NATURE'S OWN CAMERAS AND THE PRESENCE OF THE PAST
The recording of vision and sound, and its play-back by means of films, television, radio and records, has reached a very high standard.
In our just pride in this achievement it is easy to dismiss as fantastic the idea that Nature, whose laws we have so cleverly applied in our inventions, may herself have been making her own permanent records of events down the ages; and that in due course man may find means to play back some of these records for his edification and entertainment. One would then be witnessing not just events that have taken place during the motion picture era, but events in the world's history going back many centuries. This is very far indeed from being present possibility, but we can at least recognize its potential.
A few clues are already to hand from common experience. Simple examples of transitory picture records are of course before us every day. Light causes shadows which are silhouettes of people and things. The sun casts small images of itself on the ground below trees in summer because of the "focussing" effect of tiny gaps between the leaves. This "pin-hole camera" phenomenon is more impressive when a room is blacked out in daylight and there is a tiny hole in the blind: the scene outside is now reproduced (upside down) on a vertical surface in the room.
These two simple examples are only a beginning: there must be many natural situations where light passes through small interspaces between rocks and stones to bring about the "pin-hole camera" effect. Clearly Nature has been making her transitory pictures (mostly unseen by man) since the dawn of time.
In the realm of sound Nature has a way of producing an echo. This too is transitory, but it is a simple form of natural sound recording and play-back.
Sometimes Nature's pictures are not merely transitory. When a scrap of newspaper is left lying about for some time in the open with part of it hidden from light, e.g. under a stone, there is a colour differentiation across the paper showing which part has been exposed to light and which has not. In this way a simple "silhouette" is permanently recorded. The "picture" has been taken, developed and fixed. What happens with the piece of newspaper may occur with many natural materials - in varying degree. So in many parts of the world there may be permanent pictures made by Nature, very faint but there.
Nature may be doing more than is generally recognized in the way of "fixing" her records; for the moment let us jump ahead to something that Nature seems to do that we at the moment cannot do, namely the direct recording and play-back of emotions.
In old buildings, particularly old churches, sensitive persons detect a special "atmosphere" that can be attributed to some kind of natural recording of the feelings of those who used the building in long-past days. One assumption is that the materials constituting the walls and floors of the buildings have been able to record emotions in the past and for our benefit (through suitably sensitive persons) "play back" the record. How Nature could do this is beyond our comprehension, but it is possible that she has some techniques for the purpose - in which case we are not obliged to look for supernatural explanations.
Now to consider what are more usually called "hauntings". Some claim to have seen strange things in haunted houses, in the form of people from the past appearing and walking about. other accounts include sound and emotions. All these reports are open to dispute and many dismiss them entirely (sometimes because they are too disquieting) but if there is anything in them it could be put down as a form of natural recording in the past and play-back in the present. And, once again, one does not necessarily have to postulate supernatural causes.
We may now come to the most remarkable of Nature's recording and play-backs, which cannot be denied since the evidence is present in all our heads. The human brain, only a few cubic inches in volume, is a marvelous mechanism which records sights, sounds and emotions, and in memory we have the play-back up to fifty years or more after the event. As our brains are the unaided work of Nature we should not underrate her general capacity for making her own recordings and playing therm back. She obviously has some techniques that are quite beyond our present comprehension.
Between the transitory pictures and the odd scraps of faded paper on the one hand, and the human brain and "hauntings" on the other there is a great gap. It may be filled up to some extent when we know more of the photo-sensitivity of materials other than those we use in photography and the possibilities of purely natural processes for the developing and fixing of such impressions. From here one can only pass to speculation, or simply questions. Will the light valve ever be perfected so that if any image has been cast and fixed, however faint and small, it can be magnified to make it visible to the human eye? Can Nature record a series of rapid pictures on the same surface, e.g. of rock or stone, in such a way that they are kept separate, so that they may in due course be sorted out into a motion picture? What can Nature do in this way with sound? Can man ever track down the places where Nature's records have been made?
The fruits of such research in future generations might be rewarding indeed. It would be interesting for example to see on a television screen, as an eyewitness, the landing of William the Conqueror - obtained from rocks on the Sussex coast. but there would be other events of the past much more worth seeing, and indeed attending.
Perhaps Nature has in some manner recorded every past event and stands ready to play it back? If so we are just as surrounded by the past as we are by the present.
_________________________________________________________
MY FACE BELONGS TO ME
Some have good reasons for wanting their pictures in the papers and newsreels. In particular those in "show business" profit by them. Others do not want their photographs to be taken and used in this way.
The decision as to the use of a personal photograph should rest with the subject of it. Therefore, no photograph should be taken and publicly used without the permission of the subject. There should also be a payment, if the subject desires, because a man's face is his copyright and if anyone makes money out of it he should have his proper share - as an author does with a book or a composer with his music. At present the copyright photograph is often virtually stolen. If the person has done something shameful or if it is otherwise in the public interest that his face be displayed for all to see it should be for the law to require or permit this, not some commercial interest.
The result of adopting this policy might be drastically to reduce the supply of personal photographs to the press and other publicists, and would naturally be strongly resisted by them. The public, however, would not suffer unreasonably and many innocent persons would be spared distress. many pictures now appearing in print do not do any good to the public. one kind is certain pictures of accidents and disasters and their victims. Where "horror' pictures do give enjoyment it may well be of the unhealthy kind and detrimental in the long run to those who devour them. Let the law, not the publishers, decide what is decent and necessary.
The unbridled public use of personal photographs is one of a number of abuses that have grown large in our times for lack of proper control when they were young enough to be easily suppressed.
SUNDRY THOUGHTS AND INNOVATIONS
F.L.Barrow
>
