From: Bob Bernstein  <elided>
To: "Holton, Gerald" <elided>
Subject: Go Webb         
Date: Mon, 27 Dec 2021 02:12:06
User-Agent: Alpine 2.23.2 (DEB 509 2020-10-04)

Early Christmas Day I watched the picture-perfect launch of the James Webb Telescope from French Guiana. When I motioned to my wife to come in and look at my computer screen, I was so on the brink of tears that I could only motion to her to look at NASA's stream of images.

NoW it's early Monday morning and I am daydreaming that I am standing in that remote country watching the launch in person, and have next to me, as a companion, Percy Bridgman. I want to say him, "THERE'S your "ascription of physical reality!"

No one, I believe, but for Bridgman, knew how flimsy most of our intellectual efforts to make that ascription, say, of a concept or an operation, really were. I understand his frustration (exasperation!) when he wrote that it -- this elusive ascription of physical reality -- was mostly, for the physicist, a matter of "convention and convenience."

But Saturday morning that "problem" seemed irrelevant. If approached with respect and a profoundly careful depth of perception, she will eventually vouchsafe us another tiny peek behind the curtain. So the French team, exultant at their STUNNING success, could only shout "Go Webb!"

My hopes and prayers are that this note finds you and yours doing okay.

Very best regards,

-- 
Bob Bernstein