While I was still in Berlin, I read a book by H.G. Wells. It was called The World Set Free. This book was written in 1913, one year before the World War, and in it H.G. Wells describes the discovery of artificial radioactivity and puts it in the year of 1933, the year in which it actually occurred. He then proceeds to describe the liberation of atomic energy on a large scale for industrial purposes, the development of atomic bombs, and a world war which was apparently fought by allies of England, France, and perhaps including America, against Germany and Austria, the powers located in the central part of Europe. He places this war in the year 1956, and in this war the major cities of the world are all destroyed by atomic bombs.
Up to this point the book is exceedingly vivid and realistic. From then on the book gets to be a little, shall I say, utopian. With the world in shambles, a conference is called in Brissago in Italy, in which a world government is set up.
This book made a very great impression on me, but I didn"t regard it as anything but fiction. It didn"t start me thinking whether or not such things could in fact happen.
The Germans (...) this book (...) point of view. Where, well, suppose I would oppose this thing here now, what good I do? I wouldn't do very much good, I would just loose my influence. Then why should I oppose? You see, there was no, the moral point of view was completely absent or very weak, and every consideration was simply a consideration of what would be the predictable consequence of my action. And on that basis, this was re- on that basis did I reach in 1931 the conclusion that h***** will get into power. Not because the forces of the n*** revolution were so strong but because, but rather because I found that there would be no resistance whatsoever.
(...)
Source: Leo Szilard, 'Reminiscences', in The Intellectual Migration, pp99-100
Up to this point the book is exceedingly vivid and realistic. From then on the book gets to be a little, shall I say, utopian. With the world in shambles, a conference is called in Brissago in Italy, in which a world government is set up.
This book made a very great impression on me, but I didn"t regard it as anything but fiction. It didn"t start me thinking whether or not such things could in fact happen.
The Germans (...) this book (...) point of view. Where, well, suppose I would oppose this thing here now, what good I do? I wouldn't do very much good, I would just loose my influence. Then why should I oppose? You see, there was no, the moral point of view was completely absent or very weak, and every consideration was simply a consideration of what would be the predictable consequence of my action. And on that basis, this was re- on that basis did I reach in 1931 the conclusion that h***** will get into power. Not because the forces of the n*** revolution were so strong but because, but rather because I found that there would be no resistance whatsoever.
(...)
Source: Leo Szilard, 'Reminiscences', in The Intellectual Migration, pp99-100