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Sent: 11 September 2003 11:08
CCNet SPECIAL: EDWARD TELLER ON THE IMPACT HAZARD AND PLANETARY
DEFENCE
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
"A pessimist is a person who is always right, but gets no
enjoyment.
An optimist imagines that the future is uncertain. Our duty is to
be
an optimist. Then we are prepared to do something about any
threats."
--Edward Teller, Near Earth Object Interception
Workshop 1992
"Many of the giants of our age have been concerned about the
asteroid/comet danger and about our need for emergency
preparedness.
Few have done more to help us to begin this important work
than Dr. Edward Teller."
--Andy Smith, CCNet, 11 Sept. 2003
===============
(1) WHY NOW?
Edward Teller
(2) TELLER, SPACEGUARD & WTC+2
Sir Arthur C Clarke
(3) A SALUTE TO DR TELLER AND GOODS NEWS
Andy Smith
(4) RE: EDWARD TELLER
Oliver Morton
(5) EINSTEIN, SZILARD & TELLER ON HITLER AND THE BOMB
Benny Peiser
================
"WHY NOW?"
Hand-transcribed text
of an after-dinner speech by
Dr. Edward Teller
on the occasion of his 84th birthday
January 15, 1992
Los Alamos National Laboratory
{Note: This was a banquet speech to the NASA-sponsored Near Earth
Object
Interception Workshop, following birthday festivities, which
included
the naming of asteroid 5006 (1989 GL5) in Teller's honor by its
discoverer, Eleanor Helin.}
There are two answers to the question "Why Now?"
First, in the last three years very remarkable changes have
occurred
in the world. One of them is that I can visit Hungary. What has
happened?
Nobody present, nobody in the world, had foreseen it. Now, for
the first
time, incredible things can really happen, including
international
cooperation on a subject like defense against asteroids.
I cannot pass over, in talking about this subject, the indirect
and powerful ways our national laboratories contributed to what
has happened. Nuclear energy did not have the possibility of
remaining undiscovered. That it has been discovered and has been
used - probably not without mistakes, but without major mistakes
-
has persuaded people who had been previously impotent and
unforthcoming
to find leaders to take them one big step toward peace. That the
Russian people stood up in incredible numbers to defend their own
freedom and that of others... this was made possible by the
magnificent
fact that nuclear power rested in the hands of those who did not
misuse it in a truly major way, in the hands of our government
which is in fact dedicated to peace. It is a reason to say
that we
can work on all knowledge leading to technology in the confidence
that people will use it properly...the role of the national
laboratories
in bringing this about cannot go unmentioned. The big changes in
the
world give a reason for "why now," and "why
here" (at Los Alamos).
There is another reason: because of a remarkable number of
technological
developments which have made it possible to do something about
meteorites. Computers, radar, lasers, nuclear energy... you will
see
how each of these has contributed. We are now facing a problem
that
before the Tunguska meteorite could not be addressed. These
methods
were not available. Now they are.
I would like to make my main statement. It will be brief, but the
consequences are long. Here is my recommendation about what to do
with the opportunity that is here. We must do this in four
separate
phases, one at a time. Therefore, we must give the lion's share
of
attention to the first phase: knowledge.
We must find out about meteorites. A lot has been found out. Very
much
more remains to be found out. In what ways? Many are obvious.
I'll mention
two special points, which have not received detailed emphasis
as yet in this meeting. One is the incredible developments in
Livermore
in the improvement of lasers. We can now concentrate a lot of
illumination in a narrow spectral region for a short time, with
laser
pulses a hundred times cheaper than before (in terms of megabuck
per
megawatt). Powerful lasers have already focussed on the moon.
With the help of rockets, or even from the Earth, we can
illuminate
a meteorite that passes closer than the moon. We could heat up
the
surface and watch it cool, yielding information about its
conductivity.
The importance of this subject is now evident to me, although not
before yesterday.
A second example. Shall we look at them from Earth or from
space?
I don't know. But I will give an argument to look at them from
space,
because it is not completely obvious. If we put the telescope on
a
(low) orbiting satellite, it can see all of the sky and with no
disturbance from the atmosphere. Clearly one of their important
properties is their changing brightness because of their rotation
and
changing position. These intensities can be measured from the
ground.
They can be measured more quantitatively if the atmospheric
disturbances are corrected, but the disturbances cannot be
eliminated
as completely as if you didn't have them in the first place.
I have a practically religious belief that the most important
thing
is knowledge, which is in principle good. We need to measure
intensities to 0.1%, which can be done by CCD's. Unlike
photographic
plates, which are clumsy and old-fashioned, CCD's report directly
to
a computer, and then you can perform miracles. With 50 bits to a
hundred
bits you can get accurate positions of stars and spectral lines.
The
Sun changes intensity ½% to 1% every eleven years. We have
similar
information to date on a few dozen stars. Let's get stellar
variability
to 0.1% for a million of them, 10^8 bits. Ask the computer to
check
the catalog. We don't want to know this to find out about the
long-term
energy variation in stars - it has been a million years from the
production of energy to when it is emitted. What we see on the
short
term is due to hydrodynamics, which we don't understand (except
for
Cepheid variables). We're ignorant about the smaller variations.
Why do we want to know about them? I'll tell you after I find
out.
Galileo said look first, then find out what the problems are.
From space you have a better possibility of learning about
meteorites
and also about this entirely different branch of science.
This project might be done internationally; a national effort
would
be difficult and expensive. But the public interest exists for
this
first step of knowledge.
The second step is experimentation. Every year one of these
potentially
dangerous meteorites (it is not actually dangerous) comes closer
than
the moon. We should send out satellites to discover them, try to
do
what you would do for defense if you needed to, whether nuclear
or
non-nuclear. We can give an absolute guarantee that we will have
no
detectable radioactivity on the Earth. These could be
stones, rubble
piles, a comet, chondrites, iron meteorites - whatever - you take
the best look at them and experiment, so if and when a real
danger
occurs, you have already practiced. Do it internationally. The
United
States should pay less than half the cost; this is not to save
dollars,
but criticism from other nations would be much more constructive
if they
were paying. The planning, the money, the actions should all be
international. If a threat occurs, the knowledge from our
experimentation can be used.
The third phase is defense against a meteorite that is going to
hit.
One might think about starting to make plans about who decides
what
to do when it happens. Perhaps it is good to make plans. I'll say
why
it might not be good. I hope that we will have more than three
months'
notice, not about a hypothetical object, but about a real one
that
will hit. Maybe we should evacuate 1,000 people or maybe we
should
use one of the methods we have already practiced. If the decision
on
how to decide is made in advance, it will be made by
bureaucrats.
If the threat is happening, the people will decide; I trust the
people better. If the object is deflected, then we have step
number
four.
As step four, we can make plans for the safety of the whole
future.
I would like to practice on a small one because there is a 99%
chance
that a small one will come before a big one, so it is the optimal
approach.
In this extraordinary time, which is the end of three years of
miracles,
we are looking into only the possibility of a better future,
because
there are big and different changes for different people in 1992
(like
starvation). This is a crisis for which the Chinese symbol that
means
both danger and opportunity applies. Defense against
meteorites is
one way to make the opportunity more and more real.
I will make a more general remark about how the opportunity
should be
used. The right solution was proposed in early 1946 to the U.N.
Its
outstanding characteristic was to seek security in cooperation
and
openness (not secrecy) in the ashes of the Lilienthal report. It
was
proposed by Oppenheimer, who was not a right-winger; and by
Baruch,
who was not a left-winger, and presented to the United Nations.
All
political parties supported it, the right solution, but it went
to
nought due to the veto of Stalin. It involved an International
Atomic Development Authority with limited but sufficient
powers.
I think we can succeed now.
Two last things. First, you might call me over-optimistic.
We should
be daunted by neither war nor meteorites. Man has been called a
problem-solving animal. Man and woman are called problem-creating
animals. We will have new problems to solve. I am optimistic,
however,
and not only because it is my birthday.
Second, a pessimist is a person who is always right, but gets no
enjoyment. An optimist imagines that the future is uncertain.
Our duty is to be an optimist. Then we are prepared to do
something
about any threats.
===================
(2) TELLER, SPACEGUARD & WTC+2
Sir Arthur C Clarke, Sri Lanka
Dear Benny,
Thanks - quite a guy! But don't think we ever had any contact.
As you know, I've tackled this subject in HAMMER OF GOD - and in
RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA - where I chose tomorrow - WTC + 2! - for
the
catastrophe...And invented the name SPACEGUARD...
Hard at work on THE LAST THEOREM - my final novel.
All best,
Arthur 10 Sept 03
===============
(3) A SALUTE TO DR TELLER AND GOODS NEWS
Andy Smith <astrosafe22000@yahoo.com>
Hello Benny and CCNet,
Many of the giants of our age have been concerned
about the asteroid/comet danger and about our need for
emergency preparedness. Few have done more to help us
to begin this important work than Dr. Edward Teller.
In the early 90's he participated in many of the key
technical planetary defense (PD) conferences and we
dedicated an asteroid to him, as a tribute. He was
also instrumental in promoting the landmark
international Planetary Defense Workshop (Livermore,
Ca.,1995)and the preservation of the outstanding
proceedings, on the Web. We will remember and miss
him.
AIAA Planetary Defense Conference - 23-26 Feb. 2004
It is a pleasure to report that the program for the
AIAA Planetary Defense Conference (PDC)seems
outstanding and it should be on the Web soon, along
with registration information. The conference is
international, in scope. It will address the basics of
PD and examine several emergency scenarios. Some of
the Space Guard and Space Shield folks are involved.
The Aerospace Corporation is doing a lot of the
planning and organizing - to their great credit.
The AIAA (American Institute of Aeronautics and
Astronautics) has been in a leadership role, on this
important subject, for more than a decade. They wrote
two important policy papers which helped to start
some of the key programs and we are grateful to them
for their many contributions.
A Salute to the B612 Foundation
This outstanding new program seeks to promote the
development of an NEO deflection capability by 2015
and we certainly welcome them to the club.
Astronaut/scientist/engineer Rusty Schweickart has
been instrumental in getting this impressive program
going and he will make a major input to the AIAA PD
confab.
We hope they will involve the excellent specialists
from Russia and elsewhere and that this will be an
outstanding international effort. Many of the papers
at the 1995 PDW (on the Web) pointed to the importance
of this capability and to our global ability, even at
that time, to develop a defensive system. What we need
is a sufficiently high priority and modest funding.
Most of the PD equipment needed is on-the-shelf, so
such a program can and should be very cost-effective.
Our estimate of the time required to assemble and
launch one or more defensive missions, in the 90's,
was about 2 years. A good global program should be
able to reduce that to a few weeks and to improve the
effectiveness, markedly.
We thank Rusty and his associates for their efforts
and we wish them well. Many of the astronauts and
cosmonauts have strongly supported PD and they could
unite to support B612.
The NEO Hunt
We commmend the dedicated NEO search teams. This will
be another outstanding year and we should again pass
the 400 mark. However, it will not be as good as last
year. Funding and priority problems may be creeping in
again. Perhaps these issues can be raised at the PDC.
Major Thrust
Our further studies of the Tambora induced famines, in
1815 (and the series of subsequent famines), strongly
suggest that the threshold for a global catastrophe is
in the 200 meter NEO range and that the engine is
starvation. Accordingly, we urge the initiation of
programs aimed at meeting the extended emergency food
need. This may require the rapid shifting of food
production and the development of special emergency
crops (perhaps using genetic modification methods). If
any CCNet subscribers have ideas and/or related
activities planned or underway, regarding this need,
we invite communication.
Cheers
Andy Smith/International Planetary Protection Alliance (IPPA)
astrosafe22000@yahoo.com
=================
(4) RE: EDWARD TELLER
Oliver Morton <abq72@dial.pipex.com>
At 9:38 am +0100 10/9/03, you wrote:
> EDWARD TELLER (1908-2003). FATHER OF PLANETARY NEO DEFENCE
> Edward Teller, one the 20th century's most important and
most
> controversial scientist died yesterday, aged 95. He was the
unsung
> hero of the free world who was instrumental in the West's
defeat
> of both Nazi Germany and Sowjet dictatorship.
Benny, what do you see as Teller's instrumental role in the
defeat
of Nazi Germany? It's fairly hard to see any way to link the
defeat
of Germany to the Manhattan Project. And besides, Teller's
role in
the original fission-weapon development was not particularly
great.
After two failures to deliver what was required of him, and in
part
at his own request, he was removed from work on the development
of the
atomic bomb in the spring of 1944. He did, in his own words
"act as
Szilard's chauffeur", driving him out to meet Einstein on
Long Island
when the Einstein letter to Roosevelt was being drafted in 1939.
But that, and the rest of his moral support for Szilard and
Wigner at
that time, is surely not what you'd call instrumental.
And I'm not sure I'd call him the "father of planetary NEO
defence",
either. I'd have though that honour should go to either the
originator of the idea or the person who gets a successful
program
started. Studies of interception had been around since the 1960s,
and I don't know of any Teller interest before the late
1980s/early
1990s; nor has anything Teller was associated with matured into a
defence system. Teller may have been far more active backstage
than
those of us outside his world can know, and I'd be fascinated to
hear
more about that. But if so, it is hard to see to what effect.
It's
also worth pointing out that it is conceivable his association
with
ideas about planetary defence was actually detrimental, in that
there
has always been a suspicion in some quarters that the whole idea
is
make-work for idle hands at places like Livermore.
None of this is to say he wasn't a great physicist, a
world-historical
figure, and a very imaginative man, to boot -- also one who
inspired
touching loyalty in colleagues that bordered on the filial. I
remember
that on the last morning of the Erice meeting that Pete Worden
arranged
in 1992 (IMS) he talked about Jupiter, realising that it would
get hit
by things a lot more frequently than other planets, and
speculated as
to whether the Great Red Spot had in some way been triggered by
an
impact centuries ago. It was the first thing I thought of when I
heard about Shoemaker Levy. (His idea that large explosions might
influence storm patterns might, I suppose, have arisen from the
notion
he briefly explored that nuclear weapons could be used to modify
the
weather and relieve a Californian drought, something I once heard
about from a Livermore climate modeller...)
best, o
=============
(5) EINSTEIN, SZILARD & TELLER ON HITLER AND THE BOMB
Benny Peiser <b.j.peiser@livjm.ac.uk>
Oliver, don't underestimate Albert Einstein's letter in 1939 to
U.S. President Roosevelt. The letter itself was the result of
advise he had received from Teller and Szilard. As it turned out,
their warning that Hitler was already working on an atomic bomb
that "if carried by a boat and exploded in a port might very
well
destroy the whole port together with some of the surrounding
territory" was wrong. With the outbreak of World War II, the
U.S.
administration - against strong popular opposition - began
supporting
Britain under siege with large amounts of military and economic
assistance. Eventually, the U.S. recognised that Hitler had to be
defeated by American military force and entered the war. But when
WWII ended, no weapons of mass destruction were found (sounds
familiar,
yes?).
Einstein, Teller and Szilard - three of the greatest scientific
minds
of the 20th century - were wrong about Hitler's possession of
atomic
weapons, but not about his drive to acquire them. Given enough
time,
Hitler might well have developed the first useable atomic
weapons.
And the world we live in would be a much different place. On the
second anniversary of 9/11, it is prudent to remember the painful
lessons from our battles against Nazi Germany and Soviet
dictatorship
as we face new totalitarian regimes that threaten international
security and the community of free democracies. BP
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*
Sent: 11 September 2003 14:55
SCIENCE EDITOR SAYS TORINO SCALE INVITES SENSATIONALISM
David Whitehouse <Dr_D_Whitehouse@msn.com>
Dear Benny,
After QQ47, I would say that if the Torino Scale (TS) has been
developed
as a PR tool then it is clearly failing. I have heard it said
that the
TS is fine but researchers and reporters should understand and
use it
better. This is a curiously circular logic. In my view just
saying
that shows how inadequate the TS is, being a PR tool that so many
misunderstand and misuse.
Clearly, QQ47 became a story because it was TS1. It remained a
story because
of the inertia of a good tale spiced up with some juicy figures,
and the
lack of effective media management when it got out. I stayed out
of it
because it was not a story (unlike NT7). But when the story
became something
else, i.e. there is no real risk, I, like others who initially
stayed out,
waded in.
The TS is now the problem, not the solution. The TS is great for
journalists
as it gives them opportunities to do stories they would not have
had without
it. The TS, unwittingly, has institutionalised sensationalism. I
have heard
that the TS is being modified. May I ask by whom, and if many
media
professionals are involved, especially those with experience of
previous
incidents?
I think that the comparison of the TS with the Richter Scale is
unwise. The
situations are not comparable.
I am also concerned about the way some are analysing past scares
in a way
which is not, in my view, either objective or helpful in
determining what to
do in the future.
"Cherry picking" individual sentences from press
releases and reports, using
them out of context and basing an argument around them leads to a
spurious
case. One could equally selectively highlight other sentences in
the same
documents and come to an entirely different view. There is a
selection effect
here. Quotes are being chosen and used to support a foregone
conclusion, and
less convenient ones ignored. This would not be tolerated in
science, so why
is it in media studies?
It is a fruitless exercise. It is not the way PR and media
professionals go
about things because they know better. They know that such an
approach
offers a narrow and unworldly view of the process of
communicating
scientific issues to the public. What is one to make of reports
(or chapters
in forthcoming books) that analyse the media in such a partial
way.
No member of the public looks at reports that way, no member of
the press
looks at press releases that way.
Are the annual scares, even if some of them did not deserve to be
stories,
causing any real harm? The public are not stupid. How many of
them, now,
believe we're all doomed in a few years thanks to QQ47? They know
that the
previous scares went away, and even a cursory reading of most of
the
articles about QQ47 would have told them that this one almost
certainly would
go away as well. Are some not taking this too seriously? As they
say, there
is only one thing worse than being talked about...
And do not underestimate the resourcefulness of journalists who
will
constantly surprise with the way they can get a story seemingly
out of
nowhere.
Regards,
David Whitehouse
Science Editor
BBC News Online
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please contact the moderator Benny Peiser <b.j.peiser@livjm.ac.uk>.
Information circulated on this network is for scholarly and
educational
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any other purposes without prior permission of the copyright
holders.
DISCLAIMER: The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed in the
articles and texts and in other CCNet contributions do not
necessarily
reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the moderator of
this
network.