Frederick Soddy Quotes
It is probable that all heavy matter possesses—latent and bound up with the structure of the atom—a similar quantity of energy to that possessed by radium. If it could be tapped and controlled, what an agent it would be in shaping the world’s destiny. The man who put his hand on the lever by which a parsimonious nature regulates so jealously the output of this store of energy, would possess a weapon by which he could destroy the earth if he chose.
The lecture was on radium and the radioactivity that scientists had recently discovered. This appears to be the first time a scientist suggested the possibility of using atomic energy to produce a powerful weapon. At the same time, note that he also mentioned the possible destruction of the earth. “Heavy matter” referred to the elements—many of which had not yet been discovered—that had larger atomic numbers than radium like uranium.
Frederick Soddy `1877–1956, English Scientist, Lecture to the British Military Royal Engineers, 1904
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
This declaration, drafted by Russell and Einstein two days before Einstein’s death was signed by a number of other prominent scientists.
There was no problem with Iran having nuclear power. However, they wanted to utilize a process with which fuel for nuclear bombs could be made. Russia had offered to provide them with nuclear fuel for any power plant that they might want to create, but Iran refused insisting that they had a right to enrich their own uranium. Then they lied to the inspectors for the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission. They had threatened to “wipe Israel off the map” and the major Arab nations in the area secretly asked the United States to prevent Iran getting nuclear weapons even if force had to be used. Economic sanctions were tried first.
He was the first man to see the experimental evidence of nuclear power and he realized that it had the potential for an incredibly powerful weapon. It was his message about the possibilities about the atomic bomb that Albert Einstein transmitted to FDR, leading to American development of the bomb.(See {624449}.) By the time the atomic bomb had been developed, Germany had surrendered and Szilard and others felt that there was no longer a need to beat the Germans to the development. So he went from the biggest enthusiast to the most serious opponent.
he cupped his two hands Fermi was the scientist who organized and planned the first controlled nuclear chain reaction
Rutherford had been the first to split the atom in 1919.
Breslin was criticized in a Federal report for his alarmist news coverage of the Three Mile Island nuclear mishap:
The atomic bomb had just been used the year before. However, in the next decades, nuclear weapons were not used again as those nations with nuclear capability also had potential enemies with nuclear weapons. The fear of Mutually Assured Destruction prevented nuclear weapons from being used for a long time.
The enriched nuclear fuel could be used to operationalize a nuclear bomb. Iran had a history of using illegal poison gas in the Iraq-Iran War (Both sides used chemical weapons.) Iran had a history of aiding terrorist organizations. And Iran is the only nation belonging to the UN and sighing its charter in modern history that has threatened to destroy another nation via their President whose threats had not been retracted. Iran also is a Shiite Muslim nation and is at odds with the Sunni Muslim countries of the Middle East and if the Iraqis developed a nuclear bomb, there would be a Middle Eastern nuclear arms race. If Iraq would not cease its development program under pressure from other nations, a military attack was the other option. All were indeed ugly.
He made this quotation in a discussion about nuclear weapons, but the principle is valid for many areas from the Internet to pharmaceuticals. In the nuclear weapons case there have been a number of accidents – including fatal ones – over the years and on several occasions a nuclear weapon came close to detonating near populated areas. In one case, radiation damage from a crash of a nuclear weapons equipped bomber have made an area in Spain unusable for years into the future.
Frederick Soddy FRS was an English radiochemist who explained, with Ernest Rutherford, that radioactivity is due to the transmutation of elements, now known to involve nuclear reactions. He also proved the existence of isotopes of certain radioactive elements. He was a polymath who mastered chemistry, statistical mechanics, finance and economics.
