The Eccentric Father of the Atomic Bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer (2019)

Oppenheimer obviously also appears in Richard Rhodes' utterly superb "The Making of the Atomic Bomb", though he only becomes a main character in the sequel, "Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb", which is also great.

Oppenheimer was a highly skilled physicist, but Rhodes attributes his ability to lead the Manhattan Project to his gifts as a "synthesizer" of ideas and knowledge from many people and disparate branches of science. In my opinion he really came into his own, though, after the bomb, when he started formulating the US' atomic energy strategy, essentially inserting himself -- a scientist, not a statesman -- into the political elite by sheer force of will and charisma. Rhodes tells of Oppenheimer completely dominating meetings in early efforts that resulted in the formation of the Atomic Energy Commission (which became the US Department of Energy), essentially writing national policy recommendations on his own.

Oppenheimer realized the dangers of nuclear proliferation and detente early on, and wanted the world to own atomic energy as a force for good. He wanted an international organization (what became the IAEA) to control atomic energy and not let the US and UK have a monopoly on it. Oppenheimer also recommended against developing the hydrogen bomb, which he thought would dangerously escalate the destructive power of nuclear arms. This opposition ultimately led to Oppeheimer's trial that cost him his security clearance.

But it was his extensive writings on what the future of atomic energy could be that I think set him apart in this years. He was prescient about nuclear arms race and tried to steer the US and the world towards peaceful use of atomic energy. If his policies had been implemented we may have been in a different place today.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16884.The_Making_of_the_...

Recently saw it on Steven Weinberg’s list:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/apr/03/steven-weinber...

It checks all of the boxes for the "Radical outlier who changes everything by dint of genius and hard work" while barely acknowledging the circumstances, environment, timing etc...

Gifted from birth

Non-traditional and "Troubled" socially

Ahead of peers and mentors

Focused and Driven

Overcame institutional/structural resistance

This is not meant to detract from Oppenheimer's immense contributions, to the contrary. I thought it was something worth keeping in mind as I read the article - especially considering that Oppenheimer himself would spread credit to others and attempt to dismiss the idea that the Manhattan Project was a "One man show."

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_man_theory

The guy helped build a weapon which destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in a matter of seconds. Oh shucks, what an eccentric and quirky guy he was. Objectively, he is one of history's greatest villains and arguably the one of the greatest war criminals, but luckily, he was on the winning side.

If Oppenheimer was japanese and he helped build bombs for the japanese and the japanese dropped nukes on say Baltimore and San Fran during the war, he would have been tried and executed after ww2 by the victorious US. I doubt "The Eccentric Father of the Atomic Bomb" is the titled we'd use if he was japanese.

A really interesting thing to note about Oppenheimer, as the author points out, was a somewhat "haphazard" approach both to studying physics, and in his actual scientific work. Meaning, picking the problems he found the most interesting, rather than some grand, overarching idea.

It's always fascinating in reading books of this sort to see just how closely knit the physics community was, since Oppenheimer studied with Born and Thomson, met Bohr as a student, and later worked with a lot of the truly great ones. Even in the macabre poisoning episode, the tutor he left the apple for was Patrick Blackett, a future Nobel laureate.