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The Recollections of Eugene P.Wigner - As Told to Andrew Szanton (Hardcover, Softcover Reprint Of The Original 1st Ed. 1992)
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The Recollections of Eugene P.Wigner - As Told to Andrew Szanton (Hardcover, Softcover Reprint Of The Original 1st Ed. 1992)
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A veteran of the Smithsonian's oral-history program on the
Manhattan Project, Szanton brings an educated focus and a writer's
sensitivity to these expertly shaped memoirs, based on over 30
interviews, of a Hungarian-born Nobelist who helped create the
atomic bomb. Born in 1902 as a middle-class product of Budapest's
excellent private schools (along with Edward Teller, John von
Neumann, and Leo Szilard, the three other Hungarian "geniuses"
behind the Manhattan Project), Wigner graduated to a lectureship at
Princeton in 1930. It was from this position of relative safety
that he watched, horrified, as Hitler rose to power. Convinced that
the Nazis would soon develop an atomic bomb, Wigner solicited and
translated Einstein's renowned letter to FDR warning of the
potential danger of atomic weapons; urged US military leaders to
fund fission research; and joined the Metallurgical Laboratory at
the Univ. of Chicago in time to witness the first controlled
nuclear chain reaction. Though acknowledging here that "we should
have known that Hitler would not build an atomic bomb," and in
spite of his regret about Hiroshima, Wigner claims to wish only
that US nuclear capability had been achieved earlier, in time to
prevent Soviet expansion. His terror of dictatorships, he says,
contributed to his belief in the "foolishness" of mutual assured
destruction; his outrage at the "sick" opinions of rebellious
American youth in the 1960's; his continuing support for active US
preparation for nuclear attack; and his attendance at scientific
conferences sponsored by the vehemently anti-Communist Unification
Church. Though he reviles his "best friend" Leo Szilard as a
"staunch leftist," Wigner refuses to condemn Werner Heisenberg for
his work with the Nazis. The nature of these memoirs, in which the
interviewer remains virtually invisible, precludes any challenge to
such apparent contradictions - a disappointment in an otherwise
intriguing self-portrait. (Kirkus Reviews)
General
Imprint: |
Kluwer Academic / Plenum Publishers
|
Country of origin: |
Netherlands |
Release date: |
September 1992 |
First published: |
1992 |
Authors: |
Eugene P. Wigner
|
Volume editors: |
Andrew Szanton
|
Authors: |
Andrew Szanton
|
Dimensions: |
230 x 146 x 32mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover
|
Pages: |
324 |
Edition: |
Softcover Reprint Of The Original 1st Ed. 1992 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-306-44326-8 |
Categories: |
Books >
Science & Mathematics >
Physics >
General
|
LSN: |
0-306-44326-0 |
Barcode: |
9780306443268 |
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