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Particle Physics Resurrects Alexander Graham Bell’s Voice

119 points| sohkamyung | 8 years ago |spectrum.ieee.org | reply

19 comments

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[+] Lordarminius|8 years ago|reply
I recall a documentary I watched a while ago, and had almost forgotten, about an African tribe in which the presenter plays a 100 year old old voice recording of the natives' ancestors made by an earlier explorer . You could see the astonishment and joy in their faces when they heard the voices and names of tribe members they had heard about but never even seen. (If anyone else has seen the documentary please remind me of its title)

We tend to place great emphasis on pictures and video, but audio recordings I believe, capture the past like none other. There is a connection here that is unique.

Great work by the creators of IRENE. Much praise also to Bell and his team, and all the other uncredited contributors to the development of the telephone.

I'm sure to start making audio recordings to store up for future generations.

[+] kthejoker2|8 years ago|reply
Can only concur in that hearing these recordings brought an involuntary tear to my eye. Something something human spirit.
[+] beamatronic|8 years ago|reply
You may already have voice memos and voicemails on your phone right now. Take a moment to email them to yourself so you have another copy that’s easy to get to.
[+] macintux|8 years ago|reply
You don't think they would have been even more excited to both see and hear their ancestors?
[+] your-nanny|8 years ago|reply
It's gray-ham bell, in his own voice. Can't in good conscience use the short vowel a any longer
[+] ljcn|8 years ago|reply
Not surprising as he grew up in Scotland, and that's how Britons today still pronounce Graham. Perhaps Graham was widely pronounced that way in Canada and the USA at the time too? I don't know.
[+] fovc|8 years ago|reply
It was also a very soft H, almost like gray-ahm
[+] ggchappell|8 years ago|reply
> Bell knew there was a distinct possibility of a patent fight with Edison, so on three occasions he had papers and experimental products sealed in tin boxes and deposited at the Smithsonian Institution for safekeeping.

You can (or could) do that?

[+] saalweachter|8 years ago|reply
For some reason this reminded me of the Narmer Palette, (one of?) the oldest artifacts naming a king and his works.
[+] leereeves|8 years ago|reply
Where's the particle physics?
[+] ddavis|8 years ago|reply
The same technology used to align the silicon detectors for ATLAS (one of the detectors on the LHC) was used to recover the audio. (article mentions optical metrology)
[+] txsh|8 years ago|reply
It doesn’t seem right that a man who fought so hard to prevent deaf people from being taught sign language now gets to be heard forever.

Bell was a despicable monster whose work led to forced sterilizations in the US and to the holocaust in Germany.

If it had been me, I would have smashed the disk.

[+] DoctorOetker|8 years ago|reply
the IEEE is turning into an advertisement network?

I just hope the next floating point format does not do:

2E3 CocaCola + 3E4 BigMac =3.2E4 McMenu