For a brilliant scientist, the allure of the Strategic Defense Initiative is hard to resist: Star Wars traffics in some of the most challenging problems in physics, assuages the con-science by promoting defensive weapons and offers funding the likes of which haven't been seen since the Apollo program. But no less a scientist than the architect of the X-ray laser that inspired SDI has decided that he can resist it all.
... Peter Hagelstein resigned from Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, a top weapons center, sold his house, called the lab to say he had the flu and slipped into hiding. Next month he joins the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, his alma mater, as an untenured associate professor ...
