RADIOCARBON AND ATMOSPHERIC 14CO2 PIONEER ATHOL RAFTER

ABSTRACT Direct atmospheric 14CO2 measurements began in New Zealand in 1954, initially to improve 14C as a dating tool, but quickly evolving into a method for understanding the carbon cycle. These early 14CO2 measurements immediately demonstrated the existence of an “Atom Bomb Effect,” as well as an “Industrial Effect.” These two gigantic tracer experiments have been utilized via 14CO2 measurements over the years to produce a wealth of knowledge in multiple research fields including atmospheric carbon cycle research, oceanography, soil science, and aging of post-bomb materials.

National War Heritage at the Australian War Memorial and Hiroshima Peace Park

Much material heritage is marked by national memorials to war and its heroes. This article considers two examples that commemorate aspects of defeat, loss, and military disaster in war – the Australian War Memorial and attached museum and the museum and Peace Park at Hiroshima Japan. For Australians, the nation became a recognisable entity in the wake of disastrous defeat at Gallipoli in World War I. The physical manifestation of that heritage combines a solemn mausoleum with a massive and expanding museum that celebrates all Australia’s war contributions since then. For Japan, the peace park in Hiroshima focuses on the civilian heritage of the atom bomb Americans dropped in August 1945. Unlike the Australian Memorial, there is no celebration of war, soldiers, or militarism at the Peace Park. This article explores the differences, similarities, ironies, and contradictions of war heritages built out of crushing instances of loss rather than national moments of victory.

Jaspers als Zeitdiagnostiker

For a number of writings of Jaspers it is significant that they imply diagnoses (or critical reflections) about some cultural and political tendencies and events during his lifetime. Those diagnoses becomes evident in the books “Man in modern Age”, “The Question of German Guilt”, “The Atom bomb and the Future of Man” or “The Future of Mankind”, and “The Future of Germa- ny”. There Jaspers treated in a critical mode: inhuman consequences of the development of modern sciences und techniques, the guilt of German people for the rise of Naziism, the danger of the extinction of all mankind by the atom-bomb, the abolition of individual freedom and human dignity by totali- tarian governments, the introduction of a new constitution for West-Germany without an open and broader discussion and cooperation with the German people a. s. o. That those critical diagnoses are grounded in a liberal ethos of freedom and humanity in Jaspers’ philosophy is the main thesis of this article.