Science and sensibility

Prime TV has been running a series listing New Zealands's top 100 history makers. Suffering as the series did in' third network conditions' it didn't come across my radar until last week but I found the names and the stories that made up the top 25 pretty interesting - who knew Peter Snell's 800 metres record (run on cinders) would have won silver at last year's olympics?

The final was tonight and I was rather surprised and very pleased to see the panel chose Ernest Rutherford to top the list. Of course my surprise wasn't due to any lack of achievement on Rutherford's part - he is, after all, universally acknowledged as the father of the nuclear age, could have won three Nobel Prizes, was called a 'second Newton by Einstein and is one of 11 people to have a chemical element named after him. I was surprised because New Zealanders in general don't celebrate his achievements as we should. In fact the problem that New Zealanders have with Rutherford were neatly summed up by the response of two of the panelists. Raybon Kan thought that if kiwis were really proud of Rutherford we would not be proud of our nuclear free stance. .Llistener columnist Douglas Lloyd-Jenkins (who started by saying he 'doesn't get science') was even more ridiculous and said he didn't see why we should celebrate the man who found out how to blow up the world or words to that effect. For some reason New Zealanders have utterly associated Rutherford with nuclear energy (which we are justifiably not big fans of) and not allowed themselves to realise the amazing things he did.

1. He was the first to explain the physical phenomena at generate the effects of radioactivity. It was this work AND NOT SPLITTING THE ATOM that won him the 1908 Nobel Prize for Chemistry
2. By bouncing those radioactive particles off gold atoms and recording the results he became the first person to understand that atom had a small nucleus that was surrounded largely by empty space. Close you eyes and think of an atom. Presuming you don't know too much quantum physics you just thought of the Rutherford model of the atom.
3. He was the first successful alchemist. Rutherford fired radioactive particles into the nucleus of a Nitrogen atom, this caused the Nitrogen to become unstable and fire out a proton, becoming an Oxygen molecule. He described this experiment as 'playing at marbles'

New Zealander's confused attitude to Rutherford comes from the fact that that last experiment is sometimes referred to as Rutherford's 'splitting of the atom' and we all know what happens when we split an atom.

I don't actually think splitting the atom is a good way to describe what Rutherford did, but it is important to note that it was the first time that nucleus of an atom was deliberately altered. Rutherford's break-throughs did set the scene for other scientists who would later create nuclear bombs but associating him with nuclear weapons would be like like associating Newton with cannons because accurate ballistics relies on his laws of motion. Just a bit stupid.

New Zealanders should embrace our greatest son without confusion. The first mind to ever really comprehend the things that form our reality, the atoms that make us all and everything we see, was a kiwi one. That's something we should be very proud of.