Jewish Intellectuals and the Birth of the Nuclear Era

Tuition: $360 | YIVO members: $270**

This is a live, online course held on Zoom. Enrollment will be capped at about 25 students. All course details (Zoom link, syllabus, handouts, recordings of class sessions, etc.) will be posted to Canvas. Students will be granted access to the class on Canvas after registering for the class here on the YIVO website. This class will be conducted in English, and any readings will be in English.

Instructor: Alex Wellerstein

Despite their minority status, intellectuals, scientists, and strategists of Jewish descent had an outsized impact on many key historical events and debates in the history of nuclear weapons during World War II and the Cold War. Beginning with the rise of Jewish prominence in theoretical physics in the early 1900s, the course tracks the key figures, ethical debates, and geopolitical influences of Jewish scientists on the creation, proliferation, and plans for the use of nuclear weapons.

Topics will include: the pivotal role of Jewish physicists in the origins of the American and British nuclear programs during World War II; the ethical, moral, and political challenges faced by figures like J. Robert Oppenheimer; the contrasting worldviews of Edward Teller and Leo Szilard in the early Cold War; and the role that Jewish intellectuals played in both planning for and resisting nuclear war in the later Cold War.

The course will also examine the intersection of Jewish identity, the Holocaust, and the existential threat posed by nuclear war, as well as the involvement of Jewish figures in Israel's nuclear program and its implications for global non-proliferation efforts. Ultimately, the course will be exploring why Jewish thought and experiences—particularly those shaped by persecution, displacement, and survival—had a disproportionate impact on some of the most consequential developments of the atomic age, shaping both the scientific community and the ethical discourse surrounding nuclear weapons.

Course Materials:
The instructor will provide all course materials digitally throughout the class on Canvas.

Alex Wellerstein is an Associate Professor in Science and Technology Studies at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. His research is primarily centered on nuclear history. His first book, Restricted Data: A History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States, was published by the University of Chicago in 2010. His second book is in progress and slated to be published summer 2025 by HarperCollins, and is a new history of Harry Truman and nuclear weapons. Professor Wellerstein has a BA in History from the University of California, Berkeley, and a PhD in the History of Science from Harvard University. Along with his academic writings, he has publishing articles in The Atlantic, Harper’s Magazine, and The New Yorker, among other venues. He publishes two blogs, Restricted Data: A Nuclear History Blog (sporadically updated) and Doomsday Machines: The Postapocalyptic Imagination in Fact and Fiction (updated weekly), and is also known as the creator of the NUKEMAP, an online nuclear weapons effects simulator that has been used by tens of millions of people globally.

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