Where are all the nuclear experts?

The idea this week: nuclear war remains a horrifying possibility — our new nuclear career review examines what you could be doing about it.

Here at 80,000 Hours, we’re often trying to find ways to protect future generations.

If we’d been trying to do that in 1950, one thing would have been at the top of everyone’s minds: the terrifying threat of nuclear annihilation. Indeed, many of the world’s greatest thinkers, politicians, and communicators devoted their careers to understanding and reducing the threat — people like Thomas Schelling, Carl Sagan and even, in his later years, Albert Einstein.

But since the end of the Cold War, the nuclear expert has all but disappeared.

And that’s a problem.

It’s a problem because the risk of nuclear war didn’t just disappear with the Cold War.

In fact, the world is currently facing many nuclear challenges:

• The US is modernising its nuclear arsenal.
• China is on track to quintuple their nuclear forces by 2030.
• Cooling relations between the US and Russia mean that existing arms reduction treaties (like New START) are looking very likely to lapse.
• Rising tensions in the Middle East, alongside the collapse of the Iran deal, mean we could very possibly see a new nuclear weapons state in the near future.
• And all that’s before we start talking about the war in Ukraine.

In this new nuclear age, we’re going to really need those nuclear experts.

So, we spoke to some existing experts to find out what you could be doing with your career to help. For example, you could be:

• Working in governments, especially the US Congress, Department of Defense, and Department of Energy
• Researching crucial questions, like how to keep a nuclear war from escalating after the first bomb has gone off
• Carrying out large-scale advocacy, like rebuilding public support for nuclear reductions

We think that working to reduce nuclear risk could be one of the best things you could do with your career, which is why we’ve added “nuclear weapons safety and security” to our list of the highest-impact career paths our research has identified so far.

So, why not take a moment to explore how your talents can play a role in preventing nuclear catastrophe and preserving peace for generations to come.

Learn more:

• Our problem profile on nuclear war
• Our blog post on why you might not want to work on nuclear disarmament (and what to work on instead)
• The new nuclear age — a collection of articles on US nuclear arsenal in Scientific American
• Our article on why we should try to protect future generations