1913

Atomic battery

• When radioactive isotopes decay,
• they produce thermal and kinetic energy
• so that we can make an atomic battery
• using that energy to generate electricity.
• Henry Moseley made first atomic battery
• using beta radiation from radium.

Beta particles

• Ernest Rutherford distinguished
• alpha and beta radioactive decay in 1899.
• Beta radiation penetrates and ionizes
• more than alpha radiation.
• Later, Henri Becquerel showed that beta radiation
• is emission of electrons.
• Coincidentally, perhaps, electricity
• is the flow of electrons.

Becoming safer

• If you could put all evils in a box
• and promise to never take them out,
• someone else would want to look at them.
• If everyone obeyed the golden rule,
• and took more pride in commonalities than differences,
• would we still be able
• to honor individual talents and efforts?
• If we were to build an army of robot enforcers
• who would deter all aggression,
• the robots would need to be our masters.