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elspood comments on Rationality Quotes November 2012 - Less Wrong
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I think you set a false dichotomy here - we can generate relatively safe nuclear power (thorium reactors) without existential risk, and without creating the byproducts necessary to create nuclear weapons. This is not an argument against the root comment, however.
Sure, thorium reactors do not appear to immediately allow nuclear weapons - but the scientific and technological advances that lead to thorium reactors are definitely "dual-use".
I'm not entirely convinced of either the feasibility or the ethics of the "physicists should never have told politicians how to build a nuke" argument that's been made multiple times on LW (and in HPMOR), but the existence of thorium reactors doesn't really constitute a valid argument against it - an industry capable of building thorium reactors is very likely able to think up, and eventually build, nukes.