Re: Three mile island syndrome

[Fonsos Fonsos <psg_allez@yahoo.com>]

What's great about the way the approach you use is
that it encourages a person to become educated about
Nuclear power. I've always felt that it's not an "Us
against them" approach but an approach assimilar to
yours, i.e. present a few facts which maye be viewd as
pro and con, compare it to other choices both pro and
con, and finally encourage a person to obtain a bit
more knowledge on their own. Bottomline is that from
what I've seen plants run in a sound manner should
sell themselves. I have no experience in a plant but
based on those in the past which have had their share
of problems, it appears that those problems were due
to poor management of the plant.

Cheers,
  Alfonso
PSG_allez@yahoo.com
--- ruth_weiner <ruth_weiner@email.msn.com> wrote:
> I don't think "convincing" is quite the appropriate
> posture.  This is the
> point of view I present (both to students and to
> others in discussion):
> 
> "Nuclear power is not a religion, but a means of
> producing electricity.
> "Belief" or "trust" are not involved.  Like any
> other means of converting
> heat to energy, it has environmentally damaging side
> effects: waste is
> produced and must be dealt with, and very
> radioactive products of fission
> must also be dealt with.  We try to minimize
> environmental damage but we
> can't eliminate it.   Unsafe operation of a nuclear
> power plant or of an
> enrichment facility or of an x-ray generator or of
> any other facility
> handling radioactive materials can lead to health
> damage and in the worst
> case, death, and that is why we are careful to
> operate these facilities
> safely.  The same can be said about fossil fuel
> burning power plants (yes,
> they are operated safely), hydroelectric dams, 
> chemical plants, dry
> cleaning operations, auto repair shops, etc.
> 
> It is currently chic to exaggerate the dangers of
> nukes.  Those who benefit
> by exaggerating either the environmental or health
> damage of any facility
> will continue to exaggerate it, and people who want
> to believe them will
> continue to, and trying to convince them otherwise
> won't work.
> 
> If you really want to know, it behooves you to learn
> something about how
> nuclear power is generated, and then you can make up
> your own mind."
> 
> This is why I agree that  trying to portray other
> means of electric power
> production as villains and nukes as saints, or even
> only portraying other
> means as worse villains than nukes, is self
> defeating.
> 
> Ruth Weiner
> ruth_weiner@email.msn.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ROCKWD@aol.com <ROCKWD@aol.com>
> To: Multiple recipients of list
> <radsafe@romulus.ehs.uiuc.edu>
> Date: Thursday, December 07, 2000 9:08 AM
> Subject: Re: Three mile island syndrome
> 
> 
> >In answer to your question regarding convincing
> people of Nuclear Power's
> >positive side, see the book "The Dynamics of
> Technical Controversy."  I
> think
> >the author was Maher (I lent my copy and am not
> sure).  His thought is:
> When
> >a controversy boils down to a pro technology side
> versus an anti technology
> >side, the motivated anti's will usually win the
> battle for public opinion.
> >Especially when the technology is very complex and
> not easily understood by
> >the public.  The reason is the technologists, by
> their nature, are not
> >equipped to resort to the sort of emotional appeals
> of the motivated
> anti's.
> >Pro's talk about projected (or in the case of
> Southern California, current)
> >energy needs and anti's get on the evening news
> screaming about your
> children
> >mutating while dressed in a skeleton suit and
> throwing blood on the
> utility's
> >headquarters building.
> >
> >Roland Hanson
>
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> >The RADSAFE Frequently Asked Questions list,
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> >information can be accessed at
> http://www.ehs.uiuc.edu/~rad/radsafe.html
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> 
> 
>
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