht had been Director of the Reichsbank under the Weimar Republic and continued in that position under Hitler. He was responsible for rebuilding the German economy and keeping it functioning during the war. He had been tried for war crimes at Nuremberg and found not guilty. It was concluded that he had just been doing what bankers do. If I had known who he was, I could have at least asked him how he got his name.

On Friday the 14th of August we drove to Nürnberg. Much was still in ruins, and there were large areas of the old town that were simply open spaces with rubble. But from what had been rebuilt it was already clear that the ancient center of this great medieval city was going to be reconstructed as close to its original form as possible. On Saturday we went swimming in the Main river and visited one of the Baroque palaces outside Bayreuth. In the evening we saw Parzifal. I’ve seen several performances since, but nothing quite as magical or mystical as that one in Bayreuth 1953. The Holy Grail was represented by a bowl, which began to glow and then gradually emitted intense brilliant light. I have no idea how that effect was achieved in those days.

The next day we were off on what was the greatest tour of Europe I have had. Following Tom Cranfill’s advice I had obtained tickets to the Salzburg Festival. We went by way of Munich, my first chance to see the city I would be living in. At the end of the war the central part of Munich was more than 90% destroyed, and overall damage was over 60%. That meant that 3 out of 5 buildings were either gone or in ruins. A lot of rebuilding had been done in the nine years since the war, but there were still ruins everywhere. It seemed that the only buildings to survive the bombing were those Hitler had built: the two Nazi Party Headquarters buildings on Königsplatz (after the war one became the America House, the other became part of the Hochschule für Musik und Theater), the Gestapo Headquarters on Ludwigstrasse (then the US Consulate), and the Haus der Kunst (originally the Haus der deutschen Kunst, for Nazi-approved art; after the war it was used to house the highlights of the fabulous Bavarian collections of art; the major galleries, the Pinakotheken, were all still in ruins). In contrast to some of the other cities which had been largely destroyed, the decision was made to rebuild Munich much as it had been before the war. I spent a sabbatical in Munich in 1988, and found that almost all physical traces of the war were gone. Interestingly, the students at the University then didn’t seem to know that all of the streets lined with with 18th and 19th century buildings and houses had been burned out and were ruins 40 years earlier.

We went for lunch at the Biergarten of the Löwenbräukeller on Stiglmaierplatz. It had been reconstructed just the way it had been before its destruction in a bombing raid in 1944. I had my first encounter with one of Munich’s most famous specialties, Leberknödelsuppe (liver dumpling soup). A few hours later I was sick to my stomach and I blamed the soup. But we made it in good time to Salzburg and Heinz gave me the traditional remedy: a sugar cube soaked with several drops of Underberg bitters. It worked within a few hours, but I was still under the weather and decided to skip the performance of Handel’s Julius Cesar that evening. It was many months before I tried Leberknödelsuppe again. Now I regard it as a delicacy, not to be missed on a visit to Munich.

The next day I had recovered and that evening saw the world premiere of a new opera, Gottfried von Einem’s “Der Prozess” (“The Trial”). The opera is based on Franz Kafka’s book. Josef K is arrested without being told why, tried for an unnamed crime, and convicted. It is a dark and surreal story, and very depressing. Von Einem’s music is influenced by Stravinsky and Prokofiev, and was well suited to the theme. During the intermission I saw a small man standing alone looking at the audience. I walked over to him and asked how he liked the opera. He told me he would like to know what I thought of it. After some discussion we introduced ourselves. He was Gottfried von Einem. I liked Der Prozess, but it has not made its way into the repertoire of major opera houses. Little did I suspect that almost two decades later a close friend, Pavel Čepek, would be caught up in a real trial in Prague, very much like that in Kafka’s play.

The next day we drove through the spectacular lake and mountain scenery of the Salzkammergut, and in the evening saw a memorable performance of ”Don Giovanni” at the Festival Hall. The circum-alpine tour of the next month, through the Austrian Alps, northern Italy, southwestern France and Switzerland was literally the experience of a lifetime. In those days, you could stay in youth hostels and small hotels and eat in local restaurants for a pittance. On the advice of friends we discovered the ‘other’ Riviera, the one between Genoa and La Spezia which is still a gem. But perhaps the highlight of the trip for me was to Chamonix to see Mont Blanc and then on to Zermatt to see the Matterhorn. In 1953 there were none of the cableways that exist today; there were long and sometimes difficult hikes to see the sights.

Returning to Munich, I moved into the Red House, Studentenheim am Biederstein, where Heinz and I shared a tiny room. Last year Heinz, after having visited an exhibition on cubist art in Ferrara, reminded me that I covered the walls with prints of paintings by Braque. I think I was more fortunate that the other members of our American group in that I instantly had about 30 friends, all with interesting stories to tell. With one exception all had been too young to serve in the military. The exception was our wise Papa Wagner, in his twenties. He had been a fighter pilot in the Luftwaffe, and although he was less than a decade older than the rest of us, he was our local father figure.

Our Junior Year group started the semester early, in September, with special courses in German Language and European History. For the University of Munich (its real name is Ludwig-Maximilian Universität, better known simply as LMU) the semester began in October. We were able to enroll in regular courses in the University. The German students do not take exams until they are ready to finish their studies after 4 years at the University. If we wanted to attend University lectures and get JYM credit for a course, JYM provided tutors and we would get special exams arranged for us. A peculiarity of the University system in Germany (and much of Europe), is that the students keep their own records. The University issued each student a ‘Studienbuch.’ You would write in it what lectures you were attending. After one of the lectures, sometime during the semester, you would go up to the Professor and get his signature in the Studienbuch. Of course, that meant that in reality you only needed to attend one lecture (or give your Studienbuch to someone else to get the required signature). A complete honor system. Basically, you could learn the material any way you wanted. What counted was how well you did on the end of your studies when you took all the exams, usually over about a two-week period. For the typical German student this meant that the first year was spent in confusion trying to figure out what you were doing. Year 2 was pure fun, having parties and general good times. Year 3 was a time for moderate panic, and year 4 was spent in total panic preparing for the exams. You also need to realize that German Universities (and most in Europe) do not have tuition. Higher education is free to those who are qualified. You pay a small fee and get the right to get a pass on public transportation, greatly reduced prices for tickets to concerts, opera, plays, museums, etc. The last time I was in Munich, the University was trying to figure out what to do about the perpetual ‘students’ who never seemed to finish but took advantage of these amenities, an estimated 20,000 out of 80,000 enrolled students.

My friends at the Studentenheim am Biederstein advised me that there were certain lectures you just had to have in your Studienbuch. I was able to sign up for them without asking for credit from the JYM. One absolute must was Advanced Sanskrit; no one ever seemed to take Introductory Sanskrit or to attend more than the one lecture required to get the Prof’s signature. Another absolute must was to attend at least one of Professor Theodor Dombart’s lectures on Egyptology. Dombart looked the part of a proper Egyptologist of the time. In his sixties, he had a triangular beard that extended down almost to his waist. German sentences usually have the verb at the end. In lecturing Dombart was able to devise very long and complex sentences that could go on for a minute or more, and then forget the verb at the end, leaving you up in the air as to what it was about. Or sometimes he would remember the verb and follow it with a ‘nicht’ which negated everything he had just said. And then there were the lectures on Art History by Hans Sedlmayer, open to all students in the University. The audiences always completely filled the AudiMax, the Auditorium Maximum, the largest lecture hall in the University, with students sitting on all the steps as well. The lectures were great, but you could tell when the end was coming because Professor Sedlmayer would start putting on his coat and shawl while still lecturing and give a final “Danke schön für Ihre Aufmerksamkeit” (Thank you for your attention) as he put on his hat and headed out the door.

The main building of the University on the Ludwigstrasse had opened, but some of the roof was missing, and parts of the building were still in ruins. When winter came it was cold, and most of the classrooms were not heated. I wore a heavy winter coat and gloves—not the easiest gear for taking notes.

I called back to the US a few times to talk to my parents. It wasn’t easy. Germany had been allowed to keep a single transatlantic cable at the end of the war. To place a call to America you went to the postal-telephone office and made an appointment for the call, usually ten days or more in advance. When the day came you would wait until you were called and assigned to a booth. Then you would wait in the booth until the connection had been made, usually a few minutes. Then you had maybe five minutes to exchange pleasantries before you were cut off so the next person could make their call.

Nevertheless, that year in Munich was the highlight of my life. I went to concerts, opera or plays an average of four days each week. Tickets for students always seemed to be available and were incredibly cheap. There was only one large concert hall, the Herkulessaal in the Residenz, but already two Opera houses. Munich already had four symphony orchestras (it now has five) and you could hear anything from music by Orlando di Lasso (16th century) to the concert series Musica Viva, which never performed anything older than ten years. Serious opera was in the Prinzregententheater, a near duplicate of the Festival House in Bayreuth, and also built for Wagner’s Operas. One of the highlights was Carl Orff’s “Carmina Burana”. I sat in the last row. Orff himself was in the box immediately behind me. Whether you know it or not, you have heard at least part of Carmina Burana; the themes have been used in so many films and TV shows. It is sometimes called the first piece of rock music. It consists of secular songs in vulgate Latin sung by monks. In that 1954 staging the 50 or so monks making the chorus were dressed in blue and red robes and were sitting around a huge round table that occupied most of the stage. Soloists would appear on the table. I’ve seen a number of performances since, none with such grand staging. Another memorable performance was a Stravinsky ballet with stage sets designed by Paul Klee.

The Theater am Gärtnerplatz, which burned out in one of the air-raids in July, 1944, had been rebuilt and was in operation every day. It did light opera, operettas and musicals. Again, I was fascinated by the staging which sometimes involved movies projected onto the background.

Our Junior Year program gave us the regular German University vacation periods off, three weeks over Christmas/New Year and two months between the winter and summer semesters. So I was able to spend several weeks in Vienna, Rome, and Paris. In Rome I atted a concert in the Palazzo Farnese. Much later I realized that the Palazzo Farnese was the setting for Act 2 of Tosca, where she murders Scarpia. A few years ago a friend going to Tosca as his first opera once asked me “what is it about?” I had to respond “Well, false imprisonment, torture, rape, murder, betrayal and suicide—the usual things”.

Fasching is Munich’s version of Mardi Gras, only instead of one day it lasts at least two months, from just after New Year until the beginning of Lent. It is the darkest, coldest part of the winter, and to make up for it there are parties. Big Parties, costume parties called Balls. Almost all were open to the public for the modest price of a ticket. Attendance was usually between one and five thousand revelers. I believe their real purpose is to make sure you have something to repent during Lent. On weekends there might be as many as 30 costume balls each night. The festivities would start about 9 p.m., but most students didn’t arrive until much later, and the balls would end at dawn. The early morning streetcars would be full of people in every sort of outlandish costume. It was common to go with your girl friend but to leave with someone else’s. The art was removed from the Haus der Kunst, and the building was transformed into a painted cave with fantastic lighting. But for me the best parties were in the underground air-raid bunkers of the Regina Hotel underneath Lenbach Platz and the surrounding area. The bunkers, ordinarily sealed but opened for Fasching, were a labyrinth. There were many little rooms and three large ones where there would be orchestras and dance floors. Once into the maze you could have the devil of a time finding your way back out again. Most people wore masks or had their faces painted so well you couldn’t even recognize friends. You would soon lose those you had come with and be having a good time with total strangers without ever finding out who they were. You might even wind up going together to a breakfast of Weisswurst and beer in one of the early-opening restaurants. In retrospect, it was remarkably innocent fun and good therapy for those who had experienced the war first hand. Now it is much more formal, much less exciting and fun: today many of the Munich students go to Venice for Carnival instead.

Although that year in Munich was the most exciting time of my life, I am amazed when I look back at the pictures I took that it was still a city largely in ruins. And this was 8 years after the war had ended. Although I never participated directly in war, the experience of living in a bombed-out city left me with a real contempt for those who regard it as a reasonable way of solving problems.

My last year at SMU was spent partly planning on going to graduate school and more intensively planning on how to get back to Europe, maybe the next time to somewhere that had not been so affected by war.