WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.428 align:middle line:90% [SQUEAKING] 00:00:02.428 --> 00:00:03.392 align:middle line:90% [RUSTLING] 00:00:03.392 --> 00:00:06.766 align:middle line:90% [CLICKING] 00:00:06.766 --> 00:00:10.640 align:middle line:90% 00:00:10.640 --> 00:00:14.000 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: Welcome to 22.04 and 22.103. 00:00:14.000 --> 00:00:17.915 align:middle line:84% This is a typical class, but it-- 00:00:17.915 --> 00:00:20.040 align:middle line:84% let me just tell you a little bit about the history 00:00:20.040 --> 00:00:21.080 align:middle line:90% of this class. 00:00:21.080 --> 00:00:24.640 align:middle line:84% It started out as it's just like a small focus. 00:00:24.640 --> 00:00:28.800 align:middle line:84% Six students, and we were interested in exploring 00:00:28.800 --> 00:00:31.720 align:middle line:84% some of these questions about why nuclear power has struggled 00:00:31.720 --> 00:00:33.000 align:middle line:90% in the world. 00:00:33.000 --> 00:00:37.200 align:middle line:84% The undergraduates petitioned the department to make it 00:00:37.200 --> 00:00:41.000 align:middle line:84% a mandatory class, which meant migrating obligation went 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:42.520 align:middle line:90% way up. 00:00:42.520 --> 00:00:47.080 align:middle line:84% And then the department decided to create a graduate version 00:00:47.080 --> 00:00:50.240 align:middle line:84% of the class, which also then became mandatory thanks 00:00:50.240 --> 00:00:52.240 align:middle line:90% to student petitions. 00:00:52.240 --> 00:00:53.920 align:middle line:90% So here we are. 00:00:53.920 --> 00:00:59.530 align:middle line:84% This class now is huge, and it's very strange. 00:00:59.530 --> 00:01:04.250 align:middle line:84% This class will challenge everything 00:01:04.250 --> 00:01:08.750 align:middle line:84% you believe, probably, about nuclear power for a reason. 00:01:08.750 --> 00:01:11.070 align:middle line:84% We want you to know why you're doing what you're doing, 00:01:11.070 --> 00:01:14.850 align:middle line:84% and we want you to understand the debate about why 00:01:14.850 --> 00:01:19.690 align:middle line:84% nuclear energy has and will, in a way, struggled 00:01:19.690 --> 00:01:21.790 align:middle line:84% to thrive, at least in the United States, 00:01:21.790 --> 00:01:24.493 align:middle line:84% but also, if we're fair, increasingly struggling 00:01:24.493 --> 00:01:26.910 align:middle line:84% in other parts of the world, including places like France, 00:01:26.910 --> 00:01:30.050 align:middle line:84% Japan, Korea where nuclear power has historically, 00:01:30.050 --> 00:01:33.130 align:middle line:84% in recent years, had a heyday-- and of course, it 00:01:33.130 --> 00:01:34.550 align:middle line:84% had a heyday in the United States, 00:01:34.550 --> 00:01:37.570 align:middle line:90% too, but much farther back. 00:01:37.570 --> 00:01:42.850 align:middle line:84% So that's the idea behind this class. 00:01:42.850 --> 00:01:45.550 align:middle line:84% It used to be there was lots and lots of reading in this class, 00:01:45.550 --> 00:01:49.090 align:middle line:84% and the kind of Haas-style class where there's hundreds 00:01:49.090 --> 00:01:50.770 align:middle line:90% pages a week of reading. 00:01:50.770 --> 00:01:52.870 align:middle line:84% But as the class grew and became mandatory, 00:01:52.870 --> 00:01:55.950 align:middle line:84% that became a little burdensome for a lot of students. 00:01:55.950 --> 00:01:57.990 align:middle line:84% So there's still substantial reading, 00:01:57.990 --> 00:02:01.150 align:middle line:84% and we want you to do the reading, 00:02:01.150 --> 00:02:06.390 align:middle line:84% but that's kind of up to you-- oh my gosh. 00:02:06.390 --> 00:02:11.730 align:middle line:84% We are way over the number of students I anticipated. 00:02:11.730 --> 00:02:14.390 align:middle line:90% 00:02:14.390 --> 00:02:19.830 align:middle line:84% The syllabus-- current syllabus is posted on Canvas. 00:02:19.830 --> 00:02:21.930 align:middle line:84% The syllabus goes in chronological order, 00:02:21.930 --> 00:02:25.850 align:middle line:84% so if the readings are shown before the lecture, 00:02:25.850 --> 00:02:28.557 align:middle line:84% try to do those readings before the lecture. 00:02:28.557 --> 00:02:30.390 align:middle line:84% If the readings are shown after the lecture, 00:02:30.390 --> 00:02:32.130 align:middle line:84% you do the readings after the lecture. 00:02:32.130 --> 00:02:35.590 align:middle line:90% 00:02:35.590 --> 00:02:38.350 align:middle line:84% There are-- so now let me talk about homework. 00:02:38.350 --> 00:02:41.270 align:middle line:84% So one of the goals of this class 00:02:41.270 --> 00:02:46.390 align:middle line:84% is to teach you how to write coherently 00:02:46.390 --> 00:02:50.070 align:middle line:84% and convincingly, which is a skill that 00:02:50.070 --> 00:02:54.390 align:middle line:84% is, of course, increasingly becoming lost as AI 00:02:54.390 --> 00:02:59.360 align:middle line:90% becomes our crutch for writing. 00:02:59.360 --> 00:03:02.860 align:middle line:84% I would contend that even though AI can fix your writing, 00:03:02.860 --> 00:03:04.760 align:middle line:84% it would still be nice to be able to write 00:03:04.760 --> 00:03:09.480 align:middle line:84% and, more precisely, read what you-- read things critically. 00:03:09.480 --> 00:03:11.280 align:middle line:90% And so the goal-- 00:03:11.280 --> 00:03:13.260 align:middle line:84% one of the goals of this class is to do that. 00:03:13.260 --> 00:03:16.160 align:middle line:84% In fact, it's a core requirement for the undergrads. 00:03:16.160 --> 00:03:19.160 align:middle line:84% And it's not technically a core requirement 00:03:19.160 --> 00:03:21.920 align:middle line:84% for the grad students, but I will remind you 00:03:21.920 --> 00:03:24.400 align:middle line:90% that you will have to write-- 00:03:24.400 --> 00:03:26.640 align:middle line:84% if you're a PhD student-- you have 00:03:26.640 --> 00:03:28.060 align:middle line:84% to write a thesis no matter what. 00:03:28.060 --> 00:03:32.520 align:middle line:84% And if you're a PhD student, you also need to write a prospectus 00:03:32.520 --> 00:03:35.640 align:middle line:84% and defend your prospectus in front of the faculty. 00:03:35.640 --> 00:03:38.360 align:middle line:84% For many of you, this will be your first chance 00:03:38.360 --> 00:03:42.040 align:middle line:84% to write about a nuclear topic and defend it 00:03:42.040 --> 00:03:43.500 align:middle line:90% with faculty review. 00:03:43.500 --> 00:03:47.480 align:middle line:84% It's a great opportunity to dry run that experience 00:03:47.480 --> 00:03:49.440 align:middle line:90% to help you pass calls. 00:03:49.440 --> 00:03:52.480 align:middle line:84% So that is part of the motivation for asking 00:03:52.480 --> 00:03:54.280 align:middle line:90% you to do a lot of writing. 00:03:54.280 --> 00:03:58.130 align:middle line:84% The only writing that you absolutely must do in this class 00:03:58.130 --> 00:04:00.210 align:middle line:90% is the final paper. 00:04:00.210 --> 00:04:02.630 align:middle line:84% It is-- so I'll talk about the final paper in a moment, 00:04:02.630 --> 00:04:07.370 align:middle line:84% but to help you do your final paper more successfully, 00:04:07.370 --> 00:04:10.050 align:middle line:84% we have this idea that you can do these small writing 00:04:10.050 --> 00:04:13.330 align:middle line:84% assignments over the course of this semester in response 00:04:13.330 --> 00:04:14.850 align:middle line:90% to the readings-- 00:04:14.850 --> 00:04:19.209 align:middle line:84% or either directly in response or the subject of the readings, 00:04:19.209 --> 00:04:21.370 align:middle line:84% we'll see how they're structured. 00:04:21.370 --> 00:04:26.570 align:middle line:84% And those will be reviewed, you will get feedback on them, 00:04:26.570 --> 00:04:32.130 align:middle line:84% and then you would turn in a revised copy later in the week. 00:04:32.130 --> 00:04:35.830 align:middle line:84% So historically I had a TA that would grade all these readings. 00:04:35.830 --> 00:04:38.210 align:middle line:84% You can see how much readings-- how many essays 00:04:38.210 --> 00:04:39.730 align:middle line:90% I would have to grade. 00:04:39.730 --> 00:04:41.510 align:middle line:84% It takes about, for a class of this size, 00:04:41.510 --> 00:04:46.690 align:middle line:84% about 35 hours of grading a week to handle all the essays. 00:04:46.690 --> 00:04:51.010 align:middle line:84% Since-- because of the Trump budget cuts, 00:04:51.010 --> 00:04:52.930 align:middle line:84% there are university budget cuts, 00:04:52.930 --> 00:04:57.340 align:middle line:84% and I now no longer have a TA for this class. 00:04:57.340 --> 00:05:02.380 align:middle line:84% So in consultation with the department head and others, 00:05:02.380 --> 00:05:06.780 align:middle line:84% we have devised the following process to grade the readings. 00:05:06.780 --> 00:05:10.140 align:middle line:84% Your initial submissions would be submitted, 00:05:10.140 --> 00:05:13.240 align:middle line:84% if you opt into the homework, believe it or not, 00:05:13.240 --> 00:05:19.060 align:middle line:84% to an AI review that I have trained on a data set, 00:05:19.060 --> 00:05:21.540 align:middle line:84% and actually does a really good job, 00:05:21.540 --> 00:05:24.140 align:middle line:84% better than I can do, honestly, of finding logical errors 00:05:24.140 --> 00:05:25.380 align:middle line:90% in your arguments. 00:05:25.380 --> 00:05:28.020 align:middle line:84% AI is extremely good at textual analysis. 00:05:28.020 --> 00:05:31.180 align:middle line:84% For all the flaws, it can sometimes make with facts-- 00:05:31.180 --> 00:05:33.500 align:middle line:84% it's very good at textual analysis. 00:05:33.500 --> 00:05:37.060 align:middle line:84% You would get an AI-generated response, 00:05:37.060 --> 00:05:39.268 align:middle line:84% and then you would have to write-- you would treat it 00:05:39.268 --> 00:05:41.810 align:middle line:84% like a little peer review that you would get if you submitted 00:05:41.810 --> 00:05:42.580 align:middle line:90% a journal article. 00:05:42.580 --> 00:05:46.400 align:middle line:84% You have to respond to all of the criticisms. 00:05:46.400 --> 00:05:49.380 align:middle line:84% So you would say, you've made some kind 00:05:49.380 --> 00:05:54.140 align:middle line:84% of logical fallacy error in this section, 00:05:54.140 --> 00:05:56.840 align:middle line:84% and then you can either fix it or you 00:05:56.840 --> 00:05:59.840 align:middle line:84% can say, I believe the review is incorrect, 00:05:59.840 --> 00:06:02.760 align:middle line:84% and write in your cover sheet to your submission 00:06:02.760 --> 00:06:06.720 align:middle line:84% why you're not going to change it, but you need to look at it. 00:06:06.720 --> 00:06:09.700 align:middle line:84% As long as you go through that process, you turn it in, 00:06:09.700 --> 00:06:14.640 align:middle line:84% and I'm convinced that the final version has had your attention 00:06:14.640 --> 00:06:19.400 align:middle line:84% and is a meaningful thing, you get 100% score. 00:06:19.400 --> 00:06:26.280 align:middle line:84% Because the purpose is just to get you motivated to practice 00:06:26.280 --> 00:06:29.320 align:middle line:84% reading-writing-revising, reading-writing-revising, 00:06:29.320 --> 00:06:30.800 align:middle line:90% reading-writing-revising. 00:06:30.800 --> 00:06:33.280 align:middle line:84% And so you would do that about seven 00:06:33.280 --> 00:06:36.120 align:middle line:84% times-ish over the course of the semester. 00:06:36.120 --> 00:06:38.260 align:middle line:84% The exact number will have to be adjusted 00:06:38.260 --> 00:06:41.520 align:middle line:84% because I have to revamp the syllabus to accommodate 00:06:41.520 --> 00:06:45.360 align:middle line:84% the capacity of the AI grading system, which 00:06:45.360 --> 00:06:48.760 align:middle line:84% is limited in exactly the kinds of writing responses 00:06:48.760 --> 00:06:49.820 align:middle line:90% it can respond to. 00:06:49.820 --> 00:06:53.330 align:middle line:84% So the final version will be looked at by me. 00:06:53.330 --> 00:06:56.070 align:middle line:84% But you just-- like, full credit, no credit, 00:06:56.070 --> 00:06:57.090 align:middle line:90% kind of response. 00:06:57.090 --> 00:06:59.730 align:middle line:84% If all that sounds like a waste of your time, 00:06:59.730 --> 00:07:04.210 align:middle line:84% and you are really busy and you're taking 83 units, 00:07:04.210 --> 00:07:08.170 align:middle line:84% and you just don't want to deal with this, check the box 00:07:08.170 --> 00:07:10.570 align:middle line:84% that says, I want to opt out of homework, 00:07:10.570 --> 00:07:13.750 align:middle line:84% and you can just write the final paper. 00:07:13.750 --> 00:07:14.716 align:middle line:90% So it's up to you. 00:07:14.716 --> 00:07:19.130 align:middle line:84% If you want to practice learning, do the homework. 00:07:19.130 --> 00:07:21.390 align:middle line:84% Total homework score is only going to be about 15% 00:07:21.390 --> 00:07:22.890 align:middle line:84% of your total grade, it's just there 00:07:22.890 --> 00:07:24.890 align:middle line:84% to give you a little bit of motivation. 00:07:24.890 --> 00:07:29.130 align:middle line:84% If you don't do your homework, you can't get an A, but if you 00:07:29.130 --> 00:07:31.690 align:middle line:84% miss an assignment because you've got to go to a conference 00:07:31.690 --> 00:07:37.530 align:middle line:84% or you're sick or whatever, 1/7 of 15% is 2% of your grade, 00:07:37.530 --> 00:07:39.970 align:middle line:90% it's not going to kill you. 00:07:39.970 --> 00:07:42.090 align:middle line:90% So that's the logic of that. 00:07:42.090 --> 00:07:44.978 align:middle line:84% So if you want-- please check your box of choice. 00:07:44.978 --> 00:07:47.270 align:middle line:84% If you want some more time to think about it, go ahead, 00:07:47.270 --> 00:07:50.700 align:middle line:84% but please get that form back to me by Friday. 00:07:50.700 --> 00:07:53.380 align:middle line:84% And you can put-- if you're not going to fill it out 00:07:53.380 --> 00:07:55.500 align:middle line:84% now and leave it up here, you can put it 00:07:55.500 --> 00:07:59.420 align:middle line:84% in my mailbox on the second floor of Building 24. 00:07:59.420 --> 00:08:02.220 align:middle line:84% Or shoot me an email with your choice. 00:08:02.220 --> 00:08:04.900 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:08:04.900 --> 00:08:08.860 align:middle line:84% Let me talk a little bit about the final paper. 00:08:08.860 --> 00:08:11.300 align:middle line:90% So the final paper is either-- 00:08:11.300 --> 00:08:14.860 align:middle line:84% the final paper includes a process of peer review, 00:08:14.860 --> 00:08:18.680 align:middle line:84% reviewing someone else's paper, and revised paper, 00:08:18.680 --> 00:08:20.780 align:middle line:84% and then I grade the final revised paper. 00:08:20.780 --> 00:08:23.660 align:middle line:84% Now AI has also changed how this was done. 00:08:23.660 --> 00:08:25.980 align:middle line:84% In the past, that was it, you turn in the final paper 00:08:25.980 --> 00:08:26.640 align:middle line:90% and I would grade it. 00:08:26.640 --> 00:08:28.220 align:middle line:84% Now I get final papers and I can't tell what-- 00:08:28.220 --> 00:08:29.365 align:middle line:90% where the final paper-- 00:08:29.365 --> 00:08:30.740 align:middle line:84% I can't tell if you know anything 00:08:30.740 --> 00:08:34.260 align:middle line:84% or if this is generated by a computer. 00:08:34.260 --> 00:08:37.620 align:middle line:84% So as a result, everyone in this class 00:08:37.620 --> 00:08:41.700 align:middle line:84% will have a one-on-one oral exam with me 00:08:41.700 --> 00:08:43.780 align:middle line:90% in the last week and a half. 00:08:43.780 --> 00:08:48.250 align:middle line:84% I will read your paper, I will put questions on the paper, 00:08:48.250 --> 00:08:50.810 align:middle line:84% you will meet with me, and I'll talk to you about it, 00:08:50.810 --> 00:08:52.550 align:middle line:84% and be quick and painless, and all 00:08:52.550 --> 00:08:55.702 align:middle line:84% we want to make sure is you know what you're talking about. 00:08:55.702 --> 00:08:57.410 align:middle line:84% And if you know what you're talking about 00:08:57.410 --> 00:08:59.750 align:middle line:84% and I'm convinced you wrote the paper, 00:08:59.750 --> 00:09:03.070 align:middle line:84% then you get whatever score is on the paper. 00:09:03.070 --> 00:09:05.410 align:middle line:84% If I'm not convinced you know what you're talking about, 00:09:05.410 --> 00:09:07.710 align:middle line:90% we have a longer conversation. 00:09:07.710 --> 00:09:12.350 align:middle line:84% So that's how the final paper will be graded. 00:09:12.350 --> 00:09:13.110 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:09:13.110 --> 00:09:17.870 align:middle line:84% So what should a good final paper look like? 00:09:17.870 --> 00:09:19.510 align:middle line:90% It's a research paper. 00:09:19.510 --> 00:09:22.390 align:middle line:84% It is not-- and I need to underscore this a thousand 00:09:22.390 --> 00:09:26.670 align:middle line:90% times, it is not a book report. 00:09:26.670 --> 00:09:32.110 align:middle line:84% Do not just summarize some topic in the literature 00:09:32.110 --> 00:09:34.630 align:middle line:90% and write it into a paper. 00:09:34.630 --> 00:09:39.670 align:middle line:84% You need to come up with an idea over the course of the semester, 00:09:39.670 --> 00:09:44.030 align:middle line:84% a question that you want to answer, and refine it to a point 00:09:44.030 --> 00:09:48.770 align:middle line:84% where you can go do a little bit of original research 00:09:48.770 --> 00:09:51.330 align:middle line:90% and answer your question. 00:09:51.330 --> 00:09:54.030 align:middle line:84% And that is what your final paper is about. 00:09:54.030 --> 00:09:58.307 align:middle line:84% And that is really excellent practice for the qualifying exam 00:09:58.307 --> 00:09:59.390 align:middle line:90% for the graduate students. 00:09:59.390 --> 00:10:02.590 align:middle line:84% That is exactly what you need to do to write your prospectus. 00:10:02.590 --> 00:10:05.670 align:middle line:84% If you can't do that, if you're simply summarizing the field, 00:10:05.670 --> 00:10:07.890 align:middle line:84% you have not identified a research direction 00:10:07.890 --> 00:10:09.810 align:middle line:84% and you will not pass your exams. 00:10:09.810 --> 00:10:13.650 align:middle line:84% So this is your first practice at being 00:10:13.650 --> 00:10:18.130 align:middle line:84% able to actually identify an interesting and tractable 00:10:18.130 --> 00:10:19.170 align:middle line:90% question. 00:10:19.170 --> 00:10:22.570 align:middle line:84% And we will have workshops where you meet with students 00:10:22.570 --> 00:10:26.770 align:middle line:84% and groups, and people will help you get to that point 00:10:26.770 --> 00:10:29.850 align:middle line:84% where your question is well-thought-out and tractable 00:10:29.850 --> 00:10:32.030 align:middle line:84% within the scope of what we can do in this class. 00:10:32.030 --> 00:10:33.590 align:middle line:90% So we'll give you lots help. 00:10:33.590 --> 00:10:35.798 align:middle line:84% There's also the Writing Lab in the department, which 00:10:35.798 --> 00:10:37.257 align:middle line:84% has been doing this for a long time 00:10:37.257 --> 00:10:38.690 align:middle line:84% and is very well-versed at helping 00:10:38.690 --> 00:10:40.890 align:middle line:90% people go through this process. 00:10:40.890 --> 00:10:44.620 align:middle line:84% But I just-- if you leave it to the end and you're like, 00:10:44.620 --> 00:10:47.660 align:middle line:84% oh, I'm just going to write a review of the Westinghouse 00:10:47.660 --> 00:10:50.820 align:middle line:84% AP1000 about why all of its safety features, 00:10:50.820 --> 00:10:53.180 align:middle line:84% and you don't have a question, you're 00:10:53.180 --> 00:10:57.420 align:middle line:84% not going to get anything more than a C on that paper. 00:10:57.420 --> 00:11:01.440 align:middle line:84% So that is really important that you understand, 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:02.760 align:middle line:90% this is a research paper. 00:11:02.760 --> 00:11:05.460 align:middle line:90% 00:11:05.460 --> 00:11:09.060 align:middle line:84% There is a whole document on the syllabus, 00:11:09.060 --> 00:11:11.112 align:middle line:84% on this Canvas site called Guidelines 00:11:11.112 --> 00:11:12.320 align:middle line:90% for Writing Your Final Paper. 00:11:12.320 --> 00:11:13.500 align:middle line:90% Go read it. 00:11:13.500 --> 00:11:15.260 align:middle line:84% It tells you how to start, it tells you 00:11:15.260 --> 00:11:17.380 align:middle line:84% how to organize a research paper, 00:11:17.380 --> 00:11:21.180 align:middle line:84% it tells you the expectations and length. 00:11:21.180 --> 00:11:24.100 align:middle line:84% I think it tells you probably everything you need to know. 00:11:24.100 --> 00:11:30.380 align:middle line:84% So I also have posted papers from previous students that 00:11:30.380 --> 00:11:32.900 align:middle line:90% got A-pluses on their papers. 00:11:32.900 --> 00:11:36.307 align:middle line:84% So you can look at their papers and be like, oh, OK, I get it, 00:11:36.307 --> 00:11:37.640 align:middle line:90% and it's pretty straightforward. 00:11:37.640 --> 00:11:40.540 align:middle line:84% They've all agreed to have their papers shared 00:11:40.540 --> 00:11:42.630 align:middle line:90% on Canvas with you guys. 00:11:42.630 --> 00:11:46.430 align:middle line:84% And if you aren't satisfied, I have a whole collection 00:11:46.430 --> 00:11:50.750 align:middle line:84% of people who have such papers and I can give you more. 00:11:50.750 --> 00:11:53.790 align:middle line:84% And I will be very happy to meet with you throughout the course 00:11:53.790 --> 00:11:57.370 align:middle line:84% of the semester to help you refine your paper, 00:11:57.370 --> 00:12:00.510 align:middle line:84% to think through it if there's any challenges. 00:12:00.510 --> 00:12:01.260 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:12:01.260 --> 00:12:06.550 align:middle line:84% So any questions about the syllabus, the homework, 00:12:06.550 --> 00:12:07.970 align:middle line:90% or the final paper? 00:12:07.970 --> 00:12:11.430 align:middle line:90% 00:12:11.430 --> 00:12:12.230 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:12:12.230 --> 00:12:14.910 align:middle line:84% So that's kind of it for expectations. 00:12:14.910 --> 00:12:17.150 align:middle line:84% Let's talk about what you're going to see-- this 00:12:17.150 --> 00:12:19.390 align:middle line:90% is very thin. 00:12:19.390 --> 00:12:20.770 align:middle line:90% Yeah, question? 00:12:20.770 --> 00:12:22.270 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Will we have an opportunity 00:12:22.270 --> 00:12:26.110 align:middle line:84% to see what a homework assignment will look like before 00:12:26.110 --> 00:12:27.250 align:middle line:90% opting in or out of? 00:12:27.250 --> 00:12:28.083 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: Yeah. 00:12:28.083 --> 00:12:29.750 align:middle line:90% So they're just prompts. 00:12:29.750 --> 00:12:33.510 align:middle line:84% And they're basically one-page essays. 00:12:33.510 --> 00:12:35.030 align:middle line:90% That's the expectation. 00:12:35.030 --> 00:12:37.550 align:middle line:90% You write a page. 00:12:37.550 --> 00:12:40.110 align:middle line:84% Most people find it hard to write a page. 00:12:40.110 --> 00:12:43.400 align:middle line:84% They want to write a page and a half or two pages. 00:12:43.400 --> 00:12:47.760 align:middle line:84% And the goal is, if you've written two pages, 00:12:47.760 --> 00:12:48.660 align:middle line:90% look at it again. 00:12:48.660 --> 00:12:51.600 align:middle line:84% What is here that I really don't need to say? 00:12:51.600 --> 00:12:55.480 align:middle line:84% And practice being concise, clear, 00:12:55.480 --> 00:12:57.323 align:middle line:90% take out extraneous stuff. 00:12:57.323 --> 00:12:58.240 align:middle line:90% There are some-- yeah. 00:12:58.240 --> 00:13:00.360 align:middle line:84% So I can also give you some guidelines. 00:13:00.360 --> 00:13:04.840 align:middle line:84% If your paper in any place, just, like, well, in my opinion, 00:13:04.840 --> 00:13:06.480 align:middle line:84% this is how it should be, and you 00:13:06.480 --> 00:13:08.940 align:middle line:84% don't give arguments to back it up, 00:13:08.940 --> 00:13:11.480 align:middle line:90% then that's not a good response. 00:13:11.480 --> 00:13:14.100 align:middle line:84% I really-- you need to back up your responses. 00:13:14.100 --> 00:13:17.480 align:middle line:84% It needs to be like pointed and concise. 00:13:17.480 --> 00:13:20.220 align:middle line:84% That's what makes a good reading response. 00:13:20.220 --> 00:13:20.760 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:13:20.760 --> 00:13:24.477 align:middle line:84% But remember, there's no A or B or C. If you do it, 00:13:24.477 --> 00:13:26.560 align:middle line:84% you go through the exercise, you get the critique, 00:13:26.560 --> 00:13:29.620 align:middle line:84% and you turn in the revised copy, you get 100%. 00:13:29.620 --> 00:13:31.780 align:middle line:84% So don't fret too much about that. 00:13:31.780 --> 00:13:35.840 align:middle line:84% It will teach you, as you go along, what you need to do. 00:13:35.840 --> 00:13:39.580 align:middle line:90% There was a question here? 00:13:39.580 --> 00:13:41.500 align:middle line:90% No? 00:13:41.500 --> 00:13:42.380 align:middle line:90% Yep. 00:13:42.380 --> 00:13:44.420 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Would you train the model 00:13:44.420 --> 00:13:45.947 align:middle line:90% using as a past assignments? 00:13:45.947 --> 00:13:46.780 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: Yeah. 00:13:46.780 --> 00:13:47.620 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:13:47.620 --> 00:13:51.060 align:middle line:90% I used past reading responses. 00:13:51.060 --> 00:13:53.540 align:middle line:90% It's really good. 00:13:53.540 --> 00:13:54.340 align:middle line:90% It's amazing. 00:13:54.340 --> 00:13:57.540 align:middle line:84% I'm like, oh yeah, I didn't catch that. 00:13:57.540 --> 00:13:59.260 align:middle line:90% It's really good. 00:13:59.260 --> 00:14:04.740 align:middle line:84% It's also not your normal-- it's a very high token AI, 00:14:04.740 --> 00:14:07.200 align:middle line:84% so I think it's 100,000-token output or something. 00:14:07.200 --> 00:14:10.080 align:middle line:84% So it's an expensive model to run. 00:14:10.080 --> 00:14:16.260 align:middle line:90% 00:14:16.260 --> 00:14:17.060 align:middle line:90% Yeah? 00:14:17.060 --> 00:14:19.980 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Is there any potential for using that AI 00:14:19.980 --> 00:14:22.260 align:middle line:90% on our final paper to check-- 00:14:22.260 --> 00:14:23.260 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: Oh, yeah. 00:14:23.260 --> 00:14:25.380 align:middle line:84% So, yeah, so let me talk to you about your final-- 00:14:25.380 --> 00:14:28.820 align:middle line:90% I assume you will use AI tools. 00:14:28.820 --> 00:14:31.675 align:middle line:84% I can tell you not to use them, but I can't prove 00:14:31.675 --> 00:14:32.800 align:middle line:90% that you will not use them. 00:14:32.800 --> 00:14:37.160 align:middle line:84% So help yourself to AI tools, but don't forget, 00:14:37.160 --> 00:14:39.350 align:middle line:84% you have to defend-- you have to internalize 00:14:39.350 --> 00:14:42.790 align:middle line:84% that information, and the argument, and defend it. 00:14:42.790 --> 00:14:45.070 align:middle line:84% And AI is still not good enough not 00:14:45.070 --> 00:14:49.990 align:middle line:84% to make technical mistakes, factual mistakes on the scale 00:14:49.990 --> 00:14:51.005 align:middle line:90% of writing a paper. 00:14:51.005 --> 00:14:52.630 align:middle line:84% I have tried and tried and tried to get 00:14:52.630 --> 00:14:54.590 align:middle line:84% them to write final papers and they will not 00:14:54.590 --> 00:14:56.230 align:middle line:90% write good final papers. 00:14:56.230 --> 00:15:02.870 align:middle line:84% So you need to-- using an AI to help you find information 00:15:02.870 --> 00:15:06.830 align:middle line:84% is great, but it's kind of up to you 00:15:06.830 --> 00:15:09.170 align:middle line:84% to make sure that information is complete, 00:15:09.170 --> 00:15:11.790 align:middle line:84% that it's relevant, that you believe it. 00:15:11.790 --> 00:15:16.270 align:middle line:84% And we can talk a little bit about a good way to use AI-- 00:15:16.270 --> 00:15:20.370 align:middle line:84% basically, if you do not-- it might tell you things, 00:15:20.370 --> 00:15:22.570 align:middle line:84% and if you do not understand what it's telling you, 00:15:22.570 --> 00:15:23.770 align:middle line:90% you need to keep studying. 00:15:23.770 --> 00:15:26.530 align:middle line:84% You need to keep digging in until you understand it 00:15:26.530 --> 00:15:30.733 align:middle line:90% because it's too easy to make-- 00:15:30.733 --> 00:15:32.650 align:middle line:84% to just count on the answer and make mistakes. 00:15:32.650 --> 00:15:34.110 align:middle line:90% I'll give you an example. 00:15:34.110 --> 00:15:39.000 align:middle line:84% I was recently writing a paper about melanocortin receptor 1, 00:15:39.000 --> 00:15:41.160 align:middle line:84% which is part of the melanocortin system 00:15:41.160 --> 00:15:42.880 align:middle line:90% in your neurotransmitters. 00:15:42.880 --> 00:15:46.240 align:middle line:84% This is one of my hobbies as I work on biotech. 00:15:46.240 --> 00:15:53.920 align:middle line:84% And I was like, oh, I need to know which peptides have binding 00:15:53.920 --> 00:15:55.840 align:middle line:90% affinity for this receptor. 00:15:55.840 --> 00:15:58.080 align:middle line:84% So I asked the AI because I didn't 00:15:58.080 --> 00:16:00.760 align:middle line:84% want to look up the molarity binding affinities in all 00:16:00.760 --> 00:16:03.180 align:middle line:84% the literature, and it gave me a table, and I was like, 00:16:03.180 --> 00:16:04.200 align:middle line:90% fantastic. 00:16:04.200 --> 00:16:06.720 align:middle line:84% And then I was proceeding along, and later on I 00:16:06.720 --> 00:16:10.160 align:middle line:84% was like, something is not right here. 00:16:10.160 --> 00:16:12.880 align:middle line:84% And it turns out, yes, it gave me the binding affinities 00:16:12.880 --> 00:16:15.580 align:middle line:84% for mouse melanocortin receptors, 00:16:15.580 --> 00:16:17.780 align:middle line:84% not for human melanocortin receptors. 00:16:17.780 --> 00:16:22.300 align:middle line:84% Now, you can trip yourself up with your prompts, 00:16:22.300 --> 00:16:25.620 align:middle line:84% and you really need to know what data you're getting, 00:16:25.620 --> 00:16:27.060 align:middle line:90% check the sources. 00:16:27.060 --> 00:16:30.120 align:middle line:84% If there are no sources, don't trust it. 00:16:30.120 --> 00:16:34.320 align:middle line:84% So that's just an example of how AI can lead you astray. 00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:37.610 align:middle line:84% And you are on the hook for getting the right answer. 00:16:37.610 --> 00:16:39.010 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:16:39.010 --> 00:16:40.250 align:middle line:90% Yeah? 00:16:40.250 --> 00:16:43.630 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Does the AI critique for the sake of critiquing, 00:16:43.630 --> 00:16:45.450 align:middle line:84% or does it also point out what you do well? 00:16:45.450 --> 00:16:48.430 align:middle line:84% Because I can make an AI argue for or against the same point. 00:16:48.430 --> 00:16:50.500 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: It writes two sections. 00:16:50.500 --> 00:16:52.750 align:middle line:84% The first one is like, oh, you did a good job on this, 00:16:52.750 --> 00:16:54.850 align:middle line:84% but you could have done a better job on that. 00:16:54.850 --> 00:16:59.210 align:middle line:84% And then it says, and here are all the mistakes you made. 00:16:59.210 --> 00:17:01.550 align:middle line:90% So, yeah. 00:17:01.550 --> 00:17:02.050 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:17:02.050 --> 00:17:05.589 align:middle line:90% 00:17:05.589 --> 00:17:07.246 align:middle line:90% Any opposition to this? 00:17:07.246 --> 00:17:09.329 align:middle line:84% People feel good about where they're settling down 00:17:09.329 --> 00:17:10.609 align:middle line:84% and where they're going to check the box on 00:17:10.609 --> 00:17:12.770 align:middle line:84% whether they're going to do homework or not? 00:17:12.770 --> 00:17:13.970 align:middle line:90% Sounds good. 00:17:13.970 --> 00:17:16.810 align:middle line:84% All right, let's talk a little bit about the class lectures. 00:17:16.810 --> 00:17:18.925 align:middle line:84% I want this to be a discussion friendly-class. 00:17:18.925 --> 00:17:20.550 align:middle line:84% In the beginning it was like a seminar. 00:17:20.550 --> 00:17:22.450 align:middle line:84% Now it's too big to be a seminar. 00:17:22.450 --> 00:17:28.810 align:middle line:84% But if you feel that something isn't right 00:17:28.810 --> 00:17:31.170 align:middle line:84% and you want to speak up, definitely 00:17:31.170 --> 00:17:34.710 align:middle line:84% do it because it will enrich all of our experience. 00:17:34.710 --> 00:17:37.430 align:middle line:84% There's no canon of knowledge in this class 00:17:37.430 --> 00:17:39.070 align:middle line:90% that you need to walk away with. 00:17:39.070 --> 00:17:41.270 align:middle line:84% This is not differential equations 00:17:41.270 --> 00:17:44.030 align:middle line:84% where if you don't get to the series solution 00:17:44.030 --> 00:17:47.190 align:middle line:84% at the end of the semester, you screw yourself 00:17:47.190 --> 00:17:49.710 align:middle line:84% on knowing how to solve complex differential equations, 00:17:49.710 --> 00:17:50.730 align:middle line:90% it's not like that. 00:17:50.730 --> 00:17:54.710 align:middle line:84% There's so much information about policy choices around 00:17:54.710 --> 00:17:58.630 align:middle line:84% nuclear energy that we cannot conceivably cover even 10% of it 00:17:58.630 --> 00:18:00.310 align:middle line:90% in this class. 00:18:00.310 --> 00:18:03.030 align:middle line:84% This is just to give you a smattering of what's 00:18:03.030 --> 00:18:04.990 align:middle line:84% going on out there, in my perspective, 00:18:04.990 --> 00:18:11.710 align:middle line:84% on what is the most defensible position on different things. 00:18:11.710 --> 00:18:15.110 align:middle line:84% But if you feel like I have ignored something 00:18:15.110 --> 00:18:16.630 align:middle line:84% or you don't understand something 00:18:16.630 --> 00:18:19.810 align:middle line:84% and you want to push back, do it. 00:18:19.810 --> 00:18:21.870 align:middle line:84% I totally encourage this kind of debate 00:18:21.870 --> 00:18:23.650 align:middle line:84% because that's what we're all about. 00:18:23.650 --> 00:18:27.870 align:middle line:84% This class is not really debate, more dialectic, 00:18:27.870 --> 00:18:31.990 align:middle line:84% that we want to have this back and forth in pursuit 00:18:31.990 --> 00:18:35.040 align:middle line:84% of the truth, and that's the goal. 00:18:35.040 --> 00:18:39.060 align:middle line:84% And everyone brings biases to these issues. 00:18:39.060 --> 00:18:40.620 align:middle line:90% I bring my own set of biases. 00:18:40.620 --> 00:18:44.520 align:middle line:84% I've been in been here for 14 years 00:18:44.520 --> 00:18:49.340 align:middle line:84% and have a sense of what the nuclear industry does, 00:18:49.340 --> 00:18:53.320 align:middle line:84% and I see it a certain way, and I'm going to present that. 00:18:53.320 --> 00:18:58.640 align:middle line:84% But you may wonder, why-- this is not how you've heard-- 00:18:58.640 --> 00:19:01.400 align:middle line:84% this is not what you've heard, and I completely 00:19:01.400 --> 00:19:05.680 align:middle line:84% welcome you to give your perspective and share it 00:19:05.680 --> 00:19:08.060 align:middle line:90% with the class. 00:19:08.060 --> 00:19:08.560 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:19:08.560 --> 00:19:11.800 align:middle line:90% 00:19:11.800 --> 00:19:13.480 align:middle line:90% Let's see. 00:19:13.480 --> 00:19:14.600 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:19:14.600 --> 00:19:18.360 align:middle line:90% That's it for preview. 00:19:18.360 --> 00:19:21.960 align:middle line:90% Any last questions? 00:19:21.960 --> 00:19:25.880 align:middle line:84% In that case, in the remaining hour, 00:19:25.880 --> 00:19:31.370 align:middle line:84% I'm going to try to cover 110 years of history. 00:19:31.370 --> 00:19:34.610 align:middle line:84% And I don't-- people come to nuclear from all different 00:19:34.610 --> 00:19:39.450 align:middle line:84% backgrounds, and a lot of people here-- 00:19:39.450 --> 00:19:43.890 align:middle line:84% I know for a fact that many undergrads join the department 00:19:43.890 --> 00:19:46.610 align:middle line:84% because they like the people, and they don't really 00:19:46.610 --> 00:19:48.835 align:middle line:90% know a lot about nuclear. 00:19:48.835 --> 00:19:50.210 align:middle line:84% Whereas the grad students, you've 00:19:50.210 --> 00:19:52.130 align:middle line:84% been around nuclear for a while and you probably 00:19:52.130 --> 00:19:54.270 align:middle line:84% know something about it, but not all grad students. 00:19:54.270 --> 00:19:56.610 align:middle line:84% Sometimes people have undergraduate degrees 00:19:56.610 --> 00:19:59.870 align:middle line:84% in chemistry or physics, and now they've decided to try nuclear. 00:19:59.870 --> 00:20:02.228 align:middle line:84% So they may not know the whole history of nuclear. 00:20:02.228 --> 00:20:04.270 align:middle line:84% So we're going to go just go through the history. 00:20:04.270 --> 00:20:07.610 align:middle line:84% It's very basic, but it's just to give you a sense 00:20:07.610 --> 00:20:11.290 align:middle line:84% to set up an understanding of why 00:20:11.290 --> 00:20:13.555 align:middle line:84% things look the way they do, especially here 00:20:13.555 --> 00:20:14.430 align:middle line:90% in the United States. 00:20:14.430 --> 00:20:17.970 align:middle line:84% Most of this class is focused on the United States, 00:20:17.970 --> 00:20:21.250 align:middle line:84% and so it was just going to give you some of that history. 00:20:21.250 --> 00:20:22.750 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:20:22.750 --> 00:20:26.410 align:middle line:84% So this strikes me as very dim, but I don't know 00:20:26.410 --> 00:20:27.910 align:middle line:90% if I can do anything about it. 00:20:27.910 --> 00:20:30.860 align:middle line:90% 00:20:30.860 --> 00:20:31.560 align:middle line:90% I'm sorry. 00:20:31.560 --> 00:20:33.980 align:middle line:90% I'll work on that later. 00:20:33.980 --> 00:20:37.580 align:middle line:84% So the discovery of nuclear energy 00:20:37.580 --> 00:20:44.300 align:middle line:84% is fascinating in the sense that its origins are actually 00:20:44.300 --> 00:20:48.522 align:middle line:84% the question, why do the stars shine? 00:20:48.522 --> 00:20:50.480 align:middle line:84% I don't know, has anyone-- do people know this? 00:20:50.480 --> 00:20:52.147 align:middle line:84% How many people knew that nuclear energy 00:20:52.147 --> 00:20:54.260 align:middle line:90% was discovered for a reason? 00:20:54.260 --> 00:20:54.860 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:20:54.860 --> 00:20:57.900 align:middle line:84% So what happened is, early on, it 00:20:57.900 --> 00:21:04.020 align:middle line:84% was assumed that the sun was burning like a lump of coal 00:21:04.020 --> 00:21:05.940 align:middle line:90% in the sky. 00:21:05.940 --> 00:21:11.540 align:middle line:84% And Hermann von Helmholtz then showed that this probably 00:21:11.540 --> 00:21:12.860 align:middle line:90% couldn't be right. 00:21:12.860 --> 00:21:14.620 align:middle line:84% Given the sun's luminosity, which 00:21:14.620 --> 00:21:16.820 align:middle line:84% is a measure of its total power output, 00:21:16.820 --> 00:21:20.860 align:middle line:84% if it-- and its apparent size, which they could measure, 00:21:20.860 --> 00:21:23.640 align:middle line:84% they said if it were just burning chemical reaction, 00:21:23.640 --> 00:21:27.480 align:middle line:84% then it would have burned out in a few thousand years. 00:21:27.480 --> 00:21:29.780 align:middle line:84% But they knew that that at that time, 00:21:29.780 --> 00:21:31.400 align:middle line:84% human history had already extended 00:21:31.400 --> 00:21:34.360 align:middle line:84% more than a few thousand years, so it couldn't be-- 00:21:34.360 --> 00:21:35.760 align:middle line:90% it couldn't be burning. 00:21:35.760 --> 00:21:38.020 align:middle line:84% So Helmholtz proposed a new mechanism. 00:21:38.020 --> 00:21:41.720 align:middle line:84% He decided that perhaps gravitational contraction 00:21:41.720 --> 00:21:45.400 align:middle line:84% from the mass of the sun was actually driving 00:21:45.400 --> 00:21:46.860 align:middle line:90% the expulsion of energy. 00:21:46.860 --> 00:21:49.440 align:middle line:84% If you will, a conversion of gravitational potential 00:21:49.440 --> 00:21:51.020 align:middle line:90% energy into heat energy. 00:21:51.020 --> 00:21:53.660 align:middle line:84% This is called the Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism. 00:21:53.660 --> 00:21:56.760 align:middle line:84% It's a real mechanism, and it is active in stars. 00:21:56.760 --> 00:21:57.940 align:middle line:90% And he did a calculation. 00:21:57.940 --> 00:22:00.880 align:middle line:84% He said, oh, if we take into account this mechanism, 00:22:00.880 --> 00:22:04.280 align:middle line:84% the sun would burn for 20 million years. 00:22:04.280 --> 00:22:08.700 align:middle line:84% And that seemed like a suitable explanation for the sun. 00:22:08.700 --> 00:22:10.360 align:middle line:90% 20-- what did I say? 00:22:10.360 --> 00:22:10.980 align:middle line:90% 20 million? 00:22:10.980 --> 00:22:11.860 align:middle line:90% 20 million years. 00:22:11.860 --> 00:22:13.360 align:middle line:90% 20 million years. 00:22:13.360 --> 00:22:18.040 align:middle line:84% So that was, for a moment, considered a good answer, 00:22:18.040 --> 00:22:21.520 align:middle line:84% but the problem was that at the time, 00:22:21.520 --> 00:22:26.340 align:middle line:84% geologists believed that Earth was essentially timeless, 00:22:26.340 --> 00:22:28.450 align:middle line:90% that it had existed forever. 00:22:28.450 --> 00:22:30.090 align:middle line:84% And that raised this weird question. 00:22:30.090 --> 00:22:34.650 align:middle line:84% Like, if the sun were, in fact, only at most 20 million years 00:22:34.650 --> 00:22:43.210 align:middle line:84% old, how did the Earth hang around and do things 00:22:43.210 --> 00:22:45.770 align:middle line:90% while the sun got formed? 00:22:45.770 --> 00:22:50.530 align:middle line:84% Why didn't it somehow disrupt the Earth at that time? 00:22:50.530 --> 00:22:54.610 align:middle line:90% So that was a problem. 00:22:54.610 --> 00:23:01.370 align:middle line:84% But then Lord Kelvin, of the Kelvin thermometer, came around, 00:23:01.370 --> 00:23:06.870 align:middle line:84% and he measured the cooling rate of the Earth. 00:23:06.870 --> 00:23:12.250 align:middle line:84% He said, let us assume that the Earth starts as a ball of lava, 00:23:12.250 --> 00:23:15.810 align:middle line:84% or molten rock, and then it cools at a certain rate, 00:23:15.810 --> 00:23:17.810 align:middle line:84% how long would it have to cool in order 00:23:17.810 --> 00:23:21.530 align:middle line:84% to get the crust depth that we estimate exists today? 00:23:21.530 --> 00:23:23.490 align:middle line:84% And he said, well, it turns out, it 00:23:23.490 --> 00:23:26.830 align:middle line:84% looks like it must have been cooling for somewhere between 20 00:23:26.830 --> 00:23:28.480 align:middle line:90% to 100 million years. 00:23:28.480 --> 00:23:31.220 align:middle line:84% And since we know that the sun is 20 million years old, 00:23:31.220 --> 00:23:33.380 align:middle line:84% then this is more or less consistent 00:23:33.380 --> 00:23:35.700 align:middle line:90% and everyone was happy. 00:23:35.700 --> 00:23:39.420 align:middle line:84% So the Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism was great. 00:23:39.420 --> 00:23:44.380 align:middle line:84% But then, this other guy came along named Henri Becquerel. 00:23:44.380 --> 00:23:47.380 align:middle line:84% Becquerel is, of course, the unit of radioactive decay, 00:23:47.380 --> 00:23:49.880 align:middle line:84% and Becquerel said, oh, wait a second, 00:23:49.880 --> 00:23:52.180 align:middle line:84% there's all this radioactivity in the Earth, 00:23:52.180 --> 00:23:55.060 align:middle line:84% and when it decays, it's contributing heat. 00:23:55.060 --> 00:23:57.880 align:middle line:84% So yes, it is cooling according to Kelvin's calculation, 00:23:57.880 --> 00:24:01.060 align:middle line:84% but it's also being warmed by radioactive decay. 00:24:01.060 --> 00:24:03.440 align:middle line:84% And then when you add that warming, 00:24:03.440 --> 00:24:05.620 align:middle line:84% it implies that the Earth can't possibly 00:24:05.620 --> 00:24:07.560 align:middle line:84% be just a few tens of millions of years old, 00:24:07.560 --> 00:24:10.060 align:middle line:84% it has to be billions of years old. 00:24:10.060 --> 00:24:11.480 align:middle line:90% And now we had a problem. 00:24:11.480 --> 00:24:14.800 align:middle line:84% How was it that the Earth was billions of years old, 00:24:14.800 --> 00:24:17.940 align:middle line:84% but the sun was only 20 million years old? 00:24:17.940 --> 00:24:20.820 align:middle line:90% So there was a paradox. 00:24:20.820 --> 00:24:25.430 align:middle line:84% And it strongly suggested that this Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism 00:24:25.430 --> 00:24:26.790 align:middle line:90% was not sufficient. 00:24:26.790 --> 00:24:29.870 align:middle line:84% The clue came from this plot, which 00:24:29.870 --> 00:24:32.790 align:middle line:84% is called the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. 00:24:32.790 --> 00:24:37.150 align:middle line:84% Many of you may know this is as a main line sequence. 00:24:37.150 --> 00:24:41.550 align:middle line:84% It's a plot showing the star's luminosity on the y-axis, 00:24:41.550 --> 00:24:46.030 align:middle line:84% and on the x-axis, its surface temperature, and its blackbody 00:24:46.030 --> 00:24:47.750 align:middle line:90% radiative temperature. 00:24:47.750 --> 00:24:53.670 align:middle line:84% And what stood out was that the stars were not scattered-- 00:24:53.670 --> 00:24:55.410 align:middle line:84% each one of these dots represents a star, 00:24:55.410 --> 00:24:57.510 align:middle line:84% and the stars weren't scattered uniformly. 00:24:57.510 --> 00:25:01.630 align:middle line:84% If the Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism applied, 00:25:01.630 --> 00:25:06.830 align:middle line:84% we would expect that the luminosity of the star 00:25:06.830 --> 00:25:09.910 align:middle line:84% would scale directly with the mass. 00:25:09.910 --> 00:25:12.870 align:middle line:84% But that did not appear to be the-- 00:25:12.870 --> 00:25:15.690 align:middle line:84% in this case, there would be no order necessarily on this chart. 00:25:15.690 --> 00:25:19.830 align:middle line:84% But there was this weird order on this chart, 00:25:19.830 --> 00:25:24.330 align:middle line:84% and that led to the conclusion that there 00:25:24.330 --> 00:25:26.210 align:middle line:84% must be some underlying mechanism that 00:25:26.210 --> 00:25:29.750 align:middle line:84% controls both luminosity and the temperature, 00:25:29.750 --> 00:25:31.850 align:middle line:84% but they didn't know what it was. 00:25:31.850 --> 00:25:34.873 align:middle line:84% But there's something that gave rise to this effect. 00:25:34.873 --> 00:25:36.790 align:middle line:84% Then they started measuring the mass of stars. 00:25:36.790 --> 00:25:38.690 align:middle line:84% They did this by looking at binary stars that 00:25:38.690 --> 00:25:42.110 align:middle line:84% orbit each other, and they can calculate the masses, 00:25:42.110 --> 00:25:46.330 align:middle line:84% and they found out that this is, in fact, a plot of mass. 00:25:46.330 --> 00:25:53.130 align:middle line:84% So that indicated that, in fact, the luminosity 00:25:53.130 --> 00:25:54.830 align:middle line:84% did not scale linearly with mass, 00:25:54.830 --> 00:25:59.810 align:middle line:84% but actually, it scaled to the third or fourth power of mass. 00:25:59.810 --> 00:26:03.250 align:middle line:84% And from that, they concluded that a homogeneous energy 00:26:03.250 --> 00:26:05.810 align:middle line:84% source, like the Kelvin-Helmholtz mechanism, 00:26:05.810 --> 00:26:08.090 align:middle line:84% was not a sufficient explanation. 00:26:08.090 --> 00:26:13.530 align:middle line:84% There had to be something where the energy production had 00:26:13.530 --> 00:26:18.930 align:middle line:84% great dependence on temperature so that as the mass went up, 00:26:18.930 --> 00:26:22.540 align:middle line:84% it would-- the energy production was skyrocket maybe 00:26:22.540 --> 00:26:24.900 align:middle line:90% at the center of the star. 00:26:24.900 --> 00:26:28.220 align:middle line:84% And indeed, the existence of these different regions 00:26:28.220 --> 00:26:31.260 align:middle line:84% suggested there might be different mechanisms. 00:26:31.260 --> 00:26:33.140 align:middle line:84% It turns out, as labeled here, these 00:26:33.140 --> 00:26:37.940 align:middle line:84% are all different fusion mechanisms that come into play. 00:26:37.940 --> 00:26:40.120 align:middle line:84% But they didn't know what these were initially. 00:26:40.120 --> 00:26:44.100 align:middle line:84% They just recognized that there was some other process. 00:26:44.100 --> 00:26:48.300 align:middle line:84% One year after the end of World War I, in 1920, 00:26:48.300 --> 00:26:51.360 align:middle line:84% the greatest probably astronomer of the 20th century, 00:26:51.360 --> 00:26:56.940 align:middle line:90% Arthur Eddington, wrote this. 00:26:56.940 --> 00:27:02.380 align:middle line:84% "The sun is drawing on some vast reservoir of energy by means 00:27:02.380 --> 00:27:05.020 align:middle line:84% unknown to us, this reservoir can scarcely be the other than 00:27:05.020 --> 00:27:08.140 align:middle line:84% the subatomic energy, which is known very recently--" 00:27:08.140 --> 00:27:11.460 align:middle line:84% the discovery isotopes was 1919, a year earlier, 00:27:11.460 --> 00:27:13.240 align:middle line:84% "that existed abundantly in all matter. 00:27:13.240 --> 00:27:16.260 align:middle line:84% The suspicion has been generally entertained that the stars are 00:27:16.260 --> 00:27:18.620 align:middle line:84% the crucibles in which the lighter atoms, 00:27:18.620 --> 00:27:22.190 align:middle line:84% which abound in the nebulae, are compounded into more complex 00:27:22.190 --> 00:27:22.690 align:middle line:90% elements." 00:27:22.690 --> 00:27:23.810 align:middle line:90% This is the R process. 00:27:23.810 --> 00:27:27.990 align:middle line:84% This is how we get heavy isotopes. 00:27:27.990 --> 00:27:30.230 align:middle line:84% You just-- it's just a suspicion. 00:27:30.230 --> 00:27:32.830 align:middle line:84% "We sometimes dream that man will one day learn how 00:27:32.830 --> 00:27:37.030 align:middle line:84% to release his energy for its use." 00:27:37.030 --> 00:27:38.630 align:middle line:90% He was completely right. 00:27:38.630 --> 00:27:41.910 align:middle line:84% This is indeed what is going on in the stars. 00:27:41.910 --> 00:27:44.790 align:middle line:84% But the very prescient Eddington is even more prescient than we 00:27:44.790 --> 00:27:48.910 align:middle line:84% might realize because he concluded, 00:27:48.910 --> 00:27:53.030 align:middle line:84% "This latent power could be controlled for the well-being 00:27:53.030 --> 00:27:55.270 align:middle line:90% of the human race-- 00:27:55.270 --> 00:27:57.950 align:middle line:90% or for its suicide." 00:27:57.950 --> 00:28:01.470 align:middle line:84% See, he recognized, even in 1920, 00:28:01.470 --> 00:28:04.230 align:middle line:84% that having the ability to manipulate something 00:28:04.230 --> 00:28:07.990 align:middle line:84% with such energy density as exists in nuclear energy 00:28:07.990 --> 00:28:10.130 align:middle line:84% meant that you could do wonderful things, 00:28:10.130 --> 00:28:12.735 align:middle line:84% like make electricity and power the world, 00:28:12.735 --> 00:28:14.110 align:middle line:84% and you could do terrible things, 00:28:14.110 --> 00:28:16.750 align:middle line:90% like make nuclear weapons. 00:28:16.750 --> 00:28:19.200 align:middle line:84% So long before-- this is why nuclear weapons show up 00:28:19.200 --> 00:28:22.280 align:middle line:84% in sci-fi literature well before they 00:28:22.280 --> 00:28:25.480 align:middle line:84% were ever invented, because of this understanding 00:28:25.480 --> 00:28:28.040 align:middle line:90% and realization. 00:28:28.040 --> 00:28:31.740 align:middle line:84% And, in fact, this is more true than you may realize. 00:28:31.740 --> 00:28:35.240 align:middle line:84% Of course, Eddington is not talking about fission, 00:28:35.240 --> 00:28:38.440 align:middle line:84% he's talking about energy release from fusion, 00:28:38.440 --> 00:28:41.140 align:middle line:84% but in most modern nuclear weapons, 00:28:41.140 --> 00:28:42.920 align:middle line:90% the majority of energy-- 00:28:42.920 --> 00:28:46.560 align:middle line:84% the vast majority of energy comes about because 00:28:46.560 --> 00:28:48.240 align:middle line:90% of fusion processes. 00:28:48.240 --> 00:28:50.600 align:middle line:84% So, yeah, this is, in fact, the exact same stuff 00:28:50.600 --> 00:28:52.520 align:middle line:90% that is driving the bombs. 00:28:52.520 --> 00:28:53.140 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:28:53.140 --> 00:28:57.840 align:middle line:84% So fast forward 13 years, we are in 1933, 00:28:57.840 --> 00:29:00.640 align:middle line:84% the same year the Nazi Party took over Germany. 00:29:00.640 --> 00:29:03.880 align:middle line:84% It began to blame the Jews for the economic distress 00:29:03.880 --> 00:29:08.120 align:middle line:84% of the country imposed on it by the agreements that 00:29:08.120 --> 00:29:09.880 align:middle line:90% ended World War I. 00:29:09.880 --> 00:29:13.880 align:middle line:84% Einstein, as a Jew, flees to the United States. 00:29:13.880 --> 00:29:16.500 align:middle line:84% Many in we're in Europe are, of course, worried 00:29:16.500 --> 00:29:19.940 align:middle line:84% about this German nationalism, German rearmament 00:29:19.940 --> 00:29:22.102 align:middle line:90% that's happening. 00:29:22.102 --> 00:29:23.560 align:middle line:84% They had just finished World War I, 00:29:23.560 --> 00:29:25.480 align:middle line:84% no one wanted to see another World War, 00:29:25.480 --> 00:29:29.060 align:middle line:84% and people were trying to get out of there fast. 00:29:29.060 --> 00:29:34.220 align:middle line:84% That September, this guy, this is Leo Szilard. 00:29:34.220 --> 00:29:38.420 align:middle line:84% He's a Hungarian physicist, and he's really the father 00:29:38.420 --> 00:29:40.500 align:middle line:90% of nuclear engineering. 00:29:40.500 --> 00:29:47.140 align:middle line:84% He invented the nuclear reactor, he invented the breeder reactor, 00:29:47.140 --> 00:29:49.980 align:middle line:84% and he invented the closed nuclear fuel cycle. 00:29:49.980 --> 00:29:52.448 align:middle line:84% So he's a very important figure in our field, 00:29:52.448 --> 00:29:54.240 align:middle line:84% although we don't talk about him very much, 00:29:54.240 --> 00:29:57.580 align:middle line:84% but he was at the beginning of it all. 00:29:57.580 --> 00:30:02.100 align:middle line:84% And here in September 1933, he had just 00:30:02.100 --> 00:30:07.980 align:middle line:84% imagined the idea of a nuclear chain reaction. 00:30:07.980 --> 00:30:10.640 align:middle line:84% He said-- this is from his memoirs, 00:30:10.640 --> 00:30:12.520 align:middle line:84% "I was waiting for the light to change, 00:30:12.520 --> 00:30:15.090 align:middle line:84% and as the light changed to green and I crossed the street, 00:30:15.090 --> 00:30:18.330 align:middle line:84% it suddenly occurred to me that if we could find an element 00:30:18.330 --> 00:30:22.430 align:middle line:84% which is split by neutrons and which would emit two neutrons 00:30:22.430 --> 00:30:28.650 align:middle line:84% when it absorbed one neutron--" like uranium, "such an element, 00:30:28.650 --> 00:30:30.730 align:middle line:84% if assembled in a sufficiently large mass, 00:30:30.730 --> 00:30:32.950 align:middle line:84% could sustain a nuclear chain reaction. 00:30:32.950 --> 00:30:36.390 align:middle line:84% I didn't see at the moment just how one would go about finding 00:30:36.390 --> 00:30:38.230 align:middle line:90% such an element." 00:30:38.230 --> 00:30:44.590 align:middle line:84% Now, since the early experiments from Eddington 00:30:44.590 --> 00:30:46.950 align:middle line:84% and others, the idea of binding energy 00:30:46.950 --> 00:30:49.830 align:middle line:84% had come about, people had measured the binding energy 00:30:49.830 --> 00:30:52.050 align:middle line:84% and found the curve of binding energy 00:30:52.050 --> 00:30:55.490 align:middle line:84% so that if you break apart large isotopes, you get energy out, 00:30:55.490 --> 00:30:59.510 align:middle line:84% if you fuse light isotopes, you get energy out. 00:30:59.510 --> 00:31:02.910 align:middle line:84% And people were manipulating these isotopes 00:31:02.910 --> 00:31:05.270 align:middle line:84% by shooting various things at them 00:31:05.270 --> 00:31:07.750 align:middle line:90% and looking at what happens. 00:31:07.750 --> 00:31:12.800 align:middle line:84% But to be clear, nobody knew of anything called fission. 00:31:12.800 --> 00:31:17.040 align:middle line:84% It was mostly end-to-end reactions, p, n reactions, 00:31:17.040 --> 00:31:20.640 align:middle line:84% very simple nucleon-nucleon kinds of things, 00:31:20.640 --> 00:31:24.590 align:middle line:90% and some radioactive decay. 00:31:24.590 --> 00:31:28.447 align:middle line:84% So he had this idea of some chain reaction. 00:31:28.447 --> 00:31:30.280 align:middle line:84% In fact, there are various proposals using-- 00:31:30.280 --> 00:31:34.000 align:middle line:84% I forget, like beryllium and weird things 00:31:34.000 --> 00:31:37.260 align:middle line:84% on how to create the chain reaction in the early days. 00:31:37.260 --> 00:31:38.960 align:middle line:84% Of course, none of them would work. 00:31:38.960 --> 00:31:41.080 align:middle line:84% But because a chain reaction would 00:31:41.080 --> 00:31:43.460 align:middle line:84% lead to the uncontrolled release of energy, 00:31:43.460 --> 00:31:46.480 align:middle line:84% he knew immediately that that was going to be a problem. 00:31:46.480 --> 00:31:49.560 align:middle line:84% And so he filed a secret patent with the British Navy 00:31:49.560 --> 00:31:52.360 align:middle line:84% on the concept of the chain reaction 00:31:52.360 --> 00:31:55.880 align:middle line:84% in an attempt to control the technology. 00:31:55.880 --> 00:32:00.080 align:middle line:84% OK, so the next year, an Italian physicist 00:32:00.080 --> 00:32:05.560 align:middle line:84% named Enrico Fermi, who is my advisor's advisor, 00:32:05.560 --> 00:32:08.000 align:middle line:84% was playing around with uranium, and he 00:32:08.000 --> 00:32:12.450 align:middle line:84% noticed that when he shot neutrons at the uranium, 00:32:12.450 --> 00:32:15.030 align:middle line:90% all kinds of stuff came out. 00:32:15.030 --> 00:32:18.130 align:middle line:84% And he wasn't sure what was going on. 00:32:18.130 --> 00:32:22.090 align:middle line:84% This wasn't recognized initially as splitting of the nucleus. 00:32:22.090 --> 00:32:25.090 align:middle line:84% That the nucleus could be split was originally 00:32:25.090 --> 00:32:28.810 align:middle line:84% proposed by this German woman named Ida Noddack, 00:32:28.810 --> 00:32:31.370 align:middle line:84% but she is completely lost to history 00:32:31.370 --> 00:32:33.970 align:middle line:84% and has never received any credit for the fact 00:32:33.970 --> 00:32:37.610 align:middle line:84% that she had originally proposed this idea of fission. 00:32:37.610 --> 00:32:39.917 align:middle line:84% Four years later, in December 1938-- 00:32:39.917 --> 00:32:41.750 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Can you say her name one more time? 00:32:41.750 --> 00:32:43.030 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: Ida Noddack. 00:32:43.030 --> 00:32:43.822 align:middle line:90% STUDENT: Thank you. 00:32:43.822 --> 00:32:45.370 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: Yep. 00:32:45.370 --> 00:32:50.090 align:middle line:84% Four years later, in 1938, another German, Otto Hahn, 00:32:50.090 --> 00:32:53.810 align:middle line:84% and another woman, Austrian Lise Meitner, 00:32:53.810 --> 00:33:00.130 align:middle line:84% Fritz Saltzman, shown here, argued that-- 00:33:00.130 --> 00:33:03.490 align:middle line:84% and experimentally demonstrated that, in fact, the nucleus 00:33:03.490 --> 00:33:05.350 align:middle line:90% was fission. 00:33:05.350 --> 00:33:08.150 align:middle line:84% They are the ones who popularly received the credit, 00:33:08.150 --> 00:33:10.790 align:middle line:84% but it was originally Ida's idea. 00:33:10.790 --> 00:33:12.950 align:middle line:84% This fissioning of uranium was not yet linked 00:33:12.950 --> 00:33:14.670 align:middle line:90% to any chain reaction. 00:33:14.670 --> 00:33:18.210 align:middle line:84% It was simply thought that when you shoot neutrons in uranium, 00:33:18.210 --> 00:33:19.390 align:middle line:90% it breaks apart. 00:33:19.390 --> 00:33:21.990 align:middle line:84% The idea that it could sustain a nuclear chain reaction 00:33:21.990 --> 00:33:24.390 align:middle line:84% would require it to generate more than one neutrons, that 00:33:24.390 --> 00:33:27.150 align:middle line:90% had not yet been observed. 00:33:27.150 --> 00:33:32.390 align:middle line:84% But then, four months later, in March of 1939, 00:33:32.390 --> 00:33:34.970 align:middle line:84% Frédéric Joliot, French physicist, 00:33:34.970 --> 00:33:39.870 align:middle line:84% showed that uranium fission, indeed, neutrons came out. 00:33:39.870 --> 00:33:40.610 align:middle line:90% How many? 00:33:40.610 --> 00:33:43.930 align:middle line:84% Not exactly clear, but neutrons came out. 00:33:43.930 --> 00:33:48.870 align:middle line:84% And then he eventually showed that it was more than one. 00:33:48.870 --> 00:33:50.690 align:middle line:84% While this is all going on in the world, 00:33:50.690 --> 00:33:53.830 align:middle line:84% the discovery of fission, there's 00:33:53.830 --> 00:33:55.910 align:middle line:84% also a lot of work going on in fusion. 00:33:55.910 --> 00:33:58.510 align:middle line:84% So in 1934, this is the same year 00:33:58.510 --> 00:34:03.110 align:middle line:84% that Fermi discovered that uranium does weird things, 00:34:03.110 --> 00:34:07.390 align:middle line:84% there was all this work on plasma confinement. 00:34:07.390 --> 00:34:10.120 align:middle line:84% A lot of people were talking about the linear pinch 00:34:10.120 --> 00:34:12.400 align:middle line:90% and Z-pinch. 00:34:12.400 --> 00:34:15.960 align:middle line:84% And there were some early ideas, mostly developed by Bennett 00:34:15.960 --> 00:34:17.679 align:middle line:90% in the United Kingdom. 00:34:17.679 --> 00:34:21.780 align:middle line:84% This stuff was not really being done early on in the US. 00:34:21.780 --> 00:34:25.320 align:middle line:84% But the basic idea here is that you pass a current 00:34:25.320 --> 00:34:29.060 align:middle line:84% through this ionized gas, it creates a magnetic field, 00:34:29.060 --> 00:34:32.560 align:middle line:84% right-hand rule, and it compresses the compresses 00:34:32.560 --> 00:34:34.080 align:middle line:90% the gas on itself. 00:34:34.080 --> 00:34:36.920 align:middle line:84% And if you could get that to happen fast enough, 00:34:36.920 --> 00:34:38.613 align:middle line:90% potentially you can make fusion. 00:34:38.613 --> 00:34:40.280 align:middle line:84% And we still have people who are working 00:34:40.280 --> 00:34:43.320 align:middle line:90% on Z-pinch drivers for fusion. 00:34:43.320 --> 00:34:45.280 align:middle line:84% You may be aware of the Z Machine, which 00:34:45.280 --> 00:34:49.840 align:middle line:84% is a giant bank of capacitors that basically does this 00:34:49.840 --> 00:34:53.860 align:middle line:84% not by pinching the gas, but in a little metal capsule, 00:34:53.860 --> 00:34:56.360 align:middle line:84% and it compresses the capsule and attempts-- 00:34:56.360 --> 00:34:59.500 align:middle line:84% and does actually successfully work and create fusion, 00:34:59.500 --> 00:35:02.680 align:middle line:84% you just probably can't make it economic. 00:35:02.680 --> 00:35:05.280 align:middle line:84% But we use this machine to create fusion neutrons 00:35:05.280 --> 00:35:07.930 align:middle line:84% for diagnosing nuclear weapons and doing all kinds of stuff 00:35:07.930 --> 00:35:11.090 align:middle line:90% here in the United States. 00:35:11.090 --> 00:35:15.410 align:middle line:84% So by the time fission was confirmed in 1938, 00:35:15.410 --> 00:35:19.610 align:middle line:84% these studies were just starting to show up in the United States. 00:35:19.610 --> 00:35:23.810 align:middle line:84% So Joliot was busy trying to count the number of neutrons 00:35:23.810 --> 00:35:25.610 align:middle line:90% coming out of uranium. 00:35:25.610 --> 00:35:28.610 align:middle line:84% And meanwhile, the Nazis are violating the Treaty 00:35:28.610 --> 00:35:32.930 align:middle line:84% of Versailles that ended World War I. The Japanese imperialist 00:35:32.930 --> 00:35:36.010 align:middle line:84% government had begun attacking China. 00:35:36.010 --> 00:35:39.930 align:middle line:84% Fascist Italy withdrew from the League of Nations. 00:35:39.930 --> 00:35:42.930 align:middle line:90% Germany begins to annex Austria. 00:35:42.930 --> 00:35:45.250 align:middle line:84% The whole world is falling apart. 00:35:45.250 --> 00:35:48.170 align:middle line:84% And the last straw was in that September, 00:35:48.170 --> 00:35:52.458 align:middle line:84% the Germans invaded Poland, which the rest of the world 00:35:52.458 --> 00:35:54.750 align:middle line:84% can no longer close its eyes to and say, oh, of course, 00:35:54.750 --> 00:35:58.130 align:middle line:84% it was part of the traditional German fatherland. 00:35:58.130 --> 00:36:00.690 align:middle line:84% Yeah, it was a clear invasion, and that 00:36:00.690 --> 00:36:05.100 align:middle line:84% led to the Allied powers declaring war on Germany. 00:36:05.100 --> 00:36:07.880 align:middle line:84% So understandably, Mr Leo Szilard, 00:36:07.880 --> 00:36:09.380 align:middle line:84% who, from the beginning, was worried 00:36:09.380 --> 00:36:12.840 align:middle line:90% about the chain reaction-- 00:36:12.840 --> 00:36:17.420 align:middle line:84% and you heard about Joliot's experiments counting neutrons, 00:36:17.420 --> 00:36:22.780 align:middle line:84% he went to Joliot and said, if it is more than one, 00:36:22.780 --> 00:36:25.420 align:middle line:84% please do not publish your result 00:36:25.420 --> 00:36:28.780 align:middle line:84% because it will show that uranium can be used for a chain 00:36:28.780 --> 00:36:32.540 align:middle line:84% reaction, and everyone knows, going back to Eddington, 00:36:32.540 --> 00:36:35.940 align:middle line:84% that that means we can make a bomb out of nuclear energy. 00:36:35.940 --> 00:36:43.940 align:middle line:84% So here is the first real moral dilemma of the nuclear age. 00:36:43.940 --> 00:36:45.040 align:middle line:90% What would you have done? 00:36:45.040 --> 00:36:53.460 align:middle line:90% 00:36:53.460 --> 00:36:55.880 align:middle line:90% Yeah? 00:36:55.880 --> 00:37:00.060 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: I think published the research because someone would 00:37:00.060 --> 00:37:05.920 align:middle line:84% find out eventually and I still kind of believe 00:37:05.920 --> 00:37:09.460 align:middle line:84% that the information itself is neutral and it's how we use it. 00:37:09.460 --> 00:37:11.440 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: Yeah, that has always 00:37:11.440 --> 00:37:15.440 align:middle line:84% been the argument that has always been made. 00:37:15.440 --> 00:37:18.240 align:middle line:84% There's another famous person, Gernot Zippe, 00:37:18.240 --> 00:37:20.420 align:middle line:84% who invented the uranium enrichment gas centrifuge, 00:37:20.420 --> 00:37:22.600 align:middle line:84% which, of course, Iran has used to try 00:37:22.600 --> 00:37:25.280 align:middle line:84% to build a nuclear weapons program, among other countries. 00:37:25.280 --> 00:37:28.070 align:middle line:84% And he is always on-- he is quoted as saying, 00:37:28.070 --> 00:37:30.320 align:middle line:84% "With a kitchen knife, you can make a sandwich or kill 00:37:30.320 --> 00:37:33.240 align:middle line:84% a person," the technology is neutral. 00:37:33.240 --> 00:37:36.520 align:middle line:90% It's a certain perspective. 00:37:36.520 --> 00:37:39.580 align:middle line:84% But Szilard had a different view. 00:37:39.580 --> 00:37:42.320 align:middle line:84% He's like, maybe the technology is neutral, 00:37:42.320 --> 00:37:44.480 align:middle line:90% but we can also wait. 00:37:44.480 --> 00:37:46.680 align:middle line:84% This is not the time, we are going to war 00:37:46.680 --> 00:37:50.720 align:middle line:90% with Germany, let's just wait. 00:37:50.720 --> 00:37:53.400 align:middle line:90% Joliot published the results. 00:37:53.400 --> 00:37:57.160 align:middle line:84% He showed that, indeed, more than one neutron 00:37:57.160 --> 00:37:59.720 align:middle line:84% could be released-- was released, 00:37:59.720 --> 00:38:04.530 align:middle line:84% and that meant any nuclear physicists worth their salt 00:38:04.530 --> 00:38:09.610 align:middle line:84% here at the dawn of World War II knew that a nuclear weapon was 00:38:09.610 --> 00:38:10.310 align:middle line:90% possible. 00:38:10.310 --> 00:38:13.090 align:middle line:90% 00:38:13.090 --> 00:38:17.010 align:middle line:90% OK, so what happened? 00:38:17.010 --> 00:38:18.350 align:middle line:90% So Szilard panicked. 00:38:18.350 --> 00:38:21.090 align:middle line:90% 00:38:21.090 --> 00:38:23.530 align:middle line:84% Joliot published in March of 1939, 00:38:23.530 --> 00:38:27.530 align:middle line:84% and Szilard decided to write a letter 00:38:27.530 --> 00:38:30.250 align:middle line:84% to the President of the United States saying, 00:38:30.250 --> 00:38:33.770 align:middle line:84% this is an emergency, we need to do something about this. 00:38:33.770 --> 00:38:36.150 align:middle line:84% But nobody knew who Leo Szilard was. 00:38:36.150 --> 00:38:40.410 align:middle line:84% And so Leo Szilard took his letter out to Einstein's house 00:38:40.410 --> 00:38:44.490 align:middle line:84% on Long Island and said, would you please sign this letter 00:38:44.490 --> 00:38:46.570 align:middle line:90% and pretend it's from you? 00:38:46.570 --> 00:38:48.730 align:middle line:90% And so that's what Einstein did. 00:38:48.730 --> 00:38:51.330 align:middle line:84% And as a result of receiving this letter 00:38:51.330 --> 00:38:54.450 align:middle line:84% signed by Albert Einstein, the President 00:38:54.450 --> 00:38:56.550 align:middle line:90% set up the Uranium Committee. 00:38:56.550 --> 00:38:58.570 align:middle line:84% The Uranium Committee's job was just 00:38:58.570 --> 00:39:02.100 align:middle line:90% to investigate uranium fission. 00:39:02.100 --> 00:39:04.560 align:middle line:84% various sites were set up around the United States. 00:39:04.560 --> 00:39:10.560 align:middle line:84% The reactor in Chicago, a place at University of Chicago, 00:39:10.560 --> 00:39:13.540 align:middle line:84% a place at University of Columbia 00:39:13.540 --> 00:39:18.140 align:middle line:84% was set up to look at uranium extraction from the ground. 00:39:18.140 --> 00:39:24.480 align:middle line:84% When I was a grad student at Princeton, their version of EHS, 00:39:24.480 --> 00:39:27.440 align:middle line:84% Environmental Health and Safety, called me up one day and said, 00:39:27.440 --> 00:39:29.740 align:middle line:84% there is a radioactive filing cabinet 00:39:29.740 --> 00:39:32.180 align:middle line:84% in the basement of the engineering building, 00:39:32.180 --> 00:39:34.960 align:middle line:84% can you please come and have a look and tell us what this is? 00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:39.300 align:middle line:84% And it turned out, it was the Uranium Committee original lab 00:39:39.300 --> 00:39:44.500 align:middle line:84% notebooks from doing uranium separation from ores, 00:39:44.500 --> 00:39:47.700 align:middle line:84% and there was all this liquid spilled on the pages, 00:39:47.700 --> 00:39:51.740 align:middle line:84% and thus, very mildly radioactive. 00:39:51.740 --> 00:39:58.780 align:middle line:84% So yeah, that was a fun little thing to do as a grad student. 00:39:58.780 --> 00:40:01.690 align:middle line:84% This was basically not-- this was not the Manhattan Project. 00:40:01.690 --> 00:40:04.950 align:middle line:84% It was a little more than just organized research. 00:40:04.950 --> 00:40:08.310 align:middle line:84% It was-- the President wasn't panicking in the way 00:40:08.310 --> 00:40:09.890 align:middle line:90% that Szilard was panicking. 00:40:09.890 --> 00:40:12.050 align:middle line:84% And Szilard didn't want a bomb to be made, 00:40:12.050 --> 00:40:17.122 align:middle line:84% he just wanted to investigate to see what the situation was 00:40:17.122 --> 00:40:18.830 align:middle line:84% because he didn't want the Germans to get 00:40:18.830 --> 00:40:22.430 align:middle line:84% there first because we did nothing but sit on our hands. 00:40:22.430 --> 00:40:23.450 align:middle line:90% So that's all it was. 00:40:23.450 --> 00:40:25.690 align:middle line:90% It was just a research project. 00:40:25.690 --> 00:40:30.430 align:middle line:84% Then two English physicists, Otto Frisch and Rudolf Peierls, 00:40:30.430 --> 00:40:34.390 align:middle line:84% wrote a memo to their British government saying, hey, 00:40:34.390 --> 00:40:36.230 align:middle line:90% we could build a bomb. 00:40:36.230 --> 00:40:38.230 align:middle line:90% And here's their memo. 00:40:38.230 --> 00:40:40.710 align:middle line:84% "The attached detailed report concerns the possibility 00:40:40.710 --> 00:40:43.710 align:middle line:84% of constructing a," quote, "'super-bomb' which utilizes 00:40:43.710 --> 00:40:46.850 align:middle line:84% the energy stored in atomic nuclei as a source of energy. 00:40:46.850 --> 00:40:50.110 align:middle line:84% The energy liberated in the explosion of such a super-bomb 00:40:50.110 --> 00:40:52.790 align:middle line:84% is about the same as that produced by the explosions 00:40:52.790 --> 00:40:55.750 align:middle line:90% of 1,000 tons of dynamite." 00:40:55.750 --> 00:41:00.110 align:middle line:84% a factor of 15 off for first generation. 00:41:00.110 --> 00:41:01.810 align:middle line:90% Not too bad, a little low. 00:41:01.810 --> 00:41:05.130 align:middle line:84% "The energy is liberated in a small volume, in which it will, 00:41:05.130 --> 00:41:07.850 align:middle line:84% for an instant, produce a temperature comparable to that 00:41:07.850 --> 00:41:09.270 align:middle line:90% of the interior of the sun. 00:41:09.270 --> 00:41:12.050 align:middle line:84% The blast from such an explosion would destroy life 00:41:12.050 --> 00:41:13.290 align:middle line:90% in a wide area. 00:41:13.290 --> 00:41:15.390 align:middle line:84% The size of this area is difficult to estimate, 00:41:15.390 --> 00:41:20.250 align:middle line:84% but it will probably cover the center of a big city." 00:41:20.250 --> 00:41:24.050 align:middle line:84% This is very remarkable because at the time 00:41:24.050 --> 00:41:26.770 align:middle line:84% they wrote this memo, no chain reaction 00:41:26.770 --> 00:41:28.390 align:middle line:90% had yet been demonstrated. 00:41:28.390 --> 00:41:30.450 align:middle line:84% There was no nuclear cross-section data 00:41:30.450 --> 00:41:34.050 align:middle line:90% for these isotopes. 00:41:34.050 --> 00:41:37.570 align:middle line:84% They just did this from first principles. 00:41:37.570 --> 00:41:42.250 align:middle line:84% This is the magic of being a really good physicist. 00:41:42.250 --> 00:41:43.830 align:middle line:90% And they basically got it right. 00:41:43.830 --> 00:41:46.650 align:middle line:84% The British started a program, which was codenamed the Tube 00:41:46.650 --> 00:41:48.663 align:middle line:90% Alloys Program. 00:41:48.663 --> 00:41:50.830 align:middle line:84% As soon as the British started this weapons program, 00:41:50.830 --> 00:41:52.288 align:middle line:84% the United States says, well, we're 00:41:52.288 --> 00:41:54.370 align:middle line:84% not going to let the Brits do this by themselves. 00:41:54.370 --> 00:41:59.460 align:middle line:84% And so the United States, the British, and the Canadians, 00:41:59.460 --> 00:42:03.740 align:middle line:84% often forgotten, got together and started the Manhattan 00:42:03.740 --> 00:42:05.460 align:middle line:84% Project, and that, of course, led 00:42:05.460 --> 00:42:07.420 align:middle line:90% to the production of the bomb. 00:42:07.420 --> 00:42:10.540 align:middle line:84% Of course, the rest of the Manhattan Project history 00:42:10.540 --> 00:42:11.880 align:middle line:90% is nuclear weapons history. 00:42:11.880 --> 00:42:15.620 align:middle line:84% I won't get into that today, but the important reason 00:42:15.620 --> 00:42:17.980 align:middle line:84% to bring this up is to get you to realize 00:42:17.980 --> 00:42:23.260 align:middle line:84% that here now at the birth of the discovery of nuclear energy, 00:42:23.260 --> 00:42:26.760 align:middle line:84% this was now a wartime weapons program, 00:42:26.760 --> 00:42:31.660 align:middle line:84% and it was instantly surrounded by enormous amounts of secrecy. 00:42:31.660 --> 00:42:33.860 align:middle line:84% So for fission, the connections are obvious. 00:42:33.860 --> 00:42:38.180 align:middle line:84% The first reactor built at Stagg Field at University of Chicago, 00:42:38.180 --> 00:42:41.460 align:middle line:84% and the production reactor's later built during the Manhattan 00:42:41.460 --> 00:42:48.520 align:middle line:84% Project at Hanford in Washington State, were all done in secret. 00:42:48.520 --> 00:42:50.180 align:middle line:84% How you build reactors were secret. 00:42:50.180 --> 00:42:52.060 align:middle line:90% Nuclear data was secret. 00:42:52.060 --> 00:42:53.740 align:middle line:90% Everything was secret. 00:42:53.740 --> 00:42:57.310 align:middle line:84% It also actually applied also to fusion. 00:42:57.310 --> 00:42:59.430 align:middle line:84% Initially, all the fusion concepts-- 00:42:59.430 --> 00:43:01.397 align:middle line:84% most of the fusion concepts were secret 00:43:01.397 --> 00:43:03.230 align:middle line:84% if they were developed in the United States. 00:43:03.230 --> 00:43:05.850 align:middle line:84% We were late to the game on fusion, 00:43:05.850 --> 00:43:08.270 align:middle line:84% so things like the Z-pinch which came from the UK, 00:43:08.270 --> 00:43:12.260 align:middle line:84% were not secret, but the stellarator, for example, it 00:43:12.260 --> 00:43:16.390 align:middle line:84% was invented by Lyman Spitzer, secret. 00:43:16.390 --> 00:43:18.890 align:middle line:84% And Princeton-- the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab, 00:43:18.890 --> 00:43:22.910 align:middle line:84% if you are in the fusion world, about PPL, PPPL, and that 00:43:22.910 --> 00:43:26.770 align:middle line:84% was all set up in response to the Manhattan Project. 00:43:26.770 --> 00:43:29.430 align:middle line:90% 00:43:29.430 --> 00:43:34.750 align:middle line:84% Secrecy means big bureaucratic institutions. 00:43:34.750 --> 00:43:38.190 align:middle line:84% Secrecy means a security apparatus. 00:43:38.190 --> 00:43:42.670 align:middle line:84% And it means two classes of people, those who get to know 00:43:42.670 --> 00:43:44.790 align:middle line:90% and those who don't get to know. 00:43:44.790 --> 00:43:47.390 align:middle line:84% And when you have that kind of arrangement, 00:43:47.390 --> 00:43:49.270 align:middle line:84% you have the people who are in the 00:43:49.270 --> 00:43:52.870 align:middle line:84% know having a vested interest in protecting 00:43:52.870 --> 00:43:55.160 align:middle line:84% their community and their groups, 00:43:55.160 --> 00:43:59.680 align:middle line:84% and saying all kinds of stuff to people who don't know 00:43:59.680 --> 00:44:03.580 align:middle line:84% to make sure that their activities get protected 00:44:03.580 --> 00:44:08.760 align:middle line:84% and keep this club exclusive and so on and so forth. 00:44:08.760 --> 00:44:14.560 align:middle line:84% And so this set the stage for strong government involvement 00:44:14.560 --> 00:44:17.800 align:middle line:84% and all nuclear research, including research on things 00:44:17.800 --> 00:44:19.960 align:middle line:84% like just peaceful nuclear power. 00:44:19.960 --> 00:44:23.240 align:middle line:84% The government owned everything, it's deciding what was secret 00:44:23.240 --> 00:44:25.360 align:middle line:90% and what was not secret. 00:44:25.360 --> 00:44:28.920 align:middle line:84% There was a report called the Smyth Report, which 00:44:28.920 --> 00:44:31.220 align:middle line:84% was the initial decision about what, 00:44:31.220 --> 00:44:33.680 align:middle line:84% from the Manhattan Project-- what information we 00:44:33.680 --> 00:44:35.520 align:middle line:84% would release and what information 00:44:35.520 --> 00:44:37.320 align:middle line:90% would be kept secret. 00:44:37.320 --> 00:44:39.320 align:middle line:84% If you want, one of the first mimeograph copies 00:44:39.320 --> 00:44:44.080 align:middle line:84% of the Smyth Report stapled is sitting in my research group, 00:44:44.080 --> 00:44:47.200 align:middle line:84% well before it was ever printed by any government printed 00:44:47.200 --> 00:44:48.000 align:middle line:90% office-- 00:44:48.000 --> 00:44:53.380 align:middle line:84% printing office, so you want to come see it. 00:44:53.380 --> 00:44:56.500 align:middle line:84% And that meant that there was also 00:44:56.500 --> 00:44:59.540 align:middle line:84% going to be just a lot of money going into this because this 00:44:59.540 --> 00:45:02.640 align:middle line:84% was a national security priority of the US government. 00:45:02.640 --> 00:45:06.740 align:middle line:84% People today like to complain that the renewable people are 00:45:06.740 --> 00:45:10.020 align:middle line:84% getting subsidies from the government and so on. 00:45:10.020 --> 00:45:12.420 align:middle line:84% The nuclear people got subsidies. 00:45:12.420 --> 00:45:16.500 align:middle line:84% In the beginning, nuclear had so much government support 00:45:16.500 --> 00:45:21.860 align:middle line:84% for the first 11 years of its existence. 00:45:21.860 --> 00:45:25.440 align:middle line:84% In the end, Congress created the Atomic Energy Commission, 00:45:25.440 --> 00:45:27.940 align:middle line:84% better known as the AEC, that would control 00:45:27.940 --> 00:45:32.180 align:middle line:84% all nuclear research, public and private, whether for military 00:45:32.180 --> 00:45:33.980 align:middle line:90% or for peaceful purposes. 00:45:33.980 --> 00:45:37.660 align:middle line:84% And never before or since has a government been so heavily 00:45:37.660 --> 00:45:41.380 align:middle line:84% involved-- or has imposed itself so directly 00:45:41.380 --> 00:45:43.780 align:middle line:84% in the emergence of a new industry. 00:45:43.780 --> 00:45:47.940 align:middle line:84% And that has completely shaped how things have turned out. 00:45:47.940 --> 00:45:54.070 align:middle line:84% So as this was happening, there was an important change 00:45:54.070 --> 00:45:56.790 align:middle line:84% happening in the post-war environment. 00:45:56.790 --> 00:46:02.090 align:middle line:84% No longer was this a wartime project, 00:46:02.090 --> 00:46:05.790 align:middle line:84% but it was still very political and strategic. 00:46:05.790 --> 00:46:08.150 align:middle line:84% After World War II, the rest was concerned 00:46:08.150 --> 00:46:09.870 align:middle line:90% about the Soviet Union. 00:46:09.870 --> 00:46:12.490 align:middle line:84% And the Soviets had been, of course, 00:46:12.490 --> 00:46:15.870 align:middle line:84% our allies in World War II, and many, many, many Soviets 00:46:15.870 --> 00:46:22.030 align:middle line:84% died fighting the Germans on the behalf of the Western countries, 00:46:22.030 --> 00:46:27.250 align:middle line:84% but then popular communism in Russia, 00:46:27.250 --> 00:46:31.510 align:middle line:84% and this was leading to criticism 00:46:31.510 --> 00:46:34.630 align:middle line:84% of Western capitalist approaches. 00:46:34.630 --> 00:46:37.030 align:middle line:84% And as a result, the world appeared 00:46:37.030 --> 00:46:39.910 align:middle line:84% to be dividing along ideological lines. 00:46:39.910 --> 00:46:41.870 align:middle line:84% Eastern European countries increasingly 00:46:41.870 --> 00:46:45.630 align:middle line:84% turned towards Russia, joining the Soviet Union. 00:46:45.630 --> 00:46:48.760 align:middle line:84% The West was opposing this because they 00:46:48.760 --> 00:46:52.060 align:middle line:84% saw this divide that happened once again, 00:46:52.060 --> 00:46:55.120 align:middle line:84% just like the divide that led to World War II, 00:46:55.120 --> 00:46:59.400 align:middle line:84% but no one had an appetite for another hot war, a third World 00:46:59.400 --> 00:47:00.080 align:middle line:90% War. 00:47:00.080 --> 00:47:03.960 align:middle line:84% And so this became what is known as the Cold War. 00:47:03.960 --> 00:47:06.560 align:middle line:84% And it was going to be a war fought 00:47:06.560 --> 00:47:11.900 align:middle line:84% on the territory of ideology, and nuclear power 00:47:11.900 --> 00:47:15.120 align:middle line:84% turned out to be one of the first Battlefronts. 00:47:15.120 --> 00:47:19.480 align:middle line:84% So the generals of this nuclear power battle 00:47:19.480 --> 00:47:22.480 align:middle line:84% were the commissioners of the Atomic Energy Commission. 00:47:22.480 --> 00:47:26.840 align:middle line:84% The head of the commission was David Lilienthal. 00:47:26.840 --> 00:47:30.920 align:middle line:84% Lilienthal had been an American attorney 00:47:30.920 --> 00:47:34.100 align:middle line:84% who ran the Tennessee Valley Authority, TVA. 00:47:34.100 --> 00:47:38.800 align:middle line:84% TVA was, at the time, the biggest electric utility 00:47:38.800 --> 00:47:39.700 align:middle line:90% in the United States. 00:47:39.700 --> 00:47:41.960 align:middle line:84% It's still one of the biggest utilities. 00:47:41.960 --> 00:47:46.160 align:middle line:84% It was formed after the attempt to build a bunch of dams 00:47:46.160 --> 00:47:49.250 align:middle line:84% to control flooding along the Mississippi River, 00:47:49.250 --> 00:47:51.112 align:middle line:84% and as a result, you have a bunch of dams, 00:47:51.112 --> 00:47:53.570 align:middle line:84% you have a bunch of electricity, they became a giant energy 00:47:53.570 --> 00:47:54.610 align:middle line:90% producer. 00:47:54.610 --> 00:47:57.290 align:middle line:84% And when you built the enrichment facilities 00:47:57.290 --> 00:48:00.210 align:middle line:84% to make enriched uranium to build the first nuclear weapon 00:48:00.210 --> 00:48:04.070 align:middle line:84% during the Manhattan Project, you needed a ton of electricity, 00:48:04.070 --> 00:48:07.850 align:middle line:84% so they went to TVA, and TVA was very intimately engaged 00:48:07.850 --> 00:48:11.090 align:middle line:84% in the Manhattan Project, basically powering 00:48:11.090 --> 00:48:12.110 align:middle line:90% all these facilities. 00:48:12.110 --> 00:48:14.930 align:middle line:84% And so afterwards, the head of the TVA 00:48:14.930 --> 00:48:17.050 align:middle line:84% was selected to be a commissioner 00:48:17.050 --> 00:48:18.930 align:middle line:90% of the Atomic Energy Commission. 00:48:18.930 --> 00:48:22.890 align:middle line:84% Another guy, Strauss, Lewis Strauss, 00:48:22.890 --> 00:48:26.630 align:middle line:84% is the evil villain in the recent Oppenheimer movie. 00:48:26.630 --> 00:48:30.230 align:middle line:84% If you saw the guy trying to take on Oppenheimer, 00:48:30.230 --> 00:48:32.850 align:middle line:90% that was Strauss. 00:48:32.850 --> 00:48:36.190 align:middle line:84% He was a philanthropist, very rich from the beginning, 00:48:36.190 --> 00:48:39.170 align:middle line:84% very politically connected, and he 00:48:39.170 --> 00:48:41.090 align:middle line:90% believed that nuclear energy-- 00:48:41.090 --> 00:48:43.650 align:middle line:84% basically viewed nuclear energy in a way like people view 00:48:43.650 --> 00:48:47.590 align:middle line:84% AI today, this is going to be the way to get rich. 00:48:47.590 --> 00:48:50.610 align:middle line:90% So he wanted to do this. 00:48:50.610 --> 00:48:53.310 align:middle line:84% Gordon Dean, actually not on this photo, 00:48:53.310 --> 00:48:54.490 align:middle line:90% was an investment banker. 00:48:54.490 --> 00:48:57.110 align:middle line:84% I mean, all these guys were basically business guys. 00:48:57.110 --> 00:48:59.610 align:middle line:84% And they worked side by side with nuclear physicists, 00:48:59.610 --> 00:49:01.890 align:middle line:84% but none of them were nuclear physicists themselves. 00:49:01.890 --> 00:49:03.515 align:middle line:84% None of them really understood anything 00:49:03.515 --> 00:49:06.350 align:middle line:84% about science or technology, but they understood business. 00:49:06.350 --> 00:49:09.150 align:middle line:84% And they saw a bright future for nuclear energy, 00:49:09.150 --> 00:49:11.150 align:middle line:84% a big, beautiful, bright business 00:49:11.150 --> 00:49:16.070 align:middle line:84% future that was going to make them all very, very rich. 00:49:16.070 --> 00:49:19.510 align:middle line:84% So they didn't know how it was going to be done. 00:49:19.510 --> 00:49:23.410 align:middle line:84% Strauss was actually a very big proponent of fusion. 00:49:23.410 --> 00:49:27.150 align:middle line:84% He went on to famously say that thermonuclear fusion was going 00:49:27.150 --> 00:49:29.830 align:middle line:84% to be so revolutionary that it would power the world and it 00:49:29.830 --> 00:49:32.470 align:middle line:84% would be, quote, "too cheap to meter." 00:49:32.470 --> 00:49:36.470 align:middle line:84% If you've heard that quote before, that came from Strauss. 00:49:36.470 --> 00:49:40.630 align:middle line:84% But basically, they all wanted to get in on the ground floor. 00:49:40.630 --> 00:49:44.600 align:middle line:84% They all wanted to be Nvidia, making the hardware that 00:49:44.600 --> 00:49:46.840 align:middle line:84% would power this nuclear revolution that would 00:49:46.840 --> 00:49:48.000 align:middle line:90% power the world. 00:49:48.000 --> 00:49:50.640 align:middle line:90% And who better to provide this-- 00:49:50.640 --> 00:49:55.740 align:middle line:84% the chips, if you will, for the atomic revolution 00:49:55.740 --> 00:49:57.100 align:middle line:90% but US companies? 00:49:57.100 --> 00:50:00.840 align:middle line:84% Fission companies that they have ownership stakes in. 00:50:00.840 --> 00:50:04.960 align:middle line:84% And so to do this, the AEC adopted this plan 00:50:04.960 --> 00:50:09.140 align:middle line:84% of open-ended research, as any good business person would do. 00:50:09.140 --> 00:50:10.655 align:middle line:90% We don't know how to do this. 00:50:10.655 --> 00:50:12.280 align:middle line:84% We get all the smart people in the room 00:50:12.280 --> 00:50:15.040 align:middle line:84% together and let them just come up with ideas 00:50:15.040 --> 00:50:17.760 align:middle line:90% and see which ones stick. 00:50:17.760 --> 00:50:21.640 align:middle line:84% They didn't want to prematurely settle 00:50:21.640 --> 00:50:25.480 align:middle line:84% on any particular technology and then make a mistake. 00:50:25.480 --> 00:50:28.280 align:middle line:84% They knew from the beginning that they needed a commercially 00:50:28.280 --> 00:50:30.920 align:middle line:84% viable product, and their goal was 00:50:30.920 --> 00:50:34.720 align:middle line:84% to find a way to make nuclear energy cheaper than coal. 00:50:34.720 --> 00:50:37.320 align:middle line:90% That was their official goal. 00:50:37.320 --> 00:50:41.440 align:middle line:84% But all of this had to be done in classified channels 00:50:41.440 --> 00:50:45.310 align:middle line:84% through the government, which actually suits their interests. 00:50:45.310 --> 00:50:46.727 align:middle line:84% That gives them tremendous control 00:50:46.727 --> 00:50:48.768 align:middle line:84% and means there are no competitors that they have 00:50:48.768 --> 00:50:49.950 align:middle line:90% to worry about, no startups. 00:50:49.950 --> 00:50:52.730 align:middle line:84% It's going to be their people, they get contracts, 00:50:52.730 --> 00:50:55.690 align:middle line:90% and that was great. 00:50:55.690 --> 00:50:58.090 align:middle line:84% Well, in the world of fusion, the AEC 00:50:58.090 --> 00:51:02.610 align:middle line:84% said, OK, let's support the toroidal pinch, the mirror 00:51:02.610 --> 00:51:06.210 align:middle line:84% machine, and the Lyman Spitzer stellarator idea. 00:51:06.210 --> 00:51:10.410 align:middle line:84% All these programs were built up in the United States in secret. 00:51:10.410 --> 00:51:13.890 align:middle line:84% In the land of fission, the AEC searched around 00:51:13.890 --> 00:51:14.910 align:middle line:90% for reactor designs. 00:51:14.910 --> 00:51:18.610 align:middle line:84% They did the RFP, Request for Proposals, 00:51:18.610 --> 00:51:20.530 align:middle line:84% on how to-- we had built reactors 00:51:20.530 --> 00:51:22.530 align:middle line:84% at Hanford to make plutonium, but those were not 00:51:22.530 --> 00:51:23.293 align:middle line:90% power reactors. 00:51:23.293 --> 00:51:24.710 align:middle line:84% They were not optimized for power, 00:51:24.710 --> 00:51:27.290 align:middle line:90% so we need power reactor ideas. 00:51:27.290 --> 00:51:28.850 align:middle line:84% So we put out an RFP-- you know how 00:51:28.850 --> 00:51:33.130 align:middle line:84% many ideas for different reactor designs they got back? 00:51:33.130 --> 00:51:34.210 align:middle line:90% 80. 00:51:34.210 --> 00:51:34.750 align:middle line:90% 8-0. 00:51:34.750 --> 00:51:35.590 align:middle line:90% I mean, it blows-- 00:51:35.590 --> 00:51:39.750 align:middle line:84% I cannot possibly list 40 reactor concepts, nevermind 80. 00:51:39.750 --> 00:51:43.780 align:middle line:84% I mean, this was really the true-- truly the beginning. 00:51:43.780 --> 00:51:47.020 align:middle line:84% Of these 80, and they downselected to five reactors 00:51:47.020 --> 00:51:48.340 align:middle line:90% to pursue in parallel. 00:51:48.340 --> 00:51:50.360 align:middle line:84% There was the homogeneous reactor, 00:51:50.360 --> 00:51:54.420 align:middle line:84% which is a uranium and water sludge in a ball 00:51:54.420 --> 00:51:59.660 align:middle line:84% because the idea was it would be very simple to build. 00:51:59.660 --> 00:52:03.300 align:middle line:84% Maybe it will actually be cost-competitive with coal. 00:52:03.300 --> 00:52:05.780 align:middle line:84% Unfortunately, things like precipitates 00:52:05.780 --> 00:52:09.400 align:middle line:84% happen, and then that affects the criticality, 00:52:09.400 --> 00:52:11.380 align:middle line:90% and that is not a good concept. 00:52:11.380 --> 00:52:14.220 align:middle line:84% But that was one of the early ideas they pursued. 00:52:14.220 --> 00:52:16.700 align:middle line:84% Sodium graphite reactor, they're experiments that 00:52:16.700 --> 00:52:20.620 align:middle line:90% went on to become EBR-I and II. 00:52:20.620 --> 00:52:22.520 align:middle line:90% And EBR-I and II is here. 00:52:22.520 --> 00:52:24.340 align:middle line:84% Sodium reactor-- I guess this probably 00:52:24.340 --> 00:52:28.060 align:middle line:84% was a fast reactor, but maybe not a breeder reactor. 00:52:28.060 --> 00:52:30.940 align:middle line:90% A lot of ideas. 00:52:30.940 --> 00:52:34.240 align:middle line:84% Sodium graphite reactor because it would use less uranium, 00:52:34.240 --> 00:52:36.260 align:middle line:84% and, of course, a water-based reactor 00:52:36.260 --> 00:52:39.340 align:middle line:84% because it seemed to be technologically straightforward. 00:52:39.340 --> 00:52:43.480 align:middle line:84% All this was happening with giant government-funded 00:52:43.480 --> 00:52:44.520 align:middle line:90% programs. 00:52:44.520 --> 00:52:47.400 align:middle line:84% This was the golden era of nuclear engineering. 00:52:47.400 --> 00:52:49.900 align:middle line:84% As long as you were part of one of the ordained companies, 00:52:49.900 --> 00:52:54.760 align:middle line:84% you got lots of money and could do lots of crazy things. 00:52:54.760 --> 00:52:56.600 align:middle line:90% 1953. 00:52:56.600 --> 00:53:00.940 align:middle line:84% President Eisenhower-- General Eisenhower, 00:53:00.940 --> 00:53:03.440 align:middle line:84% one of the only people who could probably do this, 00:53:03.440 --> 00:53:08.320 align:middle line:84% said, we need to cut-- we spent so much on the war, 00:53:08.320 --> 00:53:10.880 align:middle line:84% we need to cut government spending. 00:53:10.880 --> 00:53:15.160 align:middle line:84% And across the board, including in militarily significant 00:53:15.160 --> 00:53:18.320 align:middle line:84% domains, there were major budget cuts, 00:53:18.320 --> 00:53:24.560 align:middle line:84% and the AEC was forced to terminate all of these programs. 00:53:24.560 --> 00:53:30.440 align:middle line:84% But then something saved fission, but not fusion-- 00:53:30.440 --> 00:53:32.440 align:middle line:90% the US Navy. 00:53:32.440 --> 00:53:37.820 align:middle line:84% So it had-- the US Navy had its own interest in nuclear power. 00:53:37.820 --> 00:53:40.230 align:middle line:84% It didn't care about making electricity, 00:53:40.230 --> 00:53:42.890 align:middle line:84% but it wanted nuclear reactors to power ships, 00:53:42.890 --> 00:53:46.330 align:middle line:90% and in particular, submarines. 00:53:46.330 --> 00:53:51.130 align:middle line:84% The submarines of the US Navy at the time were diesel submarines. 00:53:51.130 --> 00:53:54.630 align:middle line:84% They had to snorkel with something to suck in fresh air, 00:53:54.630 --> 00:53:57.190 align:middle line:84% they ran diesel generators that were charged batteries, 00:53:57.190 --> 00:54:01.410 align:middle line:84% and then they had batteries they could submerge. 00:54:01.410 --> 00:54:05.650 align:middle line:84% At that time, American submarines kind of sucked. 00:54:05.650 --> 00:54:09.430 align:middle line:84% Soviet submarines were much better than American submarines. 00:54:09.430 --> 00:54:12.830 align:middle line:84% They had better batteries, they were quieter, 00:54:12.830 --> 00:54:14.850 align:middle line:84% they could stay submerged longer, 00:54:14.850 --> 00:54:17.250 align:middle line:90% and that drove the US Navy nuts. 00:54:17.250 --> 00:54:22.730 align:middle line:84% And they were particularly concerned about a revisit 00:54:22.730 --> 00:54:26.930 align:middle line:84% of what happened during World War II, when the Germans, 00:54:26.930 --> 00:54:29.650 align:middle line:84% who made the famous U-boat, which were basically 00:54:29.650 --> 00:54:34.130 align:middle line:84% death traps, but they were churning these U-boats out 00:54:34.130 --> 00:54:38.700 align:middle line:84% at the rate of 25 per month, about one submarine per day. 00:54:38.700 --> 00:54:44.140 align:middle line:84% And the Navy was saying, if the Soviets, who we're now in a Cold 00:54:44.140 --> 00:54:48.300 align:middle line:84% War with, attain German production levels, 00:54:48.300 --> 00:54:50.563 align:middle line:84% and their boats are already better than our boats, 00:54:50.563 --> 00:54:51.980 align:middle line:84% they can basically have free reign 00:54:51.980 --> 00:54:54.080 align:middle line:84% and do whatever they want in the oceans, and this is a crisis, 00:54:54.080 --> 00:54:56.180 align:middle line:84% and there's going to be a second Pearl Harbor, 00:54:56.180 --> 00:54:58.340 align:middle line:84% and we need to do something about this. 00:54:58.340 --> 00:55:01.700 align:middle line:84% So their idea was to leapfrog ahead 00:55:01.700 --> 00:55:05.780 align:middle line:84% by using nuclear power to build a better submarine that 00:55:05.780 --> 00:55:07.960 align:middle line:84% could stay submerged indefinitely, 00:55:07.960 --> 00:55:10.340 align:middle line:84% did not need to snorkel, and would 00:55:10.340 --> 00:55:13.380 align:middle line:84% be faster and better in all sorts of ways 00:55:13.380 --> 00:55:15.940 align:middle line:90% than the Soviet boats. 00:55:15.940 --> 00:55:19.340 align:middle line:84% And they went around to Congress trying to drum up money for this 00:55:19.340 --> 00:55:21.940 align:middle line:84% and kept saying, second Pearl Harbor, 00:55:21.940 --> 00:55:27.100 align:middle line:84% and that was a very effective line of argumentation. 00:55:27.100 --> 00:55:32.920 align:middle line:84% So what was the Navy's objectives here? 00:55:32.920 --> 00:55:34.860 align:middle line:90% Well, they wanted a-- 00:55:34.860 --> 00:55:38.590 align:middle line:84% they want just a reactor that was going to be small enough 00:55:38.590 --> 00:55:43.630 align:middle line:84% to fit in the hull of a submarine, more than anything, 00:55:43.630 --> 00:55:47.850 align:middle line:84% and that was comfortable and familiar for naval engineers. 00:55:47.850 --> 00:55:50.430 align:middle line:84% So naval engineers were comfortable designing things 00:55:50.430 --> 00:55:52.110 align:middle line:90% with water. 00:55:52.110 --> 00:55:55.150 align:middle line:84% The chemistry of water and chemistry of corrosion 00:55:55.150 --> 00:55:56.910 align:middle line:84% is something that-- water-based corrosion 00:55:56.910 --> 00:55:58.990 align:middle line:90% was something they understood. 00:55:58.990 --> 00:56:03.070 align:middle line:84% Water makes a great working fluid because a lot of energy 00:56:03.070 --> 00:56:04.910 align:middle line:90% goes into the phase change. 00:56:04.910 --> 00:56:07.925 align:middle line:84% And it is a great moderator because there's 00:56:07.925 --> 00:56:09.550 align:middle line:84% a lot of hydrogen, which means that you 00:56:09.550 --> 00:56:12.430 align:middle line:84% could make the reactor small, the core small. 00:56:12.430 --> 00:56:17.430 align:middle line:84% So for all of these reasons, the pressurized water reactor 00:56:17.430 --> 00:56:22.510 align:middle line:84% was selected as the optimal reactor for powering boats. 00:56:22.510 --> 00:56:28.310 align:middle line:84% It was not selected for its economic competitiveness, 00:56:28.310 --> 00:56:31.590 align:middle line:84% and it was not selected because it was safe. 00:56:31.590 --> 00:56:34.930 align:middle line:84% On a submarine, the principal concern 00:56:34.930 --> 00:56:37.210 align:middle line:84% is that when the torpedo is coming at you, 00:56:37.210 --> 00:56:40.510 align:middle line:84% your boat can go fast and get out of the way of the submarine. 00:56:40.510 --> 00:56:43.170 align:middle line:84% That's how you save the people on board. 00:56:43.170 --> 00:56:47.330 align:middle line:84% If the nuclear reactor has a meltdown once every 100 years 00:56:47.330 --> 00:56:50.230 align:middle line:84% or once every 10,000 years is irrelevant. 00:56:50.230 --> 00:56:52.290 align:middle line:84% You need to go fast, that's what's relevant. 00:56:52.290 --> 00:56:55.270 align:middle line:84% And that's what the nuclear reactor enabled them to do. 00:56:55.270 --> 00:56:59.090 align:middle line:84% So they didn't care about things like overall safety 00:56:59.090 --> 00:57:01.650 align:middle line:90% of the reactor. 00:57:01.650 --> 00:57:05.210 align:middle line:84% And so now we have two parallel efforts. 00:57:05.210 --> 00:57:08.350 align:middle line:84% We have the Navy pursuing the pressurized water reactor, 00:57:08.350 --> 00:57:12.850 align:middle line:84% very singlemindedly because they need to defeat the Soviets, 00:57:12.850 --> 00:57:15.450 align:middle line:84% and we have these business guys over at the AEC who 00:57:15.450 --> 00:57:17.730 align:middle line:84% are doing this open-ended research, exploration 00:57:17.730 --> 00:57:21.370 align:middle line:84% of the entire phase space and just had their budget cut. 00:57:21.370 --> 00:57:25.350 align:middle line:84% And so you can guess, when the budget cut came, 00:57:25.350 --> 00:57:27.130 align:middle line:90% how this shook out. 00:57:27.130 --> 00:57:32.520 align:middle line:84% The Navy wanted, of course, to keep their program going. 00:57:32.520 --> 00:57:34.935 align:middle line:84% They wanted to escape the budget cuts. 00:57:34.935 --> 00:57:37.060 align:middle line:84% And they had built a whole lot of political support 00:57:37.060 --> 00:57:39.660 align:middle line:84% in Congress by saying, second Pearl Harbor, second Pearl 00:57:39.660 --> 00:57:40.660 align:middle line:90% Harbor. 00:57:40.660 --> 00:57:44.020 align:middle line:84% And in order to further cement that they 00:57:44.020 --> 00:57:49.380 align:middle line:84% would have ongoing funding, they went to Congress and said, look, 00:57:49.380 --> 00:57:52.980 align:middle line:84% we know the AEC is doing this reactor thing. 00:57:52.980 --> 00:57:54.640 align:middle line:84% We're also doing the reactor thing. 00:57:54.640 --> 00:57:55.620 align:middle line:90% And guess what? 00:57:55.620 --> 00:57:58.740 align:middle line:84% You can put Navy reactors on land. 00:57:58.740 --> 00:58:01.460 align:middle line:84% They look like little submarines. 00:58:01.460 --> 00:58:03.920 align:middle line:84% And you can make electricity with them. 00:58:03.920 --> 00:58:06.560 align:middle line:84% So there's no need to send money to the AEC. 00:58:06.560 --> 00:58:09.472 align:middle line:84% Just give us all the money, and we'll do all the research, 00:58:09.472 --> 00:58:11.180 align:middle line:84% and you'll kill two birds with one stone, 00:58:11.180 --> 00:58:12.680 align:middle line:84% and you'll save lots of budgetary money, 00:58:12.680 --> 00:58:14.000 align:middle line:90% and everything will be happy. 00:58:14.000 --> 00:58:16.000 align:middle line:84% And, of course, you don't really have any option 00:58:16.000 --> 00:58:18.500 align:middle line:90% because second Pearl Harbor. 00:58:18.500 --> 00:58:19.520 align:middle line:90% And it worked. 00:58:19.520 --> 00:58:26.740 align:middle line:84% And so the AEC was, of course, very unhappy. 00:58:26.740 --> 00:58:29.260 align:middle line:84% Not only did the AEC want its own money, 00:58:29.260 --> 00:58:32.430 align:middle line:84% like every institution, but their experts 00:58:32.430 --> 00:58:35.230 align:middle line:84% had already looked at the pressurized water reactor 00:58:35.230 --> 00:58:36.250 align:middle line:90% and dismissed it. 00:58:36.250 --> 00:58:38.990 align:middle line:84% It was not one of the initial five choices. 00:58:38.990 --> 00:58:40.990 align:middle line:84% And the reason they dismissed it is because they 00:58:40.990 --> 00:58:43.990 align:middle line:84% felt it was too hardware-intensive, it was not 00:58:43.990 --> 00:58:47.770 align:middle line:84% going-- because you had to deal with high-pressure water, 00:58:47.770 --> 00:58:51.070 align:middle line:84% you had to deal with steam heat exchangers, 00:58:51.070 --> 00:58:54.550 align:middle line:84% you have to do with a whole bunch of stuff. 00:58:54.550 --> 00:58:57.830 align:middle line:84% You have to deal with water flow and cavitation and all 00:58:57.830 --> 00:59:00.590 align:middle line:84% these things that made the engineering hard. 00:59:00.590 --> 00:59:04.910 align:middle line:84% And they just thought it was not going to be economical. 00:59:04.910 --> 00:59:06.990 align:middle line:84% There was no way that, in their view, 00:59:06.990 --> 00:59:09.470 align:middle line:84% that this reactor was going to compete with coal, 00:59:09.470 --> 00:59:12.430 align:middle line:90% which their original objective. 00:59:12.430 --> 00:59:15.310 align:middle line:84% And it's worth noting that the AEC was not the only group 00:59:15.310 --> 00:59:17.270 align:middle line:90% to have this perspective. 00:59:17.270 --> 00:59:20.550 align:middle line:84% So nuclear power is taking off all over the world, 00:59:20.550 --> 00:59:26.063 align:middle line:84% primarily in France and in the Western countries. 00:59:26.063 --> 00:59:27.730 align:middle line:84% It's happening in the Soviet Union, too, 00:59:27.730 --> 00:59:32.440 align:middle line:84% but France and UK were the first countries in Europe 00:59:32.440 --> 00:59:36.960 align:middle line:84% to really stand up a big nuclear research program. 00:59:36.960 --> 00:59:39.600 align:middle line:84% And they had also decided the pressurized water reactor was 00:59:39.600 --> 00:59:41.400 align:middle line:90% not going to be competitive. 00:59:41.400 --> 00:59:43.860 align:middle line:84% And they chose gas graphite reactors. 00:59:43.860 --> 00:59:46.840 align:middle line:84% That's what they thought was the way to go. 00:59:46.840 --> 00:59:51.520 align:middle line:84% Unfortunately, the AEC failed, and back here in the United 00:59:51.520 --> 00:59:54.920 align:middle line:84% States, Shippingport was indeed built. 00:59:54.920 --> 00:59:59.880 align:middle line:84% It was, in fact, on budget and on time, probably 00:59:59.880 --> 01:00:02.720 align:middle line:84% the last on-budget, on-time reactor built in the United 01:00:02.720 --> 01:00:05.400 align:middle line:90% States. 01:00:05.400 --> 01:00:08.280 align:middle line:84% I did a calculation recently to figure out what the electricity 01:00:08.280 --> 01:00:11.280 align:middle line:84% cost was from this reactor, and it's actually 01:00:11.280 --> 01:00:16.320 align:middle line:84% about the same as the current modal reactors 01:00:16.320 --> 01:00:18.800 align:middle line:84% that were just completed a couple of years ago, 01:00:18.800 --> 01:00:21.640 align:middle line:84% when you inflation-adjust it and everything else. 01:00:21.640 --> 01:00:23.780 align:middle line:84% Now this had none of the safety that a modal has, 01:00:23.780 --> 01:00:26.600 align:middle line:84% but it's amazing because the cost is basically 01:00:26.600 --> 01:00:30.100 align:middle line:90% unchanged in all this time. 01:00:30.100 --> 01:00:34.740 align:middle line:84% OK, so the competition with the Soviets was heating up. 01:00:34.740 --> 01:00:36.860 align:middle line:90% We had the space race. 01:00:36.860 --> 01:00:38.540 align:middle line:90% We had the arms race. 01:00:38.540 --> 01:00:40.500 align:middle line:84% And now there was a kilowatt race 01:00:40.500 --> 01:00:45.100 align:middle line:84% to see who would put nuclear power on the grid first. 01:00:45.100 --> 01:00:48.020 align:middle line:84% Congress decided that this was another battleground in which 01:00:48.020 --> 01:00:50.540 align:middle line:84% America needed to demonstrate the superiority 01:00:50.540 --> 01:00:54.860 align:middle line:84% of the capitalist system, and particularly, they 01:00:54.860 --> 01:00:57.500 align:middle line:84% wanted American-made nuclear power 01:00:57.500 --> 01:01:01.620 align:middle line:84% to be the nuclear power that was going to power the world. 01:01:01.620 --> 01:01:04.700 align:middle line:84% And that would bring all freedom-loving people together 01:01:04.700 --> 01:01:07.280 align:middle line:84% and make everyone an ally of the United States. 01:01:07.280 --> 01:01:10.020 align:middle line:84% It was very strategic and we had to do this. 01:01:10.020 --> 01:01:13.940 align:middle line:84% So strangely, this belief had a rather positive effect 01:01:13.940 --> 01:01:17.500 align:middle line:84% on Fusion, but it turned out to be a really strangely 01:01:17.500 --> 01:01:19.768 align:middle line:90% negative effect on fission. 01:01:19.768 --> 01:01:22.060 align:middle line:84% So in the fusion world, there are all these conferences 01:01:22.060 --> 01:01:26.190 align:middle line:84% that happened, and ideas were declassified, 01:01:26.190 --> 01:01:29.450 align:middle line:84% and the tokamak was shown to the world, and things moved forward. 01:01:29.450 --> 01:01:32.830 align:middle line:84% It was all done in vein of just research, 01:01:32.830 --> 01:01:35.530 align:middle line:84% not making competitive nuclear power. 01:01:35.530 --> 01:01:37.970 align:middle line:84% But in the competitive nuclear power space, 01:01:37.970 --> 01:01:41.670 align:middle line:84% things went-- in fission, things went a little differently. 01:01:41.670 --> 01:01:48.550 align:middle line:84% So in 1954, to cement this new perspective, 01:01:48.550 --> 01:01:51.230 align:middle line:84% Congress passed a revised version of the Atomic Energy 01:01:51.230 --> 01:01:53.710 align:middle line:84% Act, and this law was supposed to fix 01:01:53.710 --> 01:01:59.150 align:middle line:84% the stoppage that was caused a year earlier by Eisenhower's 01:01:59.150 --> 01:02:00.550 align:middle line:90% budget cuts. 01:02:00.550 --> 01:02:02.990 align:middle line:84% And what they said was, OK, we're 01:02:02.990 --> 01:02:07.830 align:middle line:84% going to support nuclear power, but private industry is 01:02:07.830 --> 01:02:09.850 align:middle line:90% going to build these reactors. 01:02:09.850 --> 01:02:12.710 align:middle line:84% So instead of this huge amount of money 01:02:12.710 --> 01:02:15.870 align:middle line:84% coming from the government, the government 01:02:15.870 --> 01:02:19.310 align:middle line:84% is going to declassify all these concepts 01:02:19.310 --> 01:02:22.930 align:middle line:84% and let private companies build power, 01:02:22.930 --> 01:02:26.080 align:middle line:84% and that's how you do it in a capitalist system, not 01:02:26.080 --> 01:02:29.560 align:middle line:84% a state-sponsored system like the Soviet Union. 01:02:29.560 --> 01:02:32.580 align:middle line:84% So the AEC licensed their designs. 01:02:32.580 --> 01:02:34.080 align:middle line:84% They went around and they said, well 01:02:34.080 --> 01:02:36.180 align:middle line:84% since we have a bunch of private companies, 01:02:36.180 --> 01:02:37.600 align:middle line:90% we can have more designs. 01:02:37.600 --> 01:02:43.218 align:middle line:84% And they said, OK, they licensed 10 concepts to private industry, 01:02:43.218 --> 01:02:44.760 align:middle line:84% and the private industry was supposed 01:02:44.760 --> 01:02:48.640 align:middle line:90% to fund this R&D themselves. 01:02:48.640 --> 01:02:53.200 align:middle line:84% Well, the race for the Soviet Union was on. 01:02:53.200 --> 01:02:58.866 align:middle line:84% And just to illustrate how people looked at this, 01:02:58.866 --> 01:03:00.880 align:middle line:84% this is a quote from one of the senators. 01:03:00.880 --> 01:03:03.580 align:middle line:84% "If we are outdistanced by Russia in this race, 01:03:03.580 --> 01:03:05.440 align:middle line:90% it would be catastrophic. 01:03:05.440 --> 01:03:08.700 align:middle line:84% If we are outdistanced either by the United Kingdom or France, 01:03:08.700 --> 01:03:11.160 align:middle line:84% there would be tremendous economic tragedy to our commerce 01:03:11.160 --> 01:03:14.540 align:middle line:84% and international commerce of this great nation of ours." 01:03:14.540 --> 01:03:16.640 align:middle line:84% People really thought that this-- 01:03:16.640 --> 01:03:20.320 align:middle line:84% we had to win this race, and that this private industry 01:03:20.320 --> 01:03:23.290 align:middle line:84% method was going to be the way to do it. 01:03:23.290 --> 01:03:24.430 align:middle line:90% There is the problem. 01:03:24.430 --> 01:03:26.090 align:middle line:84% We license these 10 reactor concepts 01:03:26.090 --> 01:03:28.050 align:middle line:84% to 10 different companies, and the companies 01:03:28.050 --> 01:03:30.170 align:middle line:90% sat on their hands. 01:03:30.170 --> 01:03:32.530 align:middle line:90% They didn't do very much. 01:03:32.530 --> 01:03:34.770 align:middle line:90% Why? 01:03:34.770 --> 01:03:37.630 align:middle line:84% A, nobody knew which technology was going to work, 01:03:37.630 --> 01:03:40.970 align:middle line:84% and this company got this design and they're like, 01:03:40.970 --> 01:03:43.970 align:middle line:84% oh, yeah, no, we didn't invent this. 01:03:43.970 --> 01:03:48.310 align:middle line:84% And on top of it, there were nine other competitors out there 01:03:48.310 --> 01:03:51.170 align:middle line:90% and there were zero customers. 01:03:51.170 --> 01:03:58.370 align:middle line:84% So why are we going to mortgage the bank of our company 01:03:58.370 --> 01:04:04.230 align:middle line:84% to satisfy the AEC's pet project to build nuclear power? 01:04:04.230 --> 01:04:07.290 align:middle line:84% This is not our business obligation to do this. 01:04:07.290 --> 01:04:10.250 align:middle line:90% So the AEC fixed this problem. 01:04:10.250 --> 01:04:14.070 align:middle line:90% They went to Euratom. 01:04:14.070 --> 01:04:16.290 align:middle line:84% Does anyone know what Euratom is? 01:04:16.290 --> 01:04:17.250 align:middle line:90% All right. 01:04:17.250 --> 01:04:20.970 align:middle line:84% So Euratom was one of the first three European communities 01:04:20.970 --> 01:04:23.630 align:middle line:90% created after World War II. 01:04:23.630 --> 01:04:28.990 align:middle line:84% These communities were ways to prevent European nations 01:04:28.990 --> 01:04:33.510 align:middle line:84% from going to war with each other again. 01:04:33.510 --> 01:04:36.970 align:middle line:84% The three of them were the European-- 01:04:36.970 --> 01:04:40.130 align:middle line:90% 01:04:40.130 --> 01:04:42.430 align:middle line:90% the European Economic Community. 01:04:42.430 --> 01:04:47.230 align:middle line:84% That eventually gave rise to the euro currency. 01:04:47.230 --> 01:04:50.830 align:middle line:84% The second one was the European coal and steel community, 01:04:50.830 --> 01:04:53.310 align:middle line:84% which, of course, coal and steel was the principal sources 01:04:53.310 --> 01:04:56.510 align:middle line:84% of war-making machinery, and everyone exchanged, 01:04:56.510 --> 01:04:58.330 align:middle line:90% and had equal access. 01:04:58.330 --> 01:05:01.790 align:middle line:84% This would prevent any of asymmetric uprising 01:05:01.790 --> 01:05:03.430 align:middle line:90% of military power. 01:05:03.430 --> 01:05:08.270 align:middle line:84% And the third one was this new forward-looking technology, 01:05:08.270 --> 01:05:12.390 align:middle line:84% nuclear power, and there was a cooperative arrangement 01:05:12.390 --> 01:05:14.950 align:middle line:84% to have all the European countries work together 01:05:14.950 --> 01:05:18.310 align:middle line:84% on making peaceful nuclear energy, 01:05:18.310 --> 01:05:19.960 align:middle line:84% and that way, there wouldn't be any one 01:05:19.960 --> 01:05:23.520 align:middle line:84% country who got ahead and could make a bomb and so on. 01:05:23.520 --> 01:05:24.840 align:middle line:90% So that was the idea. 01:05:24.840 --> 01:05:29.360 align:middle line:84% The nuclear part was called Euratom. 01:05:29.360 --> 01:05:35.220 align:middle line:84% And negotiations for Euratom began in 1955, included in 1958, 01:05:35.220 --> 01:05:38.200 align:middle line:84% but here at the very beginning of the negotiations, 01:05:38.200 --> 01:05:40.880 align:middle line:84% the EEC is trying to solve this problem with companies sitting 01:05:40.880 --> 01:05:43.600 align:middle line:84% on their hands, and so they said, great, you guys 01:05:43.600 --> 01:05:46.220 align:middle line:84% want to do this whole nuclear thing in Europe, 01:05:46.220 --> 01:05:49.720 align:middle line:84% and you have a lot of countries, why 01:05:49.720 --> 01:05:56.520 align:middle line:84% don't you buy a gigawatt of nuclear power from US companies? 01:05:56.520 --> 01:06:00.980 align:middle line:84% Now today, a gigawatt sounds not very much power, one reactor. 01:06:00.980 --> 01:06:03.660 align:middle line:84% But back then, it was a lot of power. 01:06:03.660 --> 01:06:06.640 align:middle line:84% It was about 10 reactors because reactors were a lot smaller 01:06:06.640 --> 01:06:08.480 align:middle line:90% at that time. 01:06:08.480 --> 01:06:11.520 align:middle line:84% People forget, we started with small modular reactors. 01:06:11.520 --> 01:06:15.120 align:middle line:84% So that was one European customer 01:06:15.120 --> 01:06:17.960 align:middle line:90% for each American company. 01:06:17.960 --> 01:06:19.150 align:middle line:90% Problem solved. 01:06:19.150 --> 01:06:22.450 align:middle line:84% That created an instant market for the Americans 01:06:22.450 --> 01:06:25.310 align:middle line:90% who were not willing to start. 01:06:25.310 --> 01:06:27.210 align:middle line:84% Now they had a guaranteed customer, 01:06:27.210 --> 01:06:30.770 align:middle line:84% they would invest money, that was the idea. 01:06:30.770 --> 01:06:33.850 align:middle line:84% Well, why did Euratom agree to do this? 01:06:33.850 --> 01:06:36.050 align:middle line:84% Why didn't they just say, no, no thanks, 01:06:36.050 --> 01:06:38.110 align:middle line:84% we'll develop the technology ourselves. 01:06:38.110 --> 01:06:40.850 align:middle line:90% 01:06:40.850 --> 01:06:42.730 align:middle line:90% Doesn't seem very strategic. 01:06:42.730 --> 01:06:45.330 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Weren't they just destroyed post-war? 01:06:45.330 --> 01:06:46.430 align:middle line:90% And had fewer resources? 01:06:46.430 --> 01:06:48.490 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: They did have fewer resources. 01:06:48.490 --> 01:06:52.570 align:middle line:84% That probably factors in at some levels. 01:06:52.570 --> 01:06:53.113 align:middle line:90% Yeah? 01:06:53.113 --> 01:06:55.530 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: They were considered to be more safe under the US 01:06:55.530 --> 01:06:58.010 align:middle line:90% umbrella. 01:06:58.010 --> 01:07:00.490 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: Yeah, I think the US umbrella 01:07:00.490 --> 01:07:03.130 align:middle line:90% is emerging at this time. 01:07:03.130 --> 01:07:06.730 align:middle line:84% It is certainly-- everyone is deferential to the United States 01:07:06.730 --> 01:07:11.330 align:middle line:84% because it played such an important role in World War II. 01:07:11.330 --> 01:07:13.090 align:middle line:90% But it's still early days. 01:07:13.090 --> 01:07:14.810 align:middle line:84% And I think countries like France 01:07:14.810 --> 01:07:18.220 align:middle line:84% and the UK really still saw themselves 01:07:18.220 --> 01:07:20.760 align:middle line:84% as wanting to develop their own technology. 01:07:20.760 --> 01:07:21.260 align:middle line:90% Italy. 01:07:21.260 --> 01:07:24.200 align:middle line:84% Also Germany-- also with Germany. 01:07:24.200 --> 01:07:24.700 align:middle line:90% Yep? 01:07:24.700 --> 01:07:25.700 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Would it be because of one 01:07:25.700 --> 01:07:27.640 align:middle line:84% of the countries developed it first, 01:07:27.640 --> 01:07:29.340 align:middle line:84% it would create a power imbalance? 01:07:29.340 --> 01:07:30.882 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: No, that was the idea. 01:07:30.882 --> 01:07:33.670 align:middle line:84% It was like-- the Euratom thing was like a share. 01:07:33.670 --> 01:07:35.920 align:middle line:84% All right, I'll tell you-- oh, there was more guesses. 01:07:35.920 --> 01:07:38.140 align:middle line:84% OK, two more guesses and then I'll tell you the answer. 01:07:38.140 --> 01:07:40.682 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: Was it because they wanted the transfer of knowledge 01:07:40.682 --> 01:07:42.803 align:middle line:90% from the Manhattan Project? 01:07:42.803 --> 01:07:44.720 align:middle line:84% R. SCOTT KEMP: That's an interesting question. 01:07:44.720 --> 01:07:47.300 align:middle line:84% I don't know whether that was active or not. 01:07:47.300 --> 01:07:48.360 align:middle line:90% One more. 01:07:48.360 --> 01:07:50.220 align:middle line:84% STUDENT: They thought it was unsafe? 01:07:50.220 --> 01:07:50.720 align:middle line:90% No. 01:07:50.720 --> 01:07:51.470 align:middle line:90% R. SCOTT KEMP: No. 01:07:51.470 --> 01:07:55.660 align:middle line:84% No one-- the Americans paid them to do it. 01:07:55.660 --> 01:07:58.020 align:middle line:84% The Americans said, look, buy 10 reactors 01:07:58.020 --> 01:08:01.220 align:middle line:84% and we'll pay for 50% of the reactor. 01:08:01.220 --> 01:08:01.720 align:middle line:90% All right. 01:08:01.720 --> 01:08:04.860 align:middle line:84% But wait, the 1954 Atomic Energy Act 01:08:04.860 --> 01:08:08.580 align:middle line:84% prohibited the American government from spending money 01:08:08.580 --> 01:08:10.900 align:middle line:90% on private industry. 01:08:10.900 --> 01:08:13.200 align:middle line:84% Ah, this wasn't spending money on private industry, 01:08:13.200 --> 01:08:14.900 align:middle line:90% this was foreign aid. 01:08:14.900 --> 01:08:18.920 align:middle line:84% So they basically laundered their money 01:08:18.920 --> 01:08:23.520 align:middle line:84% through the Europeans to fund American corporations. 01:08:23.520 --> 01:08:27.880 align:middle line:84% This is the kind of business backroom deals 01:08:27.880 --> 01:08:30.779 align:middle line:84% that happened in order to make this work out. 01:08:30.779 --> 01:08:33.560 align:middle line:84% So in fact, it was still government-funded, 01:08:33.560 --> 01:08:37.960 align:middle line:84% it was just being laundered through the Europeans. 01:08:37.960 --> 01:08:38.920 align:middle line:90% All right. 01:08:38.920 --> 01:08:41.740 align:middle line:90% So that was the idea. 01:08:41.740 --> 01:08:44.439 align:middle line:84% They were supposed to kickstart the American industry, 01:08:44.439 --> 01:08:47.279 align:middle line:90% and things didn't work out. 01:08:47.279 --> 01:08:48.220 align:middle line:90% What happened? 01:08:48.220 --> 01:08:50.680 align:middle line:84% The Soviets beat the United States as the first nation 01:08:50.680 --> 01:08:53.279 align:middle line:84% to put a nuclear reactor on the grid. 01:08:53.279 --> 01:08:56.359 align:middle line:84% This is Abinsk, if you've never heard of the reactor. 01:08:56.359 --> 01:09:00.040 align:middle line:84% And connected to the grid in June of 1954. 01:09:00.040 --> 01:09:03.279 align:middle line:84% The British then beat the Americans 01:09:03.279 --> 01:09:06.060 align:middle line:84% to put the first Western reactor on the grid. 01:09:06.060 --> 01:09:09.760 align:middle line:84% This was Calder Hall, a gas graphite reactor shown here. 01:09:09.760 --> 01:09:11.680 align:middle line:84% Queen Elizabeth flipping the switch 01:09:11.680 --> 01:09:17.729 align:middle line:84% to connect reactor to the grid, very politely. 01:09:17.729 --> 01:09:23.850 align:middle line:84% And 1956, Shippingport, our submarine reactor, 01:09:23.850 --> 01:09:26.890 align:middle line:90% was finished in December 1957. 01:09:26.890 --> 01:09:31.569 align:middle line:90% So we just could not catch up. 01:09:31.569 --> 01:09:33.970 align:middle line:90% The Europeans were beating us. 01:09:33.970 --> 01:09:35.649 align:middle line:90% OK, so what happened? 01:09:35.649 --> 01:09:39.010 align:middle line:84% The AEC is like, this is not working out. 01:09:39.010 --> 01:09:43.729 align:middle line:84% And so instead of selling Europeans one of every design 01:09:43.729 --> 01:09:45.950 align:middle line:84% from the 10 different companies, they said, 01:09:45.950 --> 01:09:49.930 align:middle line:84% we're going to lose the market to this British reactor, 01:09:49.930 --> 01:09:52.890 align:middle line:84% and what we're going to do is instead just 01:09:52.890 --> 01:09:55.890 align:middle line:84% sell 10 copies of whatever American reactor gets 01:09:55.890 --> 01:10:01.930 align:middle line:84% finished first, and that reactor was the PWR. 01:10:01.930 --> 01:10:07.750 align:middle line:84% And so that's how the PWR became the reactor du jour. 01:10:07.750 --> 01:10:10.530 align:middle line:90% 01:10:10.530 --> 01:10:13.500 align:middle line:84% The other nine designs basically fell by the wayside 01:10:13.500 --> 01:10:15.340 align:middle line:84% once the AEC announced this project 01:10:15.340 --> 01:10:19.540 align:middle line:84% that they were going to sell 10 copies of the PWR, Pressurized 01:10:19.540 --> 01:10:20.697 align:middle line:90% Water Reactor. 01:10:20.697 --> 01:10:22.780 align:middle line:84% Corporations were no longer interested in spending 01:10:22.780 --> 01:10:26.340 align:middle line:84% their money to develop other, potentially cheaper, potentially 01:10:26.340 --> 01:10:29.140 align:middle line:90% safer reactor concepts. 01:10:29.140 --> 01:10:32.660 align:middle line:84% It was not-- there's no more customer for them. 01:10:32.660 --> 01:10:37.020 align:middle line:90% And so we chose a technology-- 01:10:37.020 --> 01:10:42.020 align:middle line:84% a technology winner without ever doing a technology evaluation. 01:10:42.020 --> 01:10:45.640 align:middle line:84% It was chosen for political reasons, 01:10:45.640 --> 01:10:52.080 align:middle line:84% for reasons of having American business win, but one can ask, 01:10:52.080 --> 01:10:55.060 align:middle line:84% what would have happened if we had actually 01:10:55.060 --> 01:10:57.220 align:middle line:84% done that systematic evaluation of all 01:10:57.220 --> 01:11:00.740 align:middle line:84% the different possible type of nuclear power? 01:11:00.740 --> 01:11:02.660 align:middle line:90% Would the history be different? 01:11:02.660 --> 01:11:04.040 align:middle line:90% Would it have cost less? 01:11:04.040 --> 01:11:07.500 align:middle line:84% Would there have been fewer accidents or safety issues 01:11:07.500 --> 01:11:08.480 align:middle line:90% to deal with? 01:11:08.480 --> 01:11:11.310 align:middle line:84% Would the safety cost burden be lower 01:11:11.310 --> 01:11:13.910 align:middle line:84% because it didn't have to deal with pressurized water? 01:11:13.910 --> 01:11:18.830 align:middle line:84% These are all kind of questions that we can't answer. 01:11:18.830 --> 01:11:20.750 align:middle line:84% One of the challenges, of course, 01:11:20.750 --> 01:11:23.230 align:middle line:84% is that once you choose a technology, 01:11:23.230 --> 01:11:28.790 align:middle line:84% it becomes the only obvious way to go forward because there's 01:11:28.790 --> 01:11:32.650 align:middle line:84% so much sunk cost investment, R&D in that technology, 01:11:32.650 --> 01:11:36.150 align:middle line:84% so much about it, it's the obvious path forward, 01:11:36.150 --> 01:11:38.910 align:middle line:84% and it's really hard to escape that and look 01:11:38.910 --> 01:11:40.690 align:middle line:90% at other ways of doing things. 01:11:40.690 --> 01:11:45.070 align:middle line:84% The internal combustion engine is a great example of that. 01:11:45.070 --> 01:11:47.250 align:middle line:90% It's just very, very sticky. 01:11:47.250 --> 01:11:49.150 align:middle line:84% It gets institutionalized because that's 01:11:49.150 --> 01:11:51.110 align:middle line:90% how people are trained. 01:11:51.110 --> 01:11:52.950 align:middle line:90% They learn on that design. 01:11:52.950 --> 01:11:55.570 align:middle line:84% Then in the case of the internal combustion engines, 01:11:55.570 --> 01:11:59.410 align:middle line:84% all these gas stations showed up to pump gasoline, 01:11:59.410 --> 01:12:03.310 align:middle line:84% which could have been something else, and so on and so forth. 01:12:03.310 --> 01:12:06.070 align:middle line:90% And it just becomes entrenched. 01:12:06.070 --> 01:12:09.890 align:middle line:84% And that is what happened to the PWR. 01:12:09.890 --> 01:12:16.170 align:middle line:84% So, of course, the history of the PWR is a strange history, 01:12:16.170 --> 01:12:20.360 align:middle line:84% and we will pick up on this in the next class. 01:12:20.360 --> 01:13:09.000 align:middle line:90%