1,000Does not seem moderators agree, so I will not bother them again on this topic here or in the relevant markets, but I feel obligation to sum up my position.
The reasoning that “it’s a weapon, nuclear, but not a nuclear weapon” depends entirely on Cold War-era folk semantics rather than the literal or modern technical meaning of the phrase. During the mid-20th century, “nuclear weapon” was used almost exclusively to describe weapons whose warheads were nuclear. At that time, nuclear propulsion didn’t exist in missiles, so “nuclear weapon” and “nuclear warhead” effectively referred to the same thing.
That historical overlap created a linguistic trap: people began treating “nuclear weapon test” and “nuclear warhead test” as interchangeable - because in practice, they always were. But that equivalence no longer holds. Modern weapons technology has expanded what can make a weapon “nuclear”. A system like Burevestnik, powered by a nuclear reactor and designed to carry a nuclear warhead, clearly qualifies as a nuclear weapon under both the older and the broader, contemporary understanding.
Furthermore, the discussion has ignored the actual term used in the question - “test”. The phrase was nuclear weapon test, not nuclear detonation. A “test” does not require a nuclear explosion; it refers to the testing of a system or component. The Burevestnik launch was explicitly described as a test of a nuclear-powered nuclear-warhead-carrier missile - i.e., a test involving a nuclear weapon.
The proper, literal reading is straightforward: a nuclear weapon test occurred.
@Henry38hw I saw your comments here since this market got tagged for the mods, but I have absolutely no knowledge or opinion on the nuclear weapons test so don't consider this to have anything to do with the market at hand... I just feel like your comment here deserves a response on a more meta level.
In the case where you find that your vision of what a market is asking is not aligned with that of the market's creator (or in this case, perhaps the moderators on behalf of a missing creator), the first thing I would suggest is to look into operationalizing your interest in the topic into your own market. You can define a market with the criteria set up exactly how you wish, to answer whatever questions you have about the future. I can see you were wise enough to "avoid" buying up the market all the way to 99% -- it gives me confidence that you can create your own markets on related topics that will probably be better run than this one was.
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Second meta thing that I'm passionate about:
That feeling when you have bet on something, and then something happens in the world that is very close, but not exactly the same as what you bet on, kind of sucks. I tend to hesitate before betting on markets with some of these criteria:
Completely empty description
Inactive creator
Displayed percentage is extremely far away from my naive estimate
These kinds of markets seem to be the ones that cause the most unfun feelings. Before betting on them, I try to ask questions to get clarification so I know exactly what I'm betting on. Creators (and other participants) are often able to clarify things and then I'll know better. If I can't get a clear answer, I just move on (or make my own market if I really care).
I'm not sure if there is a way for the site to do better here, but in general I wish markets with no description were de-prioritized because it is generally a red flag that the market creator simple cares about it less than you do.
@Eliza there is a simple way to improve. Add a colorful tag "literal" and a tag "vibe". If the market is tagged literal, then it is resolved according to words. If the tag is Vibe, then the market is resolved according to intention/intuition/tradition_reading/something_abstract/spirit.
@mods you should make a decision here, since author is inactive.
Ap says it was nuclear-capable missile https://apnews.com/article/russia-missile-nuclear-test-launch-drills-burevestnik-dd6a424d6c545ad42848416b77e93619
Moscow times says it was launched in novaya zemlya
@Henry38hw yeah I looked at more articles here, too. consensus seems to be it was at Novaya Zemlya, but that it was a nuclear-powered missile, not a missile with a nuclear payload. Nuclear weapon testing is pretty strictly about weapons that use nuclear energy for the explosions, whereas this seems to use it for the propulsion. My call is that this doesn't resolve from this news
@Stralor when the wiki page was created they did not know nuclear power can/will be used for propulsion. (-_-)
I agree, that the missile Burevestnik might not have had a nuclear payload armed this time (I did not find elaborate article yet), but it is both nuclear-powered and nuclear-capable. It is designed to carry nuclear load. It works on nuclear power, which in my opinion makes it a nuclear weapon.
@Stralor there is not a word of detonation/explosion in the question.
I do acknowledge that some people are used to "nuclear weapon test" being used for explosions, since there were not other nuclear tests existing before. Should we be restricted by the old and narrow convention, which does not match its words directly?
@Stralor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9M730_Burevestnik?wprov=sfla1
Nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed cruise missile
@Stralor https://manifold.markets/MasterP05/russia-launches-a-nuclear-weapon-in?r=SGVucnkzOGh3 this question only asks about a launch, also should resolve yes
I do acknowledge that some people are used to "nuclear weapon test" being used for explosions, since there were not other nuclear tests existing before. Should we be restricted by the old and narrow convention, which does not match its words directly?
Yes. A weapon test is a categorical thing, and we should stick to those categories. This was, afaict, a propulsion test. Even if this missile could use a nuclear payload they weren't testing said nuclear payload.
Is the burevestnik a weapon?
Is burevestnik a nuclear weapon?
Was burevestnik tested?
I bet the author meant literal meaning, and not the wikipeadia outdated meaning.
@Henry38hw I promise you wikipedia's meaning is not outdated. I've made my call and I don't expect it to change based on the current evidence; we can reassess if new info comes to light
@Stralor ok, i understand your position.
Just curious, does manifold provide third opinion?
When i find some new osint later or new russian statements, can i call for another mod to review this? Just in case you will be biased to not change your stance.
@Stralor i believe you mess up "nuclear weapon test" and "nuclear warhead test" since wikipedia has never previously had a reason to distinguish such yet. All nuclear weapons were nuclear due to their warheads.
Just curious, does manifold provide third opinion?
When i find some new osint later or new russian statements, can i call for another mod to review this? Just in case you will be biased to not change your stance.
hah yeah of course you can ask for another mod review, but if we end up providing conflicting opinions it goes into a process we call a "mod panel" where we litigate it with a three mod jury and usually take awhile to come back with an answer. fwiw I'm not invested here and I'm doing my best to act as neutrally and objectively as possible. I have no reason to have bias here and I'd gladly resolve this now if I were convinced, I'm just not convinced.
i believe you mess up "nuclear weapon test" and "nuclear warhead test" since wikipedia has never previously had a reason to distinguish such yet. All nuclear weapons were nuclear due to their warheads.
this is a fair point! but this question was written before you might need to make the same distinction, so the issue also applies to the creator's intent. I have no reason to believe Kongo would have decided a nuclear-powered missile test w/o a nuclear warhead would qualify as a nuclear weapon test
@Henry38hw If Kongo told me that this qualified then yeah I'd accept that and resolve, but they left the site and asked for their account to be disassociated from them. I would encourage you to respect their wishes and NOT reach out.
I've shared this market with my fellow moderators and asked them to weigh in to give you peace of mind. I'll let you know if/when there's any change.
thanks @Stralor for adding clarity here, and for tagging the Mod team in
@Henry38hw, @EvanDaniel will chime in later today when he has the chance, and will add his input so it's all on record here on the market
@shankypanky My take on this:
Nuclear weapons have always meant weapons where the destructive energy comes from nuclear reactions. "More than half of energy release from fission / fusion" is a definition you'll find in common use on this site.
Nuclear-propelled weapons have been a thing far longer than this cruise missile. The US Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion program dates to 1946; this concept isn't new to anyone writing about the topic. Nuclear-propelled weapons aren't new to operational service, either; six countries operate nuclear submarines and two operate nuclear aircraft carriers. Similarly, dirty bombs are not "nuclear weapons" despite using nuclear material.
I think the most reasonable reading is that "nuclear weapon" is a noun phrase with a specific definition, not simply the combination of the two independently defined words. That's a fairly normal English construct, and not surprising to find in this use case.
If I was to take over management of this question, I'd use a definition like the above; I'd probably copy some text from some of my other nuclear weapons markets, as I don't see anything indicating that's a bad approach.
If someone else ran a question with approximately this title and defined nuclear weapons differently in the description, such that this test was included, that would be within the bounds of reasonable question writing as I understand it, and I'd be willing to support them doing that -- but I'd recommend they re-word it, and would be curious what definition would result in that but not count other nuclear-powered vehicles.