Lessons from Asher

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Lessons from Asher
by C.H. Bennett (in absentia)
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I think Ashers most important lesson for other
scientists is his very personal interpretation of
the principle of Occams Razor.
William of Occam Pluralitas non est ponenda sine
neccesitate.
Asher Peres Make it simple, because I can only
understand simple things.
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Teleportation is a simple thing. For his fellow
teleportationists, discovering it with Asher was
among the most fun and important research of our
careers, It is a source of continuing nostalgia.
1994
1999
2003
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We are vain about many aspects of the
teleportation paper, even the figures.
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Ashers efficiently hand coded PS figure was only
2532 bytes. Its caption included a proof that
would have exceeded the Draconian PRL line limit
if wed put it in the main text.
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Asher initially opposed the name teleportation,
on the grounds that it mixed Greek tele with
Latin port. He preferred an all-Greek name,
telepheresis, but I persuaded him to stick with
the teleportation, on the grounds that it was
already a well known word in science fiction, and
would help make us infamous.
It did increase our flow of interesting mail.
For example, in 1997 I got a fat envelope from a
previously unknown correspondent about a minor
car crash shed had several years earlier. The
packet contained a police accident report,
pictures of the dented car, a page of scrawled
notes, and a cover letter explaining it all.
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She seems to believe that showing her evidence to
quantum experts will prevent the past from
unraveling and getting worse.
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A few years later a strange message arrived on my
answering machine My name is Brian. I read
about teleportation, and Im calling you because
I think I may have psychokinetic powers.... Uh
Oh! I just moved a bass drum with my mind. And
yesterday I bent a fork about one millimeter.
Please call me back right away at 602-927-2644!
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The first email of 2004 on the subject was less
worrisome. I'm sure previous to this e-mail you
found your work on quantam teleportation to be
very important, however, I am hoping to add some
urgency to your work. I am in love, and in order
to be there for the most wonderful girl on the
face of the planet, I need to be able to teleport
to her side at a moments notice (to protect her
from one Trevor the Terrible). Now that you
understand the severity of the situation, perhaps
you can redouble your efforts to complete a
working model of a teleportation machine. Yours
truly, Howard N Smith PS If you have a
destruct-o-ray for Trevor, I would be much
obliged if you'd allow me to borrow it. Thanks
again!
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Asher is a well known foe of dogmatism and in the
religious and political arena, for example
resisting efforts to censor a poster on the
gambling habits of the supreme being.
Gd
God
Does God play Dice?
However, he is sometimes more sympathetic to
dogmatism in scientific arena
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besides Ours
I must concede one advantage of the Fuchs-Peres
non-interpretation It probably would not have
tempted the woman with the car to worry that the
past is in danger of coming undone .
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Asher is not religious man, but he sublimates his
religious instinct into a passionate humanism and
a curious hobby of finding religious symbols in
the mineral kingdom, part of the great Book of
Nature..
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Another sign of his broad-ranging interests is
his rumored diplomatic career.
Peres meets with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
in New York 22 October 2001.
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In closing, I would like also to thank Asher for
all he has taught us, explicitly and especially
by example, over the years, and for one last
thing, unwittingly helping me win an argument
with my wife. She complained that my backpack
looked sloppy, more suitable for a schoolchild
than a grown up scientist. She said, Someone
your age ought to have a briefcase or one of
those good-looking shoulder bags for
laptops. Then Asher, my senior and mentor, came
into view, wearing a backpack that was twice as
big as mine and bright yellow.
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