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wellerstein's profile
Alex Wellerstein
Alex Wellerstein
Alex Wellerstein
Verified account
@wellerstein

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Alex WellersteinVerified account

@wellerstein

Historian of science, secrecy, and nuclear weapons. Professor of STS at @FollowStevens. UC Berkeley alum with a Harvard PhD. NUKEMAP creator. Coder and web dev.

Hoboken, NJ / NYC
blog.nuclearsecrecy.com
Joined September 2011

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    1. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet

      Your friendly reminder of potential consequences of starting a preemptive war with North Korea. (Now updated with some East Coast targets.)pic.twitter.com/wJ08sP4Te3

      26 replies 187 retweets 172 likes
    2. Canageek‏ @Canageek 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet
      Replying to @wellerstein

      Have you considered adding EMP radius to Nukemap? Would be interesting to see how many areas would be without computers after a nuke went off.

      1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
    3. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet
      Replying to @Canageek

      It's very tricky to calculate the ranges correctly, and it's even trickier to accurately guess the actual effects on electronics. I have looked into it but not tried to implement it. There are too many tricky uncertainties, and I think EMP is the wrong thing to focus on anyway.

      1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
    4. Canageek‏ @Canageek 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet
      Replying to @wellerstein

      Really? Given how much of society relies on electronics these days, that might kill more people when supply networks, 911, infastructure shut down.

      2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
    5. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 28 Nov 2017
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      Replying to @Canageek

      The ability for EMP to actually do that kind of damage is pretty speculative. In any case, if North Korea is going to use nukes, they won't risk it on the uncertainties of an EMP. They'll just aim for cities. We know what carnage would be caused by that.

      1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
    6. Canageek‏ @Canageek 28 Nov 2017
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      Replying to @wellerstein

      Ah, I didn't realize how speculative it was. I'm guessing that map exaggerated the imapact a fair bit?

      1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
    7. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 28 Nov 2017
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      Replying to @Canageek

      The EMP literature is half people who say "it's the end of the world" and half people who say "it's nothing at all." There are large uncertainty bars when you're talking about real-life effects on the ground. I don't think a state with limited nukes would risk it.

      2 replies 0 retweets 1 like
    8. Canageek‏ @Canageek 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet
      Replying to @wellerstein

      Huh, you think they would have measured the effects on electronics at range when they were testing them.

      1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
      Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 28 Nov 2017
      • Report Tweet
      Replying to @Canageek

      The EMPs people are worried about are the high-altitude ones. The number of actual tests of them are relatively limited and haven't happened since the 1960s (a very different world of electronics).

      6:58 PM - 28 Nov 2017
      1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        1. Canageek‏ @Canageek 28 Nov 2017
          • Report Tweet
          Replying to @wellerstein

          I was just working through that myself, that all the open air testing would have been done in a basically pre-computer world, so who cares if it turns off a few lights.

          0 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
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