Bombs Quotes
He was one of the team that created the first Atomic Bomb. In 1946, the atomic bomb was known about by almost all Americans and almost no one had even heard of a computer or the concept of a computer. The British and Americans during the war had collaborated to build very limited electronic calculating machines but the concept of programs to control the calculating machines was new—initially created by van Neumann and Englishman Alan Turing. When he made this statement most people thought it was the ravings of a “mad scientist. He was one of the team that later developed the first real computer at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton.”
At the time most people had very limited knowledge of the effect of nuclear weapons. Parts of the government wanted the public to think that survivability of a nuclear attack at the time was much more likely and probable than the reality that then existed. At the behest of these government agencies, advice like this was typical of what the media were publishing at the time.
