Cutchogue - A Pacifist Memento
- I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
- Albert Einstein
- Einstein must have been really besorgt when he said that.
- Certainly, back in 1939, he was preoccupied with the situation in Europe, where - he knew - Germans were working on a new lethal device, the atomic bomb.
In Cutchogue he wrote letters to the President Roosevelt who, taking Einstein's words seriously, decided to launch what is known as the Manhattan Project*.
What was Einstein doing in Cutchogue though?
He was on vacation, sailing on the Tinef; but he was a sailor who couldn't swim.
You might read more in this article about Einstein in Cutchogue.- *I don't need to explain more about the Manhattan Project, but today (August 9th) I want to give a personal contribution: I have been to many places related to WWII: Hiroshima, some concentration camps in Europe, the lab (and now Museum) where Oppenheimer was working in Los Alamos, NM, not to talk about Berlin.
I don't know if it means anything, but I grew up as a pacifist, I can't even stand people arguing, let alone using weapons of any kind.
If you ever happen to be in one of the above mentioned places, try to survive the emotional shock to remember that there is no end to brutality, as much as there is probably no end to technology.
Certainly, once we destroy everything, there will only be sticks and stones.
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