Dearest Jeff:
Although we have not seen much of each other in recent years, I think that you know of my deep affection and admiration for you.
This is not directly based on your science per se, but rather on your values, which have permeated your whole life.. private and public, scientist and teacher/mentor, humanist and mensch.
These include, but are no means limited to, honesty, integrity, true scholarship, concern for others more than for yourself, and the conviction that your neuroscientific work, which is widely regarded as the premier recent and contemporary understanding of the structure of the central auditory system, is making this wholly unfair and very often crappy world, a better place. I share your conviction.
I think you would be, and should be, gratified to realize that both your persona and your science have had a far greater positive effect on people and on your discipline than you probably could imagine.
Even when you are no longer with us in body, you will be with us in spirit, both tangibly in your effects on people and less tangibly in the Byzantine paths through which a lone Scientist affects the future of his Science. Generations of neuroscientists will owe you a debt even when they will not know your name.
I certainly am among the fortunate relatively few who can count you among their friends, whose lives have been enriched both personally and professionally. I do know who Jeff Winer is and I will not forget you, ever.
I have a very simple view of life. It is that a person's contributions to this orb are in the values that he or she has lived. Your life is SECOND TO NONE.
Norm Weinberger
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