What is your reaction to this formulation of scientists? Is Rabi's view of the imaginative power of scientists and their inherent innocence simply trivializing the deeper moral implications of the work of the Manhattan Project? For instance, Rachel Carson normally got lost in the wonder of nature as a child, yet her imagination took her on a very different path, shaped by her sense of morality and protecting humanity.
Or is it not so black and white? By shedding light on this overlooked side of the atomic scientists, what is Fiege trying to do?
While reading Fiege piece one phrase kept going through my mind, ‘Curiousity killed the cat.’ Fiege’s argument appears to be that those who built the atomic bomb built it out of there need to satisfy there curiosity with nature and science. Fiege uses this idea of the physicist, having a child like curiosity to justify the actions made by those participated in the Manhattan Project.
ReplyDeleteHe uses the example of Rachel Carson whose child-like curiosity of science led her down a less destructive path. He specifically compared Carson’s childhood to that of Richard Feynman. Fiege argues that they both grew up in homes that encouraged science. “Carson’s mother exposed her daughter to the landscape around the Pennsylvania home, and she encouraged Carson’s interest in books about nature (587).” This would suggest to me that Carson was encouraged to observe nature. Fiege explains that Feynman’s father “…encouraged Richard to mistrust formal knowledge and received wisdom, and to ask questions and describe in his own words what he observes (587) .” To me, this would suggest that Feynman was encouraged to observe as well. However I think a difference between Carson and the ‘atomic Peter Pan’s’ is that her love of science mainly led her down the path of observation, while the physicist who created the atomic bomb, attempted to observe and then control nature, without think about the moral implication of what they were doing.
I believe that the same curiosity and inspiration that drove Rachel Carson also propelled the nuclear scientists to make the back ground discoveries that were necessary for the assembly of the bomb. As the scientists made their initial developments about various nuclear theories and properties, they were unaware of the potential moral implications of nuclear power. Fiege mentions on page 595 that it was not until the year 1939 that the scientists realized that nuclear energy could be harnessed for destructive purposes. After 1939 when war broke out in Europe, the scientists made conscious choices to participate in the construction of a massively destructive weapon, but before this point, natural curiosity and wonder were still the prime motivators of the scientists.
ReplyDelete-“Funny,” he mused, “how the mountains always inspire our work.”
ReplyDelete-Oppenheimer’s is perplexing- there is a consistency between his building of the bomb and attributing his inspiration to the mountains.
-The mountains provided a backdrop of the drama. The peaks, slopes, rock, sunlight, and shadow were a part of the story’s setting.
-I find the perspectives of environmental historians so interesting. The various ways people have viewed mountains for instance, as a sort of insight and joy, escape from everyday life, an elevation and physical elevation corresponding with the elevation of the soul. Last class we discussed how technology empowered ideology. With the atomic bomb, nature provides the inspiration for technology. While untouched nature was once cherished for its sublimity, it began to take on new meanings to rapidly modernizing society. More of nature was “unknown” and with new technology/knowledge, scientists/people understood the environment more, they know about the things in nature that are not visible to the naked eye, and ultimately their relationship has changed as a result.
From the reading it appears that the initial motivators for the scientists were genuine curiosity as well as ambition. It also mentions in the reading that the scientists were not aware until later on the full potential of nuclear energy, especially in warfare. Conveniently nuclear energies potential was revealed to at least some extent just a few years prior to the war. Furthermore, once the war became an priority on the international agenda for many nations, the technology that was discovered had the potential to play a dominant role. Although the Manhattan Project might have been to satisfy the curiosity of a group of scientists, they were all aware that what was being constructed had the ability to turn the tide of the war and become one of the most powerful super-weapons the world had ever witnessed. In contrast, the weapon does speak to the success of the human race. It speaks loudly about progression, advancement, and the overall intellect of our species.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Fiege’s article, I questioned how individuals who are motivated by their curiosity of nature and science are driven to participate in creating a weapon that would destroy the very nature that awed them. Fiege states “Wonder, of course, did not compel them to transform their knowledge into a weapon. Yet the feeling certainly was integral to the discoveries without which the weapon would have been impossible.”
ReplyDeleteThe idea, “Peter Pans of the human race,” instills in children the wonder of nature and feeds into their curious minds the desire to learn more and experiment with their findings. Thus creating physicists, scientists whose childlike curiosity never diminishes.
Science is an art. To create art you must imagine what you to see happen for it to even to begin to take form. One must have some sense of the consequences that will follow your actions. Maybe at first you only see the good that can potentially come from research, but at the same time other voices are making the negative clear too. a Scientist cannot claim ignorance to potential consequences if they are spoken and in the air. While curiosity is responsible for progress, overly eager actions resulting from curiousness is also responsible many of our problems. the Manhattan Project=scientist finding out how atoms store energy at the price of not only victims of the bombs created, but also the scientist working in the labs.
ReplyDeleteFiege is presenting a different look at the reasoning behind the creation of the atomic bomb in an attempt to bring us into the mind of the scientist so that we might see the lure that the creators of the bomb felt in their work. Many people label the atomic bomb as “bad” and leave it at that, assuming that the scientists behind its creation were irresponsible or unaware of the implications.
ReplyDeleteBy painting a picture of a scientist with a childlike curiosity, Fiege seems to present the power behind the Manhattan Project as taking advantage of the knowledge of the scientists. If fueled solely by curiosity, perhaps the scientists were innocent of blame until they realized that the bomb was to be created and used for mass destruction. This view, however, assumes that all the scientists were somehow taken advantage of and did not understand the power they created even after they decided to continue its construction through to completion. President Truman’s decided to drop the bomb in order to finish the war, and he had to decide quickly, as did the bomb’s creators. The comparison to Rachel Carson simply shows how a love for science and discovery can be used on countless different paths and that Oppenheimer, Einstein, and the rest were not necessarily less moral than Carson. Fiege is showing the convoluted nature of the decisions surrounding the atomic bomb and how circumstances impact the ways that a person uses his or her knowledge, and how another person can use someone’s knowledge.
While Fiege says that curiosity was a factor in the scientists pursuit of the atomic bomb, you could also argue that ambition was a key factor as well. It goes back to the America as a Frontier society idea, since at the time Nuclear power and weapons was considered a "frontier" so naturally the scientists would want to be among the first to figure it out. It also runs hand in hand with the belief among Americans that we are the greatest people in the world, it was almost a need to develop a nuclear weapon first before anyone else. One what if question is say the scientists did not pursue the knowledge of the bomb as some people say the should have, what would have happened then if the Germans or Russians or even Japanese had developed it? How would the world be different? Would it be a better place? I highly doubt it.
ReplyDeleteI think that all scientist and researchers are the “Peter Pans.” It is their desire to explore and learn as much as possible about what is in front of them. This article made the physicist much more personable. Instead of just looking at them as people who created the most destructive weapon known to humans they are rather exploring a field to its potential and unfortunately it created something utterly destructive.
ReplyDeleteRachel Carson was also a “Peter Pan” of science but her work took a completely different path than the physicist. She had the same means of her work as did the scientist just a very different end result.
Fiege is trying to make the scientist seem more amicable then they are often viewed. The physicist were doing what any other scientist or researchers would do in a field that they find fascinating except there end result came with a lot of responsibilities. I don’t think its so black and white, you can’t blame the scientist for wanting to know more and see how far they can go in their discoveries.
After reading Fiege's article, I believed that the creation of the atomic bomb was known as an awful device, but after reading this article Fiege alters the story and talks about the way scientists viewed nature. The Peter Pan quote depicts the children's ambition to learn more about nature, and after discovering the wonders of nature, they become atomic scientists. I think Fiege's arguments that he provides in his article is that the scientists were unaware about the dangers of the atomic bomb. People today assume that the scientists who devised this product were considered as evil human beings, but Fiege attempts to prove that the scientists who conceived the atomic bomb were not bad people. These scientists were unaware that these weapons of mass destruction would defile the population of the entire world, but the creation of the atomic bomb shows progression of technology.
ReplyDeleteI think the idea of scientists being the “Peter Pans of the human race” is a carefully crafted phrase to extend an aura of innocence around the scientists. I would agree that scientists have a strong sense of curiosity that pushes them to continue exploring possibilities throughout their lives, however I do not believe that this driving force makes them blind to the consequences of their actions. Though the scientists involved in the Manhattan Project were testing and exploring various avenues, they ultimately had to know the consequences of their actions and what the particular project they were working on could influence or be pieced together to create.
ReplyDeleteWith great knowledge can come a burden, thus it is difficult for me to visualize these scientists in a child-like state of wonder when going over the facts regarding projects such as the a-bomb. The outcome would be less of a natural mystery than it would be a direct result of their hand, which would remove a sizable amount of innocence from their image.
This Peter Pan image was likely used to draw the public’s disgust away from the scientists who had a hand in the Manhattan Project. It attempts to cast them in a light of being individuals whose natural senses of curiosity were taken advantage of before they realized what was going on. It works to instill in the image of the scientist a moral, gentle side, as opposed to depicting a cold, calculating individual. This is not to say that these scientists differ from those like Rachel Carson because they lack a human side. Carson simply had interests that her curiosity pursued down different avenues. Feige attempts to show the reader that the atomic bomb scientists are just as good of people as those who are like Rachel Carson, their talents and knowledge was just used in a different matter, though both groups ultimately pursued the goal of doing what would be best for society, no matter how difficult the task.
I think the Peter Pan complex can be applied to any person whose curiosity fuels their life work, whether it be Oppenheimer, Carson, or Bill Gates. The childhood want to learn more and observe more while pushing boundaries never really dies in most humans, it is just a matter of who decides to pursue it.
ReplyDeleteI do think that this comparison trivializes the Manhattan Project. It reminds me of a difficult parenting situation: your son comes home sopping wet and muddy because he fell in a pond trying to catch frogs. You are furious as he stomps through the house creating a mess. Yet how do you punish him when he, like the scientists of the Manhattan Project, was simply curious about nature? By not only comparing the scientists to Peter Pan, but by vastly describing their curiosity and awe of nature, Fiege takes the blame of the destruction they created off their backs and gives them innocence. This also comes into play in the Rachel Carson comparison. In the environmental world, Carson is an image of morality. It seems as if Fiege is trying to transfer this morality to the scientists, whose work is seen as highly immoral.
Overall, I feel that by shedding light on this side of the atomic scientists Fiege is attempting to give them humanity. In most cases of destruction we can put a face to it: the man behind the gun that pulled the trigger, the pilot who dropped the bomb, etc. In the wake of the widespread destruction created by the atomic bomb these scientists became the face of the bomb. By sharing their personal stories of childhood, their interactions with nature, and their curiosities, Fiege gives these scientists a different image, a human image, one that induces sympathy and understanding.
Reading this article, it is clear that Fiege is attempting to convince the reader that these scientists' pure motivation makes the outcome of their studies less awful. The quote by Dyson in the caption, “The chief reward for being a scientist is not the power and the money but the chance of catching a fleeting glimpse of the transcendent beauty of nature" (5) only proves this sentiment. Fiege wants us to think of these scientists as seekers of beauty found in the natural world.
ReplyDeleteWhile this provides insight into less destructive types of research and scientific development, it cannot excuse the horrors which came along with the Manhattan Project. It is impossible to separate the desire to learn from the true reason for this research. One can argue that these scientists were innocent people, just doing their jobs, but to say that they were unaware of the horrible potential of their work is to remove a very important part of this situation.
I thought that Rabi’s quote was an interesting way of looking at scientists but I don’t completely agree with him. Just because childhood curiosities continue to affect adult life and interests doesn’t mean that scientists never grew up—certainly they did, as well as their ideas. Their curiosities didn’t always stay the same: what started out as one thing grew and matured into something else along with the scientist. I don’t think it’s accurate to compare a scientist to a child just because he retained his childhood interests throughout his life.
ReplyDeleteWith this comparison, though, and the piece in general, I think Fiege is trying to show that the scientists behind the Manhattan Project aren’t the kind of evil “mad scientists” that some people picture them as. Fiege is trying to show that the scientists weren’t out to destroy nature, and that they actually had a profound appreciation for nature and its beauties and mysteries. Love of nature manifests itself in different ways in different people, and for the scientists this love manifested itself through their attempts at unraveling the mysteries of nature.
Just a quick preliminary: Nazi Germany had begun a project to develop nuclear fission in 1939. Fortunately the third Reich did not have ample resources to properly fund the site, and their scientists focused on more immediate ways which they could support the war effort-but this was the driving factor behind the Manhattan Project. (This statement is by no means an attempt to validate both the government and scientists, for they had roughly 4 months after the defeat of Nazi Germany to re-examine the project).
ReplyDeleteAs for peter-panism, perhaps it is the scientists observation of nature and all of its chaos that urges them to create a little bit of their own. All scientists have a great knowledge of not only this planet but the universe as well. And the thing with the universe-as well as nature-is that it is hostile and completely impersonal.
We also must remember that these scientists just witnessed the most destructive war in human history, so perhaps they lost faith in man altogether- much like Sigmund Freud.
"Physicists are the Peter Pans of the human race. They never grow up, and they keep their curiosity."
ReplyDeleteI think by comparing the scientists to the childhood figure of peter pan he was able to make the ambitions and motivations of these scientists more understandable to readers. At first I thought it very hard to imagine how any one with respect to nature could create such a devastating weapon with the potential to destroy it all. But by describing the scientists s having a child like curiosity is something many of us have experienced and still do. In addition to being perpetually curious comparing the scientists to peter pan also associated them with an air of innocence. It seems as if the scientists innocent intentions in their quest for knowledge was misguided by the corrupt motivations of the human race in their never ending struggle for domination.
I think by adding the description of Rachel Carson shows the ideal situation where child like curiosity only leads to a positive outcome and a greater respect for nature.
I believe Feiber is arguing that the historic narrative constructing the atomic bomb’s creation is not a clear as is generally accepted. Through the analysis of the scientists’ past relationships with the natural world, Feiber deconstructs their historical identities, particularly as unethical scientists. The sense of wonderment these individuals found in the nature draws upon the romanticized idea of nature being a place for humans to connect with themselves and discover a better understanding of the world around them. This humanizes the scientists and presents the idea that these individuals, motivated by curiosities, followed an individualized “natural” path towards discovery. The connection between nature and the scientists is used to morally legitimize their bombs because connecting to nature and learning from the nature is viewed as a “natural” state, process of human activity and the creation of personhood (think Romanticism and frontier society).
ReplyDeleteThis might be too much of a tangent but, if the atomic bomb scientists were only fulfilling their childlike curiosities, what is it that created the destructiveness of the atomic bomb? As pointed out, the “curiosity path” leads to different outcomes and scientific products. The transition from wonderment, discovery, to bomb is not a “natural” process. By individualizing the bomb’s scientific construction and if it is trivializing the moral implications of the bomb, I think Feiber implies that larger structures contributed to the construction of the bomb. What were the scientific community’s values, trends and goals at the time that may have influenced the creation of the bomb? Since science is a product of culture, what cultural factors contributed to the creation of the bomb? If the use of these curiosities is a cultural product, can the individual scientist be “morally responsible” or was it the responsibility of the social environment during the war?
What I gained from this article was the softer side of the scientists. It showed their aww and wonder for nature in relation to the atomic bomb. The scientists found their common interests in the abundance of physical nature, which pushed them to create the atomic bomb. Although they knew what they were doing, it was for a greater cause, America. Even though this weapon of mass destruction is rarely used, it was essential for the time at hand.
ReplyDeleteI thought this article was interesting because it gave a perspective of the bomb that not many people know. It was cool getting to learn about the scientists side of it because the only thing I really knew about the bomb is that it killed a lot of people, but I never really thought about the scientists and all the effort that they put into creating it. Creating this bomb was like a big exciting science experiment for them.
ReplyDeleteWhat I took from the reading was that as individuals grew many were awestruck by the universe. The environment was an unknown wilderness that was exciting, and full of new happenings. As children, many scientists were excited to do hands on activities dealing with the environment. I think that even though a lot of ideals change as the scientists grew up the idea that the wilderness was special and it was still a giant indicator in the actions that were partook in. I think in retrospect, the “Peter Pan” idea depends on the individual and what goals that he or she wants to pursue in their future. As to those who helped create the nuclear bomb, it started as an idea, something really powerful and mind-boggling. As the war began and disagreement began, the scientists changed their thoughts from just a technological innovation, into a big broader subject. The use of the nuclear bomb for destruction/ as a weapon was an event that not only affected the citizens of many countries, as well as the scientists. I don’t think the subject is so black and white.
ReplyDelete