>> ^The_Ham:

I was taught that when Ive made a mistake, I need to take action to make things right, not get paid to do interviews about it.
First, if I had realized what I had done was wrong, I would have gone straight to the lab and pulled all the wires out of the thing, and destroyed the plans. He didnt.
Or...I would have been in Japan after the war ended, trying to help those who are still getting cancer from the mess I helped create. He didnt. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7917541)

Ive made plenty of "contributions to science", but you don't see anyone excusing me of war crimes


Or... Or... I would have turned the sun into a continuous ray of joy that would shine down on everyone and stun them all into complacent happiness. And then I would call down my mighty unicorn stead and fly around throwing bagels of satisfaction to compliment the ray of joy.

Obviously that is silliness, but I feel the same way. When I read history books, I constantly find myself... well, simply ashamed of people not acting in the way I think they should have. I've heard that saying about "walking a mile in someone's shoes", but I think it is utter b.s. because the only thing that matters is what I think. I don't need to know what they were thinking at the time or the external forces involved, I want to judge based only on what I know right now and, damnit, no one is going to stop me. This is my right because no situation in the past is ever different from the situation that I am in right now. Other people don't seem to realize that and it is my burden to have to deal with those cretins. It is a solemn task to have to judge all of this past actions by everyone, but I feel it is my duty to do so because I am right.

@lucky760, I embedded a VS vid on this comment and two came up. Is this a known thing?

In reply to this comment by Boise_Lib:
>> ^The_Ham:

I dont like how smug he is about murdering 246,000 people.

246,000 people.


This one's for you The_Ham
<div id="widget_32716427"></div><script>s=document.createElement('script');s.type='text/javascript';s.src='http://videosift.com/widget.js?video=204823&widt
h=500&comments=15&minimized=1';document.getElementById('widget_32716427').appendChild(s);</script>

>> ^The_Ham:

I dont like how smug he is about murdering 246,000 people.

246,000 people.


This one's for you The_Ham

>> ^The_Ham:

>> ^criticalthud:
i'm not sure any of them really knew the implications of what they were doing. Dropping that bomb was also very much about the future war between capitalism and communism...between two schools of economic dominance. At the time, Soviet divisions in Europe outnumbered American by a staggering amount.


Government: Dr. Feynman, we're going to need you to make a huge bomb.
Feynman: I wonder what the implications of making this huge bomb are? Oh well, der de derrrrr.


Forgive me if I fail to pass judgment on this man, who has contributed so much to science.

Feynman was brilliant. I don't doubt for a moment that he has had his own internal strife regarding his involvement in the project. Many of the scientists on the project were afflicted with a sort of tunnel vision as they focused on completing the job at hand, or felt that they had to get it done before the technology was used on them, only to later feel some version of guilt about their work. Feynman expresses his feelings about around 3:15 and goes on to say that he felt "that things were sort of doomed."

The only Manhattan Project scientist to leave the project was Józef Rotblat.

IN MARCH 1944 I experienced a disagreeable shock. At that time I was living with the Chadwicks in their house on the Mesa, before moving later to the "Big House;' the quarters for single scientists. General Leslie Groves, when visiting Los Alamos, frequently came to the Chadwicks for dinner and relaxed palaver. During one such conversation Groves said that, of course, the real purpose in making the bomb was to subdue the Soviets. [...] Remember, this was said at a time when thousands of Russians were dying every day on the Eastern Front, tying down the Germans and giving the Allies time to prepare for the landing on the continent of Europe. Until then I had thought that our work was to prevent a Nazi victory, and now I was told that the weapon we were preparing was intended for use against the people who were making extreme sacrifices for that very aim. [/reformation.org]

In the letter above, Rotblat goes on to explain that Neils Bohr shared concerns of a possible arms race between West and East, and his thoughts about why other scientists did not make the same choice to leave the project, and of accused of being a spy for the Russins after quitting the project. He was instructed speak to no one of his reasons for leaving.

Rotblat later went on to found the Pugwash Conference, with Bertrand Russell, which aimed to bring together scientists to work toward reducing the danger of (nuclear) armed conflict, and worked towards nuclear disarmament.

An excellent interview with him is over at the Vega Science Trust website:
http://vega.org.uk/video/programme/22

The National Film Board of Canada recently produced a documentary about on the work of Rotblat and the work of Pugwash. Trailer here:

>> ^criticalthud:

i'm not sure any of them really knew the implications of what they were doing. Dropping that bomb was also very much about the future war between capitalism and communism...between two schools of economic dominance. At the time, Soviet divisions in Europe outnumbered American by a staggering amount.



Government: Dr. Feynman, we're going to need you to make a huge bomb.

Feynman: I wonder what the implications of making this huge bomb are? Oh well, der de derrrrr.

Your video, Richard Feynman on helping the Manhattan Project, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

1. I don't think he was being smug at all. He even comments that he should have rethought his involvment after Germany was defeated.

2. He didn't murder anyone. People die in wars. If we label everyone who played a part in the death of an enemy during a war a murderer, there would be very, very few innocent people.

3. Yes, 246,000 people died, but that is a minuscule amount compared to the millions who would have died if the war didn't end when it did and the ~70 million who died in the war overall. Feynman bears no more blame for the deaths of the Second World War than anyone else.>> ^The_Ham:

I dont like how smug he is about murdering 246,000 people.

246,000 people.

Why not spend the money on the next big thing...

This country needs a goal, like the manhattan project or Apollo program.
Spend the money and create jobs at the same time and give science a boost..

man you did it before!

>> ^dag:

How does the US government defend keeping this classified? I thought secret classification was not to be used to protect politically damaging material? Beyond the atrocity- that's something else that should be investigated. God Bless Wikileaks but in a democratic society this should have been released by the government- and the perpetrators prosecuted.


Read "Bomb Power". It'll answer your question, but in short, it all leads back to the Manhattan Project and secrecy surrounding nuclear weapons.

http://www.amazon.com/Bomb-Power-Presidency-National-Security/dp/1594202400

As for the video here, there were clearly people carrying weapons, and depending on a larger set of circumstances, it's possible the initial attack was somehow justifiable. But, firing on that van was pretty heinous. This is the kind of shit that just perpetuates the terrorism we've already created with our lust for oil.

There's so much wharrgarbl going on in there I almost popped a blood vessel.

Contrary to the "Idiocracy" belief that our society is being "dumbed down", as it were (and, believe me, I still find myself saying this is the case) evidence suggests the opposite is the case. In first world nations across the globe intelligence quotients are rising (and plateauing in some cases, while minority's IQs are still rising), and belief in silly religions and superstitions are falling.

Yes there is Mercury in Thimersol, but it isn't the horrific kind.
Bad Mercury: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylmercury
Thimersol Mercury: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethylmercury

The key words there are "Bioaccumulate": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioaccumulate

For a look at the whole "Vaccines/Thimersol causes Autism" wharrgarbl, I rebuke with a video I posted to the sift a while back: http://videosift.com/video/Do-Vaccines-Cause-Autism-A-Detailed-Examination

Oh, and hey! How about the fact that Dr. Wakefield, the father of the whole Vaccine/Autism debacle with his article published in The Lancet was discredited finally!

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/02/02/and-now-the-antivax-failure-is-complete-the-lancet-withdraws-wakefields-paper/

As for the whole "Flouride" wharrgarbl I'd just recommend reading the Wiki's Article on Water Flouridation, in particular this section right around paragraph 3: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation#Ethics_and_politics

(Emphasis mine)

"Conspiracy theories involving fluoridation are common, and include claims that fluoridation was motivated by protecting the U.S. atomic bomb program from litigation, that (as famously parodied in the film Dr. Strangelove) it is part of a Communist or New World Order plot to take over the world, that it was pioneered by a German chemical company to make people submissive to those in power, that behind the scenes it is promoted by the sugary food or phosphate fertilizer or aluminum industries, or that it is a smokescreen to cover failure to provide dental care to the poor.[19] One such theory is that fluoridation was a public-relations ruse sponsored by fluoride polluters such as the aluminum maker Alcoa and the Manhattan Project, with conspirators that included industrialist Andrew Mellon and the Mellon Institute's researcher Gerald J. Cox, the Kettering Laboratory of the University of Cincinnati, the Federal Security Agency's administrator Oscar R. Ewing, and public-relations strategist Edward Bernays.[84] Specific antifluoridation arguments change to match the spirit of the time.[85]"


The video is right; let's get the facts. And if your facts only support your "New World Order", "omfg they're trying to control our minds" nonsense, well then, those are your "facts". There's a funny thing about why smart people believe weird things; read about it in Michael Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things". It showed me the error of some of my foolish beliefs as well.

And I'm at the point where I wonder why I bother doing this, I'm talking to walls and making friends with no one. I guess I just care too much about seeing fear mongering bullshit like this peddled as if it has any rational backing whatsoever.

http://christophersisk.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/thestupiditburns.jpg

/downvote

>> ^ShakyJake:
...I can't imagine how a project of this size could be pulled off without being leaked.


There were 130,000 people involved in the secret Manhattan Project in the 1940's.

>> ^chilaxe:
I think we'd all prefer a Manhattan Project to set up next generation nuclear, solar, and batteries.

Too bad you've let nimbyists, special interest groups, and envirowackos tell you that recycling nuclear fuel is bad, and MOX is the DEVIL! Well that's alright, we'll take your plutonium up here in Canada, and Japan will take it too, and so will the rest of the world and use it as fuel. We aren't so picky. And you seem to hate the idea of pebble bed reactors, and you absolutely refuse to fund the next generation fission and fusion reactors.

Solar and batteries are a moot method of generation and storage. A better form of passive energy transfer, or capacitance storage medium will be the better option. On top of that, the best way to get "free" energy will be the beam it back to earth method via satellite.

>> ^Mashiki:
>> ^chilaxe:
Coal is disgusting and technologically obsolete.

Lemmie know how much you dislike it when the demand starts kicking in and we start going back to coal>oil conversion technologies.


I think we'd all prefer a Manhattan Project to set up next generation nuclear, solar, and batteries.

>> ^schmawy:
There was by the end of WWII, in the Manhattan project in particular that I know about.

I'll take your word for it, but I don't think that had anything to do with the Hollywood blacklist and the shenanigans that McCarthy was pulling.

They were attacking liberals and leftists, branding them as commies.

Can people's minds be changed with film?

Of course.

Should those people have been treated like criminals?

No, because what they did wasn't criminal. All they did was speak and think in ways that opposed the powers that be.