From: Robert Comer 

Exactly what I was trying to imply.

The heavy elements, the critical mass, the chain reaction, that's what
makes and describes a nuke, not some general mass-energy equation.

Newton would probably have had no problem understanding that a nuclear
explosion converted mass to energy, but he would have had absolutely no
clue just how it did what it did.

--
Bob Comer



On Thu, 10 May 2007 11:24:07 +0100, "Phil Payne"
 wrote:

>>  But Newton would have been totally baffled by a nuclear explosion ...
>
>Indeed.  But not for very long, I suspect.
>
>Actually, the real trick is not e=mc**2 - it's the idea of the chain
>reaction.
>
>"The energy produced by the atom is a very poor kind of thing,"
>

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