Talk:Edward Teller

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Contents

[edit] Old comments

Was Teller Jewish? This seems to be implied but is not stated.

Yes.

What was the reason why Teller left Hungary? Mentioning Horthy doesn't make this clear enough. Andres 21:43, 10 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Probably not the only reason. Money, fame, possibilities are all good keywords.
Okay, here's some light on the Horthy rules: in 1920 they installed a rule called Numerus clausus, which limited the number of the students of Jewish origin in the higher education system in Hungary. They raised the numbers in 1928, showing the ambivalent nature of the Horthy era to the Jewish "problem". More on google with 'numerus clausus horthy'. --grin 10:04, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Thank you, now it's clear. Andres 18:23, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

How did the differences between Teller and many of his colleagues began? Was there any particular reason why he was not chosen the head of the H-bomb project? Andres 18:23, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

The following is not a bad summary: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bomb/peopleevents/pandeAMEX73.html
It's also worth noting that Teller was regarded as having very good ideas but never following through with them and not working well at all as an administrative head (during the Manhattan Project he refused to do the work that his section head Hans Bethe gave to him and instead passed it off on one of his assistants... who later turned out to be Klaus Fuchs). --Fastfission 16:20, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

What was the date of his death? The article doesn't state it.

First sentence: Edward Teller (original Hungarian name Teller Ede) (January 15, 1908 - September 9, 2003) was an... Isn't that "date enough"?

Funny tidbit:

He wasn't really deeply involved in Hungarian politics, but since he was a famous person he (or rather his name) was used from time to time in Hungarian political battles, or maybe he felt he had to have his word in everything important, including homeland politics. Around 2000 he wrote a letter to the "Hungarians" briefly analysing the political "merits" of the actual government.

Nowadays (2003 sept) political tensions are rising, people start to get really angry at the governing party, so it came a little surprise when Mr. Teller's letter was published in the largest government-friendly newspaper talking about the greatness of the governing party and telling the evilness of the opposition. Timing was pretty distasteful (IMHO) as well because it was published, well, after the death of him.

But politics never cease to surprise. As it turned out the letter was fake. It might have been initiated by Teller, since a reporter "friend" of him seemed to convince him to form a strong opinion about Hungarian politics, but the letter never existed (as it seems), he told some things to some people, wrote some things, and the words and thoughts were formed by some innocent and not-some-innocent people to get the desired result. Newspaper apologies, political yelling-at-everyones, all the fun.

Maybe now even politicians could just leave him to rest in pace, ey?

--grin 08:05, 19 Sep 2003 (UTC)

[edit] FAR

This article is in the process of a Featured Article review. If you want to discuss it you can do so at WP:FAR. regards, Daimanta 14:41, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Strangelove and other things

Four likely progenitors of Dr. Strangelove: 1. Werner Von Braun 2. Herman Kahn (Author of "On Thermonuclear War") 3. Henry Kissinger 4. Edward Teller

  • That's right -- that's why I changed it from "the" inspiration to "an" inspiration (Strangelove seems based on a combination of real life people; though I personally wonder how well known Kissinger was in 1964 and whether McNamara was more likely -- in any event, that's neither here nor there!). Also, the "Classical Super" was an unworkable version designed by Teller in 1946 [1] [2]; and I don't care what order the references are in as long as it is purposeful (I was doing it alphabetically by last name, but chronologically works fine too -- I didn't realize that was what you were intending). --Fastfission 17:01, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
It is extremely unlikely that Henry Kissinger was an influence for Dr. Strangelove. Production began on the movie in 1963. At that time Kissinger was not a well-known figure, and certainly did not significantly influence American defense policy. Joema 18:41, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Teller, H-bomb, Soviets

User:Ashujo added the following text:

Following the Soviet test detonation of an atomic device in 1949, Teller returned to Los Alamos in 1950 to join the hydrogen bomb program started by President Truman on Teller's initiative. This decision by Truman had been taken on the basis of the recent knowledge of the disclosure of H-bomb secrets by Klaus Fuchs to the Russians. However, later declassified documents show that almost every technical detail conceived by Teller since 1946 and communicated to the Russians by Fuchs was shown to be technically unfeasible, a fact that was not acknowledged by Teller. In fact, if Teller had not urged the administration to expedite a hydrogen bomb test, the debris from which would leave telltale signatures of the bomb's mechanism, the Russians would have gotten misled by the information that Fuchs supplied them, and Russian H-bomb development would admittedly have been stalled. During the same year Teller grew impatient with the progress of the program, insisted on involving more theorists, and accused his colleagues of lacking imagination. This worsened his relations with other researchers. By 1951, he was desperate for a workable hydrogen bomb.

I'm changing it for a few reasons. 1. Truman's launching of the H-bomb project, to my knowledge, had nothing to do with thinking Fuchs gave info to the Russians. The reason I've always seen given was that he needed something to one-up them with. I've not seen anything which would give Teller as much agency as to say that he was the one behind Truman's crash order. 2. There is no evidence that the Russians used the Mike fallout productively towards their own h-bomb design. The BAS article you cited was strongly objected to by both Russian scientists involved and by a number of historians. (Sakharov claimed -- in his memoirs I believe -- that they accidentally destroyed all fallout data they received). In any event, it's questionable just how much information one could get out of the fallout. According to some calculations, they might have been able to detect that the primary and secondary were separate from one another, but that's about it. (see [3]) Anyway, I think this flattens the history a little bit too much, gives too much agency to Teller, and I think the assumption that Teller "gave away the secret" because of his urgency to have a test is not that well founded (and anyway, Teller thought the USSR also coming up with it was inevitable anyway). Additionally, the Soviets could see for themselves that the Fuchs information was unreliable (this is well documented in both Rhodes's Dark Sun and Halloway's Stalin and the Bomb). --Fastfission 22:10, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Here is the Khariton article from BAS that disputes the idea that they used fallout analysis. [4]
"Finally, did Soviet scientists use information acquired as a result of radiochemical analyses of atmospheric samples after the U.S. test on November 1, 1952?
Definitely not. At that time, Soviet research was not organized on a sufficiently high level, and useful results were not obtained, although radiochemical analyses of samples of fallout could have provided some useful information about the materials used to produce the explosion. The relationship between certain short-lived isotopes formed in the course of thermonuclear reactions could have made it possible to judge the degree of compression of the thermonuclear fuel, but knowing the degree of compression would not have allowed Soviet scientists to conclude exactly how the exploded device had been made, and it would not have revealed its design."
Anyway, I don't think this article is really the place for all of this information (a page on the Soviet or US bomb would be more appropriate).--Fastfission 01:08, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

We don't know exactly how much info the fallout analysis gives, although it certainly shows the separation of the primary and secondary, and compression. In any case, it took the Russians three years after the Americans to produce their bomb, and Bethe thinks whatever they did get out of the fallout would give them about this much time to go from there to a workable design. It also took the British about the same time to get the idea for the Teller-Ulam design from analysing the Russian fallout. So this seems to have considerable validity. I would suggest that in addition to Teller's own Sci Am 1999 account, which obviously cannot be authentic, you add another reference from a third party. Ashujo

The point is that we don't have anything definitive either way on this question -- a few U.S. people say "it's possible," the Soviets say "well, we didn't have our act together to do that," and there is currently nothing else beyond that to answer the question. It should not be a debate on the Edward Teller page, it should go on a page about the Soviet hydrogen bomb. Also, I didn't include the Teller 1999 account to make it sound as if I believed in it (I included it because it was humorously absurd and quite reflective of his temperment); I didn't realize it was coming off that way (I've added in a few other assessments). --Fastfission 03:46, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I am not sure I understood your addition. Why would a difficult and novel design make scientists start believing that it would now be inevitable for both the US and the USSR to create the weapon? If anything, a simple design would make them believe that.--Ashujo 08:15, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

It was the elegance of it. At least, that's how it is usually described in the histories. (It sounds a bit like a fairy tale to me, "All the scientists from all around the land saw it, and lo! they knew it was beautiful and would work, a device a genius and destructive import!"). Bethe has written, I believe, that once he saw the Teller-Ulam configuration he knew it was the weapon was feasible and that it was inevitable that the USSR would discover it at some point on their own. --Fastfission 12:42, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Monte Carlo method

The page currently says that Teller was an originator of the Monte Carlo method along with Nicholas Metropolis. However I have always heard that was a product of Stanislaw Ulam, John von Neumann, and Enrico Fermi, primarily, and that it was developed at Los Alamos in 1946, i.e. after Teller had already left. (Other methods of stochastic simulation of course were in employ before Monte Carlo, but that's the generally canonical story, as I understand it). The page on Monte Carlo seems to back this story up -- what's the source for saying that Teller had anything to do with it? I've been reading a lot of literature on Monte Carlo lately and have never seen him name associated with it before, but I don't rule it out completely of course. --Fastfission 12:12, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

In more poking around in this literature I found only a few side references to Teller as someone who used and came up with some variations of Monte Carlo, but nothing naming him as an originator. I'm going to take our that text for now. --Fastfission 05:45, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Bad Religion

An extremely popular and influential punk rock band called Bad Religion, wrote a rather well known song about Edward Teller called "The Biggest Killer in American History". It should also be noted, that the singer/songwriter who wrote the song is Greg Graffin who is also a science professor at UCLA. His opinions of Teller reflect that of literally hundreds of thousands of his group's fans and a fan website even included a history of Edward Teller due the popularity of that song. I feel it's noteworthy that Tellers reach was so big, that people outside of the science community would be able to form strong opinions about him, thanks mostly to this song.--Adam

Perhaps a section on Teller in popular culture, which would also include Dr. Edward Anti-Teller. Although it would probably be better to include both at relevant points. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:17, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GRASER

Why is there no mention of Edward Teller's work on Gamma-Ray Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (GRASER)? Teller did put a GRASER project together back in the day. Adraeus 23:57, July 21, 2005 (UTC)

It is obscure (to me, anyway). Tell us more about it at GRASER. GangofOne 05:23, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, I know nothing about that either. I assume it is related to his beam-weapon Star Wars whatnot? --Fastfission 17:04, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
I have redirected Gamma-Ray Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation and GRASER to laser. There wasn't much content there, and this is a speculative device. While stimulated emission of gamma rays is possible, it's not an easy step from there to a working gamma ray laser. Wikipedia policy forbids articles on things that haven't happened yet, and may not occur.--Srleffler 04:33, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Teller Oppenheimer Controversy

Shoud'nt the story of Teller's testimony against Oppenheimer be expanded upon. It seems to only be mentioned in the caption of one of his photographs. Vatsa ,23 Sep 2005.

It is mentioned in the article, but the actual content of it (and the means by which it came about) is not in there at all. I'll try to add some more information on that if I get the time, good call.--Fastfission 15:27, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
Okay, I added a brief section on it. --Fastfission 15:49, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Connection to Israel's bomb?

A new book apparently implies that Teller may have been involved in the Israeli bomb project in some way. I haven't had a chance to look at it in detail but if someone wanted to follow up and see if it was worth citing, here is a review of it: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/16/AR2006021601897.html --Fastfission 02:35, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shelter Island

After the war and before the H-bomb, Teller played a minor role in the 1947 Shelter Island Conference; I think he had something to say about the two-meson hypothesis. I haven't done much with that article, but ultimately we should link to it from here. Melchoir 06:24, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] American?

Why is it written that Teller is a Hungarian-born American scientist?
Is it said that George Gamow is a Ukrainian-born American scientist? No. What's written is that he is a Ukrainian-born scientist, which is factually true.
Look at Marie_Curie: it isn't even written that she is a Polish-born chemist. But I certainly don't read from the article that she is a Polish-born French chemist. You know why? Because she lived and worked most of her life in a country called France, whereas Teller lived and worked most of his life in a country called USA.
I am saying that there should be a policy, so that a featured article doesn't read that Teller is an American scientist. Personally, I would stick to the facts, in a clear fashion.
Someone who only possesses the american nationality, is an American.
So someone who was born, raised and lived in the USA is an American.
Someone who was born and raised in Hungary, lived his life in the USA but wasn't naturalized is a Hungarian.
Someone who was born and raised in Hungary, lived his life in the USA and was naturalized is hungarian-born.
Someone who was born in Hungary, but was raised in the USA and lived in the USA is an American.
One can only be called an American if he was raised in the USA.LKenzo 10:11, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jewish Racism?

Why the Jewish reference right at the top?? Look at other bio's. ie Ted Kennedy, doesn't say of Catholic decent, ect. This is racism.

You are being unreasonable. Please stop removing this material, we don't really want to block you from editing. - Ta bu shi da yu 14:29, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

WOW, I am off censor, cool :)...Seriously, I am wonder WHY Teller's Jewish background is in the VERY FIRST sentence. Is this REALLY one his most defining attributes. As a Jew, I really find this offensive. Is EVERY person of Jewish decent who has a bio treated this way on Wikipedia?? I am really NOT trying to be unreasonable and I am sorry if it came across that way....Tom 2/28/06

Many biographies on Wikipedia prominently mention the race/culture/religion/nationality of the individual, ESPECIALLY when it was important. In Teller's case, it was. Had he NOT been Jewish, he would NOT have been forced to leave [a] Hungary and [b] Germany, he would most likely NOT have emigrated to the United States, he would NOT have participated in the nuclear program, and would probably have been a non-entity. He is famous because of a turn in the road that he was compelled to make.
At another level, it's no different from Iain Duncan-Smith's biography mentioning that he has Japanese ancestry. David Cannon 10:06, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jewish descent?

Can someone be of Jewish descent? I always thought we used that term (descent) to denote nationality and not religion ... or not? Just wondering. Davehorne 18:31, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

MY OPINION...I consider myself American, not Jewish first off. The State of Israel didn't exist until about 50 years ago, so people DO consider themselves of Jewish decent since Judism is like a tribe thats been around thousands of years. I am sure the Judism page has devoted HUGE writings to this and I am probably butchering this subject since I am NO expert. My point is...great, he is of Jewish decent..AWESOME!! But does this belong in the very FIRST sentence about the guy?? Is it important?? SURE, but its mentioned in his family life. Again, I looked at other famous Jewish bios and was glad to see that the ethnic/descent/whathaveyou wasn't in many of the very FIRST sentences..respect comments welcomed....Tom 2/28/06

Not sure where to throw in my opinion, but the subject intrigued me, so here goes: Far as I can tell, the term "Isaeli" denotes citizenship, "Jewish" is the religion, and "Hebrew" would be ethnicity. Any thoughts on that? Engr105th 03:39, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • As referenced on the Jew page, beginning the in the 18th century the idea as being "Jewish" as a nationality started taking hold, and continues un-abated (See African-American). The idea is to denote a unique cultural heritage which supercedes nation/state and probably influenced their lives as much as their place of birth. So for many people, Jews and Gentiles, it is a reference as part of cultural heritage. Myself and surely many others sympathize that you take offense to the reference, but it's a pro forma thing that you aren't going to be able to get rid off. I don't think 98% of the people see "Jewish" and take it disparagingly. --TKE 22:23, 28 February 2006

excuse me TKE ,but the "jewish nation" IS NOT 18 century idea, please read the WHOLE jew page.

It does not belong in the first sentence. I'm not even sure that Hungarian-born does either. I have slightly re-tweaked it to place the "father of the hydrogen bomb" into the first sentence, which produces a very nice summary of what the article is about. It would probably be best to move "Hungarian-born" to the (now) second sentence, creating "Born in Hungary, Teller moved to...". The Jewish bit...well, there's probably a good place for that, too. I'm just wary of tweaking a current FA too much. Stevage 22:31, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks TKE. Where does cultural heritage belong in a bio? First line? Second? Middle? It just seems that if it is OVER emphasized, it is a form of racism. Also, I think you would be surprised by the %s of people who do take offense, IMO. Tom 2/28/06

WOW, even having it in the 2nd line makes me feel better :) go figure...Tom 2/28/06

  • Well, as a biography, I think cultural roots are significant. You know, being the story of his life and all. If you are a student or scholar of American history, seeing his D.O.B. and the fact that he was a Hungarian-born Jew who immigrated tells me alot about social, economic, and political circumstances he is going to be dealing with; therefore giving me a good idea of where things are going to go. Being a Jew in Europe at that time was a decidedly bad place at a bad time. Suppose that without his having to come to America, atomic researched could have been altered significantly. So yes, I think it is very useful. --TKE 22:52, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Identity politics

Is there a reason suddenly a dozen editors are at this article scrutinizing some very basic points about him which are common to dozens of Wikipedia biographies? There is nothing in the description of Teller that is different from how he is described in most encyclopedias or history books. The first two sentences of the Encyclopedia Brittanica article on Teller are: "Hungarian-born American nuclear physicist who participated in the production of the first atomic bomb (1945) and who led the development of the world's first thermonuclear weapon, the hydrogen bomb. Teller was from a family of prosperous Hungarian Jews." It then goes into more detail about his early life in Budapest. --Fastfission 00:15, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

  • I agree. I just stepped in since the Tom fellow was going ape all over this talk page. And looky, the new Featured Article marks him as "Irish-Canadian." :)--TKE 00:23, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I see in looking at it again that "a dozen" was a bit of an exaggeration, but I suppose it just felt that way looking at the activity about this question! It is the sort of thing I've seen come up for people whose places of birth and the politics of them at the time are in dispute -- i.e. Copernicus, who seems to attract no end of people with stakes in saying he was Prussian or Polish respectively -- and I've never seen people concerned about it in respects to Teller, whose being Hungarian is universally discussed as a key feature of his identity and personality, and whose Jewish heritage is integral to much of his biographical details (and, amongst nuclear physicists of the 1930s and 1940s, is not at all a unique characteristic). So I find it puzzling more than anything else. --Fastfission 02:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
  • It would only rarely come up had this not been featured. As a fellow budding historian I too feel the frustrations that occur in sorting out importance and unimportance, and what constitutes significance. I find on here that too often people want to contest a word like "Prussian" since it can rile emotions. People have trouble figuring out that heritage is important, not inflammitory. I was going to mention Oppenheimer and Einstein, but figured that if you're literate on the subject you'd know. I'm also glad that Tom stopped his edits after the warning and took it to the talk page, I hoped to shed some light as the the methodology of historical annotation, something that's significantly overlook in subverting edit wars. I noticed that these arguments frustrated you as mentioned on your page, and it does myself as well. I hope to clarify some of these future worthless frustrations on these topics, as Gdansk needed early on.--TKE 05:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
  • David Hollinger has a nice term (at least, I think I heard him say it) he uses for talking about most discussions of heritage -- it swings in between the poles of "boosters" and "bigots". Either people want to label people as Jewish because they hate Jews (and think it shows something), or they want to label them as Jewish because they think Jews are the greatest; very little middle ground, and interesting in the way that they both profit from an over-emphasis on heritage. That being said, the Jewishness of the 1930s physicists, especially Manhattan Project emigres, is so well-discussed in the literature that not noting it feels very strange, though I can to some degree sympathize with the suspicion of labeling people Jewish in places where it doesn't seem necessary (hence on most pages about Teller here, I think he refers to him as Hungarian, but not Jewish, specifically). Ah well. Anyway hopefully this will blow over a bit. I don't know how religious Teller was, though a look at his memoirs would probably inform that. --Fastfission 23:54, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Legacy bit I removed

I removed the following from the "Legacy" section:

Perhaps Teller's greatest legacy was as a scientist of fierce courage, who worked tirelessly to advance causes he believed in, despite scathing popular and professional castigation. His support for research to develop defenses against nuclear weapons, also controversial, had an impact on the closing years of the Cold War. It also proved to be prescient in the face of post-Cold War nuclear proliferation.

If we want to quote someone (and there are such people out there) who say that Teller was really like this, that's fine, but putting it in the article without attribution clearly violates WP:NPOV. I'll try to find time to find a good summary of the "positive" assessments of Teller (his Medal of Freedom ceremony probably had some of them), but anyway I wanted to make it clear that I didn't just remove it because I disagreed with it. --Fastfission 02:15, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I added the offending paragraph, and after reviewing your point, I agree with your decision.
Wellspring 21:31, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A contradiction

This is from the section on SDI: "Bethe, along with IBM physicist Richard Garwin, coauthored an article in Scientific American which analyzed the system and concluded that any putative enemy could disable such a system by the use of suitable decoys. The project's funding was eventually scaled back."

This implies that the article was written in response specifically to the SDI proposal. But here's what Hans Bethe has to say:

"In 1960, Bethe, along with IBM physicist Richard Garwin, wrote an article criticising in detail the new anti-ICBM defense system that the government was planning to install. In the article that was published in Scientific American, the two physicists described in detail how almost any countermeasure that the US could take would be futile, as the enemy would be able to thwart the system through the use of suitable decoys."

SDI wasn't around in 1960, so according to this passage, the article was written in response to a different anti-ICBM system.

My question is: which is right? I don't know enough about the history to say when the article was authored. Gershwinrb 19:18, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I hadn't noticed that. I'll figure out which is which. --Fastfission 19:48, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

I believe the anti-ICBM system that Robert McNamara advocated in 1960 or so was against potential Chinese ballistic missiles, and I think that is why Bethe and Garwin penned their article- Ashujo June 9, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A candid observation

I heard him talk three times. The first was when I was in high-school. He was impressive, especially his eyebrows. The second was about a legitimately unorthodox explanation of quasars. The funny thing about that was that he theorised the biggest possible explosion, as he did in his more important activities. The third was a lecture to the general public. In that, though he had no axe to grind, he nonetheless deviated from real physics to impress his audience.

He said that corn, with enough calories, would not supply people with nutrition because it would not sink enough entropy. That is completely wrong, and he would have known that, if he thought about it for more than a minute. The nutritional deficiencies of starch have nothing to do with the difference between counting food in energy or in entropy, and the only reason he could have said so is that he had no scientific integrity, and was only interested in his audience's reaction. The best that could be said is that he spoke as though he had knowledge about a subject about which he was uninformed. This was the most unscientific performance of a scientist that I have ever heard. I only wish it had been so easy to publish this when he was still alive and destructive. David R. Ingham 09:41, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

When it comes to unscientific, you obviously haven't heard James D. Watson speak! His discourse on female obesity and sex drive given at UC Berkeley a few years ago would have been amusing, were it not so patently offensive. :) Fishhead64 05:15, 24 April 2006 (UTC) This was gratuitous, I apologise. Fishhead64 05:38, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Well it depends if you weight entropy only on a thermal base ? True burning your dried body give the same calories count than burning dried corn, but ordering the full range of proteins you should feed on, give you not only the ability to move fingers on a keyboard but to do it in an orderly manner, and in absence of said deficiencie to pursue thought beyond setting things afire...

[edit] Infobox

In put in the infobox because the Teller article is pretty lengthy and needed something to neatly summarize his information. Whether or not it is "ugly" is a matter of taste. I would imagine that many more readers find it useful. -- Rglovejoy 16:41, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

"Ugly" is certainly a matter of taste, but I think that anything which squishes a perfectly good photo to being almost illegible so that it can display a mix of important-but-already-mentioned fields (date of birth, death, name, etc. which are all in the first paragraph) along with a mixture of fields which would be almost useless to most people (a list of the institutions he had been at? who needs to know this?) doesn't make any sense to me. I don't see how "many more readers" could possibly "find it useful" — almost all of the information is either useful but redundant or would only be "useful" to a very, very small subset of readers. I find the definition of "useful" here to likely be a matter of taste as well. I don't see any great benefit added by the box, and I think the article looked better before the box was added. Looking at them side by side, one looks clean and simple, the other looks cluttered, forced, and a victory of pseudo-functionality over straightforwardness. The infobox does not in any way summarize the article; it simply lists a lot of facts, most of which are not necessary for people to know in this case and do not by themselves enhance understanding. I think that infoboxes are very useful in some case — court cases, for example, or for showing information about people in a series, such as presidents — but I don't think adding them for individual biographies need be done, and certainly shouldn't be done when it really makes the article look awful. --Fastfission 18:23, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Rglovejoy and personally find the infobox less ugly than white space. I also find it a useful navigational aid. The answers to all the questions of Fastfission can be found in the consentual discussion at [5]. Consequently I have been bold and have replaced the infobox. SureFire 12:55, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Of course, anything I say is my POV but the box does not look ugly to me. I personally find it useful to glance at biographical infoboxes before reading the main article. It has many time-saving benefits for me. I agree as per Rglovejoy and SureFire. I vote keep. But having said that there is some truth in what Fastfission says...I am slightly irked by line spacing in the infobox. It sometimes looks a little uneven, hence back to the ugly issue. However, I don't think that is a reason to remove these boxes as I'm sure a software savant will come along and fix it someday.SuperGirl 22:08, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
Dare I ask what time-saving benefits it gives you or anyone else? People have touted infoboxes as "saving time" and "providing a useful summary" but I've yet to hear exactly what in the infobox is of any use to people. This one is 90% listing of places where Teller worked for various amounts of time (sometimes quite short, and in this case one, "Manhattan Project", which was not actually an institution) and having such a list tells you really nothing about what Teller was doing at each place. I am also quite surprised that people would rather have pointless text filling up whitespace rather than a decent image—the infobox reduces the image width by almost 50%; is a half-sized image better than a little whitespace? What a lousy trade-off. Taking up that whitespace also, as a wonderful side-effect, makes the "hide" function on the table of contents box totally worthless (the template then intrudes into the article text). If you ask me, the whitespace caused by the table of contents box is something to tolerate until a "software savant" finds a way to do it better rather than using unwieldy templates. But of course nobody asked me. --Fastfission 21:45, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tellers dubious stance against using the bomb on military targets

Hello, Fastfission, your remark "if it is included at all" wonders me. It is a definite source which contradicts Teller's claim that he was against the use of the bomb on Japan, so it is highly important. Especially because Tellers stance without the letter was unclear anyway: he neither signed the petition of Szilard against the bombing nor the approval of the Scientific Panel lead by Oppenheimer. The source is the review of Barton Bernstein:

Review of: Better a Shield Than a Sword: Perspectives on Defense and Technology from Edward Teller Barton J. Bernstein Technology and Culture, Vol. 31, No. 4. (Oct., 1990), pp. 846-861.

I think that should suffice, but I can look out for the source of the letter, too. --136.172.253.189 20:54, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Odd Phrasing

However, there is contradictory evidence. In the seventies of the twentieth century a letter of Teller to Szilard emerged, dated on July 2nd, 1945

I was wondering why this is written in such a odd style but I didn't want to change it since I wasn't sure if it should be written in a numerical style ( 1970's ) or as nineteen seventies Garda40 22:45, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Chemtrails connection?

The name of Edward Teller can be found in articles covering the Chemtrails and Global dimming, like e.g. here and at all here or here. Is all this material too untrustable not to mention the connection? Kriplozoik 00:56, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Teller was a known right wing government scientist who worked on secret weapons in a secret laboratory. It is no surprise, nor very notable, that he figures into conspiracy theories about government plots. From what I can tell the reference is simply that Teller proposed a potential way to start global dimming in 1997 (and was not the first to propose such a thing), and then it inferred (but not stated) that maybe the government has started doing that. A pretty tenuous link. --24.147.86.187 19:07, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Physical description

I don't see any at all - I think we should at least include his lameness (from a Munich street-car accident, Herken, p. 25); but a full description would be better. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:55, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two genuine difficulties

There are two statements, thanks to Lingnut, for which I have not yet found sources:

the degree of credit assigned to Teller by his contemporaries is almost exactly commensurate with how well they thought of Teller generally.

This is a very plausible statement, and I believe that some source has said it, but it depends on what "how well they thought of" Teller is supposed to mean. It is unlikely that anyone who believed Teller was claiming Ulam's credit would think highly of him; and if approval of Teller's politics is implied, Hans Bethe is a major exception.

The plan actually received the endorsement of the Alberta government, but was rejected by the Government of Canada under Prime Minister John Diefenbaker. In addition to being opposed to having nuclear weapons in Canada, Diefenbaker was concerned that such a project would intensify Soviet espionage in Northern Canada.

(The only unsourced part here is the bit actually in italics; the rest is supported by the film review cited.) I have no reason to doubt that the rest is true; the reasoning would be wholly characteristic of Diefenbaker; but I do not see exact verification. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:41, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

  • I have removed the first, and adjusted the second to indicate exactly what is unsourced. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:57, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
Bethe is probably the only major exception, but he had rather complicated agenda, though. Anyway, the line can easily be qualified/minimized/removed. It's not a huge deal, though it is pretty much accurate. --Fastfission (talk) 22:43, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Teller's nephew

'Memoirs', by E. Teller and a co-author, mentions Janos Kirz, as his sister's son, several times, and describes how Teller assisted in Kirz's emigration to the U.S. from Hungary. Dr. Kirz is a noted physicsit who has developed the field of X-Ray microscopy, principally at Brookhaven National Laboratory. His research endeavors are soon moving to the West Coast. I met Dr. Kirz while I was a graduate student between 1975 to 1979 at The State University of New York at StonyBrook, where he is a Distinguished Professor of Physics. 65.132.69.104 (talk) 05:17, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Teller (magician)

The article contained the claim that Teller (born Raymond Joseph Teller), the silent half of Penn & Teller, is Edward Teller's son. This claim was uncited and directly contradicts the article on the magician. If anyone can find a reliable source for this fact then both articles should be modified. WLior (talk) 15:02, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Spurious reference created by known vandal. Can be safely ignored. WLior (talk) 15:13, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, it's not true. The only children of Edward and Mici Teller were Paul and Wendy. No magicians. --24.147.69.31 (talk) 23:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What about family life ?

Did this guy not have a family (or at least a spouse - or was he so disliked by everyone that he didn't even succeed in that)?

If he neither had family nor relationships should that lack of social life (and perhaps ability to relate to other people) not be mentioned in the article?

I think it quite significant !

Comments on this (better still, changes in the article - are appreciated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.174.83.250 (talk) 07:55, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps I should say that while I did now see that there is a very short reference (strangely in the 'Early Life an Education' section! - Did not occur to me to chase that information in that section, I have to confess) to him being married indeed ("In February 1934, he married 'Mici' [Augusta Maria] Harkanyi") I still find it very curious that in all Wikipedia biographies that I have read there is a section on social and family life and connection but not with Teller !

And of course (besides the quote above in this discussion page there is no reference to any offspring. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.174.83.250 (talk) 08:03, 1 June 2008 (UTC)