On Fri, 11 Feb 2005 12:34:43 -0700, Howard Brazee <howard at brazee.net> wrote: When Isaac Asimov re-released his Foundation trilogy, he did not want to edit any change in style or substance. But he did replace "atomic" with "nuclear" as our language had changed since he first wrote the books. Reporters had noticed that scientists found the use of "nuclear" to be a bit more precise than "atomic", so they changed what they wrote, and we all accepted it. But either word works - it's whatever is accepted. There's a real difference between fission bombs and fusion bombs as far as physicists are concerned - but the social-political difference is neglible. We treat them the same when found in a third world country. The popular press sometimes calls one a nuclear bomb, and the other a hydrogen bomb. But that's silly. These descriptions are not parallel. Politically WMD is more important anyway. If someone kills a city via a bacteria or via a bomb - the terror is the same. -- Using M2, Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/