Yes with this, I was talking about weapons that theoretically could exist, but we don't know if what we think could work will, because just researching it isn't practical. However, if that weren't the case, we absolutely would be researching things like neutronium bombs, and such.

50s were also sorta time of finding out what practical limits were, but when Teller showed them 1000Mt device USAF decided that it's a bit too much, couple Mt is plenty. when USAF tells you it's too much boom you might have gone insane

other than that, Teller was a fucking asshole, he stole credit for other's people's work, he clinged to his own failed ideas against evidence (that makes him a shitty scientist), despised Carl Sagan, he was responsible for getting Oppenheimer out of Los Alamos, also a schemer and a rabid mccarthyist the entire time. so maybe you're onto something

if he was worse at physics he'd be probably setting acetylene bottles on fire in some field or something like this