GOD OF THE ATOM

[Music] [Music] [Applause] At 5:30 on the morning of July 16th, 1945, the skies above the New Mexico desert were rent by a tremendous blast. Man had released in the atomic bomb. Everything about melted in the blast. The steel tower which held the bomb just disappeared. The sand on the surface of the desert melted into a volcanic glass. These are pieces of that fused sand from the desert. The brownish streaks are traces of the molten steel from the tower. In that blast, the sand itself was rendered dangerously radioactive and will remain so for many years to come. This instrument is called a geer counter. It detects the presence of this radio activity. [Applause] We're have to think of atomic energy as something new. But God placed this fabulous power in every tiny bit of matter in the universe when he created it. In fact, this earth has been warmed and lighted by atomic energy from the beginning. For the energy of the sun is atomic energy. No, atomic energy is not new. But now that man can control and release this. It can be said that the age was laid back the year 195 when an unknown clerk in a Swiss patent office scribbled strange equations at his desk. Here about half a century ago, Albert Einstein gave to the world E= MC². [Music] E= MC^² energy, the equivalent of mass, a radically new conception, key to the atomic age. But this is too early in the picture for us to get lost. This equation merely means that any object, this table, piece of paper, or just this pencil, just any matter represents an unbelievable amount of energy. For example, a glass of water is equivalent to the power produced by Hoover Dam in one full year. Enough energy to supply the electrical needs of your home for 4 million years. Air is a fragile thing. Yet in a single breath is energy equivalent to the burning of 200,000 gallons of high octane gasoline. sufficient fuel to fly a giant 4engineed airliner for 200,000 miles. Within just the paper of a railroad ticket is enough energy to power a cracked diesel electric streamliner three times around the world. In fact, one pound of any kind of matter is equivalent to 11 billion 400 million kilowatt hours. Of course, this doesn't mean that we can just pour a glass of water into the gas tank of our family car and start off on a trip around the world. But the energy is there hidden down inside the tiny particles of which all matter is made. These particles are so small that if we had a million of them in a pile, we couldn't see the pile. There are a number of ways that we can detect their presence even if we can't see them. For example, in this tiny bar of steel, uh there are untold numbers of these particles. If we bring a magnet close to the steel, we say that the steel becomes magnetized. Well, actually what we mean is that tiny crystal domains or groups of molecules inside the bar are rearranged or lined up by the magnet. Now, it seems inconceivable that we should hear this rearrangement, but with a simple coil of wire and a high gain amplifier, it's possible for us to hear the resultant of this movement. [Applause] Now what we have just heard is called the bark housing effect. We hear a lot these days about the problems of supersonic flight. At certain speeds and under certain conditions, air can in effect be just as solid as a brick wall. Well, air like a brick wall is made of particles that have definite size and weight. It seems that for some reason the speed of sound is the critical point in these problems. Well, the speed of sound also is related to the size and the weight and the speed at which these particles travel. But here, let me show you. This is a cylinder of helium. As you know, helium is a very light gas. That means that the particles of helium are lighter than those particles in air. Now, sound travels faster through a gas in which these particles are light than one in which they're heavy. I'm going to fill my lungs with helium. Then you notice the difference in my voice. And now my lungs are full of helium. And believe it or not, I'm talking in just the same tone of voice I've been using all the time. The difference is that sound travels much faster through helium than it does through air. And so my voice goes up. But now I've got to take a breath. >> And my voice goes down one step to normal. Of course, I still have a helium accent, but now my voice returns to normal. It would really be fun to fill a male quartet with helium sometime, wouldn't it? But seriously, into one another, of course, can't see them, but if we could, they'd look something like this. These innocent looking little fellas don't seem very, but they are. Air pressure, for example, is simply the resultant of untold billions of air molecules bombarding an object. To see the effect of this force, we may take a 5gallon oil can and heat the air inside for a few moments. This makes the air molecules here mixed with water molecules speed up and many of them are knocked out of the can through the opening in the top. A smaller number of them going faster equalize the outside pressure. But now let's turn the heat off and put the cap tightly on the can so that none of the particles which we have driven out can get back inside. As the air inside cools off, these particles slow down and wage a losing battle against the greater number of molecules hammering on the outside. And so we say the can collapses. Of [Music] course, we can't see these particles even with a microscope. However, it is possible to see smoke particles so small that they are actually buffeted about by the air molecules. Into a smoke chamber, we draw the smoke of an ordinary match. and then place it on the stage of the microscope. Although the smoke is drifting within the chamber, if we look closely, we can see the tiny smoke particles being buffeted by the invisible air molecules. We've just seen, but there's a remember. Sure you do. H2O, the commonest substance known to man, water. To grasp what this simple formula really means is to understand some of the most basic laws governing the structure of matter. In laboratory, electrolysis apparatus may help us discover why the chemist has given water the symbol H2O. The glass tubes of the apparatus are filled with water from the reservoir above. At the base of the tubes, an electric current is caused to flow through the water from one platinum tipped electrode to the other. Immediately, bubbles form and go streaming upward. As the gases begin to collect in the tops of the tubes, we notice that more forms in one tube than in the other. This means that one electrode is liberating more gas than the other as the process of electrolysis takes place. Graduated scales on the tubes indicate the proportion in which these gases are released. On one tube we read six, on the other three. The greater amount of gas when tested burns with an almost invisible blue flame. hydrogen. The other gas causes a glowing splint to burst into flame. This is oxygen. So we say that water is composed of two gases hydrogen and oxygen combined in a proportion of 2 to one. Two particles called atoms of hydrogen are combined with one atom of oxygen to form a molecule of water. H2O. So molecules are made up of atoms. But atoms themselves are not solid. They in turn are made up of other particles. For example, the hydrogen atom, simplest of them all, consists of an electron revolving about a nucleus. In this case, a single proton. The atom of oxygen is more complex. Oxygen has eight electrons revolving about its nucleus which consists of eight protons and eight neutrons. The electron, proton, neutron. Three fundamental building blocks from which all matter is made. I don't know how anyone can see the intricate design and mathematical perfection within the material world without pausing to wonder at the greatness of the God who planned it all. But nowhere in all of nature is the active presence and the infinite power of God more evident than in the forces which hold these particles together. But let's read about it in the first chapter of Colossians. For by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created by him and for him. And he is before all things and by him all things consist. Now that word consist in the original Greek literally means hold together. In other words, by him all things are held together. Yes, it's God's power that binds these particles together. Unbelievable power within the atom. Now, in the past, we've known that there was energy present in matter. But we did know that when some chemicals unite, heat is liberated. [Music] Burning coal has long been a symbol of industrial power. In fact, this energy from within matter is the lifeblood of industry, of commerce and transportation. All this is energy from within matter. I suppose we might say it's atomic energy. But just recently we've discovered that down inside in the heart of the atom is energy that is 10 million or even 100 million times greater than the chemical energy which we've been using. This is nuclear energy and as a source of power it transcends all others. We are all familiar with the release of chemical energy. But how is nuclear energy released? The proton lithium nuclear reaction is a simple but good example. When a proton, the hydrogen nucleus, penetrates the nucleus of the lithium atom, two atoms of helium are formed, whose weight is less than the proton and lithium combined. This difference in weight has been converted into 17,300,000 electron volts of energy. Remember E= MC². The equivalence of mass and energy. The proton fired at sufficient velocity to penetrate the lithium nucleus releases this tremendous amount of energy which is carried away by the two newly formed atoms of helium. Now, of course, we don't just pick up a proton and throw it at the nucleus of an atom. Both the projectile and the target are much too small. Highly specialized equipment such as the cyclron has been developed for this task. In this model of the cyclron, steel balls represent atomic particles and mechanical forces replace electrical forces. A strong magnetic field guides the particles in a circular path which widens as the velocity of the particles increases, causing them to spiral out to the target at the periphery. Now from the model to the instrument itself, the famous 60-in medical cyclron at the University of California. One job for this instrument is to provide radioactive substances for use in the neverending war against disease. And here common table salt is being melted in a crucible as the first step in its preparation as a target. When taken into the human system, instruments able to detect the presence of radioactivity will trace the substance as it travels into the various organs of the body. After the molten salt has cooled, the excess is cleared away and the plate mounted in the target assembly. Our table salt is now ready for its role as target material. The 60-in cyclron operates behind a wall of steel tanks 4 ft thick filled with water to shield the surrounding area from harmful neutron and gamma radiation. [Applause] In the controls behind the protective barrier, the operator puts the cyclron into operation. Radiationabsorbing lead vaults provide safe temporary storage for the 60-in cyclron targets as they await their use in the laboratories of medical research. Probing still farther into the mysteries of the atom is the 184in cyclron. also at the radiation laboratory of the University of California. This great 4,000 ton instrument, which spans 56 feet and towers 30 ft above its foundation, accelerates particles to far greater energies than its 60-in predecessor. As larger cyclotrons were designed and built and greater velocities achieved, Einstein's recognition that an object's mass would increase as its speed approached that of light became an important factor. In the 184in cyclron, this rotary condenser compensates for the change in mass as the particles are accelerated to tremendous velocities. [Music] Behind the perforated copper shield is the cyclrons D or accelerating electrode to which is applied the highfrequency voltage. We are now within the very heart of the 184in cyclotron inside the tank between the pole pieces of the great 4,000 ton magnet. During operation, this area is a vacuum traversed by a torrent of atomic particles emitted from the source in the center of the tank and accelerated to velocities corresponding to 200 million electron volts of energy. [Music] Outside the tank operating through a vacuum seal in the tank wall is a power operated probe which holds the target and explores the beam of particles within the accelerating region. The cyclron and similar instruments have proved to be powerful tools of research laying the foundation for much of our knowledge of the atom. knowledge which was put to test that July morning of 1945 in the New Mexico desert. One of the men who witnessed that awesome spectacle was a young atomic physicist, Lawrence Johnston. I was one of a group of scientists assigned to go overseas with the atomic bomb on its wartime mission. All of us left Los Alamos with memories of that first experimental explosion in the New Mexico desert indelibly stamped in our minds. Operational headquarters for the atom bomb was on the island of Tinyan in the Marianas 7 hours by B29 from the enemy coast. But it was the Nagasaki raid which dealt the final blow. what proved to be the final use of the Abomb in the war. We were forced to cover our eyes to avoid being blinded by the intense white light from the burst, which we calculated was 10 times as bright as day at the position of our plane. This mile wide bubble of hot gas is rising at a rate of about 100 miles an hour, carrying with it the tons of dirt thrown up by the blast. The cloud has now risen to the altitude of our plane, which is 30,000 ft. We are making a wide circle about the column, recording information radioed to us by instruments which we had dropped from our plane by parachute at the same time the bomb was released. The tremendous heat of the bomb has melted the clouds for a radius of 5 miles. Finally, the mushroom starts to break away from the column. One bomb equal to 20,000 tons of TNT has destroyed a city. The conclusion was obvious. A future war would mean the destruction of civilization as we know it. Thus, to our dismay, we find that while we as physicists know how to control the atom, we can't control man. He needs the kind of help which in my experience only God can give. The truth, as I see it, is that God has sent his son Jesus Christ for the very purpose of providing us a way of escape from the folly and destruction of our self-centered living. For me, this is no academic statement, but an experimental fact. The end of the war left many questions concerning the atomic bomb unanswered. It was of paramount importance that we find out just what an atomic war might mean. And so the nations of the world stood at the crossroads of destiny, watching a tiny coral at hole in the Marshall Islands. Into Bikini Lagoon came a fleet of target vessels led by the venerable old battleship Nevada. Bullseye for the target array. Captains of target ships said farewell to Craft, whose records were among the most colorful of the war. [Music] A shore, 75- ft steel towers were erected to house specially designed scientific instruments and some of the hundreds of cameras of all types and sizes. [Music] Doors of reinforced concrete and lead protected film from the effects of radioactivity. PVM mariners were assigned as Navy photographic ships to accompany Army photographic aircraft. Crossroads was the most photographed event in history. Dawn on AEL day. Observation, weather, and instrument planes take to the air from their base on Quadeline. The atom bomb is aboard and it's takeoff time for Dave's dream. Destination Bikini [Music] on Inuak B7 drones radiocontrolled flying without pilot or crew prepare for their flight through the center of the atomic cloud column to provide valuable scientific data. On the carrier Shangraa at sea, mother control planes are catapulted from the flight deck, preparing to take control of their pilotless charges. The drone is guided into the air by radio from the carrier. Then control is transferred to the mother ship. [Applause] The bomb ship nears the target. All personnel are standing by. From the weather plane, glass gauges are parachuted to target. Let's hear the story from a man who was air. As administrative officer for the electronics coordinating officer joint task force one, I was aboard the USS Avery Adams during operations crossroad at Bikini Atal. On Amal day, loudspeakers throughout the ship rebroadcast the words of the bombader as he released the bomb. Bombs away. [Applause] [Music] I can't speak officially, of course, but I can say that whatever disappointment was experienced in the early moments following the blast, it quickly faded as we moved in and saw the target ships at close range. [Music] [Music] [Music] as I recall the blast of operations crossroads. I am convinced that the only way to avoid the catastrophe which an atomic war would bring is for the nations of the world to get back to God. and America must lead the way. >> Back from their flight into the radioactive column of Able Blast, Army drones returned to their base. Filter bags suspended in the bomb bays contain radioactive dust particles from the contaminated area. Meanwhile, the Navy drones are landed at Roy Island as mother planes transfer radio control to the ground control officer at the edge of the landing strip. [Music] Like the Air Force drones, the Navy fighters were guided through the radioactive column. Geiger counters warn crews of the deadly gamma and beta rays from the contaminated crab. [Music] Radioactive samplings were immediately taken to laboratories for exhaustive tests and analyses during the busy period of preparation for Baker blast. [Music] Baker Day. And aboard the carrier Sedor, a Navy photographic officer briefs pilots of photo and instrument planes. [Music] [Music] [Applause] In the lagoon, lastminute tests are made of the radiocontrolled drone boats prior to their guided trip into the target area. Boarding the firing ship USS Cumberland Sound, Los Alamos engineers present their credentials to Marine Guards. Security is the watch word aboard this electronic control ship where radio signals will be transmitted to detonate the bomb. [Music] Leader of the group, Dr. Marshall Holloway, personally unlocked the master control transmitter switch in the timing laboratory. [Music] The laboratory, a maze of complex electronics equipment, interlocking radio transmitters, automatic timers and recorders. [Music] Transmitters are warmed up and adjusted for the last time. Graph cards changed on time recorders. [Music] H hour minus 2 minutes. The standby signal to all hands. At the central control console, Dr. Holloway throws the 302 switch. Dr. Ernest Titterton, assistant to Dr. Holloway crosses to the automatic firing board and prepares to broadcast the last 15 seconds [Music] 15 4 3 2 1 Fire. [Applause] Heat. Heat. [Music] If there was ever a time in the history of the world for sober and realistic thinking, this is it. I wish you could sit and talk for a while as I have with some of those who really know atomic energy and what it means. They're frank to tell us that there is no defense against an attack by atomic weapons. Furthermore, with the development of bomb launching submarines, long range supersonic aircraft, and guided missiles, it's highly improbable that an adequate defense can ever be devised. Some have gone so far as to predict that fewer than 10% of us now living will escape this destruction. But you say, "Surely there must be some hope. There must be some solution to the problem." Well, there is. But one thing is certain. Man will never find this solution until first he is willing to recognize the true nature of his problem. Our trouble in the world has never been due to the fact that we've had swords or guns or gunpowder or tanks or airplanes or even atomic bombs. Take all these things from the world and men will beat each other to death with their bare fists. The problem is not what man has, but what man is. Now, this is not a pretty picture, but it's a realistic one. If this destruction is heaped upon us, man has no one but himself to blame. Throughout the ages, God has warned man that the wages of sin is death. Over and over again, he has told us that there is no escape if we persist in defiance of his laws. But the God who made this universe has done far more than just warn us that the wages of sin is death. Has offered us the solution to our problem. He paid that death penalty for us. Limitless power to change our lives and our very nature. This is our only hope. But to say that there is just one solution to art like saying there's nothing to breathe but air. One solution is all we need if it's the right one. And remember this is God's solution. It has been proven by men in all walks of life in all ages of time. It has never failed. We are indignant when we see some men and nations openly defying God. Serious as this is, far more serious is the fact that untold millions throughout the world have excluded God their lives not by decision but by indecision, not by open defiance, but by mere indifference. But whatever the cause, the result is the same. They're without God. The heart and life remains unchanged. The problem remains unsolved. This is the world's crisis. This is truly crossroads. As never before, it is a time of decision. The choice is life or death. But we do have that choice. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everl remember The God Adam, the God of in power, to whosoever believeth in him. [Music]