From Rhodes, R., The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Touchstone (Simon and Schuster), 1988, p. 282
quoting Clark, R.W., The Greatest Power on Earth, Harper-Row, 1980 , p. 86
quoting Rudolf Peierls:
For example, if I throw a ball at a glass window one square foot in area, there may be one chance in ten that the window will break, and nine chances in ten that the ball will just bounce. In the physicist's language, this particular window, for a ball thrown in this particular way, has a "disintegration cross section" of 1/10 square foot and an "elastic cross-section" of 9/10 square foot.
nuc/crosssectionanalogy.htm - 6 Jan 2000, Jim
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