This page is for site visitors to post remembrances and thoughts at the time of Dr. Pournelle’s passing (8 Sep 2017). Your thoughts can be added using the form at the bottom of this page. Comments that are not related to words of encouragement or condolences will be removed.
Dr. Pournelle’s family appreciates those that have taken the time to send condolences and well wishes.
For those that are interested in Dr. Pournelle’s books, please see the e-books page or the Amazon page . Here’s a list of all of Jerry’s books: All The Books.
Jerry’s last post is here. The text of the eulogy given at the memorial is here. Site news is here. – Editor
I haven’t spoken to you since that Comdex sometime after the first Space Stuttle tragedy (And you predicted another. Correctly I might add) It was very enjoyable to be able to chat with you, your lovely wife and your son. As I recall you showed off your background in human psychology with a demonstration of behaviour modification. The Cookie in the Wine. Bleck! I was certainly surprising to see how quickly the room started doing it when they overheard you say this was very popular in France and oh how wonderful it was.
In any event I want to wish you the best. I also want to encourage you in your recovery. My brother suffered a stroke that left the left half of his body totally numb. He recovered (we think) by practicing the drums (Duct taping a drum stick in the numb hand) His doctors were quite astonished at his recovery but I think it makes sense. The ability to drum well involves being able to operate your limbs independantly. That would seem to me to be a good was to excersize the brain into finding the proper circuts that are functional. And better rhythm = success. If you can’t measure something you can’t really judge whats working. Correct? If wearing upside down goggles can signal the brain to do a 180 flip why not train the brain to use a different path to recover function.
He played the Drum with one hand and played the piano with the other at his wedding (Waited until his 60s to take the plunge) Someone asked me if I had every seen someone with a serious stroke play piano and drums at the same time (I said no) then the same fellow commented, “Have you ever seen someone who has NOT had a stroke do this?”
ar Dr Pournelle,
Hving not ben on this site in a while, I discovered this “well wishes” link, and am pleasedto wish you a full and speedy recovery. You are in my prayers. Ever since I first saw you at MidAmeriCn in 1976,holding forth with on everything from politics to space, you have been t the top of my list of Most Interesting People. Get Well!
I just came across your name in my recent web browsing efforts and would like to wish you all the best on your recovery from an “episode” I say that in quotes because so many years ago I read a story in Reader’s digest about a gentleman who had a stroke and always referred to it, as his “episode”. The reason I was so interested was I had a train accident and lost both legs in 1960 and I regularly attended a rehabilitation centre. I travelled with one lady who had suffered from stroke and could only walk with a cane and assistance. I wanted to know more about what happens and why. There were many people at the rehab centre who suffered from stroke and all were slowly getting back on their feet. I finally did too, albeit the feet were artificial. I hope your recovery is going well, and I also wanted to thank you for the stories you had written with Larry Niven I enjoyed them and while I have difficulty ready these days I still have two books beside the bed which I keep saying I will start on one of these days, nevertheless thanks again and godspeed. Cheers Ben Wilkat
All the best to you and your family and wishing you a speedy and full recovery.
I am privileged to have worked with you on reports for the Citizens’ Council. You are a major influence in my life.
Thank you for everything!
Sincerely,
Michael Hyson
Merry Christmas, Jerry, to you and your family.
Jerry,
Just wanted to wish you well, and to let you know I have enjoyed many of your books, Byte columns, and your website. Hope you are at full strength soon.
Robert
Long time admirer and reader. Wishing you well and hoping recover continues.
Hope you are well and stay well. You’ve provided high quality food-for-thought material for decades.
With much Appreciation and Best Wishes,
Vit
I’ve been reading your notes from Chaos Manor since I stumbled into my first computer job: writing 8080/8085 Assembly Language…early 1981. My “best friends” were a book by Lance Leventhal, a plastic sheet by James Lewis with “everything you need to know” about the 8080/8085, and Byte Magazine: especially your column and those amazing covers.
Best wishes, hopes, and prayers for your recovery!
Regards,
John Welch
I have been reading your chaos manor articles since the early days of byte. I had quite the collection, until the parents threw them out. Ver sorry to hear of your stroke, glad to hear that you are getting better.
Wishing you all the best in your recovery.
I’m sorry to hear of your stroke & wish you a speedy and complete recovery. You are a blast from my earliest foray into the world of computing and one of my trusted sources of discovery. Your name jumped out as I was trying once again to surf the name of my favorite word processor. Eureka! The hole in my memory was restored. Q&A. I used it on my 1st computer that was a hand-me-down from my brother. PC Jr with a memory sidecar & the upgraded keyboard from “the chicklet.” Basically self-taught with only the manual, I’m proud to say I actually got AutoCAD to load so I could gaze at it’s non-functioning main view with a memory drive allocated to the byte. 640k and one 5 1/4 floppy drive. Q&A, dBASE, & wordperfect were a piece of cake. The best game ever programmed was my diversion. Indianapolis 500 was a paltry 50k & using only CGA & joystick you could race the entire 500 miles (or various other race modes) against all other 33 cars complete with pit stops. Tire pressure, sway bar, wing and various other adjustments adjustments were all available in pre-race & pit stops, and several were in-car adjustable on the fly and they worked perfectly! I could lap at 220 in qualifying trim. The driving was so flawless that the CGA limitation just melted away as I watched the other cars dodge and pass each other and disappear in my mirrors. You could even drive the wrong direction & enjoy watching the others dodge you and revel in their loss of control & debris-flying crashes that could be watched in the multiple replay camera views including barrier cams & even a helicopter cam.
I hope this serves as a token of appreciation of your gift of knowledge, especially the answer of Q&A.
Bill
I’ve been reading and enjoying your works for a long time. I wish you a complete recovery! And write for many years to come!
Best wishes for a rapid and complete recovery!
Bob
Jerry,
You’ve definitely had some challenges in the last 10 years or so. I hope that your health continues to improve and that you have a long life of good health.
Hi Jerry…your blog has frequently marked significant trends in Technology and History. I cam across an article written by Conrad Black (Former Canadian Media Tycoon and convicted Felon who spent time in US prision) on July 4 2015. A portion of the article unrelated to July 4th veered that way. I don’t know why I am sending this other than when I read it I thought of you and thought…what the hell…
Conrad Black (From Nationalpost): “As this is being published on the national holiday of the United States, I offer my traditional greetings to that country, which I know well, from its highest to lowest echelons (i.e. from the White House to the prisons). Americans are right to celebrate their great country, that has until recently enjoyed a rise among nations without the slightest parallel in the history of the world. The achievement of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington in persuading the British to evict France from Canada, and then France to assist them in evicting Britain from America, was an astonishing tour de force, as was Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine’s achievement in selling a grubby little tax war as the dawn of human liberty.
“Americans had no more rights after their Revolution than before, other than a government in their own country, and no more than citizens of Britain and a number of other European countries already had. If the Americans had just remained within the British Empire, they would have been running it in one long life-time, would have ruled the world less than a century after Yorktown, would have made short work of any Confederate insurrection, and would have avoided the World Wars. (Not even Germany’s hyperactive Kaiser would have gone to war simultaneously against Britain, France, Russia, and the U.S.) The Declaration of Independence, 239 years ago, defamed poor old George III and even accused him of trying to impose French civil law on Americans.
“But the great American mythos is no less reverently touted for being largely a fiction, and Americans are still right to celebrate the birth of so important and successful a country. It is not the America I once knew and admired, and to which the world owes the success of democracy and the free market, but I wish it well. “
Jerry,
I remember reading your articles in BYTE during the Eighties. I wish you well and hope to read your work for a long time in the future.
Best regards
Ondrej /Slovakia/
My very best wishes for your continued recovery, joy and prosperity !
You have given so much of such value,to the world, and yet we all hope to hear much more from you.
Tom
Jerry,
It’s been more than 10 years since we last exchanged emails. I saw today that you have been unwell recently. I wish you a very speedy recovery and many more years of active work for the things you do so well.
I also want to thank you for launching my writing career at BYTE.
Wishing you all the best for many more years to come
Moshe
Dear Dr. Pournelle,
Your novels have given me many hours of thought-provoking entertainment. I am happy to hear that you are recovering and wish you well with your work.
I am so glad that you are doing better. I find it very difficult to tell you how important you works and collaborations are to me. Thank you so much!