The excellent quality and depth of the various essays make [the book] an invaluable resource....It is likely to become essential reading in its field.--CHOICE

"Nanoweapons describes the deadliest generation of military weaponry the world has ever seen and offers concrete recommendations for controlling their future use, thus avoiding global war and the end of humanity."--Provided by publisher.

This urgent and eye-opening book makes the case that protecting humanity's future is the central challenge of our time. If all goes well, human history is just beginning. Our species could survive for billions of years - enough time to end disease, poverty, and injustice, and to flourish in ways unimaginable today. But this vast future is at risk. With the advent of nuclear weapons, humanity entered a new age, where we face existential catastrophes - those from which we could never come back. Since then, these dangers have only multiplied, from climate change to engineered pathogens and artificial intelligence. If we do not act fast to reach a place of safety, it will soon be too late. Drawing on over a decade of research, The Precipice explores the cutting-edge science behind the risks we face. It puts them in the context of the greater story of humanity: showing how ending these risks is among the most pressing moral issues of our time. And it points the way forward, to the actions and strategies that can safeguard humanity. An Oxford philosopher committed to putting ideas into action, Toby Ord has advised the US National Intelligence Council, the UK Prime Minister's Office, and the World Bank on the biggest questions facing humanity. In The Precipice, he offers a startling reassessment of human history, the future we are failing to protect, and the steps we must take to ensure that our generation is not the last. "A book that seems made for the present moment." —New Yorker

From the dawn of the atomic age, art and popular culture have played an essential role interpreting nuclear issues to the public and investigating the implications of nuclear weapons to the future of human civilization. Political and social forces often seemed paralyzed in thinking beyond the advent of nuclear weapons and articulating a creative response to the dilemma posed by this apocalyptic technology. Art and popular culture are uniquely suited to grapple with the implications of the bomb and the disruptions in the continuity of traditional narratives about the human future endemic to the atomic age. Filling the Hole in the Nuclear Future explores the diversity of visions evoked in American and Japanese society by the mushroom cloud hanging over the future of humanity during the last half of the twentieth century. It presents historical scholarship on art and popular culture alongside the work of artists responding to the bomb, as well as artists discussing their own work. From the effect of nuclear testing on sci-fi movies during the mid-fifties in both the U.S. and Japan, to the socially engaged visual discussion about power embodied in Japanese manga, Filling the Hole in the Nuclear Future takes readers into unexpected territory

Nanoweapons just might render humanity extinct in the near future--a notion that is frightening and shocking but potentially true. In Nanoweapons Louis A. Del Monte describes the most deadly generation of military weapons the world has ever encountered. With dimensions one-thousandth the diameter of a single strand of human hair, this technology threatens to eradicate humanity as it incites world governments to compete in the deadliest arms race ever. In his insightful and prescient account of this risky and radical technology, Del Monte predicts that nanoweapons will dominate the battlefield of the future and will help determine the superpowers of the twenty-first century. He traces the emergence of nanotechnology, discusses the current development of nanoweapons--such as the "mini-nuke," which weighs five pounds and carries the power of one hundred tons of TNT--and offers concrete recommendations, founded in historical precedent, for controlling their proliferation and avoiding human annihilation. Most critically, Nanoweapons addresses the question: Will it be possible to develop, deploy, and use nanoweapons in warfare without rendering humanity extinct?

In the more than sixty years since the advent of nuclear weapons, there has been little meaningful progress toward nuclear disarmament. Some countries have nuclear weapons, while other states are forbidden to acquire them, a status quo that lacks rational basis and cannot be sustained. In this remarkable collection, scholars and policy analysts argue that humankind has a choice: either allow nuclear weapons to continue to proliferate throughout the world or move toward their complete elimination.The vast majority of people on the planet would surely opt to abolish nuclear weapons. But decisions about nuclear weapons are not made by the public, but by small groups of political elites. Consequently, in a world with nuclear weapons, the fate of humanity rests in the hands of a small number of individuals, whose perceptions, communications, and judgment determine whether there is to be a future.The contributors to this volume provide historical perspective on nuclear weapons policy; explore the role of international law in furthering the prospects of nuclear weapons abolition; consider the obstacles to abolition; present a path to achieving a nuclear weapons-free world; and look beyond abolition to consider issues of post-abolition sovereignty and general and complete disarmament. The goal of a nuclear weapons-free world can be awakened by an engaged citizenry bringing pressure from below in demanding action from political leaders. This book contributes to this awakening and engagement.

The articles contained in this volume encapsulate the current debate on why and how to move towards a world free of nuclear weapons. Presented at an international conference held in New Delhi, the papers by leading experts from around the world, question existing paradigms and explore new security architectures.

Since before the first atomic bomb exploded over Hiroshima, the history of nuclear warfare has been tangled with the spaces and places of scientific research and weapons testing, armament and disarmament, pacifism and proliferation. Nuclear geography gives us the tools to understand these events as well as the extraordinary human cost of nuclear weapons. Disarming Doomsday explores the secret history of nuclear weapons by studying the places they build and tear apart, from Los Alamos to Hiroshima. It looks at the legacy of nuclear imperialism from weapons testing on Christmas Island and across the South Pacific, as well as the lasting harm this has caused to both indigenous communities and the soldiers that were ordered to conduct tests. Tying these complex geographies together for the first time, Disarming Doomsday takes us forward, describing how geographers and geotechnology continue to shape nuclear war and imagining ways to help prevent it in the future.

Winner of the 2019 William E. Colby Award "The book I had been waiting for. I can't recommend it highly enough." —Bill Gates The era of autonomous weapons has arrived. Today around the globe, at least thirty nations have weapons that can search for and destroy enemy targets all on their own. Paul Scharre, a leading expert in next-generation warfare, describes these and other high tech weapons systems—from Israel’s Harpy drone to the American submarine-hunting robot ship Sea Hunter—and examines the legal and ethical issues surrounding their use. “A smart primer to what’s to come in warfare” (Bruce Schneier), Army of None engages military history, global policy, and cutting-edge science to explore the implications of giving weapons the freedom to make life and death decisions. A former soldier himself, Scharre argues that we must embrace technology where it can make war more precise and humane, but when the choice is life or death, there is no replacement for the human heart.

In The Future of Fallout, and Other Episodes in Radioactive World-Making Joseph Masco examines the strange American intimacy with and commitment to existential danger. Tracking the simultaneous production of nuclear emergency and climate disruption since 1945, he focuses on the psychosocial accommodations as well as the technological revolutions that have produced these linked planetary-scale disasters. Masco assesses the memory practices, visual culture, concepts of danger, and toxic practices that, in combination, have generated a U.S. national security culture that promises ever more safety and comfort in everyday life but does so only by generating and deferring a vast range of violences into the collective future. Interrogating how this existential lag (i.e., the material and conceptual fallout of the twentieth century in the form of nuclear weapons and petrochemical capitalism) informs life in the twenty-first century, Masco identifies key moments when other futures were still possible and seeks to activate an alternative, postnational security political imaginary in support of collective life today.