We've Gotta Talk About the Bomb

Historian of science Professor Alex Wellerstein joins me to talk about the sword haunting the ploughshare of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
00:00:00 - The Manhattan Project: A Secret Industry | The Birth of the Atomic Bomb

00:02:16 - Why Study Nuclear Weapons? A Historian's Perspective | Alex Wellerstein's Path to Nuclear History

00:04:32 - Nuclear Fear Across Generations | From the Berlin Wall to 9/11

00:08:21 - First Discoveries of Fission: Bomb or Reactor? | Early Thoughts on Nuclear Technology

00:13:19 - The Manhattan Project: A Crash Course in Nuclear Industry | Building an Atomic Bomb in Two Years

00:22:31 - The Infrastructure of the Manhattan Project: From Dinner Table to Industrial Scale | Hanford, Oak Ridge, and Los Alamos

00:32:36 - Was the Manhattan Project Bigger than the Space Race? | Speed, Secrecy, and the Legacy of a Crash Program

00:35:50 - Why Were the Atomic Bombs Dropped? | Exploring the Motives and Justifications

00:43:04 - How Many Bombs Did the US Have in 1945? | Production Rates and the Threat of More Bombs

00:50:52 - US Atomic Hegemony and the Prevention of World War III | Early Cold War Nuclear Diplomacy

00:59:35 - Fear of the Bomb: Radiation and the Psychological Impact | From Hiroshima to Godzilla

01:06:04 - Understanding Nuclear Fallout: Airbursts, Groundbursts, and the Threat of Radiation | Local and Global Fallout Explained