Living beyond our means: the nitrogen edition

How did a recently-promoted German janitor use uranium to change the course of history and prove the President of British Association for the Advancement of Science right? In his 1898 presidential address, Sir William Crookes told the Association that: “England and all civilised nations stand in deadly peril of not having enough to eat … the land that will grow wheat is absolutely dependent on difficult and capricious natural phenomena … It is through the laboratory that starvation may ultimately be turned into plenty… The fixation of atmospheric nitrogen is one of the great discoveries, awaiting the genius of chemists.” The genius was Fritz Haber, who has renounced his Judaism in the hope of getting a university job. More...