By: Donald V. Watkins
Copyrighted and Published on September 25, 2020
To my colleagues Mr. Johann Jordan, Dr. Donatus O. Mbanefo, and Mr. Isaac Culver:
I apologize for communicating with you through this public channel, but I have no other means to share the important information with you that is presented in this article. Hopefully, your family members will read this article to you the next time you speak with them.
Our work on the Navier-Stokes Equation was mentioned in my August 28, 2020 article “Knowledge Fuels Success”. Following the publication of this article, a highly regarded potential end-user located outside the United States established contact with me. This end-user is extremely interested in our body of specialized knowledge regarding the phenomena presented in the Navier-Stokes Equation. Their focus is obviously on the military application of this body of knowledge.
The U.S. Bureau of Prisons separated us before our four-man advanced math/physics team could: (a) reduce our Navier-Stokes Equation work to a formal document that is suitable for legal protection under domestic and international property protection laws; (b) conduct the requisite internal verification (as a team) on our final technical document; and (c) subject our findings to a critical review by a qualified third-party firm. The potential end-user may be interested in facilitating the last two tasks under a mutually beneficial arrangement.
Unlike researchers in the “free world”, we have some special factors that must be considered as I move forward with this potential end-user. I will discuss a few of them with you.
First, as inmates in a federal correctional facility, the four of us are technically and legally “slaves” by virtue of the express language in the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. We have no “personal rights except those which the law in its humanity accords to … … a slave." Ruffin v. Commonwealth, 62 Va. 790, 796 (Virginia Supreme Court, 1871) We are deemed “civiliter mortuus” and whatever property rights we have are to be “administered like that of a dead man." Ruffin at 796. To my knowledge, America is the only civilized nation where this form of “slavery” is constitutionally protected.
As “slaves” we are prohibited from commercializing our Navier-Stokes Equation body of knowledge while we are held in captivity. However, nothing prohibits us from packaging this body of knowledge and sharing it with interested parties who are free to commercialize it. Furthermore, the potential end-user in our case is affiliated with a longtime European ally of the United States.
If we team with this potential end-user, we would seek intellectual property rights protection, in the first instance, in a European nation where inmates are not legally designated in the national constitution as “slaves”. Under international intellectual property protection treaties, we would have clear legal protection everywhere, except in the U.S. where we remain classified as “slaves”.
Second, our team was not comprised of theoreticians in advanced mathematics or applied physics. As such, our approach to identifying, explaining and solving the phenomena presented in the Navier-Stokes Equation focused on the end use of our body of knowledge. From there we worked backwards. This approach contributed greatly to our success in solving the Navier-Stokes Equation.
Except our legal status as “slaves”, our situation is very similar to the one faced by Guglielmo Marconi. With no formal education in advanced mathematics and applied physics, the Italian-born Marconi developed and commercialized wireless telegraphy in 1906 for transatlantic ships. Europe’s academic and scientific communities universally dismissed Marconi as a “fraud”. Yet, in December 1909, Marconi won the Nobel Prize in physics for his wireless communications systems.
We must follow Marconi’s approach in introducing our Navier-Stokes Equation work to the world. This will likely give us the best chance to free ourselves from the gravitational pull of the systemic racism embedded in the United States scientific community.
Third, the United States is a deeply divided nation today. It is a nation at war with itself. Based upon its current state of tribal politics, there is no doubt that America will descend into further political chaos. We do not need our specialized knowledge diminished by the stereotypical views held by white Americans about the scientific achievements of black Americans. I watched this subtle form of intellectual racism play out when my brother, Levi, Jr., co-developed the Automatic Implantable Defibrillator and successfully implanted the first device in a human being at John Hopkins University Hospital in 1980. I also saw it happen when my sister, Marie, developed the mathematical algorithms for Bell Laboratories in the 1970s and 80s that facilitated the electronic transmission of data through a network of global satellites. We must learn from their experiences with intellectual racism.
Fourth, I have our worksheets, research notes, technical drawings, algorithms, theorems, data on electromagnetism, kinetic energy, motion, friction, gravitation calibrations, sound and wave calculations, and reference materials on the Navier-Stokes Equation. I have committed a lot of it to memory. I will reduce our team’s findings to a formal document and shepherd it through the myriad of challenges facing us.
Fifth, each one of us has been and continues to be grossly mistreated in the U.S. criminal justice system. Throughout our lives as African-Americans, we loved America even though she did not love us back. The potential end-user presents the best opportunity to present our body of knowledge to the free world. I will pursue this opportunity with that goal in mind.
The scientific research community has been trying to solve the Navier-Stokes Equation for over 100 years. The “solution” has paradigm-shifting importance in the military world and its commercial applications are limitless.
At the end of the day, knowledge is power. Knowledge knows no color, social status, or nationality. Superior knowledge on highly technical matters that has military applications opens many doors of opportunity, even for U.S. “slaves”.
The beauty of our case lies in the fact that four black “slaves” at the Talladega Federal Prison Camp developed the superior knowledge on the Navier-Stokes Equation that has eluded “free men/women” around the world for over a century. Our ancestors would be extremely proud of us.
Congratulations guys for a job well done! What we accomplished in Talladega under the most difficult of circumstances will be recorded in the annals of history for generations to come.
Please remember that our reunion will be held on August 28, 2029 at 10 a.m. in Geneva, Switzerland at the international headquarters of the Lombard Odier Group. We will have a lot to celebrate.
Mr. Johann Jordan, you are a pure genius in advanced mathematics and a great human being. I hope your mother, Mary Jordan, will join us at the Lombard Odier. If she does, I’m going to kiss her for bringing you into the world. We are life-long friends. Thank you!
