X-Message-Number: 5095
Date: 02 Nov 95 12:55:03 EST
From: Mike Darwin <>
Subject: CRYONICS: On Julius and Ethel

David Stodolsky writes:

>This is only true if the private funders do not require full return
>on their investment. For theoretical reasons, full value of new inventions
>cannot be fully recovered, even considering patent exploitation, etc.
>The way to understand this is that just the idea that something can
>be done is of value, and there is no way to recover this value. For
>example, the Soviet Union was able to build an atom bomb very quickly
>after its existence was revealed. The only real "secret" about the atom
>bomb was that it could be built. After the word was out, any advanced
>physics student could do it, given the resources. Failure to understand 
this
>contributed to the execution of the Rosenbergs and the surrounding "Atom 
Spy
>Hoax" (I think that's the title of a book).

Ahhh, this is Stodolsky at his best. 

Reasonably intelligent people with guns held to their heads can usually 
build something given tools and plans.  The knowledge that the atom bomb 
COULD be built incorporated, by definition, an understanding of the complex 
physics that underlay its development.  This physics was lying open on the 
table, and had been since before WWII.  You will note, however, that 
Germany, even with the very capabable Werner Heisenberg heading the program 
DID NOT build the atom bomb first.  In fact, there is substantial evidence 
that Heisenberg passively and perhaps actively derailed the Nazi's program. 
 My point here is simple; the Communiists DID NOT develop the atom bomb, 
they had the CORE work of the development hand-delivered to them free of 
charge, which was the underlying phyisics. Further, they ultimately 
imoprisoned Sakarahov and others who did make contributions as original 
thinkers.

While the Rosenbergs apparently were never successful at communicating 
useful information about bomb contruction, they were guilty of trying.  
They were also prosecuted using cooked evidence to tighten the case, but 
subsequent information from Britian and the former USSR confirms they were 
spies. See TRAITORS by Chapman Pincher (ISBN# 0-14-011151-4).

There is also little doubt that a significant amount of the "engineering 
mathematics" required to develop implosion-type weapons and the hydrogen 
bomb in particular were "stolen" from the West.

As to the general state of Soviet "science" I would refer any open-minded 
student of the history of science to the antics of T.D. Lysenko or to the 
story of Chernobyl (see CHERNOBYL by Gregori Medvedev). 

Finally, you will note that the great driver of innovation in the world has 
been a corrupted version of free market capitalism. One of my great regrets 
in life is that David Stodolsky and his kind did not get an extended 
vacation in the former Soviet Union on the receiving end (I specify 
"receiving" end here because I think they might do quite well on the 
"giving" end of Communism; and would have with little doubt been just as 
indifferent to the agony they would have created as the most diehard 
apparatchik was and is.)  I note with some hope that there are still places 
David might profitably move: North Korea, Burma, maybe even Cuba.

Anyone for taking up a collection to facilitate David's entry into one of 
these utopias as a full fledged member of the proletariat? :)

Mike Darwin


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