Szilard predicted the development of the bomb would end major war, and he was mostly right for the right reasons, though he envisioned a UN-type organization to control the bombs. And he was one of the first to understand the potential for fission chain reaction once nuclear physics got underway. And he was involved in its development. I think Ilya would be happy to be compared to him.

Bohr, too, had pretty good predictions about the implications of the bomb.

Oppenheimer seemed to understand some of the implications but was happy to leave the policy stuff to the government, and not too try to influence anything like Bohr and Szilard tried to do.

Teller just wanted to keep pushing the tech bigger and bigger.

So the inventors had all sorts of different predictions and values, same as here. Some better than others.

I agree that you shouldn't ask the inventor just because they invented the gadget. But at least in the Manhattan project the scientists were in a very strong position that if they refuse to co-operate, the bomb just won't happen (soon enough). And for that you'd want inventors versed in the wider implications.

One difference from that era is probably that interest in wider philosophy and politics was encouraged from academics. E.g. the "giants of modern physics" (Oppenheimer, Einstein, Bohr etc) took great interest and scholarship in philosophy and societal issues whereas nowadays, as you said, there's practically 0% of the inventor of the gadget to understand the issues. They should "shut up and calculate", and leave the philosophy to philosophers and the societal impact to economists.

A problem is that philosophers and economists don't really understand the technology and its ramifications, and are heavily influenced by the hype. And philosophers have very little power to influence anyway. There are valid reasons for such specialization, but it has drawbacks.

It’s obvious in hindsight, but can we really say with certainty that things would have been exactly the same if the inventors did or said nothing? I’m not willing to take that bet.

To me, effort such as this is always worth it, even if it DOES have no effect, because the chance it can change things for the better is worth it.

There's still plenty of anthropocene left for them to be right. At least I hope there is.