Hacker News Reader

Comment by maxharris | Hacker News Reader

Nuclear armageddon almost happened multiple times in the past. To think it can’t happen is a necessary step in ensuring that it does.

View on HN

Huh? The inversion (assuming it can happen) doesn't protect you... so I wouldn't call it "necessary".

Edit

Otherwise you end up with a nice contradiction: "how could this happen?! I was assuming it could happen, so it really shouldn't have!

the inversion may be necessary but not sufficient condition. I don't think you've exposed a logic flaw in OP statement (we can still discuss whether we grant them the premise)

And those are the ones that we know about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily_Arkhipov

I just added couple more, here are the video versions:

Stanislav Petrov: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7EmLf4Xlq0

Oleg Antonovich Gordievsky: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yprpoPc2g0k

Vasili Arkhipov: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLokpu4ixQE

According to some comments "The Collapse Of Communism: The Untold Story" is a movie about Oleg Antonovich Gordievsky and there is a book "The Spy and the Traitor."

And Stanislav Petrov has a movie as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTFUqnY3E3Q

The Petrov movie you linked to, The Man Who Saved The World (2014) is a very good documentary. In it, among other things, Petrov meets his favourite actor, Kevin Costner, who asks him how many people would have died had he followed orders. Petrov says, everybody. Also he gets an award at the UN and visits a US missile silo. With reenactments of him saving the world.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2277106/

Reply on news.ycombinator.com