In the Shadow of the Bomb
：Oppenheimer, Bethe, and the Moral Responsibility of the Scientist
( Princeton Series in Physics )
Publication subTitle ：Oppenheimer, Bethe, and the Moral Responsibility of the Scientist
Publication series ：Princeton Series in Physics
Author： Schweber Silvan S.
Publisher： Princeton University Press
Publication year： 2013
E-ISBN: 9781400849499
P-ISBN(Paperback): 9780691127859
Subject： E0-059 Other
Keyword： 自然科学史,军事史
Language： ENG
Disclaimer: Any content in publications that violate the sovereignty, the constitution or regulations of the PRC is not accepted or approved by CNPIEC.
Description
In the Shadow of the Bomb narrates how two charismatic, exceptionally talented physicists--J. Robert Oppenheimer and Hans A. Bethe--came to terms with the nuclear weapons they helped to create. In 1945, the United States dropped the bomb, and physicists were forced to contemplate disquieting questions about their roles and responsibilities. When the Cold War followed, they were confronted with political demands for their loyalty and McCarthyism's threats to academic freedom. By examining how Oppenheimer and Bethe--two men with similar backgrounds but divergent aspirations and characters--struggled with these moral dilemmas, one of our foremost historians of physics tells the story of modern physics, the development of atomic weapons, and the Cold War.
Oppenheimer and Bethe led parallel lives. Both received liberal educations that emphasized moral as well as intellectual growth. Both were outstanding theoreticians who worked on the atom bomb at Los Alamos. Both advised the government on nuclear issues, and both resisted the development of the hydrogen bomb. Both were, in their youth, sympathetic to liberal causes, and both were later called to defend the United States against Soviet communism and colleagues against anti-Communist crusaders. Finally, both prized scientific community as a salve to the apparent failure of Enlightenment values.
Yet, their responses to the use of the atom bomb, the testing of the hydrogen bomb
Chapter