# Tsar Bomba vs Aids **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 3, 2014, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275 "2014-10-03T14:33:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2014, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/21 "2014-10-04T12:25:09Z")
All you’d do is delay the emergence, so no. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2014, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/22 "2014-10-04T14:26:48Z")
I’d vote to drop, even if the target was Jerusalem. Or Kansas City. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2014, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/23 "2014-10-04T22:46:19Z")
> [@Heracles](#): > > \ > Uh, French? Wasn’t the Congo Belgian? > \ Nope, it was [both](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Congo). There’s a reason the other bit was called the _Belgian_ Congo and not just the Congo - it was to distinguish it from the French one. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2014, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/24 "2014-10-04T22:47:26Z")
> [@Mr.Kobayashi](#): > > He _wasn’t_?! Trick question - there _were_ no good guys in _Watchmen_ 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 8:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/25 "2014-10-05T08:52:23Z")
I’m not sure I understand why so many people think ‘it would have just emerged anyway’, if the disease historically emerged in a specific geographical area and there is no evidence it emerged elsewhere on the African continent and we destroyed that geographical area completely isn’t there a good chance that really would stop the disease in its tracks? Leaving the morality of the act aside. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 10:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/26 "2014-10-05T10:44:29Z")
> [@Disposable Hero](#): > > I’m not sure I understand why so many people think ‘it would have just emerged anyway’, if the disease historically emerged in a specific geographical area and there is no evidence it emerged elsewhere on the African continent and we destroyed that geographical area completely isn’t there a good chance that really would stop the disease in its tracks? > > Leaving the morality of the act aside. A bomb just isn’t going to destroy that much area. The region we are discussing is enormous. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/27 "2014-10-05T11:39:19Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > A bomb just isn’t going to destroy that much area. The region we are discussing is enormous. OK, I must have misunderstood how defined the area of origin had been narrowed down to. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/28 "2014-10-05T11:58:31Z")
If we set nukes aside and re-frame this question as, “Is it ethical to kill 100,000 innocent people to save 36 million lives?” then it becomes a simpler decision. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/29 "2014-10-05T12:00:31Z")
But then we’d want to know if it could \*truly \*be guaranteed that that nuking would eradicate AIDS for sure. If the answer is “not 100% sure,” then it’s a far more complex question. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/30 "2014-10-05T12:48:35Z")
It is an abhorrent hypothetical. One of the things that allowed HIV to spread as widely as it did in the US, and not be taken seriously, was the in the US, mostly gay men and IV drug users had it in the beginning, and people couldn’t be assed to see past their noses that this would eventually be a problem for everyone. I remember being 15, and first learning about AIDS, and being shocked that no matter what people’s view on homosexuality was, they weren’t sandbagging the levies. I was too naive to realize that a lot of people actually truly believed their deity have brought a plague of gay people, and being heterosexual literally protected them from it. Even when Ryan White went public, it didn’t help all that much-- a little, but not that much-- because he was considered somehow collateral damage from gayness, since clearly he had gotten HIV from a gay blood donor (or maybe a drug users, but same difference). Magic Johnson going public really changed public perception. There was someone famous who contracted AIDS through heterosexual contact. What we need to change history is someone famous, and not just famous, but on-a-pedestal famous (not gay, no checkered past, and preferably a white non-Jew), and young to get AIDS through definite sexual contact, or unknown means (ie, a non-drug user with no recent blood transfusion). If you really want to go back in history, you are going to have to go back and stick someone with a dirty needle. I’m thinking JFK, jr., since we already know his life will be cut short, and without issue. He had HIV, that might knock people out of their complacency that “I can’t get it,” and “heterosexuality is my vaccine,” and into a “Let’s fund research now!” Now, I’m not going to do this, and I’m not suggesting anyone else do it, I’m just saying this is what it’s gonna take, and that the bomb scenario isn’t the best plan. Other people have already spelled out what is wrong with the bomb scenario. ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/31 "2014-10-05T13:33:08Z")
With my time machine, I go back to 1920 and single highhandedly kill every single Jew in Europe. Hitler never gets into power and WWII never happens. I just saved 75 million lives. Go me! ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/32 "2014-10-05T14:23:11Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > If we set nukes aside and re-frame this question as, “Is it ethical to kill 100,000 innocent people to save 36 million lives?” then it becomes a simpler decision. > [@Velocity](#): > > But then we’d want to know if it could \*truly \*be guaranteed that that nuking would eradicate AIDS for sure. If the answer is “not 100% sure,” then it’s a far more complex question. We’d also want to know if there is anything else we could do to reduce or eliminate the AIDS deaths, something perhaps that didn’t involve killing innocent people. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2014, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/33 "2014-10-05T18:28:26Z")
> [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](#): > > With my time machine, I go back to 1920 and single highhandedly kill every single Jew in Europe. Hitler never gets into power and WWII never happens. I just saved 75 million lives. Go me! Nuking Munich in 1920 might do the trick more efficiently—interestingly, [that’s apparently when it had a population of 666,000](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth_of_Munich#From_1369_to_1944). ---
**Author:** ![Heracles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heracles/32/487_2.png) [@Heracles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heracles)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/34 "2014-10-06T09:49:54Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Nope, it was [both](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Congo). There’s a reason the other bit was called the _Belgian_ Congo and not just the Congo - it was to distinguish it from the French one. I stand corrected. I had always thought it was called the Belgian Congo because it was Belgium’s main colony and they wanted to show it off. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/35 "2014-10-06T10:46:56Z")
I voted yes just to set a precedent of nuking other large unpleasant groups of people. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/36 "2014-10-06T12:22:22Z")
> [@LouisB](#): > > I voted yes just to set a precedent of nuking other large unpleasant groups of people. What was unpleasant about the denizens of 1920s Kinshasha? ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/37 "2014-10-06T12:28:34Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > What was unpleasant about the denizens of 1920s Kinshasha? Well—wanton chimpanzee poachers, evidently. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/38 "2014-10-06T12:50:13Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > It is an abhorrent hypothetical. Should I bin the one I was gonna do about the car crash fire, the kid stuck in glue and you with a gun? And it’s Christmas. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2014, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275/39 "2014-10-06T12:55:24Z")
> [@Ranchoth](#): > > Well—wanton chimpanzee poachers, evidently. Although [that’s the excuse I’d have given](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnGakbprjgE). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsar-bomba-vs-aids/700275.md?page=1)