Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

We should stop running away from radiation

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 130 posts

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#81

Post by JanezStupar »

lispm wrote: post #74
JanezStupar wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't need storage sites. If we unstuck our heads from our asses we can just burn most of the waste. And you're talking like nuclear engineers are some sort of freaks just waiting to unleash the next horror upon the world. The fact is that if we want to realize UN millennium goals we need more energy. If we want to help poor asians and africans, we need more energy. If we want everybody to own a Xbox, a car and a…

Nuclear engineers are technocrats powered by corrupt politicians and corporations. The US does not need more energy. The US needs to start thinking about using less energy. About every country in the industrialized world uses MUCH MUCH less energy. If you think the US lifestyle is sustainable, then you are dreaming. Renewable will fully power us here in Germany in 40 years or less. We have started a decade ago workin…

Dude:

1. I'm not from US - and I wasn't speaking about US. I was speaking about rest of the world. Which whether you like it or not wants to live american lifestyle.

2. Current american model is indeed sustainable if we manage to bring cost of energy (total cost, including intangibles) to a low enough level.

3. I also try to minimize my impact upon world by using as few resources as I can. Being economic is fine and good. But it won't solve all our problems.

4. You resorted to an ad-hominem attack upon my person you also dared to insult me by calling me fucking lazy - when all I wanted to hear from you is what kind of alternative you propose.

5. I'm not denying that substantial progress has been made in the field of renewable power sources. The problem is that its just not enough.

6. You are vehemently claiming that Germany will be completely on renewables in 40 years. Thats what green power lobies claim. Green power is also a huge industry. Never forget that.

edit: Calling an engineer technocrat just shows that you don't even understand either the meaning of the word "engineer" or either "technocrat" for that matter.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#82

Post by gommm »

Tichy wrote: post #80

Stopped reading at "more people have died from the Tsunami", which unfortunately was line one. if you want to make an argument about radiation, make it - Tsunamis have nothing to do with it, I don't think they are radioactive.

The blurb at the top is not always written by the same writer as the article...

But even with that said, why doesn't it make sense to compare the number of casualties and damages between different accidents? It's a way to put things into perspective. People have in general a rather faulty sense of proportion and understanding of statistics.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#83

Post by gommm »

VladRussian wrote: post #71

the moron who wrote the article doesn't know what he's talking about: >Nuclear technology cures countless cancer patients every day - and a radiation dose given for radiotherapy in hospital is no different in principle to a similar dose received in the environment. From http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/coping/radiation-therapy-... : "Late side effects may first occur 6 or more months after radiation therapy is over…

And this is with a dose of around 20,000mSv. He recommends setting the limit at 100 mSv/year with a lifelong limit of 5,000 mSv.

I also agree shadowsun7, you could cut down on the name calling and be a bit more civilized in your comments. It doesn't contribute anything to the conversation but weakens your message.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#84

Post by shadowsun7 »

VladRussian wrote: post #79
shadowsun7 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That moron who wrote the article is a nuclear and medical physicist at the University of Oxford. From the HN comment guidelines: When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3." Judging from your comment history, you seem to enjoy calling names more than you do providing arguments.

your post didn't provide any contra argument, instead you went for personal attack and "karma-bombing".

A counter-argument to what, exactly? You took a statement that he made, concluded that he was a 'moron who does not know what he's talk about', and then backed that summary statement up with a lifted quote from cancer.gov that had nothing to do to the original statement?

Allison's statement is accurate: a single radiation dose is similar in principle to one received from the environment. His over-arching point is that we don't regard radiation doses in the hospital as scary, taboo and dangerous, and yet we regard any environmental dose as toxic and worth panicking over. The rest of the article lays down his arguments for this view.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#85

Post by lispm »

JanezStupar wrote: post #81
lispm wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear engineers are technocrats powered by corrupt politicians and corporations. The US does not need more energy. The US needs to start thinking about using less energy. About every country in the industrialized world uses MUCH MUCH less energy. If you think the US lifestyle is sustainable, then you are dreaming. Renewable will fully power us here in Germany in 40 years or less. We have started a decade ago workin…

Dude: 1. I'm not from US - and I wasn't speaking about US. I was speaking about rest of the world. Which whether you like it or not wants to live american lifestyle. 2. Current american model is indeed sustainable if we manage to bring cost of energy (total cost, including intangibles) to a low enough level. 3. I also try to minimize my impact upon world by using as few resources as I can. Being economic is fine and…

Look, the 40 year plan is an official plan of the current conservative government. If it is a huge business, well, fuck, that's the plan. We want green technology to be the huge growth industry for the next decades. Making money with that is the plan.

Technocracy means for example that engineers are the decision makers. Here in Germany the decision to invest billions into nuclear energy has been supported and promoted by engineers and scientists in all levels of government, government funded research institutes and universities and by companies using their influence on government.

This faulty advice has cost us billions and has left us with some industry ruins and fucked up attempts on storing nuclear waste.

Ordinary people are protesting against this for decades.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#86

Post by JanezStupar »

lispm wrote: post #85
JanezStupar wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude: 1. I'm not from US - and I wasn't speaking about US. I was speaking about rest of the world. Which whether you like it or not wants to live american lifestyle. 2. Current american model is indeed sustainable if we manage to bring cost of energy (total cost, including intangibles) to a low enough level. 3. I also try to minimize my impact upon world by using as few resources as I can. Being economic is fine and…

Look, the 40 year plan is an official plan of the current conservative government. If it is a huge business, well, fuck, that's the plan. We want green technology to be the huge growth industry for the next decades. Making money with that is the plan. Technocracy means for example that engineers are the decision makers. Here in Germany the decision to invest billions into nuclear energy has been supported and promote…

I totally agree with this last comment.

However - I have two major issues with it.

1. You assume that green technocracy is "better" than current technocracy. Or are you proposing that we let hysteric extremist (fascist?) wing of green take over?

2. The largest issue of nuclear power is that people who are declaratively for saving environment block any and all attempts to improve current situation. In this sense - the greens are at fault for Fukushima. Otherwise this plant would be probably dismantled 10 years ago and replaced with more modern and safer model. The same goes for nuclear waste - green is playing an extremely dangerous game of trying to prove that the problem of nuclear waste is insolvable, by obstructing any attempts of solution.

3. In retrospective - show me single plan created by bureaucrats that stood the test of time.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#87

Post by innes »

callmevlad wrote: post #27
daeken wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you seen the actual numbers of this, and seen them put into perspective? I'd strongly recommend looking at http://xkcd.org/radiation/ -- he puts the data into an easy to relate to format.

Yes, I mostly understand the scale of radiation we're currently dealing with in Japan, and it's mostly on the "safer" side. However, my issue is with taking an accident that deformed countless children, caused countless cases of cancer, and in general completely devastated the lives of (hundreds of) thousands of people - and essentially using it in a "How I Stopped Worrying and Love the Bomb" argument to get people t…

Hang on, chernobyl deformed countless children? Countless as in "too many to count", or faultless as in "i can't help indulging in hyperbole".

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#88

Post by lispm »

DennisP wrote: post #78
lispm wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fast breeders are dead. Nobody is building them anymore here. In Germany the attempt to build one cost several billions and it is now an amusement park.

Yes, people like you killed them.

Not really, they killed themselves. France is a huge fan of nuclear energy. What are they building now? Not a breeder.

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#89

Post by moe »

ckuehne wrote: post #49
callmevlad wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I mostly understand the scale of radiation we're currently dealing with in Japan, and it's mostly on the "safer" side. However, my issue is with taking an accident that deformed countless children, caused countless cases of cancer, and in general completely devastated the lives of (hundreds of) thousands of people - and essentially using it in a "How I Stopped Worrying and Love the Bomb" argument to get people t…

It was a great tragedy. But neither was the the number of deformed children nor the number of cases of cancer "countless". There have been put numbers on it [1]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster#Assessing_th...

And which number is the right one?

According to your link:

  - UNSCEAR claims 6000 cases of cancer.
  - IAEA claims 4000 deaths
  - Greenpeace claims 200,000 deaths
  - IPPNW claims 10,000 - 50,000 cases of cancer
  - New York Academy of Sciences claims 985,000 deaths

Re: We should stop running away from radiation

#90

Post by lispm »

JanezStupar wrote: post #86
lispm wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, the 40 year plan is an official plan of the current conservative government. If it is a huge business, well, fuck, that's the plan. We want green technology to be the huge growth industry for the next decades. Making money with that is the plan. Technocracy means for example that engineers are the decision makers. Here in Germany the decision to invest billions into nuclear energy has been supported and promote…

I totally agree with this last comment. However - I have two major issues with it. 1. You assume that green technocracy is "better" than current technocracy. Or are you proposing that we let hysteric extremist (fascist?) wing of green take over? 2. The largest issue of nuclear power is that people who are declaratively for saving environment block any and all attempts to improve current situation. In this sense - the…

The greens are definitely not fascist. I think you are confusing this. Fascist is the influence of huge corporations over people. Not the influence of people over themselves.

Wow, Fukushima is caused by the Greens now? And I though it was caused by a greedy and incompetent company not willing to invest into safety.

No company would invest into a newer model. These are extremely expensive. Like 5 billion Euro in western Europe. Every electricity company is talking about EXTENDING the life of the current plants. Replacing old ones which are running with new ones is the most stupid thing an electricity company can do. What they want is getting the money from the existing plants with as little effort as possible.

Post reply on HN