Article

2004-05-24 International-UN-NGOs

Scientists build working bomb, less the fissiles

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Posted by 11A5S 2004-05-24 12:20:40 AM|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1
Meanwhile, something else that might want to take a look at:

http://www.smartmobs.com/archives/003228.html

Would appreciate your opinions/analysis/comments on this.
Thanks.

Posted by Jay 2004-05-24 1:39:38 AM|| 2004-05-24 1:39:38 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 See also the excellent article at :
http://www.thebulletin.org/issues/2003/ma03/ma03stober.html

"Thirty-nine years ago, in the dusty ranch town of Livermore, California, the U.S. government secretly chose three newly minted post-doc physicists, put them off in a corner of a laboratory with no access to classified information, and told them to design a nuclear weapon."...

Posted by Anonymous4134 2004-05-24 6:13:34 AM|| 2004-05-24 6:13:34 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 While I agree with the premise of the ever-increasing power and sophistication of engineering design tools, a lifetime spent using, designing, building, and testing military electronics leads me to inject the following caution: Just because your simulation works doesn't mean you can build it or, if you can build it, that you can get it to work!

As far as nuclear weapons go, unless you have a Q clearance, you don't have a clue what you're talking about. I think this was just another publicity stunt by brain-dead politicians like Biden.

Posted by RWV 2004-05-24 11:16:27 AM|| 2004-05-24 11:16:27 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 RWV: We often go through two or three revs of a chip because the design tools aren't quite spot on. However, we now have teams of three or four (not counting backend) designing incredibly complex devices that would have taken scores of skilled engineers 20 years ago. In fact, many of these devices couldn't have been designed 25 years ago -- the paper and pencil design methods would have broken down.

As to having a Q clearance... A.Q. Khan didn't have one as far as I know. Physics is physics. Apparently the team in Anon4134's story did go before people with Q clearances and were told that their design was good.

Speaking of A.Q. Khan, how long will it take before someone takes his blueprints, digitizes them, and puts them on the web? Maybe one out of every three teams will get the design right. The plans of the one that works get further disseminated. Then we're in the land of the Three Conjectures.

Posted by 11A5S 2004-05-24 12:14:13 PM|| 2004-05-24 12:14:13 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 If Slow Joe Biden sez it works, you can assume the opposite.

Posted by Frank G 2004-05-24 12:15:51 PM|| 2004-05-24 12:15:51 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 If we put one thousand monkeys in a large room with paper, pencils, computers, etc., how long will it take them to come up with a feces bomb?

Posted by Alaska Paul 2004-05-24 3:49:38 PM|| 2004-05-24 3:49:38 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 Oh wow!!! a working nuclear weapon without the fissile material how very significant.

That can go with my working martini without the gin or vermouth.

Posted by Russell 2004-05-24 9:21:07 PM|| 2004-05-24 9:21:07 PM|| Front Page Top

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