I wrote somewhere during the Cold War that I sometimes wish the Iron Curtain were much taller than it is, so that you could see whether the development of science with no communication was parallel on the two sides. In this case it certainly wasn't.

Summary

This quote expresses a wish that the Iron Curtain, symbolizing the divide between Eastern and Western Bloc countries during the Cold War, was taller in order to test the impact of limited communication on scientific development. The speaker suggests that if scientific progress on both sides had indeed been parallel despite the lack of communication, it would have demonstrated the universal nature of scientific discovery. However, the quote implies that this was not the case, indicating that scientific advancements were uneven and possibly influenced by differing political ideologies and resources available in the respective blocs.

Topics