RE: Is it too late?

["Christoph Hofmeyr" <chofmeyr@nnr.co.za>]

Radsafers, Bill,

I think yours is a very sane analysis of the problem. The true LNT

believers are (should be) in a moral quandary about safety, as long as

they believe that, in the last instance, a single photon can kill.

(Aside: This reflects a disregard for actual numbers in the micro-world

and is akin to a debate on the size of a mathematical point).  This

state of mind leads to things like immeasurable exemption levels, etc.

In the regulatory field one sometimes hears of a level of risk "which

society is willing to accept", which Bill terms a 'practical level'.  Bo

Lindell's semantic solution was apparently (ref J Rozental) 'thereare no

acceptable risks, only acceptable practices'. The fact is that public

risk aversion is completely non-uniform with respect to different

hazards and Jo Public might in effect find it thousand times more

acceptable to be killed in an auto accident than by a photon.  What is

more: the goal posts are shifting all the time.  Compare the reduced

level of risk the individual soldier (in the 'developed' world) is

'willing' (i.e. expected) to face today, compared with the World Wars.

In the public mind risk, irrespective of level, tends to be equated with

danger, therefore safe = no risk, according to this unrealistic logic.

Can the professionals agree on a 'safe level'?

Chris Hofmeyr

chofmeyr@nnr.co.za





-----Original Message-----

From: William Prestwich [mailto:prestwic@MCMAIL.CIS.MCMASTER.CA]

Sent: 16 January 2002 22:18

To: Robert J. Gunter

Cc: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu

Subject: RE: Is it too late?





	I firmly believe we have been mired in what in some ways is a

semantic problem arising out of our rigorous scientific training, as

well

as the use of the LNT. I don't know how many times I have heard the

propogandist chant-"It has been scientifically proven that there is no

safe level of radiation". This obfuscation arises not just from the LNT,

but from the definition of safe as zero risk. The fact is that safe is

often

thought of in binary terms-either something is safe or it is not. In the

latter case it is equated to be dangerous. So the practical

interpretation of

the LNT is that any level of radiation is dangerous.

	As I see it there is absolutely no scientific definition of the

term safe, and its concept is a social one. I think it is really

necessary

for those who wish to retain the LNT for regulatory purposes to fight

the

political battle to define a practical non-zero level of risk to be

defined as safe. This would then lead to a practical threshhold, and the

regulators should state emphatically that levels below this are

indeed safe. This is firmer than the bureaucratic "below regulatory

concern"

	I do not believe this to be dishonest, but in fact the only sane

response to the LNT model. The alternative is to be frightened of every

banana, quart of milk, yard of earth and fellow human being on the

planet-a state I would define as insane.

Cheers,

Bill Prestwich

McMaster University,

Hamilton, Ontario.

prestwic@mcmaster.ca







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