Theodore Rockwell

Creating the New World: Stories & Images from the Dawn of the Atomic Age
AuthorHouse

404pp, over 50 figures and contemporary photographs

A first-hand narration of the extraordinary people, bizarre ideas, and novel social structure that characterized frontier life in the secret wartime science-city of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where the atomic age was being hatched. After the war, young scientists and engineers fought to convert the operation from a classified Army ordnance project to a world-wide, commercial enterprise encompassing medicine, industry, electricity generation, and a whole new technology and politics that have transformed nearly every segment of our lives.

You get to know these young people as they work to change the world and in turn are changed by the awesome realities they have unleased.

The book won first-place in the Science category of the ninth annual Independent Publishers Book Awards. Judges’ comments included “A scientist who's a splendid storyteller -- what a treat!...I was hooked from the first page…This book is a winner!” The competition attracted 2200 books from 1500 publishers, representing all 50 of the United States, nine Canadian provinces, and 18 foreign countries. This is the third national recognition of Dr. Rockwell’s well-received book. It was acclaimed Book of the Year (non-fiction) in the JADA Press Annual Book Award Competition, and Book of the Month by the Manhattan Project Heritage Preservation Association


SOME ENDORSEMENTS
for Creating the New World

"Presents in vivid, human terms many of the young scientists and engineers who first harnessed this primal force, and the extraordinary times and environment in which they worked and lived...an enlightening and fascinating account."

From the Foreword by the late Dr. GLENN T. SEABORG, Nobel Laureate, Co-discoverer of plutonium, Presidential Advisor, Chairman, US Atomic Energy Commission, 1961-71; Chairman-Emeritus, National Science Talent Search


"Your memoir is a unique contribution to the history of nuclear development in the United States. I don't know of any other book that covers the same ground--which was ground zero for the evolution of this important and controversial technology. The whole vast operation at Oak Ridge during the Manhattan Project has been a blank space in history; the early days of nuclear power development likewise. I don’t see how anyone could go wrong publishing your book. It doesn't hurt that you're an engaging storyteller and that you were present at the creation."

RICHARD RHODES, Independent journalist and historian, winner of a Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award, a National Book Critics Circle Award, a History of Science Society Award, and a Doctor of Humane Letters degree.


"A very important, well-written, and easily read book. Ted Rockwell's part in the development of atomic energy began during the Manhattan project and continues to the present day. With this background he sharply challenges many assumptions that restrict the development of nuclear power and the beneficial uses of radiation."

Dr. FRANK DUNCAN, U.S. Atomic Energy Commission historian, author of the award-winning "Rickover and the Nuclear Navy" and “Rickover: Struggle for Excellence.”


"[Rockwell’s] prose disproves the prevalent belief that no engineer can write. The sentences flow gracefully, with a feel for the rhythm of English that many who make a profession of writing would envy."

CONNIE BUCHANAN, free-lance editor, Editor of Tom Clancy's "Hunt for Red October."


“Stories and Images” born out of the sixty-year old Atomic Age are generally found in the form of bits and pieces of material filed around the world in safes, closets, media files, libraries, museums, congressional records, scientific minds, and in every conceivable type of storage bin imaginable. But Ted Rockwell takes many of these disaggregated fragments and welds them together in a fascinating history that all Americans can read, understand, and enjoy. A gifted scientist, engineer, visionary, and author, Ted has been a front-line player throughout this Age – eminently qualified to tell us the true story and set the images straight.”

Admiral JAMES D. WATKINS, USN (ret), Presidential Advisor, Chief of Naval Operations, 1982-86; Secretary of Energy, 1989-93.


"Ted Rockwell's engaging style and compelling first-hand account give readers of "Creating the New World" an invaluable perspective on the Manhattan Project and its aftermath. Through his stories, we realize that making the world's first atomic bomb was not an impersonal and abstract experience. Ted gives us a glimpse into the emotional and cultural realities of the Manhattan Project where the participants were driven to win the war for the Allies, working six days, 54 hours per week, simultaneously bewildered and inspired by the enormity of the undertaking. Ted's extraordinary gifts--as a scientist and raconteur--make "Creating the New World" a uniquely insightful and entertaining contribution to the literature on the Manhattan Project."

CYNTHIA C. KELLY, President, Atomic Heritage Foundation, Washington, DC


“Any large successful organization, not least that of the World War II nuclear bomb program, requires complex supporting structure of highly competent individuals from different levels of society. This is the story of a young engineer just out of college and with a keen sense of observation who joined the activities being carried out at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and became productively immersed in its structure and what followed. He both saw and experienced much as a committed participant at an important intermediary level at Oak Ridge. He relates his story with a freshness that brings back many memories to those of us who were also engaged in the enterprise in our own way. His saga makes it seem as though it all happened yesterday. This is a wonderful account of the complex experiences of a thoroughly dedicated nuclear engineer.”

DR. FREDERICK SEITZ, President Emeritus, The Rockefeller University; Past President, National Academy of Sciences


“Ted Rockwell has summed up more than a half-century of personal experiences as a pioneer in the nuclear age. His observations are poignant lenses on the key people and events that kindled and then nurtured the nuclear genies of electrical power, nuclear medicine, radioisotopes in research and medicine in industry, and weapons. His book is an important gift to this and coming generations.”

DR. JOHN H. GIBBONS, Assistant to the President for Science & Technology (1993-98), Director, Congressional Office of Technology Assessment
(1980-93)


“In the last few years, unnoticed yet significant developments in nuclear technology have begun to dispel public disapprobation of all things nuclear. Ted Rockwell is a knowledgeable, articulate communicator with the courage born of a lifetime of successful nuclear achievement, practical as well as theoretical. His book CREATING THE NEW WORLD may well be a critical element in further enlightening our fellow citizens to the important and many benefits of nuclear science and technology.”

DR. KENNETH C. ROGERS, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner (1987-1997); President Emeritus, Stevens Inst. of Technology; Fellow, AAAS and of American Nuclear Society

Title of book, magazine article, speech, etc.
SOME REACTIONS TO THE VIRTUAL LIBRARIAN

Virtual book-launching party stirs up interest in real-world book, ‘The Virtual Librarian’

In some ways, it was just another book-launching party. The chatter of the literati, the excitement of meeting a new author, discussing new ideas. But, in many other ways, it was literally out of this world. The venue, for one, was different; a very stylish and attractive lounge called the Activ8 Café. There were some handout booklets available, with the book’s cover, “The Virtual Librarian,” on the front, complementary “blurbs” on the back cover, and some teaser excerpts inside.

Although there were only three copies of the booklets on display, that number remained unchanged even as copies were being snatched up and carried off by eager participants, whose dress and demeanor ranged from jeans-and-teeshirt to extravagantly elegant gowns. Everyone seemed to know each other, but there were no name-tags. Instead, all the names were printed in the air above them, and the names were exotic: imposing monikers like Evis Blackflag and JPatrick Mayne, curious handles like Persis Trilling, and playful names like Twirling Tornado.

The author, Ted Rockwell, addressed the crowd through an invisible microphone. Afterwards, members of the audience asked questions or made comments that appeared silently as printed words in the air.

It was indeed out of this world. The whole event was arranged by TheSLAgency.com and took place in the virtual world called “Second Life,” a thriving community of over ten million inhabitants, who build houses and shopping malls, discuss books and attend dances and concerts, and carry out every type of human activity you can imagine (and some you probably can’t, or shouldn’t). They spend real money, which is one reason they’ve attracted attention in the consensus illusion we are pleased to call “The Real World.” And yes, you can only get there via the Internet.

Participants represent themselves in that world via effigies called “avatars.” These they can costume as simply or elaborately as they wish. By pressing arrow keys on their computers, they can guide these figures through the virtual world. And they can do more. Approaching any horizontal surface, they can choose to sit on it. If it is a straight-backed chair or bench, they will sit properly upright. But if it is a lounge chair or couch, they can throw an arm over one side, and maybe sling a leg over the opposite side.

And how did they pick up those booklets? The booklets contain software that allows them to be picked up (like the software that lets you “wear” a glove). Moreover, the software enables the avatar to turn the pages, and each printed page can be viewed and read on the owner’s computer screen in the “real world.”

Will all this actually sell real books? A lot of Second Life inhabitants think so. Stay tuned.

O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O

Librarians Intrigued by Software Assistants:
Unanticipated Problems and Opportunities Seen

The idea of assistants who manifest as human librarians, but are in fact wholly software, is sparking animated discussion among librarians and information technologists. These “virtual librarians” appear on a user’s computer screen as friendly “tech support” personnel, ready to answer questions and search out additional information sources. If desired, the user could select the gender, ethnicity and other traits of these friendly helpers, who apparently never become impatient or lose their tempers. So what’s not to like?

This subject will be discussed and debated in a Forum Thursday January 17 in the virtual community, “Second Life.” The possibility that these “librarians” could become autonomous figures with “ideas of their own” presents new problems as well as new opportunities.

“Virtual Worlds” like Dungeons & Dragons, SimWorld, and Second Life, build remarkably full and complex interactive on-line communities, but the “avatars” who inhabit these communities are merely effigies—ventriloquist dummies, so to speak—whose every thought and word is spoken, or typed, by a human participant on home computers. These avatars have no new thoughts or suggestions of their own.

Software assistants are something else. Up to now, they have been systems that handle pre-recorded phrases spoken by humans, cleverly selected by software rules and played on demand. An example is the voice you talk with when you want to know if your plane is on time. (There is really no one there, you know. You are talking to a machine.) And there is that patient lady who talks from your car’s GPS navigator: “Keep right. In 100 yards, you are going to turn onto the ramp to I-40 west. Not the first turn; the next right. And then prepare to keep left, because you are going to turn left at the stoplight at the bottom of the ramp.” Informative as she is, she has no original thoughts. Every word has been pre-recorded.

In 1966, Joseph Weizenbaum created the famous computer program “Eliza,” named after the lead character in G.B. Shaw’s play “Pygmalion.” Eliza was a mere 240 lines of software, that could recognize only 36 keywords and knew only 112 responses, 38 of which were constructed from client input. (E.g., “Do you think other members of your family also hate you?” and “How has this problem impacted your life?”) Despite the limited capability of this program, and of the computers of forty years ago, Eliza, as a virtual psychiatrist, managed to fool, for a while, a number of people who thought they were interacting with a living shrink.

A new science-fiction novel, “The Virtual Librarian: A Tale of Alternative Realities,” takes this idea even further. It presents a virtual librarian named Lib, whose software and computers incorporate today’s capabilities, plus two new features. Instead of selecting among a group of prerecorded phrases, Lib uses artificial vocalization, of the type introduced by Ray Kurtzweil about the time of Eliza. The book implies (optimistically) that this enables Lib to extend her conversation beyond any group of pre-recorded phrases. In addition, her software is evolutionary. That is, as she learns from practice, Lib can revise her software procedures, until even her programmers cannot recognize, little alone understand, how she operates.

The January 17 Forum to discuss this issue is open to all residents or visitors to Second Life, and will take place at 3PM PST (8PM EST), in the popular Activ8 Café, under the auspices of The SLAgency (see www.theslagency.com). Ted Rockwell, author of “The Virtual Librarian,” (www.members.authorsguild.net/tedrockwell) will lead the discussion.

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Book Challenges Fearful Predictions
of Machine Domination of Humanity

As machines keep getting smarter, the pundits scare us with their nightmares of the future: Either machines will annihilate the human race or we will be dehumanized into zombies. “If we’re lucky, they’ll keep us around for pets.”

A new book challenges that dreary view. The Virtual Librarian: A Tale of Alternative Realities, a visionary science novel by Ted and Bob Rockwell, suggests another possible outcome: the machines will teach us the importance of our being completely human, so that they can fully carry out their necessary and complementary mechanical functions.

The 85-year old engineer and his son Bob started on The Virtual Librarian over 10 years ago in a series of lively and far-ranging discussions about the unrealized potentialities of virtual reality. When his son died suddenly and unexpectedly in 1998, he shelved the idea. Recently, realizing that science was overtaking his fiction, he picked it up and finished it.

Thematically, The Virtual Librarian is a distinct departure from the author’s award-winning non-fiction releases, including The Rickover Effect and Creating the New World. In addition, his marketing strategy departs from his previous books: Virtual Librarian will be promoted solely, at first, inside the popular virtual world, “Second Life.” Dr. Rockwell states simply: “Where better to find readers for a book about a virtual librarian than in a virtual community of over eleven million people?”

The story pulls the reader into amazing, little-known worlds with intriguing ideas and people, including research engineers and managers, information technologists, mind analysts, and professional psychics, all drawn from the author’s personal experience. The outcome is unexpected but satisfying, leaving the reader to ponder some of the problems and possibilities humanity faces as machines develop minds of their own.

The short, lighthearted story, set in the very near future, is enjoyable just as a story. Its first surprise is that it presents a wholly different kind of virtual world from those historically and currently in vogue. Other virtual worlds, from shoot-em-up arcade games through Dungeons & Dragons to Second Life, let participants represent themselves with on-screen effigies called “avatars.” Although avatars take on an endless variety of forms and costumes, they are functionally just ventriloquist dummies, whose every word and idea is supplied by their human sponsors. The Virtual Librarian, by contrast, is entirely software, like the voice you talk with when you call to see if your plane is late. Or the omniscient voice in your car’s GPS navigator.

This virtual librarian, called Lib, has two advantages over current models. First, she talks with computer-synthesized speech, rather than being limited to selecting among pre-recorded bits of human talk. Second, her operating software is designed to be evolutionary; that is, to change its structure as it learns from experience. Lib’s designers are slow to realize that complex, interactive systems with evolutionary operating procedures inherently become unpredictable and are uncontrollable from outside. It can—and this one does--develop a mind and an agenda of its own.

Is that the first spark of consciousness? Is that how a brain creates a mind? For further information on the author or the book, see: members.authorsguild.net/tedrockwell/works.htm


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The Rickover Effect: How One Man Made a Difference, Naval Institute Press hardback, 1992. Chinese language edition, 1994. John Wiley paperback, 1995. Now available from Authors Guild's backinprint program through iUniverse (2003)
First-hand report from the wartime Manhattan Project secret city of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to initial sea trials of the first nuclear submarine, to laying the foundation for the nuclear Navy, commercial atomic power, nuclear medicine, and a host of industrial and commercial uses of the newly-tamed atom.

The book was highly acclaimed. It was nominated for a National Book Award, and its original hardcover edition (Naval Institute Press), after four printings, was followed by a John Wiley paperback, a Chinese language edition, and excerpts in the Reader’s Digest, both national and international editions. In 2002, the Authors Guild published a new edition that is still in print. The book focuses on the enigmatic, charismatic self-made admiral who almost single-handedly converted the Navy’s major vessels to nuclear propulsion and nearly simultaneously, under President Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace Program, built the world’s first commercial atomic power station and all the technology, trained personnel and infrastructure that sustains it. Most of today’s nuclear power plants are built on that same technology, which has also transformed much of non-nuclear industry, energy production, medicine, research and many hidden aspects of our everyday life.

Excerpts from 37 published reviews:

“Whatever one’s view of nuclear power, this lively firsthand account evokes admiration for the sweep of Rickover’s vision and the sheer nerve that carried him to his dream.”- Brain/Mind Bulletin (Eric Ferguson)

" Rockwell, Rickover’s former Technical Director, has written a notable, anecdote-rich biography of the controversial "father of the nuclear navy." Publisher’s Weekly

“This thought-provoking, well-written and stimulating book is not a standard biography…It is an honest tribute to a man whose greatness will one day be recognized even more than it is today.”
- Associated Press (Norman N. Brown)

“Together with Rhodes’ definitive [best-selling, Pulitzer Prize winning] account…these two works constitute the most important contributions to date on the history of atomic energy.”- Nuclear News (Lawrence Ruby)

“a lively but serious account of scores of incidents that illustrate Rickover’s extraordinary skills and personality. This is the stuff that many historians would like to include in a book but cannot afford to use. The book is vintage Rickover and thus a welcome addition to our understanding of this remarkable man.
Technology & Culture (R.G. Hewlett)

“This book is not just a history of accomplishments or a biography; it is much more…Rockwell has made the book thoroughly understandable, entertaining, thought-provoking, and stimulating to anyone and everyone.” Nuclear Technology (T.J. Iltis)

“[The author} was immensely respected by Rickover. The Admiral admired his technical competence as well as his good judgment and versatility in a host of other problem areas, including political…The writer has a fine ability to describe technical things in easily understood ways.”
The Submarine Review (CAPT William R. Anderson, USN, ret.)

“This book describes in detail and with wit…the difficult, stubborn man whose single-minded drive made his relationship with the Navy volatile and contentious.” - Reference & Research Book News

“…a riveting piece of recent history.” - New Scientist

“This is a candid, insightful portrait as only an insider could write it…about one of this country’s most controversial and elusive personalities. It shows a Rickover who was fierce, supportive, idealistic, pragmatic, sensitive and at times very cruel. . . Overall, this is an interesting book which presents Rickover from a different perspective”. - The Friday Review of Defense Literature (CAPT G.V. Nederveen, USAF)

“This book is a treasure trove of information. . . There are no coverups of the roadblocks put up by the Navy and the Atomic Energy Commission. . . and Rickover’s warts and blemishes are also shown full-sized.” - The Oak Ridger (Elsie Schmied)

“Rockwell has made an interesting and captivating story out of the career of Admiral Rickover…a textbook case for study on political science, industrial management, psychology and moti¬vation. It is a detailed record of one of the most important achievements in military and scientific work.”
B’nai B’rith Messenger (Soll H. Marshall)

"Rickover’s career validates the old cliché that "one man can make a difference." -
The Washington Times (Philip Gold)

The Reactor Shielding Design Manual (editor)

Published separately in 1956 by US Govt Printing Ofc, McGraw-Hill, and Van Nostrand. Widely republished, excerpted, translated and cited world-wide.

Arms Control Agreements: Designs for Verification (co-author) Johns Hopkins Press, 1968
What if one of the many sophisticated arms control proposals the U.S. has proposed over the years were accepted? How would we go about developing and implementing the necessary verification process? Many pundits have suggested that a massive program involving thousands of people would be necessary. This book, looking at nuclear weapons facilities, examines the possibility of using small, highly focused technical teams in new ways.

The Shippingport Presssurized Water Reactor (co-author) Published by Addison-Wesley (1958).
Part of Official U.S. Contribution to 1958 Geneva Conference on Atomic Energy. Cited by American Library Association as "one of the best technical books of 1958." Presents the newly organized and declassified technology underlying most of the world's nuclear power plants.

Vice Versa: Three One-Act Plays
Professionally performed as a staged reading by Source Theater, Washington, DC, 1990