Page 43 - MJM2_1_FULL_RCD

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spr ing
|
summer
43
An inauspicious start
it may have been, but
the Montgolfier brothers’
first hot-air balloon
flight featuring a craft
made of paper and held
together with buttons
was the beginning of
man’s ascent into the
heavens
A Place In History
Naturally, I studied everything that had to do with the Montgolfier brothers.
But what I found was more intriguing than technology. The hot-air Montgolfier
balloon was completely inferior to the one invented by Professor Jacques
Charles, who developed a hydrogen-filled balloon and flew it (along with its
builder, Marie-Noel Robert) on the first of December 1783. Why did Charles
not fly first and take his place in history? He could have, as the Montgolfiers
sent their craft aloft less than two well-publicized weeks before. Charles had
thought about the design very carefully: features he invented are still used.
I came to see ballooning as a microcosm of the history of science and
indeed the entire human journey. Ballooning teaches compelling, universal
lessons. Why is Professor Charles merely a footnote? What inspired the Mont-
golfiers? Their balloon was made of paper, held together with buttons, with
an open fire in the basket. They planned to send up condemned convicts
as the first humans in flight, no physical courage needed. But they had the
intellectual courage to attempt the impossible, to invade what many saw as
the “Territory of God.” They made the intellectual leap; the rest was easy. And
indeed at the last moment Jean-Francois Pilâtre de Rozier, a physicist, per-
suaded the King he should go because it would be a great honor to be the first
man to fly. But his was an easy choice, long after the Montgolfiers made the
intellectual leap.
Intellectual Courage Required
I soon found other examples of the importance of intellectual courage. Young
Darwin recognized evolution but took much of his life to gather the intellectual
courage to publish his theory of evolution. Einstein needed enormous intel-
lectual courage to turn physics upside down. But he never had the intellectual
courage to accept all of Quantum Theory. He could not accept the contradic-
tions to all practical experience and 400 years of Newton.
What started me thinking was a unique balloon flight I made over the Nazca
Lines in Peru. The Nazca desert is covered with abstract designs and depic-
tions of animals which can only be seen flying over them. Rediscovered by
early aviators, they have been untouched since prehistory. Some speculate
they were created to attract “alien spacecraft,” but this seems unlikely. How-
ever, would da Vinci have created the Mona Lisa if he could not step back
to admire his work? I was determined to see if the Nazca people could have
flown over their work.
I commissioned a balloon made of cotton fabric copied from examples in
local museums. The basket was created by a family that has made reed boats
since prehistoric times. Heat came from an open fire burning native timber.