Bob Millett: Mormons Need to Get on the Same Page

[_moksha]

Collegeterrace, I found that several in my ward know the name of Dr. Daniel C. Peterson, and are happy he is there to supply the answer to the tough questions, whatever they may be. They don't know what he has answered, but they take comfort that he is there.

[_collegeterrace]

I told my mom and dad that I just wanted to be ready to share and defend the Gospel on my up coming mission.

And do you have a preference for where you'd like to be called on your mission?

Where ever the Lord needs me.

OK I thought Russia would be cool but I heard no more are allowed there?

I see you are from Australia? That would be neat. My grandfather served in New Zealand.

[_collegeterrace]

Collegeterrace, I found that several in my ward know the name of Dr. Daniel C. Peterson, and are happy he is there to supply the answer to the tough questions, whatever they may be. They don't know what he has answered, but they take comfort that he is there.

Are you in a college ward too? UVU ward?

[_Ray A]

OK I thought Russia would be cool but I heard no more are allowed there?

I see you are from Australia? That would be neat. My grandfather served in New Zealand.

Understanding the Aussie accent is only marginally easier than understanding Russian. But it would be nice if you were called here.

[_ludwigm]

OK I thought Russia would be cool but I heard no more are allowed there?
I see you are from Australia? That would be neat. My grandfather served in New Zealand.

Understanding the Aussie accent is only marginally easier than understanding Russian. But it would be nice if you were called here.

There was a MP in Hungary, who - decades before that he was send to that mission - asked what language were the most difficult, the most complicated one. The answer was - unisono - hungarian.

He has learned the language - really, I've talked with him - then our history, our literature, our art.
All hungarians have liked him. Even the decided antis like me.

[_Ray A]

There was a MP in Hungary, who - decades before that he was send to that mission - asked what language were the most difficult, the most complicated one. The answer was - unisono - hungarian.

I'm struggling with basic English! But thanks for the information anyway. I don't know how some of the missionaries going to foreign language missions survived. I had trouble getting the discussions down in English, let alone unisono.

[_ludwigm]

To speak/write in english is a stress, really.

In the last hour I learned that
- the mentioned word should be unison (musicians - apparently with the exception of the english ones - use the original italian words in music, )
- the word music means the playing the sounds and the paper with written notes (one can play music without a music ??? Arrrgh! )

[_moksha]

I always thought Chinese or Zulu Click would be the hardest languages to learn. I have also heard that it was Icelandic and now Hungarian. All these claims. Perhaps I should fast and pray about it.

[_ludwigm]

The Martians

- Enrico Fermi was a man with outstanding talents, he had many interests outside his own particular field. He was credited with asking famous questions. There are long preambles to Fermi's questions like this:
- The universe is vast, containing myriads of stars, many of them not unlike our Sun. Many of these stars are likely to have planets circling around them. A fair fraction of these planets will have liquid water on their surface and a gaseous atmosphere. The energy pouring down from a star will cause the synthesis of organic compounds, turning the ocean into a thin, warm soup. These chemicals will join each other to produce a self-reproducing system. The simplest living things will multiply, evolve by natural selection and become more complicated till eventually active, thinking creatures will emerge. Civilization, science, and technology will follow. Then, yearning for fresh worlds, they will travel to neighboring planets, and later to planets of nearby stars. Eventually they should spread out all over the Galaxy. These highly exceptional and talented people could hardly overlook such a beautiful place as our Earth. - "And so, " - Fermi came to his overwhelming question, - "if all this has been happening, they should have arrived here by now, so where are they ? " - It was Leo Szilard, a man with an impish sense of humor, who supplied the perfect reply to Fermi's rethoric: - "They are among us," - he said, - "but they call themselves Hungarians. "

This is Francis Crick's version of the myth. - A saying circulated among us that two intelligent species live on Earth: Humans and Hungarians - as Isaac Asimov recalled. Hans Bethe wondered quite "seriously" whether a brain like von Neumann's does not indicate a species superior to that of man. - Richard Rhodes has reported: - At Princeton a saying gained currency that Neumann, the youngest member of the new Institute for Advanced Studies, twenty-nine in 1933, was indeed a demigod but that he had made a thorough, detailed study of human beings and could imitate them perfectly. - The myth of the Martian origin of the Hungarian scientists who entered world history on American soil during World War II probably originated in Los Alamos. Leon Lederman, director of the Fermilab, reported possible hidden intentions: - The production of scientists and mathematicians in the early 20th century was so prolific that many otherwise calm observers believe Budapest was settled by Martians in a plan to infiltrate and take over the planet Earth. - (See Kovács' map in this volume, p.45.) As a matter of fact, these suspicious Hungarians - Theodore von Kármán, John von Neumann, Leo Szilard - enjoyed the myth. Edward Teller became especially happy of his E.T. initials, but he complained about indiscretion, - Von Kármán must have been talking. Yankee magazine [March 1980] reported this landing in detail:

- Gabor, von Kármán, Kemeny, von Neumann, Szilard, Teller, and Wigner were born in the same quarter of Budapest. No wonder the scientists in Los Alamos accepted the idea that well over one thousand years ago a Martian spaceship crashlanded somewhere in the center of Europe. There are three firm proofs of the extraterrestrial origins of the Hungarians: they like to wander about (like gypsies radiating out from the same region). They speak an exceptionally simple and logical language which has not the slightest connection with the language of their neighbors. And they are so much smarter than the terrestrials. (In a slight Martian accent John G. Kemeny added an explanation, namely, that it is so much easier to learn reading and writing in Hungarian than in English or French, that Hungarian kids have much more time left to study mathematics.)

Valentine Telegdi recalled his youth [talk in Budapest 1989]: - For a young Hungarian abroad it may be good to hide his Hungarian descent, because if it is made known, too much will be expected of him. People will know that he is one of the Martians of exceptionally high intelligence who use that incomprehensible language.

An obvious explanation of the myth of the Martians may be their strange language: its grammar and vocabulary are quite distinct from those of the Indo-European languages. Kármán and Bárány proudly accented the á in their names at all times, in spite of the opposition of computerized word processors. (The Báránys did so through generations.) When polyglott Valentine Telegdi decided to learn Japanese, he rushed to Budapest to buy a Japanese language book written in Hungarian, because Hungarian grammar is similar to Japanese, while for an English author it is difficult to explain how Japanese think and speak. (Chinese, Japanese, Koreans put family name first, given name as last; in Europe only the Hungarian language follows this rule.)

According to myth, at a top secret meeting of the Manhattan Project General Groves left for the gents' room. Szilard then said: - Perhaps we may now continue in Hungarian! - Hungarian emigrees enjoyed speaking their mother tongue whenever a chance offered itself. This has made them look suspicious. Los Alamos was a place of top security. General Groves was annoyed that Neumann and Wigner had frequent telephone conversations in Hungarian. [Teller, talk in Budapest 1991.] The "thick Hungarian accent" was often heard even in the corridors of the Pentagon. (The Lugosi accent made the alien power of Dracula, the count from the faraway Transylvania even more realistic. )


Tourist brochures advertise Hungary as the country of Tokaji wine, red-hot paprika, gypsy music, csardas dancing. It is less ackowledged that the coach (1400) and the match (1836), ball-point pen (1943) and Rubik's cube (1978), alternating current technology (1885) and streamlined airplanes (1928), tungsten filaments (1905) and krypton-filled light bulbs (1930), radioactive tracing (1913) and the nuclear reactor (1942), electronically programmable computers (1946) and time-sharing computer networks (1960), the BASIC language (1964) and the WORD word processor (1988), among others, emerged from brains born and schooled in Hungary, and changed the way we live in the 20th century. Wigner's student, Alvin Weinberg designed the safe water-moderated nuclear reactors; Wigner's other student, John Bardeen invented the transistor, opening new gates for human progress.


(Excerpts from http://www.kfki.hu/~tudtor/tudos1/martians.html, it is worth to read as a whole.)