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Nuclear physics

Nuclear physics

A remarkable legacy

01 Feb 2008

Joseph Rotblat: Visionary for Peace
(ed) Reiner Braun et al.
2007 Wiley
£27.50/$45.00 hb 371pp

World changers

Joseph Rotblat, who died in 2005 at the age of 96 (see “Joseph Rotblat dies”), was a rare combination of distinguished scientist and leading peace advocate. During the Second World War he was involved with the Manhattan Project — which created the world’s first atomic bombs — but then decided to resign on ethical grounds. This life-changing decision set the scene for the dual role that he would play for the rest of his life. On the one hand, Rotblat was a key figure in setting up and leading the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, which bring together scientists and public figures concerned with reducing the danger of armed conflict and seeking co-operative solutions for global problems. On the other, he was an accomplished nuclear and medical physicist, eventually becoming president of the British Institute of Radiology.

Joseph Rotblat: Visionary for Peace is a stimulating collection of essays about Rotblat’s life and work that boasts an impressive list of contributors, demonstrating just how highly regarded he was. From the world of politics there are entries by Mikhail Gorbachev, the final president of the Soviet Union, and Kim Dae-Jung, former president of South Korea. Scientists who have contributed to the book include the current president of the Royal Society, Martin Rees, and the Nobel laureates Harry Kroto, John Polanyi and Jack Steinberger.

The essays cover nearly every aspect of Rotblat’s life, which was by no means ordinary. Born in 1908 in Warsaw, Poland, Rotblat and his family suffered severe hardship during and after the First World War, which resulted in the interruption of his education. Despite this, his intelligence and perseverance led him to gain a doctorate in nuclear physics from the University of Warsaw in 1938 and the next year he took up a post with James Chadwick (who had discovered the neutron in 1932) at Liverpool University in the UK. Unfortunately Rotblat’s wife, Tola, was unable to join him before the outbreak of the Second World War, and afterwards he discovered that tragically she had died in a Nazi concentration camp.

The 1930s was a decade of groundbreaking advances in physics — including the discovery of nuclear fission — and the book includes several essays about Rotblat’s critical role in this arena. He quickly realized that the research could lead to the production of an extraordinarily powerful weapon and, with the rise of Hitler, Rotblat began to fear the prospect of the Germans building an atomic bomb. Once war broke out, he thought that an Allied bomb could be justified if its sole purpose was to be “deterrence”, so when the Manhattan Project was set up at Los Alamos in the US in 1942, he decided — and was allowed by the British government — to join it.

Two years later, however, Rotblat experienced what he later described as a “disagreeable shock” when, over dinner one evening, General Leslie Groves, the military leader of the Manhattan Project, remarked that the real purpose in developing the bomb was to “subdue the Soviets”. Shortly afterwards, when it became clear that the Germans had abandoned their bomb project, Rotblat followed his conscience and resigned — the only scientist to do so.

He was horrified when the Allies dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, and the nuclear arms race that followed prompted him to begin actively working on initiatives to confront the threat of nuclear war. He was instrumental — as discussed in the essays by Jack Harris and David Krieger — in producing the famous Russell–Einstein Manifesto in 1955, which was a moral appeal to scientists to take the lead in pressing for nuclear disarmament. Indeed, this document pointed out that, in the wake of the development of the hydrogen bomb, war could now wipe out the entire human species. The book includes the text of the manifesto — which, sadly, is still very relevant to the world of today.

Rotblat is best remembered, however, for initiating the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, which still continue today. He served as secretary-general of the organization from its founding in 1957 until 1973 and as its president from 1988 to 1997. The conferences provide a unique opportunity for scientists from across the world to meet and talk freely. This is possible because of an insistence that each individual attends and speaks only in a personal capacity, not on behalf of any government or other organization. As Sandra Ionna Butcher’s essay explains, especially during the Cold War years, Pugwash discussions contributed to major arms control and disarmament agreements, such as the Partial Test Ban Treaty (1963) and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (1972). In 1995 Rotblat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, jointly with the Pugwash Conferences. This increased his public profile and he continued to actively campaign against nuclear weapons until his death in August 2005 at the age of 96.

In parallel with this work, Rotblat continued his day job as a nuclear physicist. He moved into medical physics in order to apply his skills directly to the preservation of human life, becoming a professor of physics at St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical College at the University of London in 1950, where he remained until his retirement in 1976.

This book has gathered together an immense amount of material on Rotblat’s life, ranging from technical discussions about his scientific research and details of his ethical views, to personal anecdotes about his character. The collective impression is of a man with a formidable intellect and carefully reasoned convictions, but also with great warmth and generosity.

As such it is not surprising that the selection of Rotblat’s own writings is particularly engrossing. In one essay, first published in 1985, he tells the story of his involvement in the Manhattan Project. Interestingly, he is very critical of his original justification for joining the project — the nuclear-deterrence argument. He discusses the folly of such thinking, saying that “it would not have worked with a psychopath like Hitler”. Indeed, in other writings he argues that the whole concept of nuclear deterrence is fundamentally flawed, particularly because of the shaky assumption that national leaders will always act rationally in any conflict situation.

The book also clearly reveals Rotblat’s strong views on the social responsibility of scientists. He was highly critical of “ivory tower” scientists who argue that such ethical issues are not their concern — especially those who continue to work on nuclear weapons. He strongly supported the idea of a “Hippocratic oath” for scientists (see “Nobel Prize winner calls for ethics oath”), ethics courses as part of scientific training and a range of ethical safeguards to prevent the misuse of scientific knowledge and developments.

Rotblat was indeed a visionary. His efforts, not least in setting up Pugwash, made a key contribution to reducing the threat of nuclear war and promoting disarmament. He also championed social responsibility among scientists long before others. We still have a long way to go on both issues, but the path would be a lot more difficult without the contribution of Joseph Rotblat.

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