“What didn’t happen”
“We’ve heard plenty about the test called Trinity, but few people know that what what was most important about the explosion was not what happened, but what didn’t happen.”
“The chain reaction did not get out of control. The atmosphere and oceans did not ignite. The world did not end in a planet-enveloping blaze of light. A few dozen physicists bet everything — all life on the planet! — on their ability to calculate in advance the result of an experiment that had never been tried before.”
“Even Hitler blanched at the stakes.”
“Enrico Fermi, one of the most brilliant of the atomic scientists, offered to take bets on whether or not the bomb would ignite the atmosphere, and if so, whether it would merely destroy New Mexico or the entire world. His macabre humor was not appreciated.”
“When the bomb exploded, the confidence of at least one physicist was briefly tested.”
http://www.sciencemusings.com/musingsarchive/2005_10_16_musings.html
According to Albert Speer, Hitler’s Minister of Armaments, in “Inside the Third Reich”, Hitler rejected out-of-hand the ideas of the top two atomic scientists whom Speer had brought in to brief Hitler — because they were Jewish. The irony is overwhelming.
“A few dozen physicists bet everything — all life on the planet! — on their ability to calculate in advance the result of an experiment that had never been tried before.”
Thats the money quote. How many people would be willing to put all life on the planet in the hands of a few dozen scientists?