What is it like to design weap-ons of mass annihilation? How do the people who produce such weapons justify their work? MIT anthropology professor Hugh Gusterson spent two and a half years at the Lawrence Livermore Labs, where scientists have been creating atomic weapons since 1952, and his book Nuclear Rites addresses those questions. Gusterson began as a nuclear peace activist, then was struck by how much he personally liked a Livermore scientist he debated. Nuclear Rites works to view the researchers as complex human beings rather than as caricatured Dr. Strange-loves, and examines how they form their identities as bomb designers.

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