Dr. Ivana Nikolić Hughes, Director of Columbia University’s Frontiers of Science program and President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and Steven Starr, former Director of the University of Missouri’s Clinical Laboratory Science Program, discuss the reality of the nuclear threat.
They review the scale of nuclear weapons from Hiroshima’s 15-kiloton bomb to modern thermonuclear warheads, including Russia’s 57,000-kiloton Tsar Bomb and the 100-megaton Poseidon drone. The conversation covers nuclear blast effects, firestorms, heat, radiation, and the long-term impacts of isotopes such as Iodine-131, Strontium-90, Cesium-137, and Plutonium-239.
Hughes and Starr highlight the potential for nuclear winter and widespread starvation from regional or global nuclear conflicts. They stress that no political or national goal is worth risking the destruction of most life on Earth.
Watch the full interview on Neutrality Studies!
