When I first contacted Henning Harmuth

Humboldt-Universitaet zu Berlin, German Democratic Republic (GDR), in the year 1974. A nationally-owned test and measurement enterprise had arranged a research project with the Department of Electronics at the Humboldt University: the industry wants to know if the "sequency technique" increasingly mentioned in technical journals is something they need to be prepared for and whether this technology could "endanger" established and proven systems of frequency technique. At the time, I belonged to a group of graduate students that was to answer this question, perhaps even in a dissertation. Nonsinusoidal functions, Walsh functions - a whole new world appeared before my eyes. But research proved quite difficult, as it appeared nearly impossible to access and read western conference proceedings from behind the Iron Curtain. What now? Reprints could be sent to countries in the west, but to East Germany? A miracle arrived in the form of an envelope full of reprints. The return address belonged to Dr. Henning F. Harmuth, Catholic University of America, Washington D.C. With kind regards from the author, I held in my hands a copy of: "Electromagnetic Walsh Waves in Communications", Applications of Walsh Functions Symposium, pp. 248-259, 1970.

The note in the margin of that article was the beginning of a long correspondence that eventually became friendship. Twenty-five years later, our relationship took on a new quality as I was asked to co-author Henning Harmuth's thirteenth book, which was a great honor for me.

The following notes describe Henning Harmuth from a very personal, subjective perspective derived from many years of correspondence, personal encounters and telephone conversations.

Let us begin chronologically. My 1976 dissertation on the foundations and applications of Walsh functions was the first chance to send a paper in the other direction, from Berlin to Washington D.C. The suspense was enormous - what would Dr. Harmuth have to say? It even increased when I heard that Henning Harmuth intended to visit the Academy of Science in East Berlin and hold a lecture during an upcoming trip to Europe. How surprised I was to hear my revered teacher speak in such an unmistakably Austrian dialect. I don't recall the title of the lecture, but that afternoon I guided my American guest through Berlin and had memorized countless facts on buildings and city history - all in vain. We walked around Berlin and spoke of everything else: politics, social systems, goals of scientific work, publicity and science, American universities. Much of this seemed foreign, much astounded me. I met an American who had good things to say about scientists in the Soviet Union and knew the works of well-known Soviet mathematicians and physicists.

A few months after this visit in Berlin, a letter arrived on June 11, 1979 (Indented text in italic font shape is the original text of Harmuth):

Dear Dr. Meffert, the IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society is holding its annual symposium from 7-9 October 1980 at the Hilton Hotel in Baltimore, Maryland. The Sequency Union, which is a Specialist Working Group of the EMC Society, wants to sponsor a program on Applications of Walsh Functions and Sequency Theory at the Symposium. ... Would you be willing to serve as a member of the Publicity Committee for your country?

A circuitous route through the East German higher education system ended not only with the permission to participate in the publicity committee, but also to attend the conference. Leaving husband and children behind in Berlin, in 1980 I flew with a Romanian airline via New York to Baltimore. Overwhelming impressions awaited me, above all the hospitality of Henning and his wife Anne.

When I first met Henning Harmuth at CUA

The largest and most impressive building at Catholic University of America was the church. Professor Henning Harmuth's office in the Department of Electrical Engineering was much smaller and more Spartan than in my imagination, but no less impressive. Its furnishings and order suggested the immense self-discipline with which its inhabitant was accustomed to working. I too got a sense of this discipline: no time for visitors. Instead, lectures, and above all work with graduate students, who at the time were concentrating on the propagation of nonsinusoidal waves. The Professor, or so it seemed to me, demanded from his students that they take his example and exhibit the same discipline and determination and work as hard as he did. Somehow I doubt they were always able to live up to this expectation.

A Fulbright Exchange Scientist

There was a very special reason for Henning Harmuth's second visit to the GDR: the April 14, 1987 Fulbright exchange agreement with the GDR. In his "Observations of a guest professor at the Technical University Dresden", Henning Harmuth writes:

In Spring of 1987 I received a letter from CIES that a Fulbright exchange program with the GDR was about to be signed and that I was invited to apply for an award within ten days. I had been found in a list since I had gone to the GDR in 1979 for an IREX exchange program of the US National Academy of Sciences.

His stay in Dresden was in the spring of 1988, when he lectured and prepared the manuscript for his new book "Radiation of Nonsinusoidal Electromagnetic Waves".

Publication Culture: Writing Books instead of Journal Papers

Henning Harmuth's scientific works always contained explosive potential. The theoretical constructs of mathematicians and physicists, designed to facilitate work and avoid conflict, were questioned and modified. First, Maxwell's equations needed correction; second, the assumption that electricity cannot flow in a vacuum; third, infinite time and space intervals were replaced with arbitrarily large, but finite intervals; and fourth, the quantization of the abstract electromagnetic "field"' was replaced by the quantization of an observable electromagnetic wave. Tough stuff.

Such revolutionary thoughts were not welcome subject matter for scientific journals. Henning Harmuth writes of his attempt to publish his works on the modifications of Maxwell's equations (Indented text in upright font shape is translated from German):

I sent manuscripts on the modification of Maxwell's equations in classical physics to Physical Review (USA) (twice), Journal of Physics A (England), Zeitschrift fuer Physik C and {Nuovo Cimento. From Physical Review I received the most abusive slander, from Journal of Physics A an insulting rejection, Zeitschrift für Physik C declined, explaining they only publish on quantum mechanics. Only the Italian was polite enough to say that the topic was too risky for him. It became clear to me that scientific journals don't need to publish if they're kept alive by a scientific society. Thus, I concentrated on commercial publishers, who have to publish to survive.

A handsome collection of publishers came together this way. Among them the North Holland Publishing Co., D. Reidel Publishing Co., Van Nostrand Reinhold, Wiley Publishers, CRC Press, Kluwer Academic, Oxford University Press, Plenum, Academic Press and the Springer-Verlag, that sold all 2400 copies of each of the first editions of Transmission of Information by Orthogonal Functions.

One particularly exotic incident bears mention here. Henning Harmuth writes:

My book Information Theory Applied to Space-Time Physics is probably the only physics book written by an American to be translated into Russian before it appeared in English. (MIR Moskau 1989, World Scientific 1992). The Russian edition was prompted by extraordinarily good reviews by Russian scientists. I even received remuneration. World Scientific published the book as a result of the Russian edition. A book review appeared in Mathematical Reviews.

These experiences are summarized in the Preface of the fourteenth book Calculus of Finite Differences in Quantum Electrodynamics:

This is the fourteenth scientific book the lead-author wrote either alone or - after age 65 - with co-authors and it will probably be the last one. The following observations of a lifetime of scientific publishing may help young scientists.

Scientific advancement is universally based on the concept of many small steps of incremental science.

This approach founders when one tries to introduce the causality law into electrodynamics in many small steps. Some new ideas cannot be advanced incrementally. They are extremely difficult to publish.

Perhaps the most important human idea ever was to climb out of the trees and to live on the ground. It was, no doubt, strongly opposed by the leading experts of tree-climbing who feared for their status. This principle has not changed. The peer review for scientific publications may or may not weed out publications that are below the level of the reviewing peers, but there is no such doubt about the elimination of anything above that level. Bulldozing through this barrier requires good health, long life, great tolerance for abuse, as well as a conviction that the concept of truth has a meaning in an experimental science and will bring some good.

It is much easier to publish books than journal articles since book publishers must publish to stay in business and books with new ideas are good for their reputation. This is not so for journals of scientific societies financed by membership dues. Dominant journals of large scientific societies are at the forefront of the battle against non-incremental science and the protection of the status of the leading experts of current activities. It would be practically impossible to publish non-incremental science if there were not some editors who understand the limitations of the peer review and make it their life's goal to overcome this barrier. They are among the few who will support ideas that contradict accepted ones. Finding such editors is difficult and time-consuming but essential.

From my own experience I rate the contribution of these editors as important as that of the authors. Science that is not published is no better than science that is not done. We have no way to estimate how much scientific progress is lost because authors were not able to overcome the barrier of the peer review. I want to use this opportunity to thank four editors who have helped me: The late Ladislaus L. Marton (Academic Press), the late Richard B. Schulz (IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility), Peter W. Hawkes (Academic Press), and Myron W. Evans (World Scientific Publishers).

When an article did make it into a journal, it was seldom without consequences. From a letter dated January 12, 1987:

My life is getting more and more complicated. In the November 1986 edition of IEEE Transactions EMC, three articles of mine appeared on the correction of Maxwell's equations. The editor wrote an introduction and also published the reviewers' commentaries --- where they were fit to print --- along with my responses. Unfortunately, the really ''juicy'' parts were never printed, though in the long term, they would have become the most interesting. You will find the reviews and my responses more readable than the articles. Now, in the US scientific community, I'm just as much in the doghouse as I was 20 years ago in West Germany. Back then, I could emigrate to the USA, but now there's nowhere to go.

And in another letter, Henning Harmuth writes:

On the positive side, the principle of radar with a large relative bandwidth is now gaining acceptance from those that need radar. I received a thick report published in the summer of 1985 that seeped through to me 18 months later. You know, sooner or later, everything tends to leak out here: Iran, Contras, Radar, Jefferson's children from a Negro mistress... Although one of the four authors was a bitter adversary earlier, the report comes to the conclusion that "The long-term potential of using large relative bandwidth signals and wideband radar systems in military applications cannot be ignored". So there's money for development - not research.

And a good year later (July 29, 1988), he writes:

In Washington I heard that the Defense Department intends to pour \$11 million into the development of technology with large relative bandwidth beginning October 1. On a long list of important developments, carrier-free radar was listed second. The Soviets have made quite a contribution, since without their publications on this subject God knows how long it would have taken. So now China, the USSR, and the USA are working in this area. On the one hand, that is very satisfying, yet on the other I never intended to develop weapons... Sooner or later I suppose I'll have a final battle with the World Conquerors, but I hope it can be postponed for a few more years.

I have turned down two offers for financial support from the CIA and I have never worked on secret projects. (March 23, 2000).

Writing such difficult books demands extreme exertions by the author - a nearly inhuman endeavor that is hard for the reader to imagine:

I beat the Klein-Gordon equation!!!! At the moment I'm absolutely exhausted and I'll need some time to recover, but I've reached all the goals I set out in this book. We will correct errors for a year and improve the text, but we don't need anything new. The renormalization is complete, both for the pure radiation field as well as for the interaction between massless and spinless particles. Hallelujah!!!!!! (March 27, 2000).

Or:

At the moment I'm feeling better. After weeks of sleepless nights and wasted days, I now know how to solve the inhomogenous difference wave equation. It's a pity how poorly elaborated difference mathematics is in comparison with differential mathematics. You have to derive or invent everything yourself. Difference mathematics is so poorly developed because it's so seldom used in physics, and it's so seldom used in physics because it's so poorly developed!!! (December 17, 2000).

Or:

The first third of the book is now finished. The success with the inhomogenous difference equations reassures me that the book is publishable or soon will be. But the price is that I practically can't sleep. It will take days of idleness before I'll be able to stay awake in the daytime and sleep at night, rather than vice-versa. (March 28, 2003).

Henning Harmuth can indeed be proud of his fifteen books that have "seen the light of day". That these works were accessible to that part of the world that cannot afford Elsevier was always a prime concern of the author. He solved the problem in his own way, by buying 150 copies of all books and sending them around the world (at no small cost):

All 150 copies have been sent. A few will get lost, a few will be stolen, but enough of them will land in university libraries and be preserved for a hundred years or more. That's long enough to get through the second Dark Age. Copies will be returned from India, as the Indian government demands customs duties for books given to Indian universities; some universities in India can't afford a $1 tax on a $ 75 book. These books will come back after nine months and be sent off to universities in more rational states.

A good year after the publication of the fifteenth and ''last'' book, Henning Harmuth writes to the publisher:

After the book AIEP vol. 137 in 2005 I decided to retire from book writing. It did not take long before I was bored to death. Even the cat got tired of playing with me. So I contacted my coauthor of long standing, Dr. Beate Meffert, and we got going on a new book with the working title ''Dirac Difference Equations and the Physics of Finite Differences''. It is heavy duty mathematics but it has new and good results. I hope to have it ready by the end of 2007 and it should have about 300 pages. Here are two questions: .... (September 2, 2006)

Henning Harmuth and Politics

His experiences during World War II as a German Air Force aid shaped Henning Harmuth's interest in politics. From then on, he always had an eye for political weaknesses and aberrations: American foreign policy in particular was a frequent topic of his rigorous analysis and critical commentary. False argumentation and sanctimonious statements by various presidents bothered him immensely. On the second Iraq war he writes on January 15, 2003:

We're curious to see what the Cowboy will do when the UN inspectors - probably - report that they've found nothing. Will he have the nerve to insinuate that this result proves how dangerous Iraq is and that an invasion is necessary? ... God preserve and protect our world from this Cowboy.

Henning Harmuth describes the search for decent journalism like this:

The British Economist is a weekly magazine with sound standards and worldwide reporting. Of course it's quite market-oriented and Capitalism is the only proper economic system. China drives the Economist crazy, because they're successful without Capitalism. The Washington Post is a daily paper that's focused on daily politics in Washington. You can get the - better - New York Times here, but... you need at least two hours to skim it.

I'm pessimistic by nature in all things economic. That's not surprising when you consider that in my youth I first went through the depression, then World War II and finally three years of Morgenthau Plan. Capitalism is a chronically unstable economic system. Even Adam Smith knew that. First efficiency and production increase beyond that of what Feudalism could generate. This is the phase in which Capitalism improves quality of life, although many people in the 19th Century didn't notice, since they paid a high price for industrialization and their wages were barely at subsistence level. But when you begin to produce as much as you need, the troubles begin. New markets are needed to increase the volume of sales. There are limits to that, because the world is finite. Then comes the attempt to create new demand. That part is theoretically unlimited and could go on forever. But practically speaking, it usually proves difficult to create as much new demand as necessary. In the end, Capitalism is made into a religion, by postulating that demand will always exceed supply and that you only need the ''right offering'' to confirm the postulate. In my view, this kind of circular argumentation is typical for religions. In science, we're proud that in principle, every claim can be refuted by experience and experimentation. In religions, people are proud that fundamental claims are irrefutable. (December 15,2003)

Christmas greetings 1993:

You're so unlucky. After 40 years of Socialism, you became Capitalists at a time when Capitalism isn't working out all that well.

Henning Harmuth in a Canoe

Henning Harmuth's means of relaxation was as extraordinary as his way of working. Between 1979 and 1989, he and his wife Anne repeatedly enjoyed unusual outings in northern Canada. Anne reported:

Henning and I alone in an open canoe, 40 days on the water experiencing that eerie sense of loneliness and anticipation known to all who have traveled the rivers of the north. Ahead of us, 925 kilometers of river ... in between, only ourselves - no one else lives here but the ghosts of the past…. Carrying food for 50 days, which at a pound and a half (680 g) per person per day is 68 kg of food. … The lure of the far north for us has more to do with the wide expanses, the aloneness, the complete separation from all we experience in civilized life, the challenge of living in nature for a prolonged period with only a few possessions, and making those possessions serve the purpose, whatever hazard nature hurls at us.

Shortly after the last trip, Anne writes:

Henning has had a bad accident and is paralyzed from the waist down. He was working on the roof of our house and fell and broke his back. He is a fighter and will fight on to be as independent as he can from a wheelchair, but no more rivers for him.

And a few months later:

Henning is home from the hospital after a three-month stay, and is busily discovering how to live in a wheelchair. Where we used to go the wilds of northern Canada for adventure, we now find just living is an adventure. Sometimes the simplest tasks take ingenuity from the perspective of a wheelchair. But Henning has never been one to avoid the difficult and I see him being creative in solving life's problems now, as always.