Best way to counter radiation scare

[Seret]

Seriously, though, it's amazing what important-looking and sciency words can do to make people panic.

Indeed, pretty much all MSDSs are terrifying.

[lajoswinkler]

Recently, one blogger made a series of posters describing the ingredients of some foods, to mock chemophobia.

One of the right-winged news-portals made a report on it and they've misunderstood the whole concept of his work. The article was about "scary chemicals in foods". What a bunch of morons. They've soon removed the article after people started mocking their stupidity.

Indeed, pretty much all MSDSs are terrifying.

Most of them are unsubstantiated copy-paste legal crap.

[WestAir]

I work in an environment where I (apparently) do get an occupational dose of ionizing radiation.

My co workers that work with me travel often, and a lot of them complain about the radiation from TSA's millimeter wave body scanners.

The most face-palming story concerning this was a person who I overheard say "TSA is safe from the radiation because they're wearing latex gloves."

To add insult to injury, this person boarded my plane and got a lovely 0.05 millisieverts for the flight, compared to the 0.00 from the body scanner.

[lajoswinkler]

I work in an environment where I (apparently) do get an occupational dose of ionizing radiation.

My co workers that work with me travel often, and a lot of them complain about the radiation from TSA's millimeter wave body scanners.

The most face-palming story concerning this was a person who I overheard say "TSA is safe from the radiation because they're wearing latex gloves."

To add insult to injury, this person boarded my plane and got a lovely 0.05 millisieverts for the flight, compared to the 0.00 from the body scanner.

Are those people on any responsible positions that require active and deep knowledge in nuclear physics and radiological safety? Because if they are, they should get canned.

[sparty48]

Allow me to explain.

When people think of radiation, they think of nuclear things. when they think of nuclear things... they thing of this:

By their logic, EVERYTHING WITH ANY TINY, TINY AMOUNT OF RADIATION IS EVIL AND SHOULD DIE!!!

[PakledHostage]

Allow me to explain. [snip]

Thanks for clearing that up for us.

[WestAir]

Are those people on any responsible positions that require active and deep knowledge in nuclear physics and radiological safety? Because if they are, they should get canned.

No, but some of them do ironically operate pulse doppler radar equipment. While the ARINC 708 isn't nearly as dangerous as the cosmic background, it's still an ironic face-palm when someone says they're okay with it, but not okay with the exact same technology used elsewhere.

Peoples irrational fears kill me inside.

[nhnifong]

Appeal to a child's appetite for rebellion. Whether their parents taught them superstitions that that come from religion, tv commercials, or old chinese farmers, it's superstition nonetheless. Kids at the right age will readily accept other teachers as an authority over their own parents because it give them an ally in their rebellion against their parents discipline.

[falofonos]

Laptops give off damaging radiation when charging.

I know some countries can be a little vague with their consumer protection information but most would insist on there being a label somewhere saying "this device will sterilize you and give you extra toes", possibly next to the "no user serviceable parts inside" sticker?

I personally would go for this appeal to common sense :-

"you know how rabbits make small pellet like turds and horses make clumpy straw filled turds and cows make flat pancake like turds but they all eat the same thing : grass... why is that?"

"I don't know."

"well if you don't know turds (or insert your preferred word here) then don't talk to me about radiation hazards"

[lajoswinkler]

No, but some of them do ironically operate pulse doppler radar equipment. While the ARINC 708 isn't nearly as dangerous as the cosmic background, it's still an ironic face-palm when someone says they're okay with it, but not okay with the exact same technology used elsewhere.

Peoples irrational fears kill me inside.

I have had a similar situation with some of my former lab colleagues. They were afraid of common inorganic salts (none, low or medium toxicity, nonvolatile) yet they were all puffing away their cigs like powerplants. I think I don't need to explain the level of their knowledge...

Laptops give off damaging radiation when charging.

I know some countries can be a little vague with their consumer protection information but most would insist on there being a label somewhere saying "this device will sterilize you and give you extra toes", possibly next to the "no user serviceable parts inside" sticker?

I personally would go for this appeal to common sense :-

"you know how rabbits make small pellet like turds and horses make clumpy straw filled turds and cows make flat pancake like turds but they all eat the same thing : grass... why is that?"

"I don't know."

"well if you don't know turds (or insert your preferred word here) then don't talk to me about radiation hazards"

That's an excellent idea.

[Albert VDS]

Banana's are radioactive and should be banned! Think of the childeren! :eek:

[sgt_flyer]

Maybe some people here did already read this 'what if' page, but it's still interesting in this thread, concerning the radiation levels in a normally working nuclear plant

(Mostly love the punchline at the end ^^)

http://what-if.xkcd.com/29/

[DJEN]

Speaking of a radiation scare, it seems we have a huge wall of nuclear fallout from Fukushima coming in fast on California. On the one hand, the news is saying "HOLY **** WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEZ!!1!1ONE!", as they tend to do. On the other hand, Japan wants reports covered up. Since this thread is about radiation scares anyway, can anyone tell me how much actual danger the average American is in right now?

None. For Koreans, however......

[Aghanim]

Laptops give off damaging radiation when charging.

I personally would go for this appeal to common sense :-

"you know how rabbits make small pellet like turds and horses make clumpy straw filled turds and cows make flat pancake like turds but they all eat the same thing : grass... why is that?"

"I don't know."

"well if you don't know turds (or insert your preferred word here) then don't talk to me about radiation hazards"

No way, I have seen that story in my practice for national exam paper (because I'm Indonesian and my government is very incompetent at grammar....... don't ask)

There are 2 guys sitting together in an airplane.

"They said the flight will go faster if we talk together"

"What do you want to talk"

"About nuclear stuff"

"I have one question: What do they produce when horses, cows and chickens eat things?"

"I don't know"

"Well you shouldn't be talking about nuclear stuff when you don't know ****"

[lajoswinkler]

None. For Koreans, however......

No, not even for Koreans. Not even for the Japanese. Only the area close to the actual power plant is mildly contaminated. The Fukushima prefecture itself it habitable.

[Palladium Corp]

Its not just bananas, a pocket full of brazil nuts would set off a radiation alarm at a nuclear power plant.

[Aghanim]

Well after browsing about the radioactiveness of brazil nuts, I found this: http://listverse.com/2013/02/06/10-things-you-probably-didnt-know-were-radioactive/

[lajoswinkler]

I wouldn't rely on an article that says:

We all know the obvious things that produce radiation: nuclear power plants, microwaves, atomic bombs, and holidays to certain parts of the Ukraine.

Putting microwave ovens in the same basket as atomic bombs is a sure sign of incredible ignorance on the subject matter.

That is not the only stupid thing in that article. First they say brazil nuts absorb massive amounts of radium to scare people. Pile of crap. They absorb relatively large amounts of radium, compared to other plants. It's just 40–260 becquerels per kilogramme of nuts. That's a pretty pathetic amount and you'd need an expensive digital Geiger counter to prove there's radium inside those nuts.

Then there's the crap about Grand Central Station.

"the radiation levels produced by the station are so high that they actually exceed the levels that nuclear power plants are legally allowed to emit."

As if nuclear power plants emit huge amounts already... They emit way below what environment emits by itself, and the station is not better than a pile of granite boulders.

Denver lives a mile above sea level? Whoa, and they get TWICE as much as the rest of the world? Sensationalism. There are places in the world where the naturally occuring levels much higher and nobody is hurt. It's not the relative amount that's important.

Then the exit signs.

Unfortunately, however, if that same disaster that cut the power also causes that sign to smash, that same radioactive isotope can escape and contaminate the building and everyone in it.

Lies. Tritium inside those signs is very dilluted and in elemental, gaseous form. It's hydrogen, lighter than helium, and the air current would disperse it and it would get out of the building fast.

Kitty litter a threat to out groundwaters? What a load of hooey.

Bananas causing radiation sickness? Even if you ate 5 million of them, nothing would happen. Potassium-40 inside of them is, just like ordinary potassium, exchanged by our body and the environment over our waste products. We keep regular amounts of it in out body and it does not accumulate.

Granite tops in kitchens "subjecting food to radiation"? Boooooo, scary.

The levels of gamma rays food sterilizing machines use is unimaginably higher, and radiation does not make the food dangerous.

Old grandma's pottery and glassware is harmless unless you pack your house with them, or you dissolve it all and eat it.

Kaolin in newspapers is harmless.

I admit, they are right about the cigarettes, but the rest of the article is a bunch of horse crap.

[WestAir]

I think you're being overly aggressive when dissecting the authors intent.

The author was being sensational, and exaggerating, but in a world where you can easily find people who believe microwaves actually do emit crazy nuclear radiation, how could you not write an article on radiation without having fun with it?

I took the authors work here as a tongue-in-cheek informative piece, rather than an uneducated work of ignorance. Even if I'm wrong, it's certainly not inviting of such grossly aggressive critique.

[78stonewobble]

Pft...

I remember reading that the UN estimated that global warming could cost around 5.000.000 lives a year from the year 2025 to 2050. If you go rather high on the Chernobyl fatality figures that still makes global warming 400 times more dangerous than a chernobyl sized nuclear accident.

-..-

[Alchemist]

The problem with atomic power is that unlike most other power sources nuclear power plant IS a slowed down atomic bomb. Of course it can be operated safely, but that requires one more thing general public can't understand - 100% engineering attitude. You can make a rocket Kerbal way (with terrible risks and expenses, but it really worked good when there were no meas to precalculate everything), but you can't make fission reactor even slightly Kerbal way at all. You can't just try, you have to be 100% sure

Chernobyl is an example of trying gone wrong (during a test they bypassed some procedures they shouldn't, because the weren't aware of some factors), Fukushima is an example of flawed design requirements (less seismic resistance that should be for that place).

And don't forget that reaction products are what really is dangerously radioactive, and thee can't be done anything about it.

And that's the problem - i's really dangerous if gets in wrong hands, so there's terrible distance between usual people and the ones who really understands the technology. You just can't make a small safe model to play with, and most people can't understand without it.

[Aghanim]

Well that is right. There is another problem, that you already showed, its just too complex. Current reactors is not a matter of flicking a switch and electricity will come out, its a complicated machine that even something that seems to not interacts with the core like feedwater pump could affects the void coefficients and thus affects reactor power output

And don't forget about that pesky decay heat. Hopefully someone invented a maintenance free nuclear reactor until fusion reactors are available, one that I heard most in this forum is LFTR

[78stonewobble]

The problem with atomic power is that unlike most other power sources nuclear power plant IS a slowed down atomic bomb. Of course it can be operated safely, but that requires one more thing general public can't understand - 100% engineering attitude. You can make a rocket Kerbal way (with terrible risks and expenses, but it really worked good when there were no meas to precalculate everything), but you can't make fission reactor even slightly Kerbal way at all. You can't just try, you have to be 100% sure

Chernobyl is an example of trying gone wrong (during a test they bypassed some procedures they shouldn't, because the weren't aware of some factors), Fukushima is an example of flawed design requirements (less seismic resistance that should be for that place).

And don't forget that reaction products are what really is dangerously radioactive, and thee can't be done anything about it.

And that's the problem - i's really dangerous if gets in wrong hands, so there's terrible distance between usual people and the ones who really understands the technology. You just can't make a small safe model to play with, and most people can't understand without it.

Well I definately don't think nuclear powerplant engineering and placement should be taken lightly and I also abhor the idea that a privately owned company's bottomline should be in any way connected with nuclear safety measures.

You are right about the 100 % engineering attitude though: Not long ago I stumbled upon this:

A number of nuclear reactor safety system lessons emerged from the incident. The most obvious was that in tsunami-prone areas, a power station's sea wall must be adequately tall and robust. At the Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant, closer to the epicenter of the 11 March earthquake and tsunami, the sea wall was 14 meters tall and successfully withstood the tsunami, preventing serious damage and radiation releases.

Definately the wrong place to save time and money as it turns out.

However, as I see it... and if the UN report is to be trusted... Not going nuclear will kill more people than going nuclear will (if done properly). In my mind it's allmost criminal to not allways try to save as many lives as possible or conversely kill as few as possible.

But theres that whole irrationality to it all... As the op refers to...

We're happily accepting or ignorant that motor vehicles killed like 1,2 mio. people in 2004 and might have injured upto 50 mio. people.

[Alchemist]

But theres that whole irrationality to it all... As the op refers to...

We're happily accepting or ignorant that motor vehicles killed like 1,2 mio. people in 2004 and might have injured upto 50 mio. people.

I think that's common attitude toward "human factor". When it's down to a formula "1 idiot killed himself and couple unfortunate enough to be near him" people either consider it not too terrible or think that they aren't such stupid and won't probably get near such an idiot. Even if as in case of road accidents it happens all the way around. When 1 technology violation can kill a hundred (like in aviation)there's completely another opinion even if everything is done to not let that happen. With nuclear power the cost is even higher because it can irradiate entire regions... Maybe people tend to project their personal experience on such cases and see that they are more than likely to make the same mistakes that led to the disaster (and they don't care that with expert personnel and some additional security measures it's much less likely to happen) so that's what really is too dangerous... and it is if you let these people to the controls, but that's why nobody does.

And honestly, I wouldn't let myself to a nuclear reactor. Chemical reactor - yes, nuclear reactor - too unsafe with what ideas I can possibly come up with.

I like idea of nuclear power, just don't leave any place for "human factor" in it - with such systems you can't afford doing anything stupid. That's why it's not very compatible with democracy - such level technologies require technocratic society.

[Aghanim]

Technocracy: Scientists, engineers, and technologists examples include these technologists who have knowledge, expertise, or skills, would compose the governing body, instead of politicians, businesspeople, and economists.[4]

Why now I prefer this more?