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by nmfisher 497 days ago
Interestingly, Werner Heisenberg was decidedly non-Nazi (and was regularly attacked as a “white jew”), and even though he had ample opportunity to leave, he chose to stay to work on the German nuclear fission program.

I don’t think it tarnished his scientific legacy, but it definitely created some friction in the post-war years.

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It's funny how the politicization of science in Nazi Germany led to things like "Aryan physics" to counter the "Jewish physics" of Einstein's relativity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Physik

Along with the flight/expulsion/imprisonment/murder of top scientists who weren't ideologically or racially "pure", it's no wonder their nuclear program was such a failure.