Thread

1. Danox · 1790966531 · focus · HN ↗

   Germany’s racism/ethnic/religious hate killed their efforts for the bomb..

   1. unrented7977 · 1790967239 · focus · HN ↗

      As much as I'm sure that gives you the warm fuzzies to think about, it's utter nonsense. That's not how this works.

      1. lambdaone · 1790968110 · focus · HN ↗

         It's absolutely how it worked for the Manhattan Project.

         1. slashdev · 1790972207 · focus · HN ↗

            How so?

            1. w0de0 · 1790978652 · focus · HN ↗

               Oppenheimer, as well as many other Manhattan Project researchers (eg Rabi & Weisskopf), were first or second generation German-Jewish immigrants/refugees. Max Bonn, Oppenheimer’s mentor, was also a refugee in the end; Oppenheimer was born to immigrants in the US but studied under Bonn in Germany prewar.

               Moreover, the physical foundation for atomic power was largely the work of German, often German-Jewish, scientists.

               So it’s plausible to suppose a counter-factual in which Germany, one less crippled by bigotry (and it is a disability…), develops the bomb.

               And it’s not just the bigotry: it’s the anti-intellectualism. Einstein could write a letter to a well-educated patrician of the New York Dutch aristocracy (FDR), and so help change the world. The pig farmer and the corporal would never have read such a letter (even if were they not already trying to murder the writer and all his cousins for nonsense reasons).

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