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The Eccentric Father of the Atomic Bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer (2019)
- AndrewKemendo 7y agoTangential: If anyone ever struggles to put theory to practice, this is a great example of the "Great Man Theory" promulgating itself. It checks all of the boxes for the "Radical outlier who changes everything by dint of genius and hard work" while barely acknowledging the circumstances, environment, timing etc... Gifted from birth Non-traditional and "Troubled" socially Ahead of peers and mentors Focused and Driven Overcame institutional/structural resistance This is not meant to detract from Oppenheimer's immense contributions, to the contrary. I thought it was something worth keeping in mind as I read the article - especially considering that Oppenheimer himself would spread credit to others and attempt to dismiss the idea that the Manhattan Project was a "One man show." [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_man_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_man_theory
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- wavefunction 7y ago>dent of genius Sorry, the pedant in me (well, me) must point out it's "dint."
- AndrewKemendo 7y agoThanks for the edit!
- firethief 7y agoThat great discoveries are so often made independently by multiple people when their time has come suggests that if the theory is right, Great Men are a dime a dozen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_discovery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_discovery
- Ididntdothis 7y agoI often wonder if the same applies to business. Maybe Jobs, Gates or Bezos didn't make such an outsized contribution but maybe they were able to concentrate on themselves what other people would have done too. Maybe just a little later or differently. Makes me wonder about Einstein. Were other people working on relativity too?
- zamadatix 7y agoPlenty of people were working on the issues that relativity sought to resolve but I've never heard of any simultaneous discovery of relativity. Many of the other stuff Einstein worked on had multiple "discoveries", I remember reading some about Brownian motion before.
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- glitchc 7y agoAbsolutely yes on the Einstein question. Check out Bohr, Lorentz and Poincare to start.
- joycian 7y agoAnd Hilbert actually beat him to the final equation.
- jorgenveisdal 7y agoActually, he didn’t. I looked into it about six months ago. Einstein clearly got there first. Essay: https://medium.com/cantors-paradise/einstein-and-hilberts-race-to-generalize-relativity-6885f44e3cbe https://medium.com/cantors-paradise/einstein-and-hilberts-ra...
- oska 7y agoGates and Bezos absolutely dispensable. Both just very aggressive opportunists. Gates actually suffocated innovation, not fostered it. The only one of the three you name where you could make a case for them making a real difference would be Jobs (and I say that even though I am a non-fan).
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoThere was a task that needed to be accomplished and nobody cared about who or how, just that it get done. Such was the nature of the times. Many men like Oppenheimer rose to greatness as a result. This pattern seems to repeat itself whenever a society finds itself under existential threat. When society needs great men great men rise to the occasion.
- Vaslo 7y agoHighly recommend the film “Fat Man and Little Boy”. A little melodramatic but an interesting view of Oppenheimer played by Dwight Shultz (Murdock from The A-Team.)
- jorgenveisdal 7y agoObviously also check out the show "Manhattan"
- atombender 7y agoI found that movie pretty disappointing. So much great historical material, a great screenwriter (Bruce Robinson), and yet such a lackluster movie. Both Shultz and Paul Newman are completely miscast. The only good part of the film is the subplot about the John Cusack character (loosely based on Harry Daghlian), which is a pretty good re-enactment of the actual incident. That scene (which is on YouTube) is worth watching on its own. For a much more accurate portrayal of Oppenheimer, check out the BBC miniseries "Oppenheimer" from 1980. In terms of TV, it's positively premodern -- more like a filmed play than a real production. But Sam Waterston is much more true to Oppenheimer's character.
- cfallin 7y ago"Day After Trinity" is also a fantastic documentary in this area! It spends a lot of time on Oppenheimer's character and has interviews with a bunch of his former colleagues.
- senderista 7y agoIf you can find it, the radio play “Atomic Bombers” is excellent.
- arghzoo 7y agoA second vote for "American Prometheus" by Kai Bird! Great follow-on read for "Making of the Atomic Bomb". I read them back-to-back, and it really makes you wonder whether we'll ever have another historical era of as much interest as WWII.
- melling 7y agoThe Making of the Atomic Bomb by Rhodes is often mentioned as a great science book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16884.The_Making_of_the_Atomic_Bomb https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16884.The_Making_of_the_... Recently saw it on Steven Weinberg’s list: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/03/steven-weinberg-13-best-science-books-general-reader https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/03/steven-weinber...
- JKCalhoun 7y agoI remember the section describing the sudden realization Leo Szilard had that kicked off the idea of atomic fission. I had never heard that story. And was it Rhodes book where he described the physicists curiously disappearing from the universities in the early 40's? And when the offer finally came to another physicist to relocate, upon checking out books on New Mexico, would discover that all the scientists that had already disappeared had recently checked out the sam books as well. Edit: Wow, found the Wikipedia article on Szilard. Man that guy was amazing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Szilard#Developing_the_idea_of_the_nuclear_chain_reaction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Szilard#Developing_the_ide...
- atombender 7y agoThe biography that this is based on, "American Prometheus", is fantastic. A fast, smart read. Oppenheimer obviously also appears in Richard Rhodes' utterly superb "The Making of the Atomic Bomb", though he only becomes a main character in the sequel, "Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb", which is also great. Oppenheimer was a highly skilled physicist, but Rhodes attributes his ability to lead the Manhattan Project to his gifts as a "synthesizer" of ideas and knowledge from many people and disparate branches of science. In my opinion he really came into his own, though, after the bomb, when he started formulating the US' atomic energy strategy, essentially inserting himself -- a scientist, not a statesman -- into the political elite by sheer force of will and charisma. Rhodes tells of Oppenheimer completely dominating meetings in early efforts that resulted in the formation of the Atomic Energy Commission (which became the US Department of Energy), essentially writing national policy recommendations on his own. Oppenheimer realized the dangers of nuclear proliferation and detente early on, and wanted the world to own atomic energy as a force for good. He wanted an international organization (what became the IAEA) to control atomic energy and not let the US and UK have a monopoly on it. Oppenheimer also recommended against developing the hydrogen bomb, which he thought would dangerously escalate the destructive power of nuclear arms. This opposition ultimately led to Oppeheimer's trial that cost him his security clearance. But it was his extensive writings on what the future of atomic energy could be that I think set him apart in this years. He was prescient about nuclear arms race and tried to steer the US and the world towards peaceful use of atomic energy. If his policies had been implemented we may have been in a different place today.
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- nhf 7y agoKai Bird is an incredibly good biographer. He just released one of Aldrich Ames, noted CIA / KGB double agent.
- atombender 7y agoI'll check it out, thanks! Edit: You mean "The Good Spy" from 2015, about Robert Ames?
- tyingq 7y agoI remember this being on PBS as a kid during the cold war. Terrified me. https://youtu.be/lb13ynu3Iac https://youtu.be/lb13ynu3Iac
- imjustsaying 7y agoYou may put that memory at ease, he was just acting.
- every 7y agoAnd there is also Doctor Atomic: https://youtu.be/fDTFyinS3zA https://youtu.be/fDTFyinS3zA
- smiljo 7y agoA great summary of Kai Bird's book, which is highly recommended! A really interesting thing to note about Oppenheimer, as the author points out, was a somewhat "haphazard" approach both to studying physics, and in his actual scientific work. Meaning, picking the problems he found the most interesting, rather than some grand, overarching idea. It's always fascinating in reading books of this sort to see just how closely knit the physics community was, since Oppenheimer studied with Born and Thomson, met Bohr as a student, and later worked with a lot of the truly great ones. Even in the macabre poisoning episode, the tutor he left the apple for was Patrick Blackett, a future Nobel laureate.
- elfexec 7y agoThis is a prime example of the winners writing history ( or more aptly those currently in power writing history ). Can you imagine a historian writing a book titled "The Eccentric Father of the Death Camp"? The guy helped build a weapon which destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in a matter of seconds. Oh shucks, what an eccentric and quirky guy he was. Objectively, he is one of history's greatest villains and arguably the one of the greatest war criminals, but luckily, he was on the winning side. If Oppenheimer was japanese and he helped build bombs for the japanese and the japanese dropped nukes on say Baltimore and San Fran during the war, he would have been tried and executed after ww2 by the victorious US. I doubt "The Eccentric Father of the Atomic Bomb" is the titled we'd use if he was japanese.
- jacquesm 7y agoThat is an interesting viewpoint, how do the Japanese view Oppenheimer?
- oska 7y agoFrom an article [1] about Oppenheimer's (invited) visit to Japan in 1960: > As Oppenheimer began his trip, he found the Japanese people grateful, even enthusiastic, at his presence in the country. Aspiring scientists were eager to learn from him, and the majority at least appeared to hold no ill will toward him for the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki that killed hundreds of thousands of people. [1] https://japantoday.com/category/features/lifestyle/j-robert-oppenheimer-father-of-the-atomic-bomb-visits-post-war-japan https://japantoday.com/category/features/lifestyle/j-robert-...
- oska 7y ago> If Oppenheimer was japanese and he helped build bombs for the japanese and the japanese dropped nukes on say Baltimore and San Fran during the war, he would have been tried and executed after ww2 by the victorious US. Your hypothetical assertion is heavily undermined by the actual reality of what happened with Werner Von Braun and all the other Nazi Germany scientists recruited by Operation Paperclip.