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by losvedir 951 days ago
I don't think that's a fair characterization of their predictions.

Szilard predicted the development of the bomb would end major war, and he was mostly right for the right reasons, though he envisioned a UN-type organization to control the bombs. And he was one of the first to understand the potential for fission chain reaction once nuclear physics got underway. And he was involved in its development. I think Ilya would be happy to be compared to him.

Bohr, too, had pretty good predictions about the implications of the bomb.

Oppenheimer seemed to understand some of the implications but was happy to leave the policy stuff to the government, and not too try to influence anything like Bohr and Szilard tried to do.

Teller just wanted to keep pushing the tech bigger and bigger.

So the inventors had all sorts of different predictions and values, same as here. Some better than others.