4 ms·

No, I understand what you're weighing, but you're still weighing it wrong. You're looking at individual deaths. What is the maximum number of deaths/injuries th

by beat 7y ago

No, I understand what you're weighing, but you're still weighing it wrong. You're looking at individual deaths. What is the maximum number of deaths/injuries that can be caused by a solar power accident? Two, maybe? Now, what is the maximum number that can be caused by a nuclear accident? Millions. Someone stumbling off a roof will not cause the evacuation of a city. Period.

LorenPechtel 7y ago
The problem is you seem to think the bigger incident is automatically worse. Mr. Evil is sitting in a tower. He has two weapons, a rifle and a rocket launcher. Scenario A: He rolls a d100. If it comes up 1 he picks up the rifle and shoots at the first person he sees. He's competent, his target dies. Scenario B: He rolls two d100s. If both come up 1 he picks up the rocket launcher and fires at the first group of people he sees. The shrapnel from the rocket will kill 10 people. You live in the city he's in. Do you want him to roll one die or two?
shawnz 7y ago
Right, that's the whole pro-nuclear argument: individual deaths are what matter, not individual incidents. What relevance do the individual incidents have when you only need 1 nuclear plant for every 500000 solar panels?[1] If we are talking about overall utility to the human race, then why shouldn't we be looking at the overall death count? I just don't see how the potential magnitude of individual incidents factors into that when the overall deaths have already been taken into account. [1]: Based on an extremely generous estimate of 1000W per solar panel, and a fairly conservative estimate of 500MW per nuclear plant
yongjik 7y ago
Okay, let's imagine an alternative universe where home-sized nuclear reactor somehow got popular and people got used to it. As a result, a typical city has millions of small nuclear reactors. Even though the government tries hard, it is impossible to regulate all of them to absolute safety, and every month there's a nuclear leak somewhere, in every city. As a result pretty much all mankind (well, at least the urbanites) enjoy(?) a permanently raised level of radiation and elevated rate of cancer. Experts say millions die per year worldwide, but since nuclear is a part of our life, we have accepted it as a given and decided it's the price we're willing to pay. On the bright side, because each reactor is so small, each leak doesn't cause evacuation of a city: at worst the unit is locked down for a few months, and (because we've been so good at it) usually nobody dies as a result. At least no one's death can be conclusively linked to any particular accident. So, in your metric, do you think this world is safer than our own Earth with large-scale nuclear plants? ...Now, note that this isn't just an idle fantasy: it's pretty much an exact mirror image of what we do with vehicular emission.

by beat 7y ago

LorenPechtel 7y ago

The problem is you seem to think the bigger incident is automatically worse. Mr. Evil is sitting in a tower. He has two weapons, a rifle and a rocket launcher. Scenario A: He rolls a d100. If it comes up 1 he picks up the rifle and shoots at the first person he sees. He's competent, his target dies. Scenario B: He rolls two d100s. If both come up 1 he picks up the rocket launcher and fires at the first group of people he sees. The shrapnel from the rocket will kill 10 people. You live in the city he's in. Do you want him to roll one die or two?

shawnz 7y ago

Right, that's the whole pro-nuclear argument: individual deaths are what matter, not individual incidents. What relevance do the individual incidents have when you only need 1 nuclear plant for every 500000 solar panels?[1] If we are talking about overall utility to the human race, then why shouldn't we be looking at the overall death count? I just don't see how the potential magnitude of individual incidents factors into that when the overall deaths have already been taken into account. [1]: Based on an extremely generous estimate of 1000W per solar panel, and a fairly conservative estimate of 500MW per nuclear plant

yongjik 7y ago

Okay, let's imagine an alternative universe where home-sized nuclear reactor somehow got popular and people got used to it. As a result, a typical city has millions of small nuclear reactors. Even though the government tries hard, it is impossible to regulate all of them to absolute safety, and every month there's a nuclear leak somewhere, in every city. As a result pretty much all mankind (well, at least the urbanites) enjoy(?) a permanently raised level of radiation and elevated rate of cancer. Experts say millions die per year worldwide, but since nuclear is a part of our life, we have accepted it as a given and decided it's the price we're willing to pay. On the bright side, because each reactor is so small, each leak doesn't cause evacuation of a city: at worst the unit is locked down for a few months, and (because we've been so good at it) usually nobody dies as a result. At least no one's death can be conclusively linked to any particular accident. So, in your metric, do you think this world is safer than our own Earth with large-scale nuclear plants? ...Now, note that this isn't just an idle fantasy: it's pretty much an exact mirror image of what we do with vehicular emission.