[ RadSafe ] Agreeing with Franz on "dogma"

Thu Aug 20 11:36:37 CDT 2015

Radsafe,

     Nuclear reactors, when operated properly and when they are not
being hit by a tsunami or a large/great earthquake, are inherently
safe.  They are designed to be safe.  They operate well and provide
useful amounts of power.  There is risk in walking down the street.
Is it safe???  (question is asked in the movie the Marathon Man)....
     Why are we always worried about LNT and the low dose end of the
curve???  Isn't the health physicist's job at higher doses/dose
rates????
     Joe Preisig


On 8/20/15, Bill Prestwich <prestwic at mcmaster.ca> wrote:
> I think it is possible to expose the falseness in the anti-nuclear movement
> within the LNT approach as used by regulators.  The argument used by this
> movement is that science has shown no level of radiation is safe. In the
> first place there is no scientific definition of safe. What the opponents
> of
> nuclear power are claiming is that safe is defined as a process that has
> zero probability of harm. With that definition almost nothing is safe. The
> reply to these people is that they are claiming that a probability of one
> in
> a trillion that an action could cause some harm means that action should be
> abolished. Instead I think one could argue that the LNT is over restricting
> and hence overly careful in protecting the public.
>
> Bill Prestwich
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: radsafe-bounces at agni.phys.iit.edu
> [mailto:radsafe-bounces at agni.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of KARAM, PHILIP
> Sent: Wednesday, August 19, 2015 2:41 PM
> To: The International Radiation Protection (Health Physics) Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Agreeing with Franz on "dogma"
>
> I don't think that the word "dogma" is at all derisive in and of itself. In
> biochem we learned the "central dogma of molecular biology" (which you can
> find in any number of textbooks in precisely that phrasing), which was
> DNA-RNA-protein. In Sunday school (Catholic) we learned a number of dogmas
> of the Catholic Church. Used properly, the word is descriptive, not loaded.
>
> In the case of LNT, the use of the word dogma is certainly appropriate in a
> number of cases.
>
> -As Franz pointed out, it is NOT appropriate for the scientific debate,
> which continues to be lively.
> -In the regulatory realm (and in the area of ALARA), LNT certainly has
> become dogma in the sense that it is the central belief behind the way that
> regulations are written and ALARA is practiced - and if LNT were to be
> shown
> to be false then we might well have to re-think the way that we practice
> ALARA as well as the way we regulate.
> -And among the anti-nuclear and anti-radiation activists LNT is most
> certainly dogma in that it is virtually the only argument they use to
> demand
> that all reactors be shut down and all use of radiation that can expose the
> public be banned - if LNT is shown to be false then their central argument
> crumbles to the ground.
>
> The word itself is neither positive nor negative - it is simply
> descriptive.
> But, like the word "evolution," it has come to mean more to some than ought
> to be the case.
>
> Andy
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu
> [mailto:radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of Peter Crane
> Sent: Wednesday, August 19, 2015 2:02 PM
> To: RADSAFE
> Subject: [ RadSafe ] Agreeing with Franz on "dogma"
>
> It's a pleasure to be able to agree with Franz for once. This use of loaded
> words such as "dogma" and "cult" to denigrate the LNT (and, on the other
> side, the hormesis theory) adds nothing to the debate. The propagandistic
> purpose is too obvious. Maybe that's OK if you are just preaching to the
> choir, since you are not out to change any minds, but trying to convert
> opponents by calling them cultists following a dogma? It doesn't work.
>
> I'd love to know more about infighting in the Austrian bureaucracy, Franz.
> I
> thought the watchword there was Schlamperei, of taking things easy and not
> too seriously, but I suppose I'm forgetting my Kafka, plus the golden rule
> of organizations -- governmental, academic, etc. -- that the smaller the
> stakes, the more vicious the internal battles can be. By the way, if you
> know Bad Ischl, Villa Rothstein, my great-grand-uncle's summer home, was
> where my grandmother played as a child, back around 1901-1903. Das gibt's
> nur einmal, das kommt nicht wieder....
>
> -- Peter Crane, Seattle
> NRC Counsel for Special Projects (retired)
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