WMartin%Office-3@sri-unix.UUCP (01/26/84)
From: WMartin at Office-3 (Will Martin) I've been reading The Philadelphia Experiment over the past few days, and my general impression has been disappointment. This is mainly due to unfulfilled expectations. I first saw a reference to it with a one-sentance blurb in the book catalog of one of the mail-order discount book sources, like Publisher's Central Bureau or Barnes&Noble. The description implied that it was an account of a military experiment during WWII in trying to make a ship invisible -- the ultimate camouflage. So I found the book at the local library and put it on reserve, since it was out. When it showed up, and I started reading, I found that it was only peripherally about the experiment itself. I'm about two-thirds through it, and so far it has dwelt on the lives of the authors and the character of the "mysterious witness" whose strange letters (written in multi-colored ink with odd capitalization) seemed to have prompted earlier articles and discussions on the subject (mostly in the UFO press). It is just barely interesting enough to continue, in the hope that it gets better (same as a recent correspondent characterized the Riverworld series). I am now in a chapter in which a scientist named only by pseudonym, and who lives as a secretive hermit in the wilds of Pennsylvania, is revealing essentially boring details of the discussions and meetings amongst the scientific advisory staff to the various naval research organizations during WWII. It all seems enmeshed in an aura of revealed secrets and supernormal forces, which the bits of fact that float to the surface do not seem to justify. I can only wonder what a movie based on this book would be -- since the book spends far more time on the search for the information and on the eccentric behavior of the parties invloved than on the much-more-interesting (to me, at least) details of the actual experiment (if it really happened), would the movie be just another search-behind-the-evil-government-coverup story or would they dramatize the experiment itself? The latter could be worthwhile, but the former is old hat and tedious. In case you care, the "experiment" was supposed to be an effort using some implementation of Einstein's Unified Field Theory and strong electromagnetic fields to render a ship invisible by deflecting light around it. The result was said to be effective, with the minor side effects of teleporting the ship from Philadelphia to Norfolk and back (instantaneously) and driving the crew mad. Hmmm... A few bugs, I guess... So, of course, there was the usual massive hush-hush coverup job and the Navy will never admit that it ever happened, etc., etc., as you have no doubt seen in many writings devoted to the conspiracy theory of history. The name of Einstein has been invoked repeatedly so far in the book as though mentioning it will make any nonsense reputable. Maybe more facts and less mysticism will surface in the later chapters, but I hold little hope. If you like reading the UFOlogists, you might like this; if you don't, you won't. Will Martin PS soMe tHINGS Were not meanT For MAN to KNOw... (underline that line in three colors of ink, and you get the general impression of this book... WM)