On July 16, 1945, a brilliant flash on a quiet reach of desert in Alamogordo New Mexico changed the world; the Nuclear Age began. On that day civilization took a long step towards its own passing. Just three weeks after the leading test on august 6, a second atomic bomb was detonated, this time over the municipality of Hiroshima. Then three days later, on August 9, Nagasaki was hit. .
The Nuclear Age was born from the destruction of World War II. The atomic bombs finalized the world with killing. From this same fury and disturbance of war came other creations which were more optimistic. From the remnants of World War II came the United Nations, an organization that would promote international cooperation to achieve peace and security, which twice in the lifetimes of its creators had brought "untold sorrow to mankind." (3)The United Nations was viewed as a place where representatives of nations could gather to resolve the world's problems with civility rather than bombs. On occasion, it has succeeded in dramatic and subtler ways, but on many other occasions it has failed to prevent wars from erupting.
In the Nuclear Age, there has been a fearful stimulate of the conflicts between the drives of violence and the forces of reason, between savageness and respect, that have been throughout human history. But the tools have modernized, as have the stakes of the outcome. In the Nuclear Age, the most awesome tools of violence, nuclear weapons, threaten the continuance of humans. .
In the 50 years since history's first atomic explosion, the promises and perils of nuclear science have touched nearly every aspect of our culture and politics. The idea of obtaining energy from atoms was proposed by several physicists and chemists during the early part of the twentieth century. Since the actual structure of the atom was unknown there was little proof of energy from atoms. This did not hamper scientists of the day from researching their proposal.
