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if transmissions in the 408 MHz band have been made from Cambridge?'
'That's rather a personally-directed opening question, Dr O'Donovan, but one central to the
agenda item, I must agree. Professor Newton, would you care to answer?' Sir Alistair Airey
asked.
'On request from the Chair I will answer, sir, even though I take exception to Dr O'Donovan
asking a question to which he must already know the answer,' Isaac Newton replied.
'Because of the great sensitivity of radiotelescopes, it must be perfectly well known that
transmissions have indeed been made from Cambridge, or from a place very near to
Cambridge. So the question really isn't a question.'
'Was the first transmission made from Cambridge?' Trugood broke out again. 'Did you start
it or did the comet? Is that really a question?'
'Sir Alistair, I would like to remind both members of the Information Committee and
members of ICSU that I am here at this meeting on invitation. I came to the meeting as a
matter of courtesy. . .'
Isaac Newton waited for murmurs around the table to subside, and then went on:
'... as a matter of courtesy. I did not come to be subjected to a barrage of intemperate
questions and remarks. If the meeting would like me to do so, I am prepared to describe
what happened at Cambridge. Beyond that I am not prepared to go.'
'Yet you are a Fellow of this Society, Professor Newton, and through your Fellowship you are
responsible for the undertakings of the Society, of which our membership of ICSU is a
particularly important undertaking,' the President said firmly.
'I am aware of that, Sir Alistair, which is exactly why I have come here this morning, and why I
am prepared to make a statement to the
meeting,' Isaac Newton answered as calmly as he could manage.
'Very well, Professor Newton. The Committee will hear your statement.'
'Doubtless, Sir Alistair, everybody here will be aware of the circumstances in which
communication with Comet Halley was established,' Isaac Newton began. 'Unfortunately the
technology used was temporary, partly because of the limited lifetime of the satellite
employed, but more particularly because our linking transmission from the satellite to the
Comet was too weak to reach very far out into the solar system. Connection with the Comet
would necessarily have been lost, and could not have been re-established for another
seventy years unless a new system of communication was established.
'A new system, namely transmission from ground-level using a wavelength short enough to
penetrate the ionosphere, was to hand, provided the problem of local interference at the
new wavelength could be solved. One way to solve this problem was to use an existing
interference-free band, which is to say one of the bands made available to
radioastronomers. Another possibility was an application by the Project Halley Board
through this Society and Committee for a new interference-free band, a band reserved for
communication between Earth and Comet Halley, a band that would need to be agreed
internationally. This second possibility would evidently have been preferable if it could have
been negotiated with sufficient speed. Unfortunately there is no example in the past of such
an international agreement being reached within the available time scale, a matter of
months only.
'I was therefore faced by an unpleasant choice. Either to lose contact with the Comet or to
use one of the reserved radioastronomy bands. I judged that use of the 408 MHz band
would be the least disruptive, because research work in radioastronomy is done nowadays
very largely in the bands reserved at still shorter wavelengths. My choice in this situation is
known to the meeting.'
'Your choice was deliberate?' the President asked in a serious tone.
'Inevitably it was,' Isaac Newton admitted.
'Would you act the same way if you had to make the choice again?'
Isaac Newton thought for a moment and then nodded.
'I cannot answer that I would not.'
Trugood made no attempt to speak through the Chair. His voice rang out:
'If ever there was a statement replete with conceit, replete with self- righteousness, then this
was it! I think the meeting should pass the strongest possible condemnation of Professor
Newton and all his ways,
which by now are becoming notorious!'
The President was wondering how best to cover this emotive outburst when he caught the
eye of an incisive-looking, grey-haired woman.
'Yes, Professor Worthing?' he asked.
This must be Wendy Worthing, a mathematician from Manchester of whom Isaac Newton
had heard.
'I came to this meeting with a quite open mind,' the woman began, 'fully prepared to make it
up in accordance with what I heard. Unfortunately, I have heard nothing from Professor
Newton that shows the smallest measure of contrition for what is very clearly a grave breach
of the Society's international undertakings. You, sir, have already drawn Professor Newton's
attention to his responsibilities as a Fellow of the Society. In a similar spirit, I would like to
ask Professor Newton if he is aware of statute twenty-seven on page one-eight-seven of the
Society's Yearbook?'
'I would rather not proceed quite so directly, Professor Worthing,' the President cautioned
warily.
'But this is the whole essence of the matter, is it not?' Wendy Worthing persisted sharply,
refusing to be put down, even by the President. 'In case Professor Newton is not aware of
statute twenty- seven, I will read it:
If any Fellow of the Society shall contemptuously or contumaciously disobey the Statutes or
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