AW: [ RadSafe ] RE: From offtopict to an ontopic comment

[Franz Schönhofer]

Mike,

Thank you very much to mention this potential of destruction. I admit that I
was only thinking of physical destruction of buildings, infrastructure and
killing people either immediately by the crossbow arrows up to the blast of
a large TNT detonation and the effects of a nuclear bomb being either
immediate death or long term illness and death. 

This my thinking was somehow irrational and difficult to explain, because
one of my favourite sayings (copyright FS) is that I prefer to work with
radioactive material over working with bacteria or virus. 

I know and I suppose you also know, that bacterial warfare is not new. I do
not remember the details, but corpses of persons having been killed by the
plague outside a besieged city were catapulted into town. One of the
"famous" persons in the Indian wars is known to have donated blankets from
such soldiers who died of ?typhus?, ?cholera? or similar to the Indians.
Unfortunately I do not know of any attempts to stop this research of any
international activities to ban them. 

I agree with you, that this would be the next step after the nuclear
destruction possibility. Also in this case there are (endless) international
negotiations going on. Because of modern times they obviously do not proceed
towards a final agreement as fast as in the scenario of Maury Siskel...... 

Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA


-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] Im Auftrag
von Brennan, Mike (DOH)
Gesendet: Freitag, 30. Jänner 2009 18:08
An: radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: [ RadSafe ] RE: From offtopict to an ontopic comment

Speaking as one who spent his first career in the trenches of the Cold War,
babysitting bombs, I believe that nuclear weapons, as potentially
destructive as they are, still have less potential for devastation than
certain biological weapons do.  There are strains of smallpox that had
almost an 80% mortality rate, and infected almost everyone who was exposed
who didn't have immunity from vaccination or having already had a similar
disease.   

-----Original Message-----
From: Franz Schönhofer [mailto:franz.schoenhofer at chello.at] 
Sent: Thursday, January 29, 2009 5:28 PM
To: neildm at id.doe.gov; Brennan, Mike (DOH); radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: From offtopict to an ontopic comment

Neil et al.,

Continuing the thoughts put forward by Mike and Neil we easily hit back to
"ontopic":

One of the next steps in this chain of "horrible weapons" is said to refer
to Alfred Nobel. When he had developed nitroglycerin and later dynamite he
is said to have considered the effect of the explosives to be so powerful
and terrible, that no wars would be fought in the future any more because of
the destructions caused. Later he had to recognize that he had been
fundamentally wrong and his discoveries made war even worse. It is said that
this was the motive to donate his wealth for the nobel prizes, one of them
for peace achievements. His secretary (Bertha von Suttner) was extremely
active in the movement for peace ("Down with weapons") and banning of wars
and might have influenced him toward this decision.

Now we have ended up with nuclear weapons, more destructive by orders of
magnitude. Should mankind have become a little more rational in the face of
potential destruction? At least this weapon has been used only twice in a
war and never since. Also in the case of nuclear weapons there are
decade-long attempts to ban these weapons. Much progress has been made, but
a worldwide ban has not been achieved yet. To the contrary new "nuclear
states" have emerged. 

Is this logic of increased destruction power from fire to crossbow to
dynamite to nuclear weapons to be continued with even more destructive
weapons? I cannot imagine anything worse in destruction power, but who could
have thought in the thirties of the last century of the power of nuclear
weapons?

Food for thought.

Best regards,

Franz 

Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA


-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] Im Auftrag
von neildm at id.doe.gov
Gesendet: Freitag, 30. Jänner 2009 00:20
An: Mike.Brennan at DOH.WA.GOV; radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: RE: [ RadSafe ] Fwd: Don't X-ray My Veggies - Offtopic comment

 Actual occurrence:

The leaders of Europe met and voted to suppress the use of the latest super
weapon as it made war too horrible to countenance.

The weapon was the crossbow, and the meeting was on August 30, 1146 

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On Behalf
Of Brennan, Mike (DOH) <SNIP>

 It reminds me of
a short story I once wrote in which a council of Homo Erectus voted to
suppress research into controlling fire because it was against the laws of
nature.  

<SNIP>
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