> Szilard proposed the possibility of a self-sustaining fission reaction in 1933. In a hypothetical universe where WWII never occurred and the Manhattan Project

> Szilard proposed the possibility of a self-sustaining fission reaction in 1933. In a hypothetical universe where WWII never occurred and the Manhattan Project never existed […] For a good history on this see The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes. It doesn't just look at the MP, but the first third (?) is about how nuclear physics developed in the early 1900s (Rutherford, the Curies, Fermi, etc) as well. Szilard was actually 'inspired' by H. G. Wells' (sci-fi?) novel The World Set Free: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free See also his: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shape_of_Things_to_Come https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shape_of_Things_to_Come