You know, the guy who wrote Star Maker, that novel in which a man wondering if all intelligent species just destroy themselves is taken on a trip through spacetime to see that, indeed, they probably do. Sometimes the news puts me in mind of him, and I wonder what he’d say or write if he saw this:
THE SPECTRE of a nuclear race in the Middle East was raised yesterday when six Arab states announced that they were embarking on programmes to master atomic technology.
Then again, there’s always Martin Rees.