Excepted from 'Popular Paradigm... the Magazine of Scientists, For Scientists!'
Interview with Kenneth Davidson
PP: Kenneth Davidson, better known as 'Kenny', is hard to miss when he arrives at work - he has the only car with a steam whistle. His job as a designer at J.U.M.P. Manufacturing involves both mundane mechanical designs and 'specialized' parts for Scientific research. Outside his office is a busy shop floor with both computer-operated and manual turning lathes, drills, metal saws. Inside his office, there's an advanced CADCAM system, an old-style drafting table and a bench with various electrical meters and soldering irons. On the wall behind his desk are posters of Nikola Tesla, Philo Farnsworth and Dr. Who.
PP: So Kenny, do you know you resemble...
KD: Yes, I know. I should wear a sign that says "No, I am not Elijah Wood and I am not a hobbit".
PP: You talk like him too.
KD: The bane of my existence...
PP: You've made quite a name for yourself with your controversial writings. Your first one was a scathing attack on Professor Dranbellago's theory on time travel.
KD: It deserved it. It was a clumsy and inelegant theory. Time particles called 'nowons' that decay into 'futurons'? Feh. My only sorrow is that he took it so personally. Fortunately for me, he's a poor shot.
PP: Is he still angry?
KD: I still check my incoming packages for ah... surprises.
PP: But you really shone in your paper on teleportation, "No Matter Where You Go, There You Are."
KD: Thank you! The concept is simple, really. At the Beginning of the Universe, the structures of all Reality was folded tight, like a map you keep in your glove compartment. Now, even though the map is unfolded, the original connection structures are still there. Once you find it, you can go to nearly anywhere. Of course, the farther away your destination is, the greater the Etheric distance and the greater resistance there is to movement. So stepping through a wall is easy, while going to another planet requires much more energy.
PP: How much more?
KD: Lots more. I'm still working to quantify it.
PP: Your most recent article, "If We're Not Magicians, Why Are We Hanging Around Them?" has raised a lot of eyebrows.
KD: I was hoping to stir up a little bit of trouble with that. We're so 19th Century... so rooted in the past. For heaven's sake, 85% of Etherites still use the English system of measurement. Hello! The world uses the Metric system! We have to widen our concepts of ourselves and our world or else risk intellectual stagnation. Then we'd be little better off than the Technocracy. And the way the Sons have treated women... terrible...
PP: And do you think the Sons of Ether are magicians and not Scientists?
KD: Not my concern. I'm getting results and that's all I care about.
PP: Tell us about your background a little.
KD: Oh. Sure. I'm an only child of fairly poor working class parents. I really owe what I am to them. They pushed me to study, and I applied myself to my schoolwork. I did pretty well in most subjects, especially the sciences. I read constantly; especially the greats of Science Fiction: Asimov, Bester... but I've always been a tinkerer also. I love to put gadgets together. Pop said he never had to buy anything because I could fix most anything: toasters, small appliances, radios... I put my foot down when he wanted me to start a VCR repair shop when I was in high school.
PP: I heard you got into trouble around then.
KD: It was a rough neighborhood. A gang of us nerds got together strictly for self defense. Word got out what we could do with our super sling-shots and a few ordinary household chemicals in the proper proportions. We got left alone. I graduated from high school and we moved shortly after that.
PP: Still in contact with your family?
KD: Yes and no. I've been too busy really. I did help my dad get some technical training and he's repairing computers now. My mom thinks I've gone looney or something.
PP: You were Awakened in high school, correct?
KD: Yes. It's kind of a funny story. As a present for my seventeenth birthday, my mom and dad scraped up enough money for me to go to a Sci-Fi convention... Lunacon. I split a room with five of my friends - it was the only way we could afford it. It was held in a bizarrely constructed hotel where you could get lost when you turned a corner. I was hiding from the Tolkien fans in a video room that had a Dr. Who marathon on. I was still there at two in the morning when it just became clear to me: how the universe was constructed and how I could get to the lobby from the sixth floor by going down three flights of stairs. Lucky for me Professor Maxwell was there as a guest lecturer.
PP: Promoting Ether theory I take it?
KD: And getting Connie Willis's autograph. I was wandering up to him after the lecture babbling about folded space and time streams, and Professor Maxwell handed me the Kitab al Alacir - the new paperback edition - and it was like... [Here Dr. Davidson mimed an explosion with his hands] to my brain.
PP: Yeah. Great book. So Maxwell took you under his wing?
KD: Not at first. He directed me to a group of Scientists in my area. They helped me get a scholarship so I could go to the college he was teaching at. He's a great teacher. I still do a lot of work for him, a lot of requests for specially turned objects, interesting circuitry, that sort of thing.
PP: Can we talk about some of the devices you're working on?
KD: Well, there's my sonic screwdriver...
PP: Just like Dr. Who?
KD: Eh, no. Mine's mostly a screwdriver. It uses sonic vibrations to move small mechanical objects at a distance. It can also use Etheric vibrations but it doesn't make that cool whirring sound. It can also sever small wires, crack dinner plates... most embarrassing. It's really helpful in removing those parts that are practically impossible it get at, though. I think it will be very helpful in VCR repair.
PP: Improving the world with small steps.
KD: Precisely. I'm also working on a new laser gun...
PP: Doesn't everyone at least sometime in their career?
KD: Of course. But instead of making a single, powerful laser, I'm using a bunch of cheap laser pointers. I call it my MILA technology - Multiple Inexpensive Laser Array.
PP: Isn't there a power limitation?
KD: Ah, that's where the spindle comes in. By rotating them at high speed I propose to spin them together in the same manner as making thread. The timing and focus is critical but I've been getting good results. Eventually it will make tunnelling through hard rock very easy.
PP: Doing anything with your "There You Are" theories?
KD: The templates that allow this dimensional travel are constantly shifting. The tricky part is calculating when one can use the template. For this I've devised the F.M.T.P. calculator.
PP: FMTP?
KD: Folded Map Template Provider. It's based on Folded Space theories - except much simpler to understand The Professor and I have been working in parallel tracks on this for years. We borrow a lot from each other's work.
PP: No professional jealousies about this?
KD: Well, a few. But we've agreed to give each other credit when we publish. In addition, we're going in slightly different directions: Maxwell's looking to move big things like cargo and I want to move small things like packages. Although he just sent me some plans for a 'micro' version of his device - should move something weighing 5,000 kilos.
Using the professor's guidelines I designed my system to max out at 1,000 kilos and I ran my first test using my car. After replacing the garage door, I decided to try it on something with less mass and have achieved moderate success. My own fault about the door; I miscalculated the weight. Placement of the decimal point is very important.
PP: Oh! Tell us about your car.
KD: It's just a four door Datsun I got at the scrap yard. The engine was blown and it needed some other work but the frame was good. The engine is a steam engine engineered for the 21st century. It's much lighter than your standard car motor, with just as much power. Still takes a while to warm up... but I've got the only car in town that toots, so who cares?
PP: How's the mileage?
KD: Better than most.
PP: Anything else special about it?
KD: No. The FMTP cradle doubles as a cellphone cradle. And no, I don't use a cellphone while driving.
PP: What's it like working in a mixed shop?
KD: It's not that mixed. We have students who are likely candidates for further training who do summer work, a Verbana who does the yardwork and general maintenance, and a Virtual Adept who does our website and some IT work.
PP: JUMP has a website?
KD: Sure. We're on the Ethernet.