Unlike Hahn and Wilson the goal is mainly to know things you aren't supposed to know. (They are not trying to build their own nukes, thank goodness.) But many different motivations for doing it.
Yes, there are a few of them. They each have their own particular interests, methods, goals, etc. There is an interesting history of these kinds of folks — there will be a section on them in my (someday finished) books!
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These sorts of people really emerged in the 1970s following John McPhee's Curve of Binding Energy, which featured weapon designer Ted Taylor arguing that there weren't any secrets left.pic.twitter.com/BaZcP6HVKq
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The big take home lesson of the Manhattan Project is that once you prove something can be done other people can and will figure out a way to do it if they have the motivation and resources.
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What made the Manhattan Project so difficult was that it had to figure out all of the workable methods for the first time around (and the risk of failure was thus very high), AND because they did it under extreme time constraints (it is still the fastest nuclear program EVER).
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All future programs eliminated the first constraint (they knew it was possible and they knew the outlines of what had worked for the US, thanks to the Smyth Report), which helped a lot. Time constraint issues varied for later programs.
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Basically what I said. When you don't know it is doable it is research. Once someone does it after that it's engineering and development. I think we are at that stage with quantum computing. We know you can make one. No it a matter of the best way to do it.
End of conversation
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