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donaldhobson t1_iwo2kr4 wrote

Reply to comment by DiligentFox in [WP] You are a member of an ancient secret organization that collects and protects every type of book - fiction, real, scientific, spiritual, safe, old, new, and forbidden. However, there is a book so dangerous that your superiors are willing to erase it from history, and you are curious why. by N00B00N_IOO

I sneak along the corridor. No one is around. I slip into the room and open that mystery forbidden book.

I see a date, 1962. A scribbled authors name, Feynman perhaps. Technical drawings and calculations cover the paper. An object, perhaps the size of a large suitcase. Some common electronic components. A few mechanical parts. And in the middle, a pair of spheres labeled "Thorium". And an estimated blast of several mega-tonnes.

You realize what this is. A nuke. And one of such elegant simple design that any reasonably skilled and equipped person could make it. Gone is the need for centrifuges, to mine many tonnes of uranium to get enough U 235. Gone are the high precision timing sequences, even the need for chemical explosives. Half the parts here are from a repurposed alarm clock.

Slowly you close the book and walk away, understanding why some knowledge should be hidden.

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