Re: Does the issue of nuclear weapons need to be addressed?

On 17 Aug, 12:01, Whiskers <catwhee...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 2007-08-16, Ian <ian.gro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

All you have said that's vaguely on topic is that they can't be
uninvented. So what? Where do /you/ think humanity should go from
here?

Here's a thought: nuclear fission could be used as a defense against an
asteroid or meteor on a collision course with the Earth - if we spotted it
in time and had the means of getting sufficient energy into the right
place at the right moment to divert the threat.

Diverting an asteroid would take momentum, not energy, and a nuclear
bomb can't provide much of that. About the best you could hope for
would be to split the thing into pieces so that the centre of mass
could pass through the earth.

As to which countries should or shouldn't have their own weapons, of any
sort, I don't think there's any point in discussing it.

I assume that any country which wants them will have them within the
next hundred years.

Ian

.

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