This BLOG is for LLNL present and past employees, friends of LLNL and anyone impacted by the privatization of the Lab to express their opinions and expose the waste, wrongdoing and any kind of injustice against employees and taxpayers by LLNS/DOE/NNSA.
The opinions stated are personal opinions. Therefore,
The BLOG author may or may not agree with them before making the decision to post them.
Comments not conforming to BLOG rules are deleted.
Blog author serves as a moderator.
For new topics or suggestions, email jlscoob5@gmail.com
Blog rules
Stay on topic.
No profanity, threatening language, pornography.
NO NAME CALLING.
No political debate.
Posts and comments are posted several times a day.
Thursday, September 22, 2022
China is playing a game!
At least 154 Chinese scientists who worked on government-sponsored research at the U.S.’s foremost national security laboratory over the last two decades have been recruited to do scientific work in China ...
"Although a former Los Alamos scientist pleaded guilty in 2020 to lying about his involvement in a China recruitment program, most of the conduct described in the report appears to have been legal. Moreover, U.S. officials and experts say most Chinese scientists who immigrate to the U.S. remain here — and many have made significant contributions to U.S. defense technology."
(1) The LANL person was not Chinese
2) The LANL person only got probation in end A former computational physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory was sentenced Friday to five years of probation and fined $75,000 for lying to federal investigators about his involvement in a Chinese government recruitment program, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice https://www.abqjournal.com/1496794/probation-for-former-lanl-scientist-in-lying-investigation-ex-turab-lookman-was-recruited-into-chinese-government-program.html
I am not trying to downplay how this can be serious but the article got serval basic facts wrong how much more do you think is wrong with this report? Sorry but once you blow that many facts you cannot be trusted. Also the report seems to be cut and pace from older stories and thrown and together in hour.
There seem to be a lot of assumptions, that because these people are now in China they have violated their security-related commitments, for example, when they were chosen for reliability.
Or that whatever secrets they might in principle have, would be useful to anyone, seems like a fantasy as much of the work going on here, seems rather useless at least to me.
It looks more like they left to work on more interesting and better funded projects, not to steal ours, although that is quite amoral behavior, it may be a painful truth, the competitive nature of our funding system does encourage amoral behavior in general.
Well you could ask as some congressmen have asked. "What is done at LANL that cannot done elsewhere" Well you can certainly do some of the work in China. It appears at the same time everyone was slamming LANL as this horrible worthless place with cowboy buttheads that needed to beat it into submission and handed over to sleazy for-profit companies that at least China saw some value in the place.
I know that it is fun to beat up on LANL but I have to ask this striderintel.com or whatever the hell it is why are they picking on LANL when the same was true if not more so in every other DOE lab and US university. It just seems to pick out LANL when you could easily look at Harvard, ORNL, ANL, U of Illinois, MIT, LLNL and so on. Things that make you go hmmm. Just who is funding this group and why this report now? Who benefits?
There is something very odd about this report and the timing. Something does not add up with this.
It looks like a copy of the Cox report from 1999. Obviously no one cared than why should we care now?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cox_Report
The Report of the Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China, commonly known as the Cox Report after Representative Christopher Cox, is a classified U.S. government document reporting on the People's Republic of China's covert operations within the United States during the 1980s and 1990s. The redacted version of the report was released to the public on May 25, 1999.
Maybe it was part of Kissinger and Nixon's plan, our scientists would flee to China in sort of a reverse Manhattan project emigration, and they would save us from ourselves, in return for his offer of Taiwan which as you know, is on record from the secret discussions.
We would need some saving, of course, because of his plan to flood the world with non-gold backed currency, which has led to some serious problems as you might be aware, regardless of your political affiliation, things may not seem to be going well.
Nixon was very devious, as you know, he supported communism and later the Khmer Rouge, as I recall, was part of this pro-China policy.
He also was a criminal, along with Spiro Agnew, as opposed to Trump who was never removed from office, that is a factual matter, although of course, could change in the future.
To be the devil's advocate, one could say the following. Oppenheimer said, scientists have known sin -- have eaten the fruit, of the knowledge of good and evil -- and the wages of sin are death, according to the Bible.
Would you accept this accusation, from our accuser?
Oppenheimer was trying to steal credit for bringing about some kind of apocalypse, from Isaac Newton, who wrote many books on it, and began the process of modern physics. He stole this, as he did not have ideas of his own, unlike Teller.
Oppenheimer was trying to steal credit for bringing about some kind of apocalypse, from Isaac Newton, who wrote many books on it, and began the process of modern physics. He stole this, as he did not have ideas of his own, unlike Teller.
9/28/2022 8:05 PM
I am confused, my understanding is Teller tried to steal the ideas for a fusion weapon from people who actually invited one ofwhich was van Neuman. I was always told Teller was just a political guy. I know that outside of LLNL physicists seem to really dislike Teller. I was undergraduate at a UC when Teller came to give a talk, the physics faculty refused to go. He ended up giving to the talk to some global peace studies thing. The physics profs just badmouthed the guy for either stealing ideas for being a stooge for the anti-red scare of the 50s and that he only did this for political gain. I also heard that UCB refused to let him be on their faculty. I even know some Hungarian physicists that do not like him. Besides this blog, a few LLNL people and some ufo buffs, I have never heard good things about Teller in the broader scientific field. By the way why do people into UFOs seem to like Teller so much?
On other hand I have heard only great things about Oppenheimer, there are book, movies, stories, and I even hear about certain methods like the Born-Oppenheimer approximation all the time. Teller not so much, other than being a traitor to other scientists.
Teller was a in fact kind of a Nobel laureate, except that Sakharov must have stolen credit for world peace, and the record shows Teller didn't receive an actual prize, it was stolen from him! Oppenheimer didn't receive any Nobel at all, not even an imaginary one like Teller.
Teller was a in fact kind of a Nobel laureate, except that Sakharov must have stolen credit for world peace, and the record shows Teller didn't receive an actual prize, it was stolen from him! Oppenheimer didn't receive any Nobel at all, not even an imaginary one like Teller.
9/30/2022 11:41 AM
What would Teller win it for? Oppenheimer probably does not deserve it either but he is famous for being a leader.
Teller was never even a Director of LLNL, I bet he never even got a DUI.
Teller supported mutually assured destruction, which brought world peace, and later supported the idea of ending it, creating more peace, the peaceful fall of the Soviet Union, and a peace dividend which helped the stock market.
Many younger people who only have second or third hand hearsay knowledge tend to overlook that Teller was a talented teacher. In the 1960s, his classes of physics for non-physics majors at Berkeley were standing room only, with overflow sessions at night at UCLA. Many of those crowding in were physics majors and grad students.
"Teller supported mutually assured destruction, which brought world peace, and later supported the idea of ending it, creating more peace, the peaceful fall of the Soviet Union, and a peace dividend which helped the stock market.
9/30/2022 6:21 PM"
Teller had nothing to to with MAD, he just jumped on it when others put it out. When others said to drop it, he said to drop it. Again besides some LLNL and the UFO people that listen to Coast to Coast I have never heard anything all that great about Teller other than being a political hack and trying get or steal credit for things he never was part of of, started, or created. He did not create the H bomb, he as not the father of the H-Bomb, he did not start Star Wars, he did not create LLNL (hint Lawrence might have something) to do with it, he did out all any actual communists, he did not start MAD, or end MAD and no I am pretty sure he was not in charge of the Area 51 UFO program.
Many younger people who only have second or third hand hearsay knowledge tend to overlook that Teller was a talented teacher. In the 1960s, his classes of physics for non-physics majors at Berkeley were standing room only, with overflow sessions at night at UCLA. Many of those crowding in were physics majors and grad students.
10/01/2022 11:46 AM
Well I heard a few stories about those "classes" first of all they where not physics classes but in fact political classes where he attacked communism and promoted himself. Most of the students that where there including a huge amount of people just showing up where hard core right wing people who bought into the whole red square of the 50s. Teller was essentially hated by much of the academic world particularly at the UC system that did not want him but plenty in the public saw him as this hero against communists. He was big into self promotion. If you want to look into it there are all sorts of issues with Teller that have been well documented.
By the way this makes no sense as UCLA is not exactly an hour drive from UCB so how did he have overflow classes at UCLA at night? As I said he have a talk at a UC school, that was not UCSC and and the physics faculty refused go. Now this may have had something to do with a former LANL Nobel prize winner who from what can gather hated the guy but all the other faculty seemed to have the same opinion. I do not know if you are familiar with the old-timers at UCB but they are not Teller fans.
From what I heard is that after Fuchs was found out to be a spy the US wanted the narrative to be that Teller was the inventor which he was happy to claim. This way it would not look as bad to say one of the H-bomb inventors was a Russian a spy. Still after Teller died all these news stories said "Father of H bomb", but if you read them it is not exactly clear what that means.
Another odd thing is no can actually say what Teller stood for. For example if for whatever reason he got caught by the Russians he would have just said how horrible capitalism was, if he had been captured by the Germans we would have gone along with them. Teller was only about Teller and would say to whatever higher up what they would want to hear, he simply had no principles whatsoever. He become a hero to the anti communists but he just as easily could have been a hero to the anti-capitalists, to the pro fascists, to a monarchy, or to whoever. Turning on Oppenheimer could score points so he turned on on Oppenheimer, the math was that simple, right, wrong, good, evil are not part of the calculation. This is why he is such a hated character by scientists, not because he was pro bomb but because he was simply pro Teller. He is just another of long line of historical characters who have acted in their own self interest and never had a personal ethic or morality other than go along with whatever is the most politically expedience. In other words Teller was pre-woke. If Teller was 34 years old today he would be screaming for CRT, how evil America is, capitalism is bad and so on. Oppenheimer was a modern day Prometheus and Teller is a modern day Judas.
Teller is best known to the general public for two things: his reputation as the "father of the hydrogen bomb" and as a key villain in the story of the downfall of Robert Oppenheimer. To me Teller will always be a prime example of the harm that brilliant men can do - either by accident or design - when they are placed in positions of power; as the famed historian Richard Rhodes said about Teller in an interview, "Teller consistently gave bad advice to every president that he worked for". It's a phenomenon that is a mainstay of politics but Teller's case sadly indicates that even science can be put into the service of such misuse of power Ironically it is the two most publicly known facts about Teller that are also probably not entirely accurate. Later in life he often complained that the public had exaggerated his roles in both the hydrogen bomb program and in the ousting of Oppenheimer, and this contention was largely true. In truth he deserved both less credit and less blame for his two major acts. Without Teller hydrogen bombs would still have been developed and without Teller Oppenheimer would still have been removed from his role as the government's foremost scientific advisor.
His second dishonest act was withholding credit from the man who actually came up with the first successful idea for a hydrogen bomb - Stanislaw Ulam. An exceptionally brilliant and versatile mathematician, Ulam first performed detailed calculations that revealed holes in Teller's original Super design and then thought of the key process of radiation implosion that would compress a batch of thermonuclear fuel and enable its sustained fusion. Teller who had been smoldering with rage at Ulam's calculations until then immediately saw the merit of the idea and significantly refined it. Since then almost every hydrogen bomb in the world's nuclear arsenals has been constructed on the basis of the Teller-Ulam model. Yet Teller seems to have denied Ulam the credit for the idea even in his later years, something that is especially puzzling considering that he downplayed his own role in the development of hydrogen bombs in the waning years of his life. Was this simply a ploy engineered to gain sympathy and to display false modesty? We will never know.
Teller became known in the press as the "father of the hydrogen bomb", a title which he did not seek to discourage. Many of Teller's colleagues were irritated that he seemed to enjoy taking full credit for something he had only a part in, and in response, with encouragement from Enrico Fermi, Teller authored an article titled "The Work of Many People," which appeared in Science magazine in February 1955, emphasizing that he was not alone in the weapon's development (he would later write in his memoirs that he had told a "white lie" in the 1955 article, and would imply that he should receive full credit for the weapon's invention).[10] Hans Bethe, who also participated in the hydrogen bomb project, once drolly said, "For the sake of history, I think it is more precise to say that Ulam is the father, because he provided the seed, and Teller is the mother, because he remained with the child. As for me, I guess I am the midwife."[11]: 166
I heard Feynman say once, that all the good people left after WWII, and not to work at the labs as there were no good people. This was in the 80's when there was a lot of anti-nuclear sentiment, however, but it may have been his true feelings.
Wrong historically on several points, but your obsession has been fed. Good for you.
10/01/2022 5:37 PM
Than please correct it. There are whole books, news stories, and plenty of talk from physics faculty. One thing for sure is that Teller was a very controversial character but please fill us in about the facts.
Than please correct it. There are whole books, news stories, and plenty of talk from physics faculty. One thing for sure is that Teller was a very controversial character but please fill us in about the facts.
10/02/2022 11:57 AM
If you care to visit the LANL Archives, you can read many, many old memos and reports concerning Teller's work and Teller. Most of that information has been declassified but never published. Maybe some enterprising historian will someday take an interest. In the meantime, only a relative few are familiar with all the details. The LANL Historian might be a good place to start.
Back in 80s many of the people from the Manhattan project were still around and could tell you some things including all the issues they had with Teller in terms of credit and who did what exactly and what happened with Opphenhiermer. Even in the 90s some of these people were alive and could give their accounts. This include people who went on to win Nobel prizes. Books and news stories have already been written from the archives and from personal accounts. You are doing that " I know things that nobody knows" shtick that you always do.
Teller kept on pushing for the hydrogen bomb. History was on his side and the increasing encroachment of the Soviets into Eastern Europe followed by major events like the Berlin airlift and the testing of the first Soviet atomic bomb firmed up his conviction and allowed him to drum up support from scientists, politicians and the military. Sadly his initial design for the Super was fatally flawed; while an atomic bomb would in fact ignite a large mass of tritium or deuterium, energy losses would be too rapid to sustain a successful fusion reaction. Even after knowing this Teller kept pushing for the design, taking advantage of the worsening political situation and his own growing prominence in the scientific community. This was Teller’s first real dishonest act.
His second dishonest act was withholding credit from the man who actually came up with the first successful idea for a hydrogen bomb – Stanislaw Ulam. An exceptionally brilliant and versatile mathematician, Ulam first performed detailed calculations that revealed holes in Teller’s original Super design and then thought of the key process of radiation implosion that would compress a batch of thermonuclear fuel and enable its sustained fusion. Teller who had been smoldering with rage at Ulam’s calculations until then immediately saw the merit of the idea and significantly refined it. Since then almost every hydrogen bomb in the world’s nuclear arsenals has been constructed on the basis of the Teller-Ulam model. Yet Teller seems to have denied Ulam the credit for the idea even in his later years, something that is especially puzzling considering that he downplayed his own role in the development of hydrogen bombs in the waning years of his life. Was this simply a ploy engineered to gain sympathy and to display false modesty? We will never know.
When the government brought charges against Oppenheimer Teller was asked to testify. He could have declined and still saved his reputation but he chose not to. Curiously, the actual testimony offered by Teller is at the same time rather straightforward as well as vague enough to be interpreted damningly. It has an air of calculated ambiguity about it that makes it particularly potent. What Teller said was the following.
As it happened however, his words were seen as a great betrayal by the majority of physicists who supported Oppenheimer. The result of this perception was that Teller himself was damaged far more by his testimony than was Oppenheimer. Close friends simply stopped talking to him and one former colleague publicly refused to shake his hand, a defiant display that led Teller to retire to his room and weep. He was essentially declared a pariah by a large part of the wartime physics community.
Please, 11:57, I implore you; learn the difference between, “then”, and, “than”.
10/03/2022 5:06 AM
Yes using the wrong than totally invalidates the point of the comment. I would have had no idea what the person said otherwise. Your contribution to the conversation is immense.
"In the meantime, only a relative few are familiar with all the details"
Sure pal, sure. This blog has had all sorts of posters claiming to be "in the know". They knew all about the WHL, all about the cowboys, all about Walp and Doran. The implication is that they are some supper important person who knows people that know people if you know what I am saying. We used to have these guys that would go around and brag in Santa Fe bars. They would also brag about all the military stuff they did like being a super seal team delta force, army navy recon, with the first verified underwater knife kill at high altitude and being the youngest person to get to the rank of sergeant while in the navy, all classified of course. I think the rise of the internt got rid of a lot of those people since you check pretty easily if they were full of it. One or two even went to the "I worked on UFOs at LANL" and made a nice second career on the goofy talk shows. This is even some guy who claimed to have worked personally with Ed Teller in the Nevada UFO site. I guess only a "few" do know the details.
On the day on which the two men met, Lazar sat in on a lecture that Teller gave at Los Alamos. It was not so much Teller’s lecture that amazed Lazar. Rather, it was the fact that when Lazar was hanging around at the entrance to the facility, there was Teller, sitting on a wall and reading the very article that the Los Alamos Monitor had written on Lazar – which just happened to be a front-page article. Lazar instantly recognized what it was that Teller was so fixated on. So, Lazar decided to make the plunge: he walked over to Teller and told him who he was – namely, the person profiled in the article because of his jet-car achievements. Teller found it all very interesting. The two talked for a while about their respective work, after which Teller headed off inside to deliver his presentation. Six years later, the paths of Lazar and Teller crossed again. It would lead Lazar into the world of Area 51, UFOs and aliens. Or, into a world of disinformation and mind-manipulation.
I'm pretty sure anyone with site access (easy to obtain with some help from the PR people) can make an appointment with the LANL Archivist to view unclassified historical files. Many non-government historians have done so over the years, to their great monetary advantage in writing exclusive historical accounts.
I'm pretty sure anyone with site access (easy to obtain with some help from the PR people) can make an appointment with the LANL Archivist to view unclassified historical files. Many non-government historians have done so over the years, to their great monetary advantage in writing exclusive historical accounts.
10/04/2022 5:06 PM
This is already been done a million time by members of the press, historians and book writers. How do think all those news stories that have been linked to got mad? I am not getting you point. Yes people did this along with interviews of the people who worked on the Manhattan project. They all seem to come to a pretty consistent picture of Teller. The 10/02/2022 9:17 PM post is form a news piece.
Well I heard a few stories about those "classes" ...
Blathered 10/01/2022 5:32 PM, who would benefit from actually checking facts, rather than continuing to mire in the hogpen of hearsay, and then ignorantly repeating the misinformation and outright lies. Oh, right, facts aren't the strong points of the wokies or the MAGAistas.
To all those trying to do a hatchet job on Edward Teller : you should enlighten your pitiful ignorance of his contributions to science by searching for E. Teller in Google Scholar.
Did you actually try this or are just throwing this out to be troll?
In any case if you look at the Manhattan era scientists Bethe, Feynman, van Neuman, Oppenheimer, Fermi, Weisskopf, Szilard, Wu, Lawrence, Seaborg, Peierls, Ulam, Segre, Fitch, James Chadweick, Skyrme, Glauber, are considered have significantly larger contributions to science than Teller. Many of these people won Nobel prizes. Teller was famous for being a major self-promoter, he is not even the sole father of the Hydrogen bomb as Ulam is considered the father, along with contributions from many others. Even the Jan-Teller effect might more Jan. The only reason Teller is known so well is his betrayal of Oppenheimer. I am not saying he did not have a contribution but not on the same level as many others associated with the Manhattan project.
42 comments:
"Although a former Los Alamos scientist pleaded guilty in 2020 to lying about his involvement in a China recruitment program, most of the conduct described in the report appears to have been legal. Moreover, U.S. officials and experts say most Chinese scientists who immigrate to the U.S. remain here — and many have made significant contributions to U.S. defense technology."
(1) The LANL person was not Chinese
2) The LANL person only got probation in end
A former computational physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory was sentenced Friday to five years of probation and fined $75,000 for lying to federal investigators about his involvement in a Chinese government recruitment program, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice
https://www.abqjournal.com/1496794/probation-for-former-lanl-scientist-in-lying-investigation-ex-turab-lookman-was-recruited-into-chinese-government-program.html
I am not trying to downplay how this can be serious but the article got serval basic facts wrong how much more do you think is
wrong with this report? Sorry but once you blow that many facts you cannot be trusted. Also the report seems to be cut and pace from
older stories and thrown and together in hour.
Q cleared Chinese return to China? Please say it isn't so.
There seem to be a lot of assumptions, that because these people are now in China they have violated their security-related commitments, for example, when they were chosen for reliability.
Or that whatever secrets they might in principle have, would be useful to anyone, seems like a fantasy as much of the work going on here, seems rather useless at least to me.
It looks more like they left to work on more interesting and better funded projects, not to steal ours, although that is quite amoral behavior, it may be a painful truth, the competitive nature of our funding system does encourage amoral behavior in general.
It's odd that a country run by smart people, would be more of a danger than a country run by dumb people, isn't it, in a world with so many weapons.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/significant-threat-national-security-china-has-been-embedding-scientists-los-alamos
A 'Significant Threat To National Security': China Has Been Embedding Scientists At Los Alamos For Decades
https://www.striderintel.com/wp-content/uploads/Strider-Los-Alamos-Report.pdf
Well you could ask as some congressmen have asked. "What is done at LANL that cannot done elsewhere" Well you can certainly do some of the work in China. It appears at the same time everyone was slamming LANL as this horrible worthless place with cowboy buttheads that needed to beat it into submission and handed over to sleazy for-profit companies that at least China saw some value in the place.
I know that it is fun to beat up on LANL but I have to ask this striderintel.com or whatever the hell it is why are they picking on LANL when the same was true if not more so in every other DOE lab and US university. It just seems to pick out LANL when you could easily look at Harvard, ORNL, ANL, U of Illinois, MIT, LLNL and so on. Things that make you go hmmm. Just who is funding this group and why this report now? Who benefits?
There is something very odd about this report and the timing. Something does not add up with this.
It looks like a copy of the Cox report from 1999. Obviously no one cared than why should we care now?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cox_Report
The Report of the Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China, commonly known as the Cox Report after Representative Christopher Cox, is a classified U.S. government document reporting on the People's Republic of China's covert operations within the United States during the 1980s and 1990s. The redacted version of the report was released to the public on May 25, 1999.
I don't think that this is the "Tech Transfer" the national labs had in mind.
China is winning, and it's not a game.
Maybe it was part of Kissinger and Nixon's plan, our scientists would flee to China in sort of a reverse Manhattan project emigration, and they would save us from ourselves, in return for his offer of Taiwan which as you know, is on record from the secret discussions.
We would need some saving, of course, because of his plan to flood the world with non-gold backed currency, which has led to some serious problems as you might be aware, regardless of your political affiliation, things may not seem to be going well.
Nixon was very devious, as you know, he supported communism and later the Khmer Rouge, as I recall, was part of this pro-China policy.
He also was a criminal, along with Spiro Agnew, as opposed to Trump who was never removed from office, that is a factual matter, although of course, could change in the future.
To be the devil's advocate, one could say the following. Oppenheimer said, scientists have known sin -- have eaten the fruit, of the knowledge of good and evil -- and the wages of sin are death, according to the Bible.
Would you accept this accusation, from our accuser?
Would you accept this accusation, from our accuser?
9/27/2022 9:39 AM
No. Who cares what the Bible says. Not to mention that everyone dies anyway so
how can this actually mean anything?
Oppenheimer was trying to steal credit for bringing about some kind of apocalypse, from Isaac Newton, who wrote many books on it, and began the process of modern physics. He stole this, as he did not have ideas of his own, unlike Teller.
9/28/2022 8:05 PM
You know nothing about the actual history of the Manhattan Project.
Oppenheimer was trying to steal credit for bringing about some kind of apocalypse, from Isaac Newton, who wrote many books on it, and began the process of modern physics. He stole this, as he did not have ideas of his own, unlike Teller.
9/28/2022 8:05 PM
I am confused, my understanding is Teller tried to steal the ideas for a fusion weapon from people who actually invited one ofwhich was van Neuman. I was always told Teller was just a political guy. I know that outside of LLNL physicists seem to really dislike Teller. I was undergraduate at a UC when Teller came to give a talk, the physics faculty refused to go. He ended up giving to the talk to some global peace studies thing. The physics profs just badmouthed the guy for either stealing ideas for being a stooge for the anti-red scare of the 50s and that he only did this for political gain. I also heard that UCB refused to let him be on their faculty. I even know some Hungarian physicists that do not like him. Besides this blog, a few LLNL people and some ufo buffs, I have never heard good things about Teller in the broader scientific field. By the way why do people into UFOs seem to like Teller so much?
On other hand I have heard only great things about Oppenheimer, there are book, movies, stories, and I even hear about certain methods like the Born-Oppenheimer approximation all the time. Teller not so much, other than being a traitor to other scientists.
Teller was a in fact kind of a Nobel laureate, except that Sakharov must have stolen credit for world peace, and the record shows Teller didn't receive an actual prize, it was stolen from him! Oppenheimer didn't receive any Nobel at all, not even an imaginary one like Teller.
Teller was a in fact kind of a Nobel laureate, except that Sakharov must have stolen credit for world peace, and the record shows Teller didn't receive an actual prize, it was stolen from him! Oppenheimer didn't receive any Nobel at all, not even an imaginary one like Teller.
9/30/2022 11:41 AM
What would Teller win it for? Oppenheimer probably does not deserve it either but he is famous for being a leader.
Teller was never even a Director of LLNL, I bet he never even got a DUI.
Teller supported mutually assured destruction, which brought world peace, and later supported the idea of ending it, creating more peace, the peaceful fall of the Soviet Union, and a peace dividend which helped the stock market.
Many younger people who only have second or third hand hearsay knowledge tend to overlook that Teller was a talented teacher. In the 1960s, his classes of physics for non-physics majors at Berkeley were standing room only, with overflow sessions at night at UCLA. Many of those crowding in were physics majors and grad students.
"Teller supported mutually assured destruction, which brought world peace, and later supported the idea of ending it, creating more peace, the peaceful fall of the Soviet Union, and a peace dividend which helped the stock market.
9/30/2022 6:21 PM"
Teller had nothing to to with MAD, he just jumped on it when others put it out. When others said to drop it, he said to drop it. Again besides some LLNL and the UFO people that listen to Coast to Coast I have never heard anything all that great about Teller other than being a political hack and trying get or steal credit for things he never was part of of, started, or created. He did not create the H bomb, he as not the father of the H-Bomb, he did not start Star Wars, he did not create LLNL (hint Lawrence might have something) to do with it, he did out all any actual communists, he did not start MAD, or end MAD and no I am pretty sure he was not in charge of the Area 51 UFO program.
Many younger people who only have second or third hand hearsay knowledge tend to overlook that Teller was a talented teacher. In the 1960s, his classes of physics for non-physics majors at Berkeley were standing room only, with overflow sessions at night at UCLA. Many of those crowding in were physics majors and grad students.
10/01/2022 11:46 AM
Well I heard a few stories about those "classes" first of all they where not physics classes but in fact political classes where he attacked communism and promoted himself. Most of the students that where there including a huge amount of people just showing up where hard core right wing people who bought into the whole red square of the 50s. Teller was essentially hated by much of the academic world particularly at the UC system that did not want him but plenty in the public saw him as this hero against communists. He was big into self promotion. If you want to look into it there are all sorts of issues with Teller that have been well documented.
By the way this makes no sense as UCLA is not exactly an hour drive from UCB so how did he have overflow classes at UCLA at night?
As I said he have a talk at a UC school, that was not UCSC and and the physics faculty refused go. Now this may have had something to do with a former LANL Nobel prize winner who from what can gather hated the guy but all the other faculty seemed to have the same opinion. I do not know if you are familiar with the old-timers at UCB but they are not Teller fans.
10/01/2022 5:19 PM
Wrong historically on several points, but your obsession has been fed. Good for you.
By the way how come people keep saying Teller was the inventor of the H-Bomb?
Klaus Fuchs and John Von Neumann are the inventors.
http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2013/08/23/the-spy-the-human-computer-and-the-h-bomb/
Heck they even had a patent.
From what I heard is that after Fuchs was found out to be a spy the US wanted the narrative to be that Teller was the inventor which he was happy to claim. This way it would not look as bad to say one of the H-bomb inventors was a Russian a spy. Still after Teller died all these news stories said "Father of H bomb", but if you read them it is not exactly clear what that means.
5:19 , again, what you “hear” has absolutely nothing to do with the facts. Seriously, stop listening to the voices in your head.
Another odd thing is no can actually say what Teller stood for. For example if for whatever reason he got caught by the Russians he would have just said how horrible capitalism was, if he had been captured by the Germans we would have gone along with them. Teller was only about Teller and would say to whatever higher up what they would want to hear, he simply had no principles whatsoever. He become a hero to the anti communists but he just as easily could have been a hero to the anti-capitalists, to the pro fascists, to a monarchy, or to whoever. Turning on Oppenheimer could score points so he turned on on Oppenheimer, the math was that simple, right, wrong, good, evil are not part of the calculation. This is why he is such a hated character by scientists, not because he was pro bomb but because he was simply pro Teller. He is just another of long line of historical characters who have acted in their own self interest and never had a personal ethic or morality other than go along with whatever is the most politically expedience. In other words Teller was pre-woke. If Teller was 34 years old today he would be screaming for CRT, how evil America is, capitalism is bad and so on. Oppenheimer was a modern day Prometheus and Teller is a modern day Judas.
Teller is best known to the general public for two things: his reputation as the "father of the hydrogen bomb" and as a key villain in the story of the downfall of Robert Oppenheimer. To me Teller will always be a prime example of the harm that brilliant men can do - either by accident or design - when they are placed in positions of power; as the famed historian Richard Rhodes said about Teller in an interview, "Teller consistently gave bad advice to every president that he worked for". It's a phenomenon that is a mainstay of politics but Teller's case sadly indicates that even science can be put into the service of such misuse of power
Ironically it is the two most publicly known facts about Teller that are also probably not entirely accurate. Later in life he often complained that the public had exaggerated his roles in both the hydrogen bomb program and in the ousting of Oppenheimer, and this contention was largely true. In truth he deserved both less credit and less blame for his two major acts. Without Teller hydrogen bombs would still have been developed and without Teller Oppenheimer would still have been removed from his role as the government's foremost scientific advisor.
His second dishonest act was withholding credit from the man who actually came up with the first successful idea for a hydrogen bomb - Stanislaw Ulam. An exceptionally brilliant and versatile mathematician, Ulam first performed detailed calculations that revealed holes in Teller's original Super design and then thought of the key process of radiation implosion that would compress a batch of thermonuclear fuel and enable its sustained fusion. Teller who had been smoldering with rage at Ulam's calculations until then immediately saw the merit of the idea and significantly refined it. Since then almost every hydrogen bomb in the world's nuclear arsenals has been constructed on the basis of the Teller-Ulam model. Yet Teller seems to have denied Ulam the credit for the idea even in his later years, something that is especially puzzling considering that he downplayed his own role in the development of hydrogen bombs in the waning years of his life. Was this simply a ploy engineered to gain sympathy and to display false modesty? We will never know.
Teller became known in the press as the "father of the hydrogen bomb", a title which he did not seek to discourage. Many of Teller's colleagues were irritated that he seemed to enjoy taking full credit for something he had only a part in, and in response, with encouragement from Enrico Fermi, Teller authored an article titled "The Work of Many People," which appeared in Science magazine in February 1955, emphasizing that he was not alone in the weapon's development (he would later write in his memoirs that he had told a "white lie" in the 1955 article, and would imply that he should receive full credit for the weapon's invention).[10] Hans Bethe, who also participated in the hydrogen bomb project, once drolly said, "For the sake of history, I think it is more precise to say that Ulam is the father, because he provided the seed, and Teller is the mother, because he remained with the child. As for me, I guess I am the midwife."[11]: 166
I heard Feynman say once, that all the good people left after WWII, and not to work at the labs as there were no good people. This was in the 80's when there was a lot of anti-nuclear sentiment, however, but it may have been his true feelings.
Wrong historically on several points, but your obsession has been fed. Good for you.
10/01/2022 5:37 PM
Than please correct it. There are whole books, news stories, and plenty of talk from physics faculty. One thing for sure is that Teller was a very controversial character but please fill us in about the facts.
Teller was never even a Director of LLNL, I bet he never even got a DUI.
9/30/2022 2:53 PM
I believe Teller was a LLNL Director but for a very short time. Not sure why it was so short.
Than please correct it. There are whole books, news stories, and plenty of talk from physics faculty. One thing for sure is that Teller was a very controversial character but please fill us in about the facts.
10/02/2022 11:57 AM
If you care to visit the LANL Archives, you can read many, many old memos and reports concerning Teller's work and Teller. Most of that information has been declassified but never published. Maybe some enterprising historian will someday take an interest. In the meantime, only a relative few are familiar with all the details. The LANL Historian might be a good place to start.
10/02/2022 5:21 PM
Back in 80s many of the people from the Manhattan project were still around and could tell you some things including all the issues they had with Teller in terms of credit and who did what exactly and what happened with Opphenhiermer. Even in the 90s some of these people were alive and could give their accounts. This include people who went on to win Nobel prizes. Books and news stories have already been written from the archives and from personal accounts. You are doing that " I know things that nobody knows" shtick that you always do.
http://wavefunction.fieldofscience.com/2015/01/the-many-tragedies-of-edward-teller.html
Teller kept on pushing for the hydrogen bomb. History was on his side and the increasing encroachment of the Soviets into Eastern Europe followed by major events like the Berlin airlift and the testing of the first Soviet atomic bomb firmed up his conviction and allowed him to drum up support from scientists, politicians and the military. Sadly his initial design for the Super was fatally flawed; while an atomic bomb would in fact ignite a large mass of tritium or deuterium, energy losses would be too rapid to sustain a successful fusion reaction. Even after knowing this Teller kept pushing for the design, taking advantage of the worsening political situation and his own growing prominence in the scientific community. This was Teller’s first real dishonest act.
His second dishonest act was withholding credit from the man who actually came up with the first successful idea for a hydrogen bomb – Stanislaw Ulam. An exceptionally brilliant and versatile mathematician, Ulam first performed detailed calculations that revealed holes in Teller’s original Super design and then thought of the key process of radiation implosion that would compress a batch of thermonuclear fuel and enable its sustained fusion. Teller who had been smoldering with rage at Ulam’s calculations until then immediately saw the merit of the idea and significantly refined it. Since then almost every hydrogen bomb in the world’s nuclear arsenals has been constructed on the basis of the Teller-Ulam model. Yet Teller seems to have denied Ulam the credit for the idea even in his later years, something that is especially puzzling considering that he downplayed his own role in the development of hydrogen bombs in the waning years of his life. Was this simply a ploy engineered to gain sympathy and to display false modesty? We will never know.
When the government brought charges against Oppenheimer Teller was asked to testify. He could have declined and still saved his reputation but he chose not to. Curiously, the actual testimony offered by Teller is at the same time rather straightforward as well as vague enough to be interpreted damningly. It has an air of calculated ambiguity about it that makes it particularly potent. What Teller said was the following.
As it happened however, his words were seen as a great betrayal by the majority of physicists who supported Oppenheimer. The result of this perception was that Teller himself was damaged far more by his testimony than was Oppenheimer. Close friends simply stopped talking to him and one former colleague publicly refused to shake his hand, a defiant display that led Teller to retire to his room and weep. He was essentially declared a pariah by a large part of the wartime physics community.
Please, 11:57, I implore you; learn the difference between, “then”, and, “than”.
Please, 11:57, I implore you; learn the difference between, “then”, and, “than”.
10/03/2022 5:06 AM
Yes using the wrong than totally invalidates the point of the comment. I would have had no idea what the person said otherwise. Your contribution to the conversation is immense.
You are doing that " I know things that nobody knows" shtick that you always do.
10/02/2022 9:11 PM
??? Who is doing that? This is anonymous blog.
??? Who is doing that? This is anonymous blog.
10/03/2022 5:32 PM
"In the meantime, only a relative few are familiar with all the details"
Sure pal, sure. This blog has had all sorts of posters claiming to be "in the know". They knew all about the WHL, all about the cowboys, all about Walp and Doran. The implication is that they are some supper important person who knows people that know people if you know what I am saying. We used to have these guys that would go around and brag in Santa Fe bars. They would also brag about all the military stuff they did like being a super seal team delta force, army navy recon, with the first verified underwater knife kill at high altitude and being the youngest person to get to the rank of sergeant while in the navy, all classified of course. I think the rise of the internt got rid of a lot of those people since you check pretty easily if they were full of it. One or two even went to the "I worked on UFOs at LANL" and made a nice second career on the goofy talk shows. This is even some guy who claimed to have worked personally with Ed Teller in the Nevada UFO site. I guess only a "few" do know the details.
I thought the 10/03/2022 11:16 PM poster is just being a troll.
You have got to be kidding
https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2018/04/the-strange-saga-of-edward-teller-and-area-51/
On the day on which the two men met, Lazar sat in on a lecture that Teller gave at Los Alamos. It was not so much Teller’s lecture that amazed Lazar. Rather, it was the fact that when Lazar was hanging around at the entrance to the facility, there was Teller, sitting on a wall and reading the very article that the Los Alamos Monitor had written on Lazar – which just happened to be a front-page article. Lazar instantly recognized what it was that Teller was so fixated on. So, Lazar decided to make the plunge: he walked over to Teller and told him who he was – namely, the person profiled in the article because of his jet-car achievements. Teller found it all very interesting. The two talked for a while about their respective work, after which Teller headed off inside to deliver his presentation. Six years later, the paths of Lazar and Teller crossed again. It would lead Lazar into the world of Area 51, UFOs and aliens. Or, into a world of disinformation and mind-manipulation.
10/03/2022 11:16 PM
I'm pretty sure anyone with site access (easy to obtain with some help from the PR people) can make an appointment with the LANL Archivist to view unclassified historical files. Many non-government historians have done so over the years, to their great monetary advantage in writing exclusive historical accounts.
I'm pretty sure anyone with site access (easy to obtain with some help from the PR people) can make an appointment with the LANL Archivist to view unclassified historical files. Many non-government historians have done so over the years, to their great monetary advantage in writing exclusive historical accounts.
10/04/2022 5:06 PM
This is already been done a million time by members of the press, historians and book writers. How do think all those news stories that have been linked to got mad? I am not getting you point. Yes people did this along with interviews of the people who worked on the Manhattan project. They all seem to come to a pretty consistent picture of Teller. The 10/02/2022 9:17 PM post is form a news piece.
Well I heard a few stories about those "classes" ...
Blathered 10/01/2022 5:32 PM, who would benefit from actually checking facts, rather than continuing to mire in the hogpen of hearsay, and then ignorantly repeating the misinformation and outright lies. Oh, right, facts aren't the strong points of the wokies or the MAGAistas.
To all those trying to do a hatchet job on Edward Teller : you should enlighten your pitiful ignorance of his contributions to science by searching for E. Teller in Google Scholar.
E. Teller in Google Scholar.
10/06/2022 12:00 PM
Did you actually try this or are just throwing this out to be troll?
In any case if you look at the Manhattan era scientists Bethe, Feynman, van Neuman, Oppenheimer, Fermi, Weisskopf, Szilard, Wu, Lawrence, Seaborg, Peierls, Ulam, Segre, Fitch, James Chadweick, Skyrme, Glauber, are considered have significantly larger
contributions to science than Teller. Many of these people won Nobel prizes. Teller was famous for being a major self-promoter, he
is not even the sole father of the Hydrogen bomb as Ulam is considered the father, along with contributions from many others. Even the Jan-Teller effect might more Jan. The only reason Teller is known so well is his betrayal of Oppenheimer. I am not saying he did not have a contribution but not on the same level as many others associated with the Manhattan project.
Post a Comment