"E. E. Doc Smith - Skylark 2 - Skylark Three" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith E. E. Doc)

find out how to use it intelligently тАФcan't use it at all, for that matter. By
its very nature it is
impenetrable to any form of matter, however applied; and this calc here,"
shaking the sheaf of
papers viciously, "shows that it must also be opaque to any wave whatever,
propagated through
air or through ether, clear down to cosmic rays. Behind it we would be blind
and helpless, so we
can't use it at all. It drives me frantic! Think of a barrier of pure force,
impalpable, immaterial,
and exerted along a geometrical surface of no thickness whateverтАФand yet
actual enough to stop
a radiation that travels a hundred million light-years and then goes through
twenty-seven feet of
solid lead just like it was so much vacuum! That's what we're up against!
However, I'm going to
try out that model, Mart, right now. Let's go!"
"You are getting idiotic again, Dick," Crane rejoined calmly, without
moving. "You
know, even better than I do, that you are playing with the most concentrated
essence of energy
that the world has ever seen. That zone of force probably can be generated . .
."
"Probably, nothing!" barked Seaton. "It's just as evident a fact as that
stool," kicking the
unoffending bit of furniture half-way across the room as he spoke. "If
you'd've let me I'd've
shown it to you yesterday."
 "Undoubtedly, then. Grant that it is impenetrable to all matter and to
all known wave-
lengths. Suppose that it should prove impenetrable also to gravitation and to
magnetism? Those
phenomena probably depend upon the ether, but we know nothing fundamental of
their nature,
nor of that of the ether. Therefore your calculations, comprehensive though
they are, cannot
predict the effect upon them of your zone of force. Suppose that that zone
actually does set up a
barrier in the ether, so that it nullifies gravitation, magnetism, and all
allied phenomena; so that
the power bars, the attractors and repellors, cannot work through it? Then
what? As well as
showing me the zone of force, you might well have shown me yourself flying off
into space,
unable to use your power and helpless if you released the zone. No, we must
know more of the
fundamentals before you try even a small-scale experiment."
"Oh, bugs! You're carrying caution to extremes, Mart. What can happen?
Even if
gravitation should be nullified, I would rise only slowly, heading south the