[ RadSafe ] uranium smoke is a teratogen

[garyi at trinityphysics.com]

Mike,

You expressed that exceptionally well.  Failure to acknowlege "inconvienient truths" is a 
pretty common trait for journalists and politicians, who are more concerned about swaying 
public opinion than about being right.  

In spite of your constructive criticism, I predict that our resident anti-DU anti-hero will press 
on with his fact dodging crusade.  He lives for the moments when he can press the send 
button and keep the dialogue going for another round.  Since he doesn't admit that he's been 
proven wrong on numerous points, the dialogue is about as constructive as a dog chasing his 
tail.

For laughs, I have pasted a similarly fruitless conversation below, from a book by S. 
Clemens.   

-Gary Isenhower
======================
"Your name, please?"

"I hight the Demoiselle Alisande la Carteloise, an it please you."

"Do you know anybody here who can identify you?"

"That were not likely, fair lord, I being come hither now for the first time."

"Have you brought any letters -- any documents -- any proofs that you are trustworthy and 
truthful?"

"Of a surety, no; and wherefore should I? Have I not a tongue, and cannot I say all that 
myself?"

"But YOUR saying it, you know, and somebody else's saying it, is different."

"Different? How might that be? I fear me I do not understand."

"Don't UNDERSTAND? Land of -- why, you see -- you see -- why, great Scott, can't you 
understand a little thing like that? Can't you understand the difference between your -- WHY 
do you look so innocent and idiotic!"

"I? In truth I know not, but an it were the will of God."

"Yes, yes, I reckon that's about the size of it. Don't mind my seeming excited; I'm not. Let us 
change the subject. Now as to this castle, with fortyfive princesses in it, and three ogres at 
the head of it, tell me -- where is this harem?"

"Harem?"

"The CASTLE, you understand; where is the castle?"

"Oh, as to that, it is great, and strong, and well beseen, and lieth in a far country. Yes, it is 
many leagues."

"HOW many?"

"Ah, fair sir, it were woundily hard to tell, they are so many, and do so lap the one upon the 
other, and being made all in the same image and tincted with the same color, one may not 
know the one league from its fellow, nor how to count them except they be taken apart, and 
ye wit well it were God's work to do that, being not within man's capacity; for ye will note --"

"Hold on, hold on, never mind about the distance; WHEREABOUTS does the castle lie? 
What's the direction from here?"

"Ah, please you sir, it hath no direction from here; by reason that the road lieth not straight, 
but turneth evermore; wherefore the direction of its place abideth not, but is some time under 
the one sky and anon under another, whereso if ye be minded that it is in the east, and wend 
thitherward, ye shall observe that the way of the road doth yet again turn upon itself by the 
space of half a circle, and this marvel happing again and yet again and still again, it will 
grieve you that you had thought by vanities of the mind to thwart and bring to naught the will 
of Him that giveth not a castle a direction from a place except it pleaseth Him, and if it please 
Him not, will the rather that even all castles and all directions thereunto vanish out of the 
earth, leaving the places wherein they tarried desolate and vacant, so warning His creatures 
that where He will He will, and where He will not He --"

"Oh, that's all right, that's all right, give us a rest; never mind about the direction, HANG the 
direction -- I beg pardon, I beg a thousand pardons, I am not well to-day; pay no attention 
when I soliloquize, it is an old habit, an old, bad habit, and hard to get rid of when one's 
digestion is all disordered with eating food that was raised forever and ever before he was 
born; good land! a man can't keep his functions regular on spring chickens thirteen hundred 
years old. But come -- never mind about that; let's -- have you got such a thing as a map of 
that region about you? Now a good map --"

"Is it peradventure that manner of thing which of late the unbelievers have brought from over 
the great seas, which, being boiled in oil, and an onion and salt added thereto, doth --"

"What, a map? What are you talking about? Don't you know what a map is? There, there, 
never mind, don't explain, I hate explanations; they fog a thing up so that you can't tell 
anything about it. Run along, dear; good-day; show her the way, Clarence." 


On 21 May 2008 at 9:05, Brennan, Mike  (DOH) wrote:

Subject:        	RE: [ RadSafe ] uranium smoke is a teratogen
Date sent:      	Wed, 21 May 2008 09:05:45 -0700
From:           	"Brennan, Mike  (DOH)" <Mike.Brennan at DOH.WA.GOV>
To:             	"radsafelist" <radsafe at radlab.nl>

> 
> 
> > SD's comments:
> >
> > .... According to the second of Olsen's articles (April 15, 2008),
> > "The shipment is safe, Hyslop said, because the concentration of
> > uranium in the sand is so low  about 10 parts per trillion. That
> > concentration  about 0.00000000001 percent  is about five to 10
> > times higher than the concentration of uranium found in concrete or
> > wall board, he said."
> 
> Chad Hyslop said this nine days later:  "In one preliminary sample,
> the concentration of lead in the sand was nearly four times higher
> than the EPA standard that triggers a hazardous-material
> designation.... The sample contained 19 milligrams of lead per
> liter...." --
> http://www.tdn.com/articles/2008/04/25/area_news/doc48115f17af5cd75912
> 04 35.txt
> 
> Hi, Ben/James.
> 
> Let's talk about credibility for a moment.  Do you want to be credible
> with this group?  I assume you do.  If you do, you need to decide to
> stop doing things like the exchange above.  When faced with strong
> evidence that DU concentrations in this shipment was very, very low;
> too low to be a health risk in any credible exposure scenario, you
> could have responded, "You are right; there really isn't a problem,
> and it is an over-reaction and waste of money to ship that sand half
> way around the world for disposal."  Instead, you said (to
> paraphrase), "OH YEAH!?! Well, what about the lead?  SO THERE!"  If
> you had thought about it for a moment you would have realized that
> given the handling this sand was already going to receive the lead
> would present no problem at all (indeed, that was stated quite clearly
> in the article you linked to), and that you bringing up the lead was
> not going to strengthen your original position about DU.  
> 
> This tendency when faced with evidence that your original position is
> in error to shift without acknowledging you were wrong in the first
> place does not give the reader the impression that you are interested
> in arriving at the truth, but only at convincing people that you are
> right, whether or not you are.  While this is only one of the things
> you do that harm your credibility, it is a pretty easy one to fix. 
> Let's start with a simple exercise:
> 
> When was the last time you were wrong about some aspect of DU; in
> particular, when you originally thought that something supported the
> position that DU is a serious health problem, but it turned out that
> it didn't? (NOTE: I am NOT asking you to concede that DU is not a
> serious health problem, only that you, in your zealousness, may have
> misinterpreted something as supporting your position when it didn't.)
> Did you acknowledge your error to the person who demonstrated it?  If
> so, how?  If not, why?
> 
> Your ability to admit the possibility that you are wrong will improve
> the chances that knowledgeable people might accept the possibility
> that you are right.