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Comment by ezoe | Hacker News Reader

The problem is, software can be really complex it's possible to make it so no one programmer can understand the whole picture. The tasks can be divided so the individual programmers are given order like "do X in condition of Y" which itself seems harmless and lawful, but combining them lead to malicious behaviours.

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this is precisely the problem. few physicists knew they were all collectively building a nuclear bomb because the big picture was well compartmentalized. feynman only found out because he picked the locks of his colleagues to piece it all together.

Can you point to the part of the book where it is stated that only few physicist (not including Feynman) knew this? I remember it very differently. From my memory:

- lock picking was for fun and didnt gain info - some warehouse workers didnt know about critical mass of uranium and stored the stuff to closely together

This is my recollection too.

ah maybe you're right. memory might be foggy. time for a fresh re-read!

Maybe you meant the part where it is clarified that the weapon was not developed against Germany but strategically against the UDSSR. (if I remember that part correctly)

I do not think this is accurate. Where did you get this version of events?

Just finished “Atomic” by Tim Baggot. A history of the development of the bomb. From my reading, lots of the physicists knew. They pushed forward as they didn’t know the extent of the german project (who had stalled due to lack of resources and a belief that while possible, a bomb wasn’t practical due to a need for a large amount of material). The safe-cracking was for amusement.

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