I.Q. Page #4

a nine-year-old from Alabama

spouts iambic pentameters...

It's packed!

To open our programme,

here with his paper entitled,

"Cold Fusion-Powered

Exploration Paradigms",

is our very own Edward Walters.

Edward Walters.

Doctor Walters...

- Are you all right, Doctor Walters?

- Ed.

Ed?

Ed.

No, no, it's P squared over N,

not N squared over P...

They forgot to transpose the Q value!

... she marries a genius,

she'll have genius children.

- Do something, Nathan.

- I am, but it's not helpful, or pleasant.

- A nuclear-powered spacecraft!

- Time, Edward...

Distinguished colleagues,

honoured guests...

Edward, just remember

why you are doing this.

Any journey in life,

if not done for human reasons

with understanding and love...

This is not the paper we wrote.

- Shhh! Listen!

...would be empty and lonely.

And look!

It's something worth remembering,

as nuclear-powered spacecraft may soon

make the ancient dream of travelling

to the edge of the universe and back

a reality.

The source of that power

is the very source

that fuels the stars themselves

and in doing so fuels

our imagination and our dreams.

Let us suppose

that V of X is a standard

barrier penetration potential...

...and that psi

is a nucleon wave function.

Then as usual, minus IH bar D psi...

...DT equals minus D squared...

...psi DX squared plus V of X.

Bravo!

What a circus! The scientific

nonsense was mind-numbing.

What was that mush about the heart?

You don't understand,

you're not a physicist.

Well, neither was he until recently.

Did you see the grease under his nails?

Congratulations!

- To genius.

- To fusion.

To the heart.

So you never went to college?

I barely finished school,

I was always taking cars apart.

Yet you have

an amazing grasp of theory.

I believe you used de Broglie's formula

for the pilot wave.

Of course, it was brilliant.

Couldn't have done without it.

I forgot that.

Could you remind me?

Yeah, sure...

X equals...

...one plus...

...W...

X equals one plus W...

...cubed...

...in...

...over pi.

Right... Can you invert that?

Where is he?

Where is that beautiful boy?

- Rocket ships. Zoom!

- Zoom!

- Home run, Catherine!

- Thank you, sir.

Ed Walters, I present Louis Bamberger.

If you had a nickel

for every nickel he has,

you would have a lot of nickels.

An honour and a pleasure, sir.

New Jersey, leader in intergalactic

rocket exploration.

- How's that sound for a licence plate?

- Long.

Sense of humour! I love this boy.

May I steal my niece

for one minute, please?

- We were just about to leave.

- Just one minute. I need some air.

James! How's the rat business?

Well, it's really students

I'm experimenting on now.

My God, the mazes must be enormous!

Green, black, red... Look at that!

It's like having four pens in one.

What an exciting time to be alive!

Louis! We need to have a talk.

This is going to be something

I understand, isn't it?

Yes, but you see...

That's better... Look, Catherine...

Look at the stars, look at the sky,

look at... Edward!

We were just talking about the stars.

Well, enough breathing...

What a night!

I haven't seen a sky like this

since I was a kid, at Stargazer's Field.

How many stars

do you think are up there?

- Ten to the twelfth, plus one.

- You don't have to say that.

No, really. Everybody is quite impressed.

Know why a comet's tail

points away from the sun?

- Yes.

- Me too.

My grandma used to tell me that stars

are where a woodpecker

pecked holes in the sky.

- She wasn't very scientific.

- My father didn't really see stars.

He said he saw

"great seas of fire and nuclear furnaces".

He said it was like a very violent ballet,

too small for anyone to see.

- What is keeping James?

- I don't know.

- He discovered a comet.

- James?

No, my father. They named it after him.

Boyd's Comet.

My God, that's you. That's your father.

- I was just reading about that.

- You've read his works?

- Some of them. There are so many.

- Three.

Three? Really? There seemed like more.

They're all so action-packed.

Action-packed? What is he saying?

- He's coming back.

- James?

No, my father.

Before he died, he promised that when

the comet came back he'd be riding on it.

Right...

Right there.

I think it's there. Just below Cassiopeia.

You're right.

He said he'd be looking down

to make sure I was OK.

- So how are you? Are you OK?

- Catherine? Catherine!

The Rat Man cometh!

- Wait...

- Catherine!

Oh, my God! Somebody call a doctor!

Albert, say something!

Just had too many Kndlisch for lunch.

I need my pills.

- Catherine, you know where they are.

- At home.

Edward, you drive me.

All right, you drive him home.

I'll collect your things, Catherine,

and see you at the Caf Descartes later.

Yes?

- Lie down.

- Albert, you want us to come with you?

- Watch out, we're going.

- Goodbye, please.

Wait a minute. How do we get home?

Good question.

It's a lovely night. We'll walk.

Look, I've found my pills.

Now, maybe we can

catch some of this in a glass.

- We should get you out of this.

- Good idea.

Over there. That caf, Edward.

A very bad Albert Einstein joke?

- His first wife divorced him.

- I live too much here, not enough here.

- You have children?

- Two boys.

Hans Albert. His mother named him

while I was out of town.

- And Edward.

- Yes?

No, Edward was the name

of the other boy.

You must have lived here at least twice.

Edward...

How did you first think of atomic fuel?

Well, it just sorta hit me.

- Boom.

- Boom!

Was it a Koestler boom or an accident?

Koestler says accidental discoveries

aren't accidents.

People have moments

of insight and intuition

that they're prepared for by experience

to recognise them for what they are.

- Babbling.

- Babbling?

You're not babbling.

If I had a mind like yours,

I wouldn't stop talking.

I think it's letting up.

- I think she wants to leave.

- She doesn't know what she wants.

- Still raining.

- Still raining.

I think your uncle wants us to dance.

Don't be irrelevant, Ed.

You can't get from there to here.

Why not?

Don't tell me that a famous

and brilliant scientist like yourself

doesn't know about Zeno's Paradox?

- Remind me.

- You can't get here,

because you have to cover

half the remaining distance.

I have to cover half of it.

But I still have half of that remaining,

so I cover half that, and...

There's still half of that left,

so I cover half of that,

and half of that, and half of that,

and since there are infinite halves left,

I can't ever get there.

So how did that happen?

I don't know. It's not possible.

- James!

- No, Ed.

James, I was supposed to meet him.

Go, go, go!

- There we go again.

- We did it!

So we have particle C, Catherine,

in orbit around particle J, James.

Now arrives particle E, Edward,

follows C, becomes a new entity,

C plus E,

which causes J to disintegrate.

"Edward Walters, a local garage

mechanic and amateur physicist,

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