RE: If you do Science, use the Scientific Method!

["NIXON, Grant (Kanata)" <GNIXON@MDS.Nordion.com>]

This raises the important question: "Who is making the claim?"

 

The LNT conjecture has been institutionalized and applied for low-dose despite any proof that it applies in that region. Science demands that the burden of proof of any conjecture or claim lies on the claimant. We are told that LNT applies without threshold to low doses despite any proof of this. The advocates and proponent of LNT have thus turned the scientific tables, placing the burden of proof on others to "disprove" LNT for low-doses. The justification being that this is a prudent "best practice" in the absence of information to the contrary.

 

No less an authority that the NCRP has implied that LNT is being recklessly applied to low doses and that this is to the detriment of the public good.

 

Opinions abound on this issue. Without the institutionalization of LNT, it could be argued that there would not be sufficient records to show when one has crossed the "threshold", if such a threshold exists. On the other hand, the LNT may simply be a very costly exercise, with limited funds having been wasted on hypothesis instead of being applied to some very tangible needs.

 

Grant

 

 

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

From: Stabin, Michael [mailto:michael.g.stabin@vanderbilt.edu]

Sent: Tuesday, September 23, 2003 9:05 AM

To: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu

Subject: RE: If you do Science, use the Scientific Method!







 

>That is why "disproving" the LNT is important.  It is being used in a reckless manner, even by those who should know better.

 

I agree that the LNT has been used recklessly, and that responsible scientists who know better should point out when that is occurring. However, I think that scientific and intellectual honesty is the most important element in both our professional lives and our dealings with the public. I believe that anyone who is honest with the data will admit that at this point in time we don't know what is going on at low levels of dose. There is evidence in some experiments and data sets of thresholds and perhaps hormesis, but in others evidence of linearity, bystander effects, and other effects at low levels that cannot be categorically refuted. Until we have a unified and accepted understanding of low level effects, we should also not recklessly claim that there are none.

 

Mike

 

 



Michael G. Stabin, PhD, CHP

Assistant Professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences

Department of Radiology and Radiological Sciences

Vanderbilt University

1161 21st Avenue South

Nashville, TN 37232-2675

Phone (615) 343-0068

Fax   (615) 322-3764

Pager (615) 835-5153

e-mail     michael.g.stabin@vanderbilt.edu

internet   www.doseinfo-radar.com



  



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