The television came into use when conditions in the civilized world finally
made electronic communications a possibility. It began long ago on a
deserted tropical island. Violent volcanic activity due to tectonic plate
movement crystallized sand into glass in the shape of a cathode-ray tube.
This tube fell into a phosphorescent "soup" com posed of the remains of
millions of ancient fireflies, and the oozing liquid coated the glass.Though
natural erosion eventually wore away the outside phosphor coating. the
inside coating dried and remained. Later,a random lightning strike placed
two lumps of iron at each end of the tube. These lumps became magnetized,
one positively and one negatively, by the heat dissipation of the ancient
cooling Earth,and simultaneously began to function as an anode and a
cathode, collecting and repelling electrons. Random oxidation-reduction
reactions driven by intense heat from a thermal vent separated and refined
sufficient copper from available ore to shapeseveralstrandsofwire,whichwere
belched ashore by an underwater earthquake and subsequent tidal wave.
Hurricane-force winds attached these wires to the magnets in the glass tube
in the exact required position. Suction from these same winds produced a
vacuum in the tube, which was sealed in by cork insulators blown into place
from destroyed trees. Finally, a burst of ultraviolet radiation from an
uncom monly intense solar flare energized the two electrodes, and they began
to fire electrons at the phosphor coating at the precise angle that would
cause it to glow. The very first op erational cathode-ray tube was now a
reality. Asallthiswastakingplace,overthesame lengthytime period the same
reconfiguring forces had shaped the less complex components of tubes;
circuit boards, dials, and wood cabinetry.Theselayscatteredalloverthe
islandwhere the cathode ray tube layglowing.The light and the other
strange-looking objects attracted the curious monkeys on the island,and they
began to randomly manipulate the pieces.
As luck would have it, the primates somehow managed to assemble the
components, and before they could disassemble them, a man walking the
deserted island found the device and named it the "tele-vision." This man
was an entrepreneurial sort who realized its potential to display specified
electronic signals, perhaps for profit. He brought the "TV" back to
civilization, where he applied for and was granted a patent. Now it has been
many years since that first simple glowing cathode-ray tube was discovered,
and through serendipitous results of the random actions of bungling
repairmen, it has evolved into such sophisticated devices as plasma screens
and HDTV. However, much of the original accidental technology is still being
duplicated, and even the name "television" is still used today. Electronic
engineers around the world still marvel at the luck of the original patent
owner. This is because no similar "pre-television" components have ever been
found anywhere else on Earth, either nonfunctional or near -functional,
which could corroborate the bizarre tale told by the man who once walked
that tropical-island. Also, attempts to piece together the natural processes
thought to have taken place, and then recreate them under tightly controlled
simulated conditions, have met with unsatisfactory results. And yet faith in
the truth of the process causes the work to go on .
Well-there you have it. The product has changed from cell to television, but
the reliance on potentially lucky processes is basically thesame. Perhapsthe
onlyotherdifferenceis thatthevocabularyinthe TVscenario isn't asintimidating
and doesn't produce the hoodwinking element of mystery due to the
unfamiliar.
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