The Rise and Fall of the Atom

Hankin Sym Tud Trowle Angel

Mary Joseph CAST

Mark Adeney Richard Venable David Clark Barney Skrentny sung by Kit Bird spoken by Peter Davies Jane Schofield Andrew Paterson

Lighting: Terry Wallhead, Peter Stancer Produced by Peter Gardiner

(An illustrated lecture by D. H. Hamilton and the Physics Department)

It has been an eternal question whether the scientist should consider the moral consequences of his invention or discovery. Gatling and Mills were boffins who did what was asked of them, and their contribution to destruction is only exceeded by that of the 'Manhattan Project' in degree, not in principle. So the solemnity of the last part of this presentation, with the 'Threnody for the victims of Hiroshima' and 'A song about Major Eatherley', left an unanswered question: can the fearful ruin caused by the atom bomb be balanced against the lives that were not sacrificed in a projected 'conventional' attack on Japan, and against the lives of thousands of starving and despairing war prisoners saved by the bomb's timely delivery ?

Of course it was right that we should have been left to reflect on this ultimate power that man has given himself; and the fascination of the evening was in watching man's resistless progress towards it.

Giving the ancients the chance to speak for themselves made a lighthearted but useful approach. We at once felt the sense of awe in the presence of men in whom wisdom was more prominent than expertise; but we could also enjoy the eternal human weakness of scientists who must disagree with each other until they can be convinced by experiment; and how pleasing to see that the first experiment needed brute force rather than scientific skill.

Soon we were in the realms of skilled scientific experiment carried out with consummate ease; and when we were told 'this one you can do for yourselves', we knew that if we tried we would certainly get it wrong and be left wondering why.

Mr. Hamilton has the happy ability to expand without pomposity the distillation of the learning of 2,50o years; and furthermore he manages to use his audience, even those of us who are ignorant, and to leave us thinking that we are potentially quite clever. As time went on we began to think we really could appreciate that a ten-inch gold ingot contains 6o million million atoms, and we felt we could consult a periodic table as confidently as a calendar, since the audience had been turned into the periodic table. `Charged particles' suggests something very modern until we found that the ubiquitous Aristotle had used them to cure gout, and that some of his contemporaries had used a piece of amber to produce the effect that Thomson was to refine and explain in the Cavendish at Cambridge. Is there 'nothing new under the sun' ?

In fact, the presentation of some of the great scientific discoveries was, as always, dramatic in that such marvels could come from simple domestic activities. The idea of a coalman delivering pitchblende at the home of the Curies as the preliminary to one of the profound discoveries is the sort of human touch that somehow gives hope to us all: the feeling that the endless gift of discovery vouchsafed to the dedicated will take us nearer to ultimate truth.

So how right it was, that as we came to the awesome explanation of the atom by Rutherford, he should be introduced on the screen paddling at the seaside, trousers rolled above his knees; it made us think that perhaps Newton really did find interest in a falling apple.

And so to imploded atoms, collapsed stars, the horror of 'black holes' and the discovery of the neutron and the possibilities that might arise from using it to bombard the nucleus of an atom.

Science, like music, knows no frontiers; and ironically it was the attempt to create scientific frontiers that produced 'the fall of the atom', and which can, if we are not careful, produce the second and final fall of man. 'The Bomb' won a war, and thereafter became a symbol of national prestige.

It may be more comfortable to try to keep science free from moral judgements and from politics; but the story of the atom leaves us much to think about. Scientists used to be called philosophers, and we can see why: the search for scientific truth is the search for eternal truth.

Mr. Hamilton and his team made the presentation seem very easy, almost casual: 'we'll just see if this one works'; and of course it did every time. It was learning with a smile, and we are very grateful to all who made it possible. D . G. C.

`PANEL OF EXPERTS' Roger Bacon (English c. 1210-1280) Democritus (Greek c. 420 B.c.) Lucretius (Greek c. 95-55 B.c.) Aristotle (Greek 384-322 B.c.) Rene Descartes (French 1561-1650) Robert Boyle (Irish 1627-1691) John Dalton (English 1766-1814)

J. A. McGrath C. R. Bionk C. J. E. Bird T. A. Heap T. A. Kaner R. D. E. Brown D. R. Kaner

Experiments: C. R. W. Bell, C. J. E. Bird, C. R. Bronk, R. D. E. Brown, A. M. Gillett, T. A. Heap Visual Aids: J. E. Hirst, D. R. Kaner, T. A. Kaner, J. C. Lawrence, A. P. McGrath, J. A. McGrath Lights and Music: P. A. Minnighan, A. J. Nichols, W. I. Sellers, R. Wadhawan, T. R. Wallhead, A. G. Whipp, J. P. C. Wye

THE RACE TO PERFECT THE ATOM BOMB Reader: I. M. K. Lowe Music: Penderecki, 'Threnody for Victims of Hiroshima' Poem: John Wain, 'A Song about Major Eatherley'