Some current work at Bell Telephone Laboratories

Faraday spoke in this hall, and many other eminent men of his century and of this one. Even for a Briton it must be thrilling to stand where they have stood, and for this American it is positively awe‐inspiring. One wishes that their words had been preserved on records—and then one realizes that one would hardly care to meet their competition in this place. One indulges in the pastime, useless but harmless, of wondering what Faraday would say could he return to this stage. Looking around the city, I think he would be amazed to see the transformations wrought through his discoveries in the lighting, the transport and the industry of this great capital, in the heart of which the Royal Institution stands now as it stood then. Looking over the scene in physics, he would be astonished by the number of the research institutions and by the size of many of them; he would be amazed by the total amount of work, and surprised by the large fraction of it that is team‐work. If he saw our budgets he might consider some of us, the nuclear physicists in particular, extravagant beyond reason. We could reply to him that he exhausted the surface‐layers of the mine, and it is not our fault if the remaining ore is very deep down. In listening to a speech like this one he would be pleased to hear such words as “current” and “magnet” over and over again, but he would be confounded by some of the words that are mixed with them. From time to time he would be led into a realm entirely new to him. It is into such a realm that I will first lead you. This is not with the object of impressing Faraday, but I will admit to getting a little whimsical pleasure out of beginning in a field of which you hardly expected to hear in a talk with a title like mine.