Re: Fw: Stop the madness

[BERNARD L COHEN <blc+@PITT.EDU>]

On Mon, 4 Feb 2002 RuthWeiner@AOL.COM wrote:



> In a message dated 2/4/02 9:34:42 AM Mountain Standard Time,

> BLHamrick@AOL.COM writes:



> > This is a very important point.  From the public's perspective, they ask

> > themselves, "Why would this group be putting all this effort into opposing

> > this if it weren't really bad?  What's in it for them?"  And, that's one of

> > the questions, we should try to answer.  Indeed, what is in it for them?

> > Publicity, Hollywood dollars?  What motivates the leaders of these

> > crusades?  I think we need to understand this aspect.



	Some of my ideas on this, snips from a forthcoming paper:



Around 1970, the Environmental movement sprung to life in the United

Sates. It was initially composed largely of numerous groups focused on

various environmental problems, dealing with both technical and political

aspects. American public opinion, as well as myself, were supportive. I

taught courses on environmental problems, sponsored a student

environmental action club, and became involved with a local group that

went out in small boats to collect samples of river water near discharge

points from steel mills which I analyzed pro bono in my laboratory. Most

of these groups consisted of enthusiastic, idealistic young people

contributing their time and energy, and that was enough to sustain them

for a year or so. Some of them tried recruiting dues paying members from

the public, and began looking for larger scale support from non-profit

foundations, promoting these processes by getting media coverage. For such

activities, they needed issues to attract public attention, and they soon

found that questioning the health and environmental impacts of nuclear

power served that purpose very well. This was a very new technology, with

associations to the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so it was not

difficult to scare the public. The reactors were being constructed by

large corporations, whom idealistic young people viewed as impersonal

seekers after profits, callous to environmental degradation and human

suffering they may cause; these were their natural enemies.

	To attack nuclear power, they needed ammunition, and this was

readily available. They only had to go through the aforementioned risk

analysis literature and pick out some if the imagined accident scenarios

with the number of deaths expected from them. Of course they ignored the

very tiny probabilities of occurrence attached to these scenarios, and

they never considered the fact that alternative technologies were causing

far more deaths. Quoting from these published scientific analyses gave

them credibility and even made them seem like technical experts.

_______________________________________________________________



	The decisive battle over nuclear power between nuclear scientists

and anti-nuclear activists was waged in the 1973-1980 time period. First,

let's consider the cast of characters in the battle. The two sides were of

an entirely different ilk. One of the main interests in life for a typical

anti-nuclear activist was political fighting, while the nuclear scientists

had no interest in such political activity, and even if they did they had

little native ability or educational preparation for it. While a typical

anti-nuclear activist was taking college courses in writing, debate, and

social psychology, the typical nuclear scientist was taking courses in

advanced calculus, radiation physics, and molecular biology. After

graduation, the former gained worldly experience by participating in

political campaigns, anti-Vietnam war protests, and environmental

activism, while the latter was gaining scientific experience working out

mathematical complexities in neutron transport theories, studying the

biological processes in the development of tumors, and devising solutions

to technical problems in nuclear power plant design. While the former was

making political contacts and developing know-how in securing media

cooperation, the latter was absorbed in laboratory or field problems with

no thought of politics or media involvement. At this juncture, the former

went out looking for a new battle to fight and decided to attack the

latter; it was like a lion attacking a lamb.

	As mentioned previously, nuclear scientists had long agonized over

such questions as what safety measures were needed in power plants, and

what health impacts their radioactivity releases might cause. All the

arguments were published for anyone to see. It took little effort for the

anti-nuclear activists to collect, organize selectively, and distort this

information into ammunition for their battle. People experienced in debate

and political fights are well prepared to do that. When they charged into

the battle wildly firing this ammunition, the nuclear scientists at first

laughed at the naivety of the arguments used, but they didn't laugh for

long They could easily explain the invalidity of the attacks by scientific

and technical arguments, but no one would listen to such explanations. The

phony charges of the attackers dressed up with their considerable skills

in presentation sounded much better to the media and to members of the

public with no scientific knowledge or experience. When people wanted to

hear from scientists, the attackers supplied their own - there are always

one or two available to present any point of view, and who was to know

that they represented only a miniscule minority of the scientific

community with little or no credibility among their peers.

	It was never even made clear to the public who the combatants

were. The battle was not billed as a bunch of scientifically illiterate

political activists attacking the community of nuclear scientists, which

was the true situation. It was rather represented as "environmentalists" -

what a good, sweet, and pure connotation that name carried - attacking

"big business" interests (the nuclear industry) which were trying to make

money at the expense of the public's health and safety. Jane Fonda, a

prominent actress recruited for the anti-nuclear army, refused to debate

with nuclear scientists; her antagonists, she said, were the corporation

executives. When the media wanted to present both sides of an issue, they

usually brought in corporation executives to present the pro-nuclear

viewpoint. Not only were these executives limited in their knowledge and

understanding, but the very fact that they represented a corporation

trying to make profits from nuclear power substantially reduced their

credibility.

	A crowning blow in the battle was the Three Mile Island accident,

which is rated as one of the top media events of the century. The media0

constantly portrayed the accident as a close call on a public health

disaster, and continue to do so to this day, although none of the studies

done after the accident give any reason to believe that to be the case.

____________________________________________________________________



	The result of the battle was a complete victory for the

anti-nuclear activists. In fact, the nuclear scientists were seldom

allowed on the battlefield. The battlefield here was the media, which

alone has the power to influence public opinion. Many nuclear scientists

tried hard to engage in the battle. For a while I was averaging 40 public

lectures per year, talking to any audience that invited me. In these 40

lectures, I reached perhaps 3000 people per year, but a single TV program

may reach 30 million, ten thousand times as many. TV shows are produced by

professionals at gripping an audience; they have large budgets, plentiful

personnel, and excellent facilities.

_______________________________________________________________________



END OF SNIPS



	With all this history behind them and the successes it has led to,

how could the Environmentalist organizations reverse their position?



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