Lord Kelvin/William Thomson
Jan 30th, 2010 | By admin | Category: AnecdotesFrom: chollanamdo#NoSpam.mindspring.com (The Sanity Inspector)
Too bad Kelvin largely remembered as a fount of regrettable quotations
these days–he *did* do a lot of heavy lifting to get us from then to now.
I came into the room, which was half dark, and presently spotted
Lord Kelvin in the audience and realized that I was in for trouble at the
last part of my speech dealing with the age of the earth, where my views
conflicted with his. To my relief, Kelvin fell fast asleep, but as I came
to the important point, I saw the old bird sit up, open an eye and cock a
balefule glance at me! Then a sudden inspiration came, and I said Lord
Kelvin had limited the age of the earth, *provided no new source (of
energy) was discovered.* That prophetic utterance refers to what we are now
considering tonight, radium! Behold! the old boy beamed upon me.
