The Moon has long been associated with insanity, as it was often assumed in ancient times that its phases were the cause of it. Hence words like "lunatic" and "lunacy", derived from its Latin alias Luna, and the slangy variant "loony" (or looney), as in Looney Tunes.
Given this, a plan to drop an atomic bomb on it is a severe act of lunacy if ever there was one.
Can you even imagine? Thankfully common sense and logic won out and Thank goodness MAGA wasn’t around back then. Sounds like Trumps next great idea . #Savethemoon
In 1942, Hungarian-American physicist Edward Teller, known now as "the father of the hydrogen bomb," entertained a devastating nightmare scenario: that an atomic bomb could ignite the atmosphere and the oceans. He reasoned that a nuclear fission bomb might create temperatures so extreme that it would cause the hydrogen atoms in the air and water to fuse together into helium, just like in our sun, generating a runaway reaction that would eventually engulf the globe, extinguishing all life and turning the Earth into a miniature star.
When Teller informed some of his colleagues of this possibility, he was greeted with both skepticism and fear. Hans Bethe immediately dismissed the idea, but according to author Pearl Buck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Arthur Compton was so concerned that he told Robert Oppenheimer that if there were even the slightest chance of this "ultimate catastrophe" playing out, all work on the bomb should stop.
So a study was commissioned to explore the matter in detail, and six months before the Trinity test, the very first detonation of nuclear device, Edward Teller and Emil Konopinski announced their findings in a report with the ominous title "Ignition of the Atmosphere With Nuclear Bombs."
"It is shown that, whatever the temperature to which a section of the atmosphere may be heated, no self-propagating chain of nuclear reactions is likely to be started. The energy losses to radiation always overcompensate the gains due to the reactions."
The Moon has long been associated with insanity, as it was often assumed in ancient times that its phases were the cause of it. Hence words like "lunatic" and "lunacy", derived from its Latin alias Luna, and the slangy variant "loony" (or looney), as in Looney Tunes.
Given this, a plan to drop an atomic bomb on it is a severe act of lunacy if ever there was one.
It's wild to consider that this really could have happened.
Can you even imagine? Thankfully common sense and logic won out and Thank goodness MAGA wasn’t around back then. Sounds like Trumps next great idea . #Savethemoon
The fifties were not as bad as the PR made them out to be.
So naturally this has me thinking of Gru trying to shrink and steal the moon in Despicable Me. 🤣
I never knew this was a real thing; I always thought it was just a meme. And yet, somehow, I am not surprised.
Every time I think I should be surprised, I'm not anymore.
Most of the time.
I'd never heard of this lunar lunacy before. ☮️
Have you ever tasted the moon or felt it resting in the small of your back?
Such an exercise obviously excludes nuking it or anything else for that matter.
Have you ever danced with the devil by the pale moonlight?
Your post reminded me of the below scenario (
https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2019/09/12/the_fear_that_a_nuclear_bomb_could_ignite_the_atmosphere.html) with Atom Bomb and the same story was also in the book (http://www.words-and-dirt.com/words/review-toby-ords-the-precipice/):
In 1942, Hungarian-American physicist Edward Teller, known now as "the father of the hydrogen bomb," entertained a devastating nightmare scenario: that an atomic bomb could ignite the atmosphere and the oceans. He reasoned that a nuclear fission bomb might create temperatures so extreme that it would cause the hydrogen atoms in the air and water to fuse together into helium, just like in our sun, generating a runaway reaction that would eventually engulf the globe, extinguishing all life and turning the Earth into a miniature star.
When Teller informed some of his colleagues of this possibility, he was greeted with both skepticism and fear. Hans Bethe immediately dismissed the idea, but according to author Pearl Buck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Arthur Compton was so concerned that he told Robert Oppenheimer that if there were even the slightest chance of this "ultimate catastrophe" playing out, all work on the bomb should stop.
So a study was commissioned to explore the matter in detail, and six months before the Trinity test, the very first detonation of nuclear device, Edward Teller and Emil Konopinski announced their findings in a report with the ominous title "Ignition of the Atmosphere With Nuclear Bombs."
"It is shown that, whatever the temperature to which a section of the atmosphere may be heated, no self-propagating chain of nuclear reactions is likely to be started. The energy losses to radiation always overcompensate the gains due to the reactions."
Luckily, we got to test the whole "nuking celestial objects" thing some years later when we sent Bruce Willis to blow up that asteroid.
Cue Neal Stephenson's SevenEves.