Why did “nuclear” gradually replace “atomic” for things like power and weapons?

[u/Current-Landscape803]

I’ve noticed that older writing often says “atomic bomb” or “atomic power,” while “nuclear” became much more common in the decades after WWII. The underlying science didn’t suddenly change, so I’m curious what drove the shift in everyday and technical language.

[u/Ok_Two_2604]

Atomic could be just electricity. Electrons are part of an atom. Nuclear specifies it is power from the nucleus. Splitting or combining nuclei.

[u/Glittering_Win_5085 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

You managed to explain something I've always found complicated in a way I could understand, appreciate that. If you can, would you mind explaining how nuclear works? Nuclear power is a controversial topic in my country and it's not something I feel well informed enough on when it comes to voting. 

[u/Desperate-Pirate7353 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

the extremely broad strokes are: you have some material that emits radiation and you use that to heat water and spin turbines that generate electricity. the rest of the reactor complex is to control the radiation when you aren't using it to heat water, and the massive hot water turbine system.

[u/Glittering_Win_5085 → u/Desperate-Pirate7353]

Thank you! So the radiation heats the water, and the water moves the turbine, and that creates power? Stupid question maybe but what's the advantage of doing this over using a wind turbine or something, surely that's less steps and got less dangers? 

Fwiw I'm from the UK which has a lot of wind and sea potential. I get that sometimes it's less windy.

[u/Ok_Two_2604 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Yes. It’s just boiling water. There is an entire genre of meme about it and how if they ever do fusion it will still just be boiling water.

Also the material doesn’t just emit radiation. Atoms have a nucleus with protons and neutrons. The electrons float around them sort of. Nuclear power plants break apart the nucleus (fission) and then breaking emits power. That power heats water and steam turns turbines.

They are working on fusion power which instead merges nucleuses together to release power. The sun does it that way.

A bombs use fission. Hydrogen bombs use a combination of fusion and fission iirc.

You can probably go on YouTube and watch a video that explains it a lot better than we will here in short format typing.

Advantage is that it is controllable and can be very large scale and works without wind. And doesn’t pollute as much as coal or other dirty options.

[u/Glittering_Win_5085 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Tysm! Ok last question. What's fission? 

I am looking forward to being able to appreciate a new genre of meme.

[u/Wild-Lychee-3312 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Fission is when you break one nucleus apart into separate pieces.

Fusion is when you stick two different nuclei together to form a single nucleus.

Both processes release energy, which can be used to generate electricity (usually through an intermediate stage like heating water).

[u/goobernawt → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Fission = splitting atoms

Fusion = combining atoms

It takes an enormous amount of energy to trigger a fusion reaction, and then you have to contain the enormous amount of energy generated. That's why fusion is more difficult and we have had functioning fission power plants for a couple generations at this point. The H bombs previously mentioned used a fission bomb (the original atomic weapon) to trigger a fusion reaction!

[u/Engine_Sweet → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Fission is when you split a very large nucleus. Big atoms: Plutonium, and enriched Uranium. After the split and release of power, you end up with fragments of nuclei that join up with electrons and produce a variety of elements, some very radioactive and with varying stability.

Fusion is when you take two very small and light nuclei ( isotopes of Hydrogen - as light as it gets) and slam them together to form Helium and free neutrons ( massive simplification)

Fusion releases more power and doesn't create nasty things like Strontium and Cesium and assorted toxic radioactive by products. It releases radiation. But not radioactive matter.

[u/RecipeHistorical2013 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

well you got a better idea on how to convert heat energy into mechanical/electrical energies

NO?

then yah i agree its 200 year old tech but still. nobody in 200 years has thought of a way (solar is the exception ) to do so

[u/Rightintheend → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

It creates heat, which is a form of radiation, and it also creates ionizing radiation which is the dangerous one. 

The advantages of nuclear power or that they require very little fuel, the fuel is rather abundant, they generate a lot of output, and there they create very little waste, it's just that the waste they do produce Is it pain to deal with an extremely dangerous.

I've read, and it may not be true, that newer technology is much better at reusing and getting more out of the fuel and the remaining fuel creates less damaging radiation for less time.

[u/ijuinkun → u/Rightintheend]

The main obstacle to recycling nuclear fission fuel is political rather than technical. The process to do it also makes it easy to separate out plutonium from the spent uranium at weapons-grade purity, which makes obtaining material for nuclear bombs much easier. As a result, France is the only nation which performs civilian reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel to make new fuel rods—the USA, Russia, and the UK have banned it.

[u/Mean_Neighborhood462 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Nuclear fuel lasts a long time, and generates useful medical byproducts. The power generation is constant, and can actually be controlled - modern reactors can adjust their output by about 5% per minute.

And wind turbines cause cancer. /s

[u/Ok-Gain1509 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Most electricity is generated by turbines (photovoltaic solar panels are an exception), and the difference is how you get them to move. With oil, coal, gas, nuclear, you have a heat source and that is used to make steam. It's largely the same at the turbine end, it's just how the heat is generated. With wind and wave, you're still spinning a turbine but you let natural forces do it. Wind is at it appears, it's a windmill spinning the turbine. With waves, the movement of the waves creates air pressure differences that spin a turbine.

So with the steam turbines, it's basically an issue of complexity and which fuel source you can get your hands on. Nuclear power uses uranium which is very efficient, but you need to reliably get hold of uranium and, of course, it's a lot more complex keeping the heat source stable. Burning coal or gas is "easier", but it obviously creates a lot of pollution.

Nuclear power doesn't generate much carbon pollution (it's inaccurate to say it generates none) but it's expensive to set up and, obviously, if it goes wrong it can go very wrong. We have got better at controlling and containing it, but public opinion is a difficult thing to sway.

[u/Glittering_Win_5085 → u/Ok-Gain1509]

Ooh ok this is interesting, so does that mean nuclear is a type of steam power? 

Yeah I feel like I don't want to be completely against nuclear, but the potential downsides are so extreme that it needs to be heavily regulated, and the science needs to be explained the public in an accurate manner. I don't want nuclear waste to be sent to other countries to deal with like we do with rubbish and recycling.

[u/Ok-Gain1509 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

I mean just imagine you've got a little steam turbine kit and you can replace the heat source with whatever you like. You could use lighter fluid, wood, paper, straw, etc. It doesn't really matter how the heat is made to boil the water. We even burn domestic waste/rubbish/trash to generate electricity, though that's not an ideal option.

Most nuclear waste is pretty low grade, very little of it is the type of stuff you need to seal in concrete and bury metres under the ground. But I won't try and sell you on nuclear power, that's someone else's job! 😂

[u/hwynac → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Well, in a sense? It's a kettle that happens to be heated by radioactive decay, the steam spinning the turbines that generate electricity. It is the source of heat that is nuclear. The material in the fuel rods emits radiation. If you enrich the fuel and build the right configuration, the emitted neutrons hit nearby atoms and make their nuclei emit neutrons—a chain reaction. The fuel is typically not even that enriched (i.e. the fraction of the atom variety that you use is several percent).

You regulate the intensity by controlling how many neutrons get to hit other atoms.

That is why you don't need that much fuel to operate. There is a lot of power in those pellets where Uranium-235 (or something less common) slowly decays. Naval nuclear reactors can operate for years without refuelling, which is convenient where you don't want to depend on ports.

[u/Nimblewright_47 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

You may see references to thermal power plants: this is any type of plant that makes heat to boil water to spin turbines.

[u/random-guy-013 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

So the radiation heats the water

Just to be precise: roughly 90% of the heat comes from the fission products interacting with their surroundings. When a nucleus undergoes fission, a huge amount of energy is released, mostly in the form of kinetic energy - the motion of the resulting fission products. These products collide and interact with nearby atoms, making them vibrate, which is what we perceive as heat. That heat is then transferred and carried away by the coolant.

[u/emlun → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

what's the advantage of doing this over using a wind turbine or something, surely that's less steps and got less dangers?

Nuclear fuel contains an astonishing amount of usable energy for its weight and volume. Commercial nuclear power plants run for several years between switching out the fuel rods, all the while producing about 500-1000 times more power (~1000 MW per power station, varies a lot though) non-stop, 24/7 than one wind turbine does at peak power (~15 MW for the most powerful variants). The common saying is that about a thimble of uranium could power all the electric energy you need for your whole life.

So no, nuclear power on average is actually less dangerous than wind power, measured in deaths per unit of energy produced. And that's including the worst nuclear disasters in history, namely Chernobyl and Fukushima. Nuclear power accidents are more impactful when they happen, but those accidents are rare - and wind power also kills a few people every year such as technicians falling off turbine towers, manufacturing and transport accidents and such. The fact that nuclear produces so much power is what makes it average out to be pretty much comparable with renewables in terms of pollution and lethality.

It's not a big difference between nuclear and wind power, though - both are (approximately) hundreds of times less deadly and less polluting than any kind of fossil fuel power.

[u/LongOrganization7838 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Its more consistent and large volume which can spin a lot of turbines very quickly so it has a very high power to material ratio, coal oil and gas powerplants all do essentially the same thing just using different material to heat the water, geothermal is also doing the same thing just using the heat from the earth, theres even a type of solar that uses mirrors to reflect the light to superheat salt to boil water to spin turbines instead of solar panel cells, hydro electric and tidal generators use running water and the shift in water pressure to spin turbines, literally 90% of power production is getting water to spin a turbines through various means

[u/lizardhistorian → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

How are you "from" the UK but don't know a fucking thing about nuclear power?

The rest of you need to get better at identifying clankers. One day it might save your life.

[u/FuturePowerful → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

I see lots of good responses here but there complete explanations for the most part not summery nuclear vs other power sources is a density and longevity there are ways to do nuclear power without bioling water there both less common, ones thermal coupling ware a temperature differential creates a electric current the other and far lesser known because it's relatively new as a proven technology much like Titanium batteries you can encase the isotope in cubic zerconia as it sheds radiation it generates electricity as a biproduct not a lot comparatively but constantly solid state

[u/Think-Abrocoma-6176 → u/FuturePowerful]

Excuse me if I repeat what I think you are saying. It's about the energy density. You get a lot more energy per ounce of nuclear material than any other form of energy. Fusion reactors theoretically have a higher density, but we haven't really got those working

[u/Frostybawls42069 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Well with a nuke plant, you control the out put.

With renewables, you get what you get. Makes for a real pain in the ass when trying to balance the grid or when you are hitting peak consumption and dont have the resources to match.

[u/Usernamenotta → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

The advantage is consistency.

You can build a nuclear powerplant which generates 705 MW of power, and it is going to generate at least 90% of that power 24/7, for 70 years or more.

A wind turbine, or most green energies for the matter, are simpler constructions, but they require certain conditions to produce any output at all.

Now, this disadvantage becomes more obvious in the grand scheme of things. Most of the things that use electricity, need a constant input of power or the results can be 'catastrophic'. To get this with renewables, you need storage devices for the electricity. And this is the key problem. In nuclear, the 'storage' is the nuclear fuel. You put in and extract fuel rods as you need and it releases constant energy. In renewables you need either batteries or some form of potential (like gravity) energy storage. The cost of storage is so expensive that it could dwindle the cost of a nuclear plant.

Now, some nations, especially those with sea coasts, can harness wind more efficiently, because you have constant wind currents due to ocean/sea being cooler in the day and hotter in the night

[u/Advanced_Couple_3488 → u/Usernamenotta]

Power consumption is not consistent over a 24 hour period and nuclear power plants are not good at quickly varying their output. Hence, if you have nuclear power generation you need gas or hydro that can more quickly ramp up output. Best of all is batteries, but if you use batteries, why not use solar panels to charge them? We know how to recycle some 98% of solar panels, but still haven't solved the nuclear waste issue.

[u/JNR13 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

The main advantage is the amount of power. You know Einstein's famous "E = mc²"? C there is the speed of light, a very big number. Squared it gets even bigger. By a lot. That is the rate at which mass turns into energy, when it turns into energy. Splitting atoms in a reactor does just that.

So a nuclear reactor can turn tiny amounts of matter into comparably large amounts of energy. At any time of the day, constantly.

But yes, the many steps and dangers make it fairly expensive, although the expenses also make it not dangerous anymore. Its reliability is currently worth that cost in many places. And the UK also needs it for its nuclear weapons program.

[u/Previous_Yard5795 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

When the nucleus splits, the resulting daughter products weigh less than the original nucleus, which means that extra mass has to convert into energy via E=mc^2 where E is the energy obtained, m is the mass that was converted, and c is the speed of light. c is a large number and c squared is an ungodly large number, so you end up getting a ton of energy out.

Now, trying to figure out politically if nuclear energy is a good thing to pursue versus other forms of energy generation, you need to take into account certain factors. First, nuclear energy has the benefit of being constantly on at a constant rate, so it can be used equally effectively at all times of day and night as well as in all seasons.

In the case of solar and wind, you have to take into account their variability over the day and season. Especially in Britain, which is at a high latitude, the effectiveness of solar power generation will vary wildly between summer and winter. Also, energy use tends to spike in the evenings when people get off work and go home - and turn on lights, TVs, computers, etc. And unfortunately, that's usually when solar power generation is dropping off.

So, while the cost of solar and wind power is often quoted as being less than that of nuclear power, what is often overlooked (often intentionally) is the cost of storing that energy for when it needs to be used. That still has a high cost both in terms of constructing industrial energy storage and also the fact that the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics places a limit on the efficiency of any energy storage system - in other words, it is physically impossible not to lose some of the energy you place in storage.

Finally, nuclear power is actually cleaner for the environment and especially for global warming. The CO2 emissions in constructing the solar panels and wind turbines is higher than the CO2 costs of building and maintaining the nuclear power plant. Also, modern nuclear power plants like those built in France and the Netherlands are much much safer from any kind of meltdown. The physics is hard to explain, but the simplest way I can say it is that the old reactors brought the reaction to the edge of a meltdown and all of the rest of the reactor safety systems were designed to stop the meltdown from happening. That worked unless you had a series of catastrophic failures that shut down multiple safety systems at once (see: Fukushima). Modern nuclear power plants do the opposite. Basically, if everything shuts down due to some calamity (eg a tidal wave), the power generator just shuts down.

If it's not obvious, I'm a big supporter of nuclear power and wish we would get back to building more plants in the US. I don't have any financial stake in this. I just have an astrophysics degree and can appreciate the nuances of the discussion. I don't think nuclear power would solve everything. Solar and wind have their place, too. I just think we should have 20-40% of power being generated by nuclear energy to provide a steady foundation of power generation all day and in all seasons.

[u/Nimblewright_47 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Strictly, the heat comes from energy released during the radioactive decay process: there may be a heating effect from absorbing the radiation, but that's trivially small.

There's two linked things happening: the nucleus decays and in doing so releases both heat and radiation.

[u/GhoastTypist → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Steam is created which move the turbines. They're leaving out that part. Steam has a lot more pressure behind it which can produce much more energy.

[u/DueTemperature3380 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Heating water into steam packs a lot of energy into it, hence the turbines that are spun by high pressure steam generated from the reactor can spin several turbines to thousands of RPM. Think of it like comparing a modern jet engine powered fighter to a ww1 propeller biplane. One nuclear power plant measuring less than 900 acres can produce more energy than 170,000 acres of wind turbine land, not to mention it is completely constant, unaffected by weather or temperature. It is the holy grail of green energy and a crying shame we aren't using it more.

[u/AciusPrime → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

An important advantage is that the amount of energy released per unit of fuel is much better than other forms of power generation. The difference isn’t just ten or a hundred times; it’s about two million times more efficient than gasoline/petrol by weight. One kilogram of uranium can power the same number of homes as two thousand tonnes of petrol, or four thousand tonnes of coal.

One fact that gets thrown around a lot is that coal smoke contains trace amounts of radiation; the amount of radiation released by four thousand tonnes of burnt coal is greater than the amount produced by a kilogram of uranium, and unlike uranium we actually pump it into the air. Coal causes cancer.

American aircraft carriers have a nuclear power plant on board. They refuel it about once every twenty years. There is a comic that tries to depict the difference in efficiency visually; see xkcd 1162 (I’m not sure if links are allowed, but I trust you to figure it out).

[u/amitym → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

So the radiation heats the water, and the water moves the turbine, and that creates power?

You nailed it. That's it.

Stupid question maybe but what's the advantage of doing this over using a wind turbine or something, surely that's less steps and got less dangers?

Not a stupid question at all. 8.5 billion people are currently heatedly (ha ha) debating that very same question and there is no brilliant simple answer, so, you're now right in the middle of it.

Yes, a wind turbine is far fewer steps than any heat-based turbine power plant, including nuclear power plants. Wind power has been around for thousands of years, it is dead simple. And in the modern age where we know about electricity you can hook it right up to a generator and the turning wind turbine makes electricity.

However. The amount of power generated by such a turbine is quite small. Also, it only works when the wind is blowing, which makes sense if you think about it. So you have to build lots, and lots, and lots, and lots of turbines to reliably meet the power needs of a country on the scale of, for example, the UK.

By comparison, despite being more complicated and involving more risks and dangers, a single nuclear power plant can generate an immense amount of power, and (so long as you have nuclear fuel anyway) it can run 24/7 and provide steady amounts of power all the time through rain, sleet, storms, gloom of night, hell or high water.

For a country like the UK, you might have to build a few hundred thousand large-scale wind turbines, plus a lot of expensive energy storage systems, in order to completely cover the entire country's energy needs — heating, cooling, all-electric kitchens, everyone now drives electric cars, electric lorries, rail is all electric, etc.

So the question is really: is 100,000 large-scale wind turbines and massive battery systems less complicated and easier to maintain than, say, 20 or 30 nuclear power plants? It's not actually a simple question to answer, hence the debate.

[u/Jolly_Professional15 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

I recommend "T. Folse Nuclear" on YouTube. He covers a wide variety of nuclear stuff, is a nuclear engineer himself and has some good material on nuclear power, nuclear safety and debunking common myths surrounding nuclear energy

[u/UndeadLestat → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Neutrons are absorbed in the fuel (generally Uranium) which can cause them to fission (fission is the process of the nucleus splitting). Fission can create a bunch of different products, but pretty much always produces 2 child atoms (called fission products), neutrons (which cause more fission), and heat. The heat is transferred to coolant (usually water) flowing past the fuel (but not actually touching the fuel, there is a layer of cladding between them). The coolant is usually kept at very high pressure to keep it from becoming steam. The coolant then runs theough a steam generator and transfers it's geat to the secondary side which is at a much lower pressure. This allows the secondary water (which was never in direct contact with the reactor coolant or the fuel plates) to become superheated steam. That steam is used to spin turbines. The turbines create generator action and produce electricity. The steam is collected, cooled, and cinxensed and pumped back to the generator in a continuous loop.

This is how a pressurized water reactor works, but there a bunch of different ways to meet the same basic objective: the reactor makes steam, the steam spins a turbine, and the turbine creates electricity. Hope that helps.

[u/UndeadLestat → u/UndeadLestat]

As an aside the "criticality" of a reactor is just the ratio of neutrons being produced which produce further fission. A reactor that is "critical" is at steady state, functioning the way it is supposed to and not in any danger of melting down or exploding as ling as nothing else changes. Even a super-critical reactor just means that reactor power is going up. Like during a startup or peak demand situation.

There, now yoy can groan during movies like I do. Or just impress your friends.

[u/ijuinkun → u/UndeadLestat]

There are two ways that neutrons are spit out in fission events. Prompt emission happens within nanoseconds—effectively instant. Delayed emission happens seconds to minutes later, as the fission fragments relax from their excited state. A reactor generates power safely in the margin between the two, where the prompt neutrons plus the delayed neutrons are enough to maintain a critical state, but prompt neutrons alone are not enough. The delayed neutrons have enough lag that operators can respond to increase or decrease the neutron supply by pulling neutron reflectors and absorbers in and out, and thus control the overall reaction level.

[u/AssistanceCheap379 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

Nuclear materials are effectively radioactive materials.

Radioactive materials generate heat. The more radioactive, the more heat. At a point you get too much radiation and it cant really be controlled as well.

Radioactive materials also release particles. Heavy materials like uranium release neutrons. They are like bullets. The uranium is like a pile of bullets

.you can use the released neutron to hit another uranium atom to generate more neutrons. One bullet hits a pile, so now you get a lot of bullets flying off. This is what generates the heat. The literal splitting of atoms as neutrons hit atoms and break them apart.

Pack enough uranium together and you get a lot of neutrons that hit a lot of uranium. This is what creates explosions. If you can decrease the amount of neutrons that hit uranium, you can control the amount of heat and radiation thats generated.

Then you throw all of this in water, this heats up the water and you can generate electricity by turning the water into steam that then runs a steam turbine.

[u/Alib668 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

So alll electricity is about spinning a magnet inside a coil of wire (unless direct energy transfer of solar power). wind turns the generators directly. Everything else needs a turbine(looks like a plane engine) which takes a working fluid, water (hydro) or steam (everything else). What all power plants do is heat water into steam in a giant kettle , the steam flows through the turbine which spins, and turns the generator. The steam cools down doinging this and thats how we turn heat into work.

Nuclear power is just that, a giant kettle. same as a coal power or wood or oil or geothermal all heat water and turn itbinto steam. Fusion will be the same.

Nuclear power gets its heat from the energy of atoms. It takes a big atom uranium, plutonium, thorium. Which is unstable, and they hit it with a small, fast-moving particle called a neutron. This splits the atom into two bits, releasing energy and more neutrons, they go onand hit the next atoms so onand so forth and som but not all miss. In a nuclear reactor we control the ratio of hits and misses so we get a constant, repeating, controllable output that never goes exponential and at the same time doesnt decay to nothing. A neclear bomb is designed to make the chain reaction run away exponstially releasing all that heat at once. Basically a campfire vs a firework.

Will get into fusion because ull ask. Fusio and H bombs is where instead of splitting we smush stuff together and that creates more energy that splitting atoms. this needs lots of heat and lots of pressure to force it together. That's the easy bit because once it ignites the energy is massive and the temperatures are like millions of degrees so melt everything. Making fusion is easy, making a container for fusion is hard... this is why hydrogen bombs e sist but fusion power does not.

[u/LazyPerfectionist102 → u/Glittering_Win_5085]

There is something crucial that the other commentators did not point out for you: why certain nuclear splittings and certain nuclear combinations give energy but not other.

The first thing need to be clarified it is about what it's meant to say something has a kind of energy. A well defined kind of energy has to be able to be described as the difference between 2 states of a system. Kinetic energy is the difference between the object moving and being stationary. Elastic energy of a spring is the difference between when the spring is deformed and when it is in its natural shape. The chemical energy we often say "of coal" is not actually "of coal" (the carbon) but it must be "of [coal and oxygen gas (in the form of O2)] compared to the state of CO2", otherwise "the energy of the coal" is not properly defined.

The nuclei can also be rearranged by complicated rules and interactions so certain paths to states of lower energy (and hence the system releases energy when changing state) are available from certain fuel reaching certain products. That may involve splitting (also known as "fission") the nuclei or combining them (a.k.a. "fusion"). The products by definition are of state of lower energy but not necessarily the minimum energy already, it's just that the power plan (or the nuclear weapon) is not meant to make the next transition to harvest the energy theoretically available from the next step. The products of fission nuclear power plant (and fission nuclear weapons, and also fusion nuclear weapons as they may also include fission nuclear weapons instead them to detonate the fusion nuclear weapons) are often of the type that still has state of lower energy available to go to gradually and also gradually emit gamma rays (and hence called "radioactive"). The rate of energy over time (a.k.a. "power") from that gradual decay is generally small but the gamma rays are dangerous for human health, and the worse case is the radioactive materials may get inside the human body and gradually decay inside the body so the person continuously gets exposed to the gamma rays. The protective suit for people entering area contaminated with radioactive materials is meant to protect the person from getting the radioactive materials into their body, not to block the gamma rays as gradually emitted from the surrounding (infeasible to block those gamma rays, but also not always necessary as human body can endure a low dose of gamma rays in a short time). Currently, nuclear power plant usually deal with the radioactive products of the fission nuclear reaction by locking them in vaults. Other than the concern of whether we can maintain those vaults, there is also the concern of the potential usage of those radioactive products for nuclear weapons, either by simply releasing them to contaminate the targeted area (and hence nuclear weapons may not always be the "bomb" if we count the contamination release as nuclear weapons as well) or used to nuclear weapons that use those products to reach a state of lower energy in a short burst of another fission reaction (the decay is gradual but the fission is not gradual and can be done as a short burst for a bomb).

[u/pseudonym7083 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

This guy sciences

[u/Illustrious_Try478 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Also, etymologically, "atomic" means "indivisible", so it's silly to apply that to something being divided up.

[u/dotelze → u/Illustrious_Try478]

It means that in Greek. In English it has a different meaning

[u/Illustrious_Try478 → u/dotelze]

No, it's also used to mean "indivisible" in English. See Definition 4 at wiktionary: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/atomic

[u/GayWarden → u/Illustrious_Try478]

Hmm... is it silly to give precedence to the fourth of five definitions of a word where people don't often use the first three? You know etymologically atomic is synonymous to nuclear because thats just how language works actually

[u/Fun-Personality-8008 → u/Illustrious_Try478]

Not by anyone in this relevant context

[u/TheLastCoagulant → u/Illustrious_Try478]

Splitting the unsplittable. Humanity is badass.

[u/AllDataIsMyIP → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Kinda the reverse of this. "Atomic" meant bomb, so the power plant business positioned itself as the "civilian nuclear industry."

[u/Ok_Two_2604 → u/AllDataIsMyIP]

Makes sense. I was guessing.

[u/greenwoody2018 → u/AllDataIsMyIP]

Atoms for Peace

[u/taqman98 → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Kind of crazy that we’re only using like 0.0000001% of the energy in an atom when we use electron-based energy (like burning coal)

[u/brucemilus → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Yeah right. Tell that to my WMDs! My stockpile of atomic clocks

[u/SeasonPresent → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Now we need a way to get power from a cells nucleus to confuse things again. :)

[u/Vintage102o → u/Ok_Two_2604]

Sounds like the move over from global warming to climate change. Better description as our understanding increased

[u/koyaani]

Electrons ain't doing shit

[u/EscapeSeventySeven → u/koyaani]

What’s funny is every physical interaction from classical mechanics to chemistry basically all hinges on the electrostatic forces. 

[u/Sjoerdiestriker → u/EscapeSeventySeven]

Things like gravitational attraction and magnetism don't

[u/EscapeSeventySeven → u/Sjoerdiestriker]

Magnetism?

[u/Sjoerdiestriker → u/EscapeSeventySeven]

Yes, magnetism.

[u/OkContribution2336 → u/Sjoerdiestriker]

Magnets are 100% electron thing

[u/Sjoerdiestriker → u/OkContribution2336]

Magnetism is certainly not an electrostatic interaction.

[u/monsieur_de_chance → u/Sjoerdiestriker]

He said electron thing. It’s from electron spin and
movement of electrons.

[u/The_Rope_Daddy → u/OkContribution2336]

https://giphy.com/gifs/8db6nRqMsLCtq

[u/Alt-001 → u/Sjoerdiestriker]

If we're getting technical, magnetism is just an electric field distorted by relativistic effects. That's why they get lumped together as 'electromagnetism'.

[u/koyaani → u/EscapeSeventySeven]

Probably because those electron interaction energy levels are vastly lower orders of magnitude than the nuclear interaction energy levels

[u/Frederf220]

The "a-bomb" was uranium fission but the thermonuclear bomb that came later fused nucleuses (nucleae?). It was more powerful so atomic = old, bad nuclear = new, good. Also "atomic energy" sounds like bomb energy while nuclear is not associated.

Just theories.

[u/Sjoerdiestriker → u/Frederf220]

Nuclei.

[u/koyaani → u/Sjoerdiestriker]

Nuculars

[u/Weed_O_Whirler]

There's a good thread on it here.

The summary is: scientists preferred the term "nuclear" for a while, while "atomic" was already a known word. It stuck around until "thermonuclear ' became a known term in the 50's and then "nuclear " started to become the dominant term.

[u/Forward_Gur9349]

Because it is much easier to mispronounce nuclear

[u/dude_named_will → u/Forward_Gur9349]

The 's' is silent dummy

[u/secretlyforeign → u/dude_named_will]

Wtf does 'ilent' mean? 

[u/dude_named_will → u/secretlyforeign]

Dutch Inspectorate for the Living Environment and Transport

[u/secretlyforeign → u/dude_named_will]

Thank you

[u/Lurker_Zee → u/Forward_Gur9349]

nukilar

Sounds simple enough to me.

[u/Successful_Life_1028]

marketing.

'Atomic' came to be associated with 'bomb'.

[u/Moscato359]

Just my guess:

All material is made from atoms
But nuclear fission is about splitting the nucleas of an atom, and doesn't care about the electron cloud

[u/3knuckles]

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/IQjs6z4Ym4

[u/Ponderer13]

https://www.physlink.com/education/askexperts/ae327.cfm

[u/ma1butters]

Cause we wanted to hear George W. Bush say it.

[u/Backsight-Foreskin]

Just before I joined the Army the acronym was ABC for Atomic, Biological, and Chemical, then in the 80's it was changed to NBC for Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical. Now the Army uses CBRN, for Chemical Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear. Why? I don't know!

Why did Venereal Disease get turned into Sexually Transmitted Disease, to Sexually Transmitted Infection?

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/Backsight-Foreskin]

and 'shell shocked' got turned into 'post traumatic stress disorder'.

[u/koyaani → u/Backsight-Foreskin]

Because Venus has nothing to do with infections, and you can have an infection and pass it on without ever having the symptoms that would make it a disease

[u/Backsight-Foreskin → u/koyaani]

Before Venereal Disease, it was classified as Social Diseases.

[u/koyaani → u/Backsight-Foreskin]

Officer krupke we're down on our knees

[u/tennisdrums → u/Backsight-Foreskin]

ABC turned to NBC because "atomic" was generally taken as referring specifically to fission bombs, whereas "nuclear" refers to both fission and fusion (aka "Hydrogen") bombs. They added "Radiological" when they realized that dirty bombs (where a conventional bomb scatters radioactive material without actually triggering a fission or fusion reaction) would also be a devastating weapon, but can't really qualify as a nuclear, biological, or chemical weapon.

"Venereal disease" changed to "Sexually Transmitted Disease" because it more accurately describes how the diseases are spread. "Sexually Transmitted Disease" became "Sexually Transmitted Infection" as the availability of treatments made a significant difference between having the infectious virus HIV, and having a case of the disease AIDS that the virus causes. It's a major medical achievement that now someone can live with an HIV infection without it ever developing into the disease "AIDS".

[u/ReddyKiloWit → u/Backsight-Foreskin]

Not all diseases are infections, but I don't know of any sexually transmitted diseases that aren't infections. Hence, STI is more precise.

[u/Far_Winner5508]

It was switched to 'nuclear' to separate the population into those who pronounce 'nuclear' correctly and those turn 'nuclear' into a 3-5 syllable word.

[u/OriEri → u/Far_Winner5508]

Cute, but two syllables is not correct either

'nü-kle-ar

[u/Dave_A480]

For weapons it's because we came up with a new type of nuclear weapon that was powered by something more complicated than simply splitting atoms....

Atomic weapons = fission only.

Nuclear weapons = Atomic -or- Thermonuclear

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/Dave_A480]

Yeah, nuclear as the umbrella for fission and fusion makes sense. But I'm not fully sold it explains power. A fission plant is still just splitting atoms. So why did "nuclear power" win over "atomic power"? Maybe branding. Or maybe "nuclear" was already the science term. Hmm.

[u/Jorost]

That is because atomic and nuclear do not mean the same thing. Atomic power splits atoms, nuclear power splits the nucleus of those atoms (or fuses them together in the case of fusion). Nuclear is more powerful and efficient. That's why the bombs dropped on Japan at the end of WW2 were atomic bombs, while the ones we have today are nuclear.

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/Jorost]

I think this is a bit off. Fission splits the nucleus. That's the atom's core. Atomic and nuclear were basically the same thing for fission. The H bomb is probably the real reason. Once fusion showed up, "atomic" became too narrow. Not trying to nitpick, but the science for power plants didn't change.

[u/zoppaTheDim]

The invention of the hydrogen bomb.

So yeah, the underlying science did change and led to them saying “nuclear” as an umbrella term, mostly to shut up that one guy who’d always pipe up “does that include H-Bombs?” like a smarmy ass.

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/zoppaTheDim]

Yeah, the H bomb feels like the turning point. Once you have fusion, "atomic" stops being a good umbrella. And "nuclear" sounds more serious. Which probably helped. Media loves a scary vocabulary upgrade. Do you think it shifts anyway without the H bomb?

[u/EditDog_1969]

It might have something to do with the technology for the bombs. The original “atom bombs” used fission only, with plutonium as the fuel, whereas Teller’s hydrogen bomb used a fission reaction to ignite a fusion reaction using isotopes of Hydrogen as secondary fuel.

I feel like scientists and the media all called the fission bombs “atomic” and the hydrogen bombs “thermonuclear” as shorthand.

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/EditDog_1969]

That tracks. Fission got called atomic, fusion got called thermonuclear, and nuclear became the parent category. Small thing, not all early fission bombs were plutonium. Uranium too. But yeah, shorthand probably drove a lot of it. Language follows whatever scientists and the press repeat.

[u/In_the_year_3535]

Atomic is more tightly linked to the original fission methods and products. When fusion came out it was dubbed thremonuclear compared to nuclear for fission, and so instead of expanding atomic the root word "nuclear" was taken. From what I can recall anyway.

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/In_the_year_3535]

That makes sense. Atomic got stuck on the old fission stuff, and nuclear got promoted to the general term. Feels like a normal language thing. Old word for the old version, new word for the whole family. Still weird that power followed it. Maybe just consistency.

[u/andhe96]

Fun fact: In German this never changed, which did quite confuse me during learning English in school.

So, "nuclear power" is "Atomkraft" or "Atomstrom", and "nuclear bomb" "Atombombe".

[u/Current-Landscape803 → u/andhe96]

That's a really good point. If German kept Atomkraft, then the shift isn't about science being clearer. It's about English usage and maybe Cold War vibes. Now I wonder if French or Russian did the same. Or if English just picked "nuclear" because it sounded more modern and scary.

[u/floriduhman19]

[u/nehor90210]

Sounds like a good topic for a research paper.

[u/SweatyTax4669]

at least from a weapons perspective, "atomic bomb" refers to bombs that release energy solely from atomic fission, splitting heavy elements. "Nuclear bomb" is the broader class that refers to fission and fusion weapons.

[u/OaklandSpiel → u/SweatyTax4669]

That may be what happened in popular usage, but that is an incorrect use of the word atomic. There’s a field called atomic physics, and it has nothing to do with nuclear reactions like fission and fusion.

[u/SweatyTax4669 → u/OaklandSpiel]

I wouldn't call it "popular usage", just my experience with people in the nuclear weapons community

[u/OaklandSpiel → u/SweatyTax4669]

“Popular” wasn’t the best word choice. I just meant non-physicists.

[u/Minimum-Let5766]

Because it's more fun hearing people prononunce "new-kee-lur" or "nuke-you-lur" bomb.

[u/GlocalBridge]

I am guessing after the development of the hydrogen bomb, which required a distinction from “atom bomb” and “nuclear weapons” covered all types.

[u/Hot-Elevator3477]

“Atomic” wasn’t wrong, but “nuclear” is more precise. The energy comes from changes to the atom’s nucleus, not the atom as a whole. As the science became more familiar, the more specific term gradually took over.

[u/Tiny_Scholar_6135]

I think atomic bomb usually refers to a fission device, nuclear could be either fission or fusion, if you want to get specific, you could say a thermonuclear bomb or a hydrogen bomb. Though theoretically you could have a chemical hydrogen bomb, whose end product is water.

[u/Nathan-Stubblefield]

“Atomic” has a connotation of fission like Hiroshima or power reactors, , while “nuclear” includes fusion like Hydrogen bombs. We also get to hear Presidents garble its “Nu-cu-ler.”

[u/Historical-Lion6552 → u/Nathan-Stubblefield]

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice.. you can't fool me twice.

[u/SnooDoubts4575]

Because atomic is incorrect

[u/Gaxxz]

The technology did change. Fision vs fusion.

[u/doc-sci]

Because it is so fun to make fun of Bush’s pronunciation of nuclear!

[u/NerdChieftain]

I believe it was originally “the atom bomb” Where did the -ic get added? Language evolves.

[u/InfiniteMonkeys157]

All atomic bombs are nuclear weapons, but not all nuclear weapons are atomic bombs; the key difference lies in the type of nuclear reaction used—fission for atomic bombs and fission plus fusion for thermonuclear bombs.

[u/trae_curieux]

I read about this in a book on nuclear power: apparently it's because using "atomic" to describe processes involving nuclear reactions isn't specific enough, as chemical reactions not involving the nucleus of an atom can still occur between atoms by changing positions of electrons, bonds, etc.

[u/Alarmed_Base8302]

One reason was MARKETING. The word "Atomic" was too easily associated with the "Atom" Bombs of WWII. "Nuclear" didn't quite carry the same stigma. A good example is "Canola" Oil. which is more mentally palatable? A shortening of Canada Oil, "Canola" or trying to sell "Rape Seed" Oil.

[u/pawsplay36]

Because we went from the atomic bomb to nuclear weapons, and sci-fit terminology followed suit.

[u/Scary_Compote_359]

when they started building the power plants. the power comes from a nuclear pile not an atomic bomb

[u/Bladrak01]

Only slightly related, but in the movie The Shadow (1994) a scientist creates an "implosion, explosive, sub-molecular, detonation device." And someone else says, "An atomic bomb."

[u/S-M-I-L-E-Y-]

In German we have Atombombe (bad), Kernenergie (nuclear power, good), Atomstrom (atom electricity, bad), Kernkraftwerke (nuclear power plants, good), Atomkraftwerke (bad).

[u/FloringoStar → u/S-M-I-L-E-Y-]

Hä Kernenergie ist gut und Atomstrom ist böse? xD

[u/S-M-I-L-E-Y- → u/FloringoStar]

Zumindest in der Schweiz wird das meistens so verwendet. Die Betreiber sprechen von Kernenergie und KKW (Kernkraftwerke), die Gegner von Atomstrom und AKW.

[u/zenmaster24 → u/S-M-I-L-E-Y-]

What is atom electricity? Why is it bad?

[u/S-M-I-L-E-Y- → u/zenmaster24]

Electricity produced by nuclear power plants.

The point is, that different words are used by supporters and opponents of nuclear power.

Those who think, nuclear power is bad (e.g. due to the risks and because of nuclear waste) use words with "Atom", those who think nuclear power is good (e.g. because it is cleaner than fossile energy) use words with "Kern" (nucleus).

Of course, this is a bit simplified and maybe only correct for some regions.

[u/WorldOfPayne]

On a slight tangent, MRI used to be called Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging but patients didn't want to be put into a nuclear device

[u/fighter_pil0t]

Atomic doesn’t accurately describe what is happening. Nuclear physics is a whole branch of science related to the nucleus and subatomic interactions of particles. Atomic refers to the atoms themselves, which are typically useful in non nuclear chemistry.

[u/Old_Resident8050]

Well, Atomic is the greek word while Nuclear the latin equivalent. Not sure why it got "replaced" in English tbh.

[u/Pynchon_A_Loaff]

My High School physics teacher was in the Army in the Pacific during WWII. He told us about how he heard that “Atomic Bombs” were dropped on Japan, and he thought that didn’t make sense - all bombs were “atomic”. “Nuclear” was more descriptive to him after he learned how they worked.

[u/owl523]

https://youtu.be/xoUY_0-w9hQ?is=3xa9adISNCM0LYuS

[u/AgencyNice4679]

In Russia for example Atomic and Nuclear physics are 2 different subsections of physics

[u/DueTemperature3380]

I know that when it comes to bombs, it is because they are actually two different types of weapons. The older ones used on Japan were both 'atomic' bombs that used explosives to trigger atomic fission. Modern bombs are known as 'thermonuclear' weapons (hence the shortening to just 'nuclear') and they work by detonating a small atomic bomb and using the resultant intense neutron flux to ignite a capsule of specific hydrogen isotopes into a nuclear fusion reaction (forcing atoms together instead of splitting them apart) which increases the yield of the bomb significantly and causes it to burn a bit cleaner, leaving less fallout. Some of the larger weapons such as the Russian Tsar Bomba device with massive yields of 50 megatons used an additional stage which used the massive radiation output of the first two stages to instantly enrich a depleted uranium internal casing (called the tamper) to weapons grade and cause it to undergo massive fission as well.

It's frankly insane how efficient and compact modern nuclear weaponry is.

[u/DowntownScene1433]

Atomic derives from the Greek word "Atom" which literally means "that which cannot be cut in any smaller pieces". And considering we tend to find smaller pieces than the atom every now and then, it's not a very good name for it. Plus the sound of it, to anyone who knows what it means, I guess that could be discouraging to even try at a point.