henry (12/14/82)
If we were talking about plutonium and energy in 1932, and had a suitable mathematical theory describing the processes which go on in the nucleus of the atom, we *wouldn't* think we could "take a 6kg. hunk of plutonium, take a conical 2kg hunk out of the side, displace it away from the main hunk on a kind of gunlike device, and set the whole thing up so that the gunlike device rams the 2kg hunk down into the main hunk, releasing energy..." as Jim Kempf suggests. We would know that gun-type ignition of a fission explosion works only if the fissile material is unreactive enough that it will not start reacting significantly before the projectile hits. This is true of U-235 but not of plutonium. Sorry, Jim, I know this is sort of irrelevant to your main point, but it illustrates the dangers of using analogies in argument... Henry Spencer U of Toronto