"On the contrary, I would argue that the problem with nuclear power is that, as is becoming increasingly clear, people's fears about it are *justified*."
Nonsense. All significant accidents have happened in old (in some cases, 3 "generations" old) technology plants, and sometimes human error was a major component.
But, in fairness to the parent poster, human error, slackness in applying regulations, construction short-cuts etc. will always be a risk. Of course newer designs are much safer, and FWIW I am pro-nuclear, but is it really nonsense to say that people's fears are justified?
I understand your resistance to regulation. But I just wonder:
We need people to stop accepting being lied to.
Could this be wishful thinking? How would you actually achieve this? To take TFA as an example: how would people ever find out they'd been lied to in this case, without being knowledgable about the workings of computers?
I assume you meant "water prevents dehydration"...? Well, maybe the EU wasn't so stupid there. If you are actually dehydrated (i.e. not just thirsty), then water will not fix the problem. This is why you don't give pure water to a diarrhoea sufferer.
Now of course regulation can be taken too far. But at the moment, the advertising industry has way too much a free hand. Here in the UK, the worst punishment that seems to be handed out is "don't do it again".
IT, food, cars - most things are actually way too complicated to be understood by an average layman. And that's before we factor in some of the subtle not-quite-lies and suggestive techniques that advertisers seem to love.
And the more I see of this kind of thing, the more I'm convinced that we need stronger regulation of advertising. A free market can only work if people are informed about what they are buying. Putting out misinformation damages the free market.
You put forth an argument regarding safety of NP and asked "what about it?", I told you I think it's bullshit and argued why, now you fork off about a question of price.
If your best low-risk alternative is prohibitively expensive, it's not much good, is it?
My point is that regarding risks and impact on life of each energy generation technology, intrinsic risks (basically, the worst case) as well as mitigated risks (i.e., the best we can do) need to be properly assessed and compared. Comparing intrinsic risks of coal to mitigated risks of NP doesn't bring much.
So the history of NP up until now is "the best we can do"? Whatever, when you actually bring some facts to the table instead of sitting there calling everything BS we can actually have a discussion.
As many nuclear fanatics on this site, you sound to me as a very angry, choleric person, not as much interested in trying to figure out a rational answer to the specific question of what energy politics would be best for humanity as inn winning a dick contest where "your" technology would so much better than "my " technology. You say "look harder" but it appears to me that dismissing people's concerns about NP as ridiculous would also need some reevaluation, especially in light of recent events.
Stop trying to argue by mind-reading. After a rant like that, I don't know how you've got the nerve to accuse anyone else of being angry.
The page conveniently doesn't mention concentrated solar power, which is obviously the safest and cleanest, if possibly not the cheapest, way of producing usable energy bar none.
You can say that again. $0.12 to $0.18 per kwh? Plus you're comparing a cutting-edge tech, which about half of world capacity installed in 2010 (!), with nuclear technologies that have been around for 50 years.
However the price is high as long as externalities are not considered. The true price of energy generation for humanity once each and every components are taken into account (pollution, accidents, politics, crime, hidden costs) is still to be determined with precision imho. My bet is that on the very long term, i.e., if humanity is to survive a couple centuries, most energy will come from solar. Nuclear power will possibly be part of the mix but not in the form we're doing it today.
This is as clear a case of special pleading as I've ever seen. So your suggested solution is "obviously" better because of something we can't yet calculate. Brilliant.
Nobody would fall from any roof if construction regulations that are enforced with NP would be applied to roofing.
You don't realise how ridiculous this sounds? Chernobyl woudn't have happened if people stuck to regulations. What's your point?
No, it's partisan bullshit, at least in part. We should all aim at the truth, not at advancing our own agenda / pet technology. Renewable energy is not "my tech" like some other asshat said somewhere, neither is nuclear power the devil. I'm simply looking
Look harder. You've spread quite a bit of bullshit of your own.
The fact that it's using figures regarding the Chernobyl death toll that were later admitted as bogus and recanted should ring a bell.
But even if you use the revised WHO figure, the death rate is still lower than all other technologies. So your point, while valid, doesn't change the argument.
Also the notion of counting roof falls as a consequence of solar energy sounds to the very least like an extremely contrived argument to me, if not outright partisan bullshit.
Why? Panels have to be installed in order to be used. How do you suggest that should be done? Not only that, but the blog author suggests ways that the risk from PV installation could be brought down - hardly a partisan attack piece.
However the fact that I'm able to easily spot a few glaring crocks in an argument unfortunately doesn't make me magically able to come with better figures.
And that right there is your problem. You've called bullshit a few times but you don't have any better information yourself, and the "crocks" you think you've spotted are not the big news you seem to think. Maybe that's why it gets "cited by each and every nuclear apologist on Slashdot" - it's a helpful contribution to our understanding of the risks.
And read my other posts, it's not just about money and it's not just about numbers of people dying. It's about not having millions of people have to worry about the nasty shit that is nuclear power and the waste from it.
I've read your other posts. Nowhere have you posted anything to do with risk per unit of electricity generated. And the Inquisitr "article" that you linked to - did you actually read it? No sources or numbers there either. If people have to worry, then could that be because of baseless scaremongering like yours?
Lack of interest, lack of expertise, laziness, you name it. I would love to read some non-partisan assessment of the options regarding energy generation, including an objective estimation of the price and risk of each technology...
Meaning that you haven't already done so? So what was your source for criticising the blog I linked to? If those numbers were wrong, where are your better numbers?
You're missing the point. People being pissed off, while bad for them, is not a basis for energy policy. I've asked you and another poster to give some actual numbers to compare the risks of different forms of electricity generation and no-one is doing it. So all we have at the moment are the numbers I posted, showing nuclear to be the safest option. If you feel so strongly then why don't you post some evidence for everyone to see?
If we're talking about safety, then deaths per unit of electricity generated is a VERY relevant measure. If you have better figures, then let's see them so we can understand what you're talking about. Otherwise, you're just throwing numbers about (500 million Europeans! ZOMG!) which don't actually mean anything.
You are right, but that is why we have democratic accountability - so people can have a say in choosing the best form of electricity generation. Ignoring the fact that nuclear power actually kills fewer people doesn't help.
You should award yourself the Nobel prize for failing to cite any sources. What about this one as an illustration of how "safe" your favoured energy sources are in comparison to nuclear?
Free speech dioes not mean you can say what you like without any consequences, it just means the governmen can't prevent you from saying things in advance.
What? As long as the Government restricts itself to punishing after the fact, free speech is not impeded? That's a crazy position.
"Agenda" in English comes from the feminine agenda and is already a correct singular term. If anything, the plural would be agendae. I'm not sure if that error means anything to either of our points, but I find it modestly ironic.
Erm, no. It's the neuter plural of agendus, gerundive of agere ("to do"), with the literal meaning of "things to be done". The irony runs in the opposite direction, I'm afraid.
I never meant to pick on any one example in particular; the plurality of "data" is merely an instance of an instance of a set of reminders. Obviously, if "data" spends the rest of time used as a mass noun, it's not the end of the world. The example was simply relevant at the time and used to illustrate a point about the decay of such reminders. Latin plurals are not innately superior in any way; merely an additional token.
As for the relationship between the loss of reminders and the loss of civilization: it's symbolic. The reminders were added to English out of respect for the people who led the way to creating civilization; losing them indicates diminished respect [...]
Look, you're really going to have to evidence these sweeping statements about respect and decay and so on. We can't know for sure what people's motivation was in borrowing words from Latin, but I might equally well suggest: lending a scholarly air to technical vocabulary; acting as a shibboleth to weed out the less-well educated; or just the availability of a handy foreign language as a source for neologisms. If you want to instill respect for the past, then for goodness' sake teach history or classics; don't try to hold back linguistic evolution like some romanophilic version of King Cnut. You're giving classical education a bad name!
Right, I get where you're coming from, but you're not doing your argument any favours by using some of these hyperbolic comparisons. The Library of Alexandria? Please. If we anglicised all plurals tomorrow, if wouldn't make a jot of difference to the incidence of arson, and surely you can see that?
Moreover, you talk about "decay" but haven't convincingly shown why the Latin plural/singular treatment is any better. Should we go to meetings saying "these agenda look interesting"? By the reasoning implied in your post, we should, as that would pay greater respect to our forebears' influence and remind us where we came from. But that's nonsense, if only because there are so many other reminders of the roots of English. Why pick on one in particular?
I'm asking for clarification, not trying to "make something less true". What is the connexion between treating "data" as singular and throwing away the accomplishments of our ancestors?
As I showed in another response to my post, both Science and Nature magazines have about three times as much usage of data in the plural than in the singular.
Just because we think about the world around us more logically than our ancestors did doesn't mean all of their accomplishments and creations should be thrown away.
Please explain the link between your first paragraph and your second.
Slashdot Mirror
"On the contrary, I would argue that the problem with nuclear power is that, as is becoming increasingly clear, people's fears about it are *justified*."
Nonsense. All significant accidents have happened in old (in some cases, 3 "generations" old) technology plants, and sometimes human error was a major component.
But, in fairness to the parent poster, human error, slackness in applying regulations, construction short-cuts etc. will always be a risk. Of course newer designs are much safer, and FWIW I am pro-nuclear, but is it really nonsense to say that people's fears are justified?
I understand your resistance to regulation. But I just wonder:
We need people to stop accepting being lied to.
Could this be wishful thinking? How would you actually achieve this? To take TFA as an example: how would people ever find out they'd been lied to in this case, without being knowledgable about the workings of computers?
I assume you meant "water prevents dehydration"...? Well, maybe the EU wasn't so stupid there. If you are actually dehydrated (i.e. not just thirsty), then water will not fix the problem. This is why you don't give pure water to a diarrhoea sufferer.
Now of course regulation can be taken too far. But at the moment, the advertising industry has way too much a free hand. Here in the UK, the worst punishment that seems to be handed out is "don't do it again".
IT, food, cars - most things are actually way too complicated to be understood by an average layman. And that's before we factor in some of the subtle not-quite-lies and suggestive techniques that advertisers seem to love.
And the more I see of this kind of thing, the more I'm convinced that we need stronger regulation of advertising. A free market can only work if people are informed about what they are buying. Putting out misinformation damages the free market.
You put forth an argument regarding safety of NP and asked "what about it?", I told you I think it's bullshit and argued why, now you fork off about a question of price.
If your best low-risk alternative is prohibitively expensive, it's not much good, is it?
My point is that regarding risks and impact on life of each energy generation technology, intrinsic risks (basically, the worst case) as well as mitigated risks (i.e., the best we can do) need to be properly assessed and compared. Comparing intrinsic risks of coal to mitigated risks of NP doesn't bring much.
So the history of NP up until now is "the best we can do"? Whatever, when you actually bring some facts to the table instead of sitting there calling everything BS we can actually have a discussion.
As many nuclear fanatics on this site, you sound to me as a very angry, choleric person, not as much interested in trying to figure out a rational answer to the specific question of what energy politics would be best for humanity as inn winning a dick contest where "your" technology would so much better than "my " technology. You say "look harder" but it appears to me that dismissing people's concerns about NP as ridiculous would also need some reevaluation, especially in light of recent events.
Stop trying to argue by mind-reading. After a rant like that, I don't know how you've got the nerve to accuse anyone else of being angry.
The page conveniently doesn't mention concentrated solar power, which is obviously the safest and cleanest, if possibly not the cheapest, way of producing usable energy bar none.
You can say that again. $0.12 to $0.18 per kwh? Plus you're comparing a cutting-edge tech, which about half of world capacity installed in 2010 (!), with nuclear technologies that have been around for 50 years.
However the price is high as long as externalities are not considered. The true price of energy generation for humanity once each and every components are taken into account (pollution, accidents, politics, crime, hidden costs) is still to be determined with precision imho. My bet is that on the very long term, i.e., if humanity is to survive a couple centuries, most energy will come from solar. Nuclear power will possibly be part of the mix but not in the form we're doing it today.
This is as clear a case of special pleading as I've ever seen. So your suggested solution is "obviously" better because of something we can't yet calculate. Brilliant.
Nobody would fall from any roof if construction regulations that are enforced with NP would be applied to roofing.
You don't realise how ridiculous this sounds? Chernobyl woudn't have happened if people stuck to regulations. What's your point?
No, it's partisan bullshit, at least in part. We should all aim at the truth, not at advancing our own agenda / pet technology. Renewable energy is not "my tech" like some other asshat said somewhere, neither is nuclear power the devil. I'm simply looking
Look harder. You've spread quite a bit of bullshit of your own.
The fact that it's using figures regarding the Chernobyl death toll that were later admitted as bogus and recanted should ring a bell.
But even if you use the revised WHO figure, the death rate is still lower than all other technologies. So your point, while valid, doesn't change the argument.
Also the notion of counting roof falls as a consequence of solar energy sounds to the very least like an extremely contrived argument to me, if not outright partisan bullshit.
Why? Panels have to be installed in order to be used. How do you suggest that should be done? Not only that, but the blog author suggests ways that the risk from PV installation could be brought down - hardly a partisan attack piece.
However the fact that I'm able to easily spot a few glaring crocks in an argument unfortunately doesn't make me magically able to come with better figures.
And that right there is your problem. You've called bullshit a few times but you don't have any better information yourself, and the "crocks" you think you've spotted are not the big news you seem to think. Maybe that's why it gets "cited by each and every nuclear apologist on Slashdot" - it's a helpful contribution to our understanding of the risks.
And read my other posts, it's not just about money and it's not just about numbers of people dying. It's about not having millions of people have to worry about the nasty shit that is nuclear power and the waste from it.
I've read your other posts. Nowhere have you posted anything to do with risk per unit of electricity generated. And the Inquisitr "article" that you linked to - did you actually read it? No sources or numbers there either. If people have to worry, then could that be because of baseless scaremongering like yours?
Lack of interest, lack of expertise, laziness, you name it. I would love to read some non-partisan assessment of the options regarding energy generation, including an objective estimation of the price and risk of each technology...
Meaning that you haven't already done so? So what was your source for criticising the blog I linked to? If those numbers were wrong, where are your better numbers?
You're missing the point. People being pissed off, while bad for them, is not a basis for energy policy. I've asked you and another poster to give some actual numbers to compare the risks of different forms of electricity generation and no-one is doing it. So all we have at the moment are the numbers I posted, showing nuclear to be the safest option. If you feel so strongly then why don't you post some evidence for everyone to see?
Why don't you contribute something positive and post some better numbers?
If we're talking about safety, then deaths per unit of electricity generated is a VERY relevant measure. If you have better figures, then let's see them so we can understand what you're talking about. Otherwise, you're just throwing numbers about (500 million Europeans! ZOMG!) which don't actually mean anything.
You are right, but that is why we have democratic accountability - so people can have a say in choosing the best form of electricity generation. Ignoring the fact that nuclear power actually kills fewer people doesn't help.
You should award yourself the Nobel prize for failing to cite any sources. What about this one as an illustration of how "safe" your favoured energy sources are in comparison to nuclear?
2. Stealing involves taking something and making it your own; the original owner is left with nothing.
Ummm, not when you're stealing ideas.
Steve Jobs' next line in the video is: "Apple has always been shameless about stealing ideas"
That would be copying ideas, then, surely? You can't steal an idea.
*Double whoosh*
Free speech dioes not mean you can say what you like without any consequences, it just means the governmen can't prevent you from saying things in advance.
What? As long as the Government restricts itself to punishing after the fact, free speech is not impeded? That's a crazy position.
Why has this post been modded "troll"? The question is legitimate.
"Agenda" in English comes from the feminine agenda and is already a correct singular term. If anything, the plural would be agendae. I'm not sure if that error means anything to either of our points, but I find it modestly ironic.
Erm, no. It's the neuter plural of agendus, gerundive of agere ("to do"), with the literal meaning of "things to be done". The irony runs in the opposite direction, I'm afraid.
I never meant to pick on any one example in particular; the plurality of "data" is merely an instance of an instance of a set of reminders. Obviously, if "data" spends the rest of time used as a mass noun, it's not the end of the world. The example was simply relevant at the time and used to illustrate a point about the decay of such reminders. Latin plurals are not innately superior in any way; merely an additional token.
As for the relationship between the loss of reminders and the loss of civilization: it's symbolic. The reminders were added to English out of respect for the people who led the way to creating civilization; losing them indicates diminished respect [...]
Look, you're really going to have to evidence these sweeping statements about respect and decay and so on. We can't know for sure what people's motivation was in borrowing words from Latin, but I might equally well suggest: lending a scholarly air to technical vocabulary; acting as a shibboleth to weed out the less-well educated; or just the availability of a handy foreign language as a source for neologisms. If you want to instill respect for the past, then for goodness' sake teach history or classics; don't try to hold back linguistic evolution like some romanophilic version of King Cnut. You're giving classical education a bad name!
Right, I get where you're coming from, but you're not doing your argument any favours by using some of these hyperbolic comparisons. The Library of Alexandria? Please. If we anglicised all plurals tomorrow, if wouldn't make a jot of difference to the incidence of arson, and surely you can see that?
Moreover, you talk about "decay" but haven't convincingly shown why the Latin plural/singular treatment is any better. Should we go to meetings saying "these agenda look interesting"? By the reasoning implied in your post, we should, as that would pay greater respect to our forebears' influence and remind us where we came from. But that's nonsense, if only because there are so many other reminders of the roots of English. Why pick on one in particular?
I'm asking for clarification, not trying to "make something less true". What is the connexion between treating "data" as singular and throwing away the accomplishments of our ancestors?
As I showed in another response to my post, both Science and Nature magazines have about three times as much usage of data in the plural than in the singular.
Just because we think about the world around us more logically than our ancestors did doesn't mean all of their accomplishments and creations should be thrown away.
Please explain the link between your first paragraph and your second.
White radiates more. It reflects all colors.
*facepalm* Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation disagrees with you.
Sheer lunacy!
Nice one!