WEBVTT - 5 Technologies To End All Wars - That Didn't 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.520 Get in touch with technology with text Stuff from stuff 0:00:07.800 --> 0:00:15.240 dot com. Then welcome to text Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland, 0:00:15.240 --> 0:00:18.720 and today I'm joined by a very special guest host. 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:24.640 Say hello, do Hi, I'm Joe McCormick. Yes, from Forward Thinking, 0:00:24.760 --> 0:00:27.840 coming over to visit our our our friendly little neighbor 0:00:27.840 --> 0:00:31.160 podcast Text Stuff. Right. For those of you who may 0:00:31.160 --> 0:00:34.680 not have listened to a Forward Thinking podcast, you should 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:38.760 fix that. I mean, Lauren, who was my former co host, 0:00:38.840 --> 0:00:41.599 is still on Forward Thinking, and so is Joe, and 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:45.639 so am I, and we talk about future stuff. They 0:00:45.680 --> 0:00:48.559 just want to hear Lauren. You need to that's they 0:00:48.560 --> 0:00:51.479 can still They can still hear her by going to 0:00:51.520 --> 0:00:54.840 Forward Thinking. So but Joe, you had this idea that 0:00:54.880 --> 0:00:57.920 was kind of milling around for a blog post, but 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:01.600 it just never quite fit anywhere, right, Yeah, but I 0:01:01.640 --> 0:01:03.680 finally wanted to talk about it with you. And it's 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:07.800 about ways that technology could, or at least people thought 0:01:08.240 --> 0:01:12.320 could end war as we know it, so about world peace. 0:01:12.440 --> 0:01:17.080 You've got a lot like people who are are real innovators, 0:01:17.520 --> 0:01:21.160 really uh, forward thinkers, for lack of a better word, 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:27.400 often get kind of idealistic and optimistic, sometimes perhaps unrealistically 0:01:27.480 --> 0:01:30.520 so right, And so we have some examples here of 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:35.600 people who very confidently at the time proclaimed that the 0:01:35.640 --> 0:01:38.959 technology either they invented or that they were an advocate 0:01:39.000 --> 0:01:42.640 for would be the end of war for one reason 0:01:42.760 --> 0:01:45.600 or another. And they fall into different kinds of categories. 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:48.160 So we're gonna talk about all of them. Yeah, So 0:01:48.200 --> 0:01:51.360 there are several different ways I guess you could imagine 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:54.840 that war between humans could end, and me, on one hand, 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:57.000 it's kind of hard to imagine that because it's just 0:01:57.040 --> 0:02:00.200 such a fundamental part of human nature and human history, 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:02.400 and obviously it would be a fantastic thing for us 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:04.840 to not violently kill each other in great numbers at 0:02:05.000 --> 0:02:08.680 intervals of time. But there are a few ways you 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:11.800 could look at how this might happen. So one would 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:16.160 be to sort of make war too risky so that 0:02:16.240 --> 0:02:19.840 it's just not in your self interest to pursue it, gotcha. 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:22.560 So the idea of being that even if you feel 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:26.800 you have an advanced military that to wage war of 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:30.680 any type would would encourage such losses as to nullify 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:35.200 any positive effect that that war might have, so it 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:38.200 just cannot be of a net advantage to you. The 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:41.280 only way to win is not to play. I guess 0:02:41.320 --> 0:02:44.000 another way, though, this is kind of harder to imagine 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:46.400 how it would be done, would be to say that 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:51.919 you would make war completely impracticable or physically impossible. So 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:55.240 it's just you somehow create a technology that makes it 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:58.280 so that people cannot actually do it. You want to 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:01.440 shoot somebody, but your gun doesn't work. It's just filled 0:03:01.440 --> 0:03:04.799 with crayons. Yeah, that would be a more difficult kind 0:03:04.840 --> 0:03:07.440 of technology to imagine, but some people have sort of 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:10.080 gone down that road and it will blur together with 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:14.200 the category I just mentioned. Um. Another way would probably 0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:19.240 be to sort of make war irrelevant, like to eliminate 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:22.400 the motivations that would drive people to war. So you 0:03:22.440 --> 0:03:24.600 imagine that you might come up with a list of 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:28.840 different reasons people would declare war on one another, and 0:03:28.880 --> 0:03:32.800 if you can eliminate all of those reasons for people 0:03:32.880 --> 0:03:36.600 wanting to go, hypothetically they won't go. Gotcha. So this 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:39.200 would be kind of the Star Trek future where you 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:43.960 have created a world where where you've eliminated need. Therefore 0:03:44.400 --> 0:03:47.360 war is a thing of the past. Yeah. Got The 0:03:47.360 --> 0:03:50.360 other one would be to sort of change us, to 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:54.360 to change our outlook or to change our nature or 0:03:54.400 --> 0:03:56.920 at least give us some kind of perspective that would 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:00.400 make war ridiculous to where we just realize it's no 0:04:00.440 --> 0:04:03.839 good and we don't want to do it. And we've 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.200 got some some actual examples that fall into these various 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:10.200 categories in more than one well, and they're One of 0:04:10.240 --> 0:04:12.880 the funny things is you don't have to go digging 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:16.839 into the annals of crank history to find people who 0:04:16.880 --> 0:04:19.400 thought world peace would come about by one of one 0:04:19.400 --> 0:04:24.520 of these methods. In fact, you can find really smart, famous, powerful, 0:04:24.640 --> 0:04:28.520 influential people who thought technology could get us down one 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:30.640 of these roads to world peace. And I think the 0:04:30.680 --> 0:04:33.480 first one we should talk about is a guy who's 0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:38.240 very Internet famous these days, Nicola Tesla. Although you did say, 0:04:38.360 --> 0:04:42.440 you know you don't have to look at cranks, Well, oh, 0:04:42.480 --> 0:04:45.680 you're you're getting on your anti Tesla. Look, I just 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:50.919 electrical Horse. The episode that just published was a rerun 0:04:50.960 --> 0:04:54.240 about our episode on Tesla where I talked about advocating 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:57.599 for Tesla and the Tesla versus Edison debate. Well, I mean, 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:00.480 it's it's not that I'm against Tesla, but it's pretty 0:05:00.600 --> 0:05:04.520 true that he had some mental health issues. But at 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.599 any rate, let's talk about this idea, this idea of 0:05:07.640 --> 0:05:12.680 a of an invention that negates war. Right, Tesla thought 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:16.840 that you could build something that would make war impossible. 0:05:17.360 --> 0:05:21.240 What was that thing, Well, it's Tesla's famous death ray, 0:05:21.440 --> 0:05:24.280 which immediately, as soon as you hear the name, you think, yeah, 0:05:24.320 --> 0:05:26.760 that that sounds peaceful. I don't know if he actually 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:29.240 called it death ray. I don't think those were The 0:05:29.240 --> 0:05:31.680 New York Times called it a death ray. Yeah. So 0:05:31.720 --> 0:05:34.400 we've got a quote from Nikola Tesla. This is from 0:05:34.440 --> 0:05:38.039 an article from nineteen thirty seven called a Machine to 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.920 End War, which featured an extended interview with Nikola Tesla, 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:46.560 where he gives the following quote. We cannot abolish war 0:05:46.600 --> 0:05:49.840 by outlawing it. We cannot end it by disarming the strong. 0:05:50.279 --> 0:05:53.320 War can be stopped not by making the strong week, 0:05:53.400 --> 0:05:56.800 but by making every nation week or strong able to 0:05:56.880 --> 0:06:00.919 defend itself. Hitherto, all devices that could be used for 0:06:00.960 --> 0:06:04.680 defense could also be utilized to serve for aggression. This 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:08.680 nullified the value of the improvement for purposes of peace. 0:06:09.160 --> 0:06:12.080 But I was fortunate enough to evolve a new idea 0:06:12.480 --> 0:06:16.040 and too perfect means which can be used chiefly for defense. 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:20.680 If it is adopted, it will revolutionize the relations between nations. 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:26.040 It will make any country, large or small, impregnable against armies, airplanes, 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:30.000 and other means for attack. My invention requires a large plant, 0:06:30.760 --> 0:06:33.520 but once it is established, it will be possible to 0:06:33.640 --> 0:06:37.400 destroy anything men or machines approaching within a radius of 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:40.840 two hundred miles. It will, so to speak, provide a 0:06:40.960 --> 0:06:46.760 wall of power, offering an insuperable obstacle against any effective aggression. 0:06:47.200 --> 0:06:50.520 So when he says plant, he of course means power plant. 0:06:50.720 --> 0:06:53.040 He does not a venus flag rout, not yet, not 0:06:53.080 --> 0:06:57.320 an enormous redwood or something. So this death ray, as 0:06:57.360 --> 0:06:59.520 as was referred to in the article I was never 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:02.360 actually fleshed out as far as we know. Tesla, first 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:04.159 of all, was famous for not writing a lot of 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:07.000 stuff down. He or at least that's why he claimed. 0:07:07.000 --> 0:07:11.680 He claimed he could envision inventions completely fully formed in 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:14.320 his head, and even take them apart virtually in his 0:07:14.400 --> 0:07:17.040 head and examine them to see how they worked, and 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:20.400 then eventually build the things, and they worked exactly the 0:07:20.400 --> 0:07:23.000 way they were supposed to. Uh, that's part of the 0:07:23.400 --> 0:07:26.800 Tesla story. Whether or not that's true, I don't know, 0:07:26.880 --> 0:07:29.720 But at any rate, we don't have any evidence that 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:33.880 Tesla had anything remotely resembling a death ray or what 0:07:34.040 --> 0:07:37.840 the actual mechanism would have been. Well, and he says, 0:07:38.200 --> 0:07:41.800 my apparatus projects particles which may be relatively large or 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:45.200 of microscopic dimensions, enabling us to convey to a small 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:48.560 area at a great distance trillions of times more energy 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:52.720 than it's possible with rays of any kind, which doesn't 0:07:52.840 --> 0:07:57.040 really sound like it means anything, but at any rate, UH. 0:07:57.200 --> 0:07:59.360 During this time of Tesla's life, he was in his 0:07:59.680 --> 0:08:03.400 seven these and this was when he was really kind 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:08.000 of mentally, it appeared he was breaking down. He had 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:14.160 already shown some signs of obsessive compulsive behaviors, possibly even 0:08:14.200 --> 0:08:17.720 some paranoid schizophrenia, because it was around this time also 0:08:17.760 --> 0:08:21.640 when he claimed that he had received transmissions from people, 0:08:21.680 --> 0:08:25.760 either from Venus or Mars, so you know, it's things 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:27.960 were a little rough for Tesla. He was also in 0:08:28.000 --> 0:08:30.720 the process of moving from one hotel to the other 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:35.079 because he would get evicted due to incurring enormous debts. 0:08:35.080 --> 0:08:37.520 But because he had such a rock star status as 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.160 a physicist and UH an electrical engineer, he would be 0:08:41.160 --> 0:08:43.720 invited to go live in another hotel until he had 0:08:43.800 --> 0:08:47.400 run up the debts there. So he may very well 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:50.880 have just been trying to earn as much money as 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.880 he possibly could selling this idea. Uh. And you know, 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:56.400 not necessarily. I don't mean that he didn't think it 0:08:56.440 --> 0:08:58.720 was real. He may very well believe that he could 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:02.840 in fact produce this advice, but he didn't. So uh. 0:09:03.080 --> 0:09:06.280 But this definitely falls into the realm of let's make 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:10.040 war impossible to happen by creating something that would prevent 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:13.600 the very act of aggression from reaching the intended target. 0:09:14.000 --> 0:09:18.360 Once another country knows that you have this capability to 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:21.720 stop any incoming attack, there's no reason they would ever 0:09:21.760 --> 0:09:25.520 attack you because it wouldn't work, right, of course, I 0:09:25.520 --> 0:09:28.000 mean that's the that's the logic behind it, and the 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:32.160 idea actually. Now, whether you're talking about array or a 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:34.480 thing that he doesn't want to call array but is 0:09:34.520 --> 0:09:38.560 instead projecting particles or whatever it is, this idea has 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:42.720 not necessarily died the basic idea of creating a technological 0:09:42.760 --> 0:09:47.520 infrastructure that would repel automatically all incoming attacks and make 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:52.120 them pointless. How about the Star Wars initiative, Yeah, the 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:55.760 Strategic Defense initiative in the nineteen eighties, often referred to 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:59.480 as the Star Wars program derisively. Yeah, I've really wanted 0:09:59.520 --> 0:10:02.760 to do a full episode about this, to really explain 0:10:03.360 --> 0:10:06.839 what the concept was, what the motivations were, because this 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:10.760 is this ends up being a very political, uh, a 0:10:10.840 --> 0:10:13.800 very political story, not just a technology story. In fact, 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:17.199 it's more political than technological in many ways. The whole 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.319 strategic defense initiative was fueled by the Cold War between 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:23.360 the United States and the then Soviet Union, and the 0:10:23.400 --> 0:10:26.440 idea was that if you have a system in place 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:31.720 that can block any incoming missile attack, then your country 0:10:31.920 --> 0:10:34.920 is going to be at an advantage and be safe 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:38.840 from aggression. Uh. This was during an era that we'll 0:10:38.840 --> 0:10:44.400 talk about very shortly, the whole idea of mutually assured destruction, 0:10:44.640 --> 0:10:46.920 but we'll get to that in a little bit. So 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:50.840 very similar idea. Yeah. There's another idea that's a lot 0:10:50.880 --> 0:10:54.800 like this, which is actually in use today, Israel's Iron 0:10:54.840 --> 0:10:56.719 Dome system. Have you read about this has been in 0:10:56.760 --> 0:10:59.480 the news lately. Yeah, it went into effect in two 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:04.680 thousand leven. This is an anti rocket defense system, so 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:08.240 it's meant to intercept rockets that are fired from outside 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:12.000 of Israel. Into Israel, and it does this by firing 0:11:12.120 --> 0:11:16.600 off interceptor missiles. They're called tamire surface to air missiles. 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:20.360 And you've got a radar system that first to texts 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:23.600 an incoming rocket, and then you have computers running predictive 0:11:24.080 --> 0:11:27.880 software that will look at the pathway of the rocket, 0:11:27.920 --> 0:11:31.520 predict which way it's going, and then send an interceptor 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.520 missile to destroy that rocket before it reaches its intended target. 0:11:35.880 --> 0:11:39.360 It's even supposed to only focus on rockets that are 0:11:39.360 --> 0:11:42.120 aimed at populated areas, So if a rocket were to 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.960 be aimed at an open area where there's not likely 0:11:46.000 --> 0:11:50.280 anyone to be harmed, it won't target that rocket. The 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:54.240 reason being that interceptor missiles are expensive. We're talking like, sure, 0:11:55.040 --> 0:11:58.040 just shy of a hundred thousand dollars a pop. So 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:01.120 also I'm imagining that this is him at large must 0:12:01.400 --> 0:12:05.319 just be incredibly expensive and complicated, because if it's actually 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:08.920 able to calculate the trajectory of an incoming rocket to 0:12:09.040 --> 0:12:12.600 figure out whether it needs to intercept or not, I 0:12:12.600 --> 0:12:16.079 mean wow. And there's been some criticism of the system. 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:22.000 One is based on just a skepticism that it's really effective. 0:12:22.360 --> 0:12:25.719 The idea being that it's possible that in a display 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:29.520 of its effectiveness when because just recently there was a 0:12:29.520 --> 0:12:32.440 news story where the system was able to shoot down 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:37.120 fifteen different incoming rockets that were fired simultaneously. Uh, and 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:40.400 that that's really impressive. But there's some critics who suggest 0:12:40.559 --> 0:12:43.839 it's kind of in a conspiracy theory way, that it 0:12:43.880 --> 0:12:47.280 could just be the is the Israeli government firing off 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:50.320 the interceptor missiles and then having them detonate because you 0:12:50.360 --> 0:12:52.560 can't see these rockets with the naked eye when they're 0:12:52.559 --> 0:12:55.440 flying through the air. They're they're too small for you 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:57.480 to notice, and they fly too high for you to notice. 0:12:57.520 --> 0:13:01.320 So it's possible that you could detonate in receptor missiles 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:04.559 then uh, and then say, oh, that's a successful interception. 0:13:05.280 --> 0:13:07.360 I'm not going to go so far as to say 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:11.560 that that conspiracy theory holds merit. I more inclined to 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.000 believe that this is in fact an actual demonstration of 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:18.040 it working. Um. But there are also critics who say 0:13:18.280 --> 0:13:21.000 it gives any system that's like this, whether it's the 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:26.360 Strategic Defense Initiative or the Iron Dome initiative, it can 0:13:26.400 --> 0:13:31.080 create an unhealthy political environment, meaning that if you have 0:13:31.520 --> 0:13:34.640 this kind of technology at your disposal, you may feel 0:13:34.800 --> 0:13:38.800 that you are to some degree invulnerable. It's weird to 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:41.240 say to some degree, but at any rate that you 0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:46.040 are largely invulnerable to incoming attack, which some argue means 0:13:46.080 --> 0:13:49.920 that you have less of of an incentive to pursue peace. Well, yeah, 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:52.280 if we want to transition to the next item on 0:13:52.320 --> 0:13:55.200 our list here, some people might say that it's very 0:13:55.240 --> 0:14:00.840 important that we all feel vulnerable in order to maintain peace. Yeah. Yeah, 0:14:00.840 --> 0:14:03.080 this is where we get into the idea of mutually 0:14:03.200 --> 0:14:06.480 assured destruction. So this is, uh, it doesn't have a 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:09.000 very friendly name, but believe it or not, for the 0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:10.960 past century, there have been a lot of people who 0:14:11.000 --> 0:14:14.079 thought that this was one of the best technological routes 0:14:14.120 --> 0:14:16.439 to world peace. Yeah, and in fact, this is this 0:14:16.480 --> 0:14:19.760 is kind of piggybacked onto Tesla's idea, right, the idea 0:14:19.800 --> 0:14:23.760 that if you are in possession of enough firepower of 0:14:23.840 --> 0:14:28.160 whatever sort, that that's enough to to deter people or 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:32.080 other countries from attacking you. This ends up being repeated 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:34.720 over and over again up and up through the Cold 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:37.320 War and before the Cold War or the Cold War. 0:14:37.440 --> 0:14:41.360 Really yeah, Hiron Maxim, who invented the machine gun, said 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:43.640 this device is going to end all war because it's 0:14:43.680 --> 0:14:46.800 so dangerous that no one would dare attack. Yeah, and 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:50.000 that ended up being very much wrong, especially in the 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:52.360 whole story of World War One and World War Two. 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:56.520 Certainly proves that Orville right believe that the airplane would 0:14:56.600 --> 0:15:00.000 end war. The airplane would be such an incredibly superior 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.600 are your vehicle that there'd be no reason to ever 0:15:03.640 --> 0:15:08.040 declare war for fear of what would rain down upon you. Obviously, 0:15:08.120 --> 0:15:10.560 that became a very important tool in war. In fact, 0:15:10.600 --> 0:15:12.440 I think there are some people who would look at 0:15:12.480 --> 0:15:15.760 those two examples you just cited and say that those 0:15:15.840 --> 0:15:19.040 might have been some of the leading causes of World 0:15:19.080 --> 0:15:22.600 War One obvious at least the leading tools. Well, I 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:24.960 mean causes in the sense that obviously there was a 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:28.520 lot of international political tension. I mean, does anybody really 0:15:28.560 --> 0:15:30.640 know what caused World War One? I think it's a 0:15:30.640 --> 0:15:34.280 lot of confusion, But uh, certainly an opinion that I've 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:36.360 heard before, and I don't know enough to dismiss it 0:15:36.360 --> 0:15:38.800 out of hand, is to say that a major factor 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:41.320 in what led to World War One was the acquiring 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:45.760 of new warmaking technology and people building up their military 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:49.320 stockpiles and basically looking for a way to test this 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:51.240 new stuff out. Well, that's part of it. I mean, 0:15:51.440 --> 0:15:54.800 during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, you had 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:58.080 all these different countries in Europe, including Germany, which had 0:15:58.120 --> 0:16:00.960 just formed as an actual country tree I mean odd 0:16:01.000 --> 0:16:04.920 people forget that Germany as a unified country didn't really 0:16:05.000 --> 0:16:09.080 exist until the mid nineteenth century. Uh, you know it, 0:16:09.280 --> 0:16:13.160 since it had previously been part of of various empires. 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:16.320 These different countries were all trying to make sure they 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:20.160 cemented their stability, that they made sure they were safe 0:16:20.160 --> 0:16:24.200 from other nations, which meant investing in militaries. For Germany 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:27.640 and for the United Kingdom that was largely naval, they 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:31.200 were investing heavily in their navies. Um. But what it 0:16:31.280 --> 0:16:33.600 what it also meant was that you had these these 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:39.720 incredibly powerful armies around Europe that were ready to go 0:16:39.760 --> 0:16:44.240 at any moment with no particular opponent. But you also 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:48.840 have these incredibly complex treaties between countries, so when there 0:16:48.880 --> 0:16:53.520 would be a precipitating event, it wasn't in at least 0:16:53.560 --> 0:16:56.680 in hindsight, it wasn't a huge surprise to see it. 0:16:56.800 --> 0:17:01.120 Kind of escalate into the major conflict that Kane. Well, 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.600 just that historical onion headline about World War One. I 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:08.639 think it's something like war declared by all. It's a 0:17:08.800 --> 0:17:12.400 that's fairly accurate. I mean, it certainly didn't all happen simultaneously, 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:15.879 but it it's again, in hindsight, you can totally see 0:17:15.880 --> 0:17:18.879 how it happened. But at the time, I'm sure people 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:23.040 just thought it was it was unimaginable, but that that 0:17:23.119 --> 0:17:26.840 philosophy continued beyond World War One. Yeah. Well, so it's 0:17:26.920 --> 0:17:29.960 quite obvious that machine guns and airplanes have not made 0:17:29.960 --> 0:17:35.560 war obsoletely, but there's a more questionable proposal, which is 0:17:35.600 --> 0:17:41.520 that maybe nuclear weapons have. Yeah. Alright, so you've heard 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:46.680 of the The scientist Edward Teller is born in Hungary 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:51.200 and uh immigrated to the United States, and he had 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:55.800 this to say about scientists in general, which was, the 0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:58.840 scientist is not responsible for the laws of nature. It 0:17:58.960 --> 0:18:01.640 is his job to find doubt how these laws operate. 0:18:02.160 --> 0:18:04.800 Is the scientist's job to find the ways in which 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:08.280 these laws can serve the human will. However, it is 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:11.840 not the scientist's job to determine whether a hydrogen bomb 0:18:11.880 --> 0:18:14.920 should be constructed, whether it should be used or how 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:17.320 it should be used. Now, the reason he said that 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:20.800 was that he worked on the Manhattan Project, all right, 0:18:20.880 --> 0:18:22.199 he was one of the science In fact, he was 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:25.840 one of the three scientists who convinced Albert Einstein that 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:29.679 he should tell the President about the powers of nuclear fission, 0:18:29.960 --> 0:18:33.040 which then of the United States. The President United States Yes, 0:18:33.720 --> 0:18:37.480 in order to precipitate the development of the atomic bomb. 0:18:38.040 --> 0:18:42.040 And then there became another discussion within the same group 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:45.159 of the Manhattan Project about the development of what they 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:50.280 were calling a superbomb, a thermonuclear weapon, and Teller was 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:53.800 very much on the side of we should make this thing. 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:56.800 This this is something we should invest in. Uh. And 0:18:56.840 --> 0:19:01.560 then there were other scientists like Oppenheimer, who said this 0:19:01.640 --> 0:19:03.400 is a bad idea, we should not do this thing. 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:06.560 And there was a lot of disagreement, which led to 0:19:06.800 --> 0:19:09.400 some pretty controversial stuff down the line. But at any rate, 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:12.320 you had Teller advocating for this. Now, why did he 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:14.720 had the cap for this? Well, he grew up in 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:19.360 Europe during a very tumultuous time and developed a distinct 0:19:19.440 --> 0:19:26.640 dislike for fascism and communism before leaving to come to America. Yeah, 0:19:26.760 --> 0:19:31.399 he saw Europe being torn apart. I mean it was 0:19:31.440 --> 0:19:34.440 already uh, it had already gone through World War One 0:19:34.480 --> 0:19:37.199 and was entering World War two, or was about to 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:39.199 enter World War two by the time he was leaving, 0:19:39.680 --> 0:19:43.240 and things just got worse from there. So in his mind, 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:45.879 one of the worst things in the world was the 0:19:45.920 --> 0:19:49.560 formation of the Soviet Union. He saw communism as being 0:19:50.000 --> 0:19:54.080 probably the greatest danger to the human race, and his 0:19:54.200 --> 0:19:58.480 argument was that if we don't pursue this sort of 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:03.560 weapons program, this arms race, the Soviet Union certainly will. 0:20:04.000 --> 0:20:06.360 So if we don't do it, we're gonna be left 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:09.800 behind and we'll be vulnerable. The only way to ensure 0:20:09.880 --> 0:20:13.200 that we're safe is to also engage in an arms race, 0:20:13.440 --> 0:20:17.600 to develop these incredibly destructive weapons and thus be a 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:20.439 big enough threat where the Soviet Union would never attack us. 0:20:20.440 --> 0:20:24.360 I mean, we would surely never attack anyone else unprovoked. 0:20:24.880 --> 0:20:26.840 So this is just for us to make sure that 0:20:26.880 --> 0:20:29.600 they don't attack us. That was the That was the 0:20:29.640 --> 0:20:33.000 general philosophy. So build up your arms to the point 0:20:33.040 --> 0:20:35.960 where you would be such a destructive force that it 0:20:36.000 --> 0:20:39.960 would be crazy to attack you, which is again very 0:20:40.000 --> 0:20:42.440 similar to what we've already talked about right. So now 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:46.919 we have gigantic nuclear stockpiles on Earth, yes, as a 0:20:46.960 --> 0:20:50.960 result of this doctrine. But this is this is interesting 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:53.520 because I feel like, while on one hand, it's not 0:20:53.600 --> 0:20:57.919 a very friendly sounding doctrine, some people might still argue 0:20:57.960 --> 0:21:01.359 for the wisdom of mad Well, it's there. I mean, 0:21:01.440 --> 0:21:03.199 there would be a lot of people. I think it 0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:07.640 is completely wrong to say that it would make war obsolete. 0:21:07.760 --> 0:21:10.520 I mean, there have been tons of wars since nuclear 0:21:10.560 --> 0:21:14.720 weapons were invented, you know, involving nuclear powers. But it's 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:17.600 some people I think might still say that, well, maybe 0:21:17.680 --> 0:21:20.880 the presence of all these nuclear weapons did prevent all 0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:24.240 out war between say the United States and the Soviet Union. 0:21:25.359 --> 0:21:27.119 We just have to keep in mind that there have 0:21:27.160 --> 0:21:30.720 been tons of proxy wars throughout the years, fought by 0:21:30.800 --> 0:21:34.120 these powers sort of through other countries. And sure so, 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:37.760 so essentially what you're saying is the existence of thermonuclear 0:21:37.760 --> 0:21:42.560 weapons has prevented a thermonuclear war. That without the existence 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:46.520 of these thermonuclear weapons in one or other of the parties, 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:50.480 the possibility of thermonuclear war rises. But because you have 0:21:50.720 --> 0:21:53.880 this this balance where you have people, you know, who 0:21:53.920 --> 0:21:57.359 realized what the implications of starting such a war would 0:21:57.359 --> 0:22:01.840 be it hasn't happened. Yeah, even if you were to 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:05.160 agree with this idea, you might not necessarily think it's 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:07.800 good for the world as a whole. It might be 0:22:07.800 --> 0:22:10.399 better for the people living in the United States and 0:22:10.440 --> 0:22:14.959 the Soviet Union and not so much for their allies. Uh. 0:22:15.000 --> 0:22:17.159 But I'm not even saying I agree with this. I 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:19.639 just wanted to say, well, this is one that we 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:22.119 can't put it in the totally ridiculous camp because I 0:22:22.119 --> 0:22:25.200 think there are still people who think that mutually assured 0:22:25.200 --> 0:22:29.439 destruction had some kind of effectiveness. Now, this has also 0:22:29.560 --> 0:22:34.320 led to the very popular trope of creating a doomsday 0:22:34.320 --> 0:22:38.040 device that is so dangerous that that's what protects you 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:41.520 from attack, right right. The idea of a fail deadly 0:22:41.680 --> 0:22:45.280 device as depicted in the movie Doctor Strangelove, which how 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:48.840 how would something like a fail deadly device work? Well, 0:22:49.080 --> 0:22:51.680 Doctor strange Love. The way it works is that it's 0:22:51.680 --> 0:22:55.359 a device that, once initiated, cannot be canceled and and 0:22:55.359 --> 0:22:57.720 and Dr Strangelove. It's it's the Soviet Union that has 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:03.359 built a device that will automatically activate if any sort 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:07.920 of oncoming attack, bombing attack were to target the Soviet 0:23:08.000 --> 0:23:10.760 Union and wants it detects such an attack, it then 0:23:11.000 --> 0:23:14.600 initiates this device, which is you can't turn it off, 0:23:14.840 --> 0:23:19.440 and it's designed to kill essentially everything. It's automatic. Yeah, 0:23:20.080 --> 0:23:22.439 and because you can't turn it off, then the ideas 0:23:22.480 --> 0:23:25.240 that's the perfect deterrent, because you just tell everyone, hey, 0:23:25.359 --> 0:23:28.399 if you attack us, this thing goes on. It kills everybody, 0:23:28.480 --> 0:23:31.439 and we can't stop it. We even if we want to, 0:23:31.560 --> 0:23:35.000 we cannot stop this thing. And uh, the the main 0:23:35.119 --> 0:23:38.280 character or the title character of the movie, Dr Strangelove, 0:23:38.280 --> 0:23:40.280 he's not the main character, but he is the title character, 0:23:40.680 --> 0:23:43.560 points out that this particular kind of device is only 0:23:43.680 --> 0:23:48.000 useful if the world knows about it, if it's secret, 0:23:48.920 --> 0:23:50.960