Charting How We Talk About Our Nuclear Age

In the storied history of human language, the idea of nuclear energy has been around for less than a blink of an eye. But even in that relatively short time, the way we’ve discussed all things nuclear has evolved dramatically.

The Atlantic Monthly takes a stab at charting those changes using the Google Ngram Viewer, which displays how often words and phrases have occurred in selected books over the years. Reactor vs Radiation? Atomic Bomb vs Nuclear Power? Intriguing stuff, although I can’t help but wish they’d pitted all of the above against Nuclear Man. [The Atlantic]