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Indeed. But let's be clear that those practices are on the bad actors themselves. Let's not paint these tragedies as some form of inherent flaws of nuclear ener

Indeed. But let's be clear that those practices are on the bad actors themselves. Let's not paint these tragedies as some form of inherent flaws of nuclear energy. One thing I cannot fully communicate with posts like this, is that it's not clear what the intention is. By these posts, I refer to posts which uses emotional summary, backed by human loss that has the subject involved. Then leave no trace of the actual rational conclusion from the facts. It looks just like an intentional emotional manipulation, which plagued most US news reports. This type of approach, makes rational discussion very difficult to progress. Edit: Look at the child reply. See what emotion brings to a discussion. From nuclear energy to illegal disposal of nuclear waste, then to holocaust. The emotion is increasing, but the subject of the discussion is dissolved in the process without any trace of respect to the other parties in the discussion. Emotion sucks the rationality from the discussion, and literally deprive the common grounds between people. In the end, achieve nothing.

forgotmypw17 5y ago
Intentions don't mean much when someone somewhere has cut one corner too many and you and your family is in the fallout zone and can't leave the house, open the windows, trust your food or water safety, and that's AFTER the weeks go by before the "general population" finds out about it at all, while the people at the top of the power pyramid know within minutes or hours... Then, years later, you read HN comments downplaying the effects and the affected with the same types of arguments as Holocaust deniers. It's emotional, but it's not manipulation. It is the reality how it happened.
raxxorrax 5y ago
It is not purely emotional though. There currently are no permanent storages worldwide. The first might soon come online in Sweden, most waste us still in wet storage. Part of it in the ocean too...
- justicezyx 5y ago
  Well, but surely the posts are fully emotional, right? The point is not that the facts behind the emotion are meaningless, it's the orientation of the discussion. Of course one can reach a destination by heading in the opposite direction, because earth is round; but it would be awfully wasteful. One can also influence people and make things happen by being super emotional/ideological, in other words, being with super little rationality (not that they are incapable, they just orient in that direction naturally). But that would be awfully ineffective.
legulere 5y ago
It is a common argumentation method of self-called "rationalists" that the opponent is not rational. It is extremely disingenuous for two reasons: You go away from arguing about the topic on hand and instead proclaim that all your opponents arguments are not valid. It is basically a "You are stupid and I do not have to listen to your points". Further true rationality does not define any goals, because it is just about using reason to come to conclusions or for deducting how to best get to a goal. People that claim to be ideology-free are very dangerous, as they are not ideology free, but cannot accept people seeing different goals. You can see this romantic view of science in a lot of nuclear power advocates. Nuclear power has, standing for progress and a representative of science, become the goal in itself that is needed to be protected. To come back to the dumping of nuclear waste: For a while that practice was not even illegal, contrary to what you claim. Nuclear power leads to nuclear waste, which has to be handled properly. Because that is expensive, there exists a high probability for improper handling to happen. Given how often improper handling of nuclear waste has happened, it seems like a systematic problem that is also very likely to happen again, as nuclear waste is an issue that stays for a very long time, which probably also means different political systems. Your argument that improper handling is only the fault of the bad actors that in the end acted out the dumping is invalid. It ignores on one hand, that the responsibility for toxic waste lies with the producers. If they did not take care for a proper disposal it is their fault. On the other hand it ignores the reasoning of the people that do the toxic waste dumping. Usually that happens in poorer regions and people do it simply because they have no alternative way of earning money.
- justicezyx 5y ago
  Pardon me? But where did I accuse "lack of rationality"? I was saying the post has little context, and based on relatively mainstream mental response, it's reasonable to assume that the OP intends to arouse emotional response through association, instead of lay out it's argument. > You are stupid and I do not have to listen to your points ... I was saying that the OP did not provide context and concrete meaning. How is that not listening? If someone refuses to talk, then it must be the others is "not listening"?!... > Further true rationality does not define any goals, because it is just about using reason to come to conclusions or for deducting how to best get to a goal. People that claim to be ideology-free are very dangerous, as they are not ideology free, but cannot accept people seeing different goals. I guess this applies to the grand parent post more than mine? > You can see this romantic view of science in a lot of nuclear power advocates. Nuclear power has, standing for progress and a representative of science, become the goal in itself that is needed to be protected. Hah?! Me and every post I saw uses climate change as the main driving force. I have never seen anyone claim that nuclear is just plainly noble or something. Everyone is claiming that tech advanced and nuclear is safer and should be acceptable, if it were to be assessed relatively evenly with alternatives... > Your argument that improper handling is only the fault of the bad actors that in the end acted out the dumping is invalid I never argued this Or I never intended to argue this. But human language is complicated, I blame myself equally as anyone who misunderstood. Back to bad actor. No, bad actor in large scale is just interests misaligned. I never doubt there is fundamental issues with nuclear that caused dumping. But let's discuss in current context: emotional public are under skewed image of nuclear.

forgotmypw17 5y ago

Intentions don't mean much when someone somewhere has cut one corner too many and you and your family is in the fallout zone and can't leave the house, open the windows, trust your food or water safety, and that's AFTER the weeks go by before the "general population" finds out about it at all, while the people at the top of the power pyramid know within minutes or hours... Then, years later, you read HN comments downplaying the effects and the affected with the same types of arguments as Holocaust deniers. It's emotional, but it's not manipulation. It is the reality how it happened.

raxxorrax 5y ago

It is not purely emotional though. There currently are no permanent storages worldwide. The first might soon come online in Sweden, most waste us still in wet storage. Part of it in the ocean too...

justicezyx 5y ago
Well, but surely the posts are fully emotional, right? The point is not that the facts behind the emotion are meaningless, it's the orientation of the discussion. Of course one can reach a destination by heading in the opposite direction, because earth is round; but it would be awfully wasteful. One can also influence people and make things happen by being super emotional/ideological, in other words, being with super little rationality (not that they are incapable, they just orient in that direction naturally). But that would be awfully ineffective.

legulere 5y ago

It is a common argumentation method of self-called "rationalists" that the opponent is not rational. It is extremely disingenuous for two reasons: You go away from arguing about the topic on hand and instead proclaim that all your opponents arguments are not valid. It is basically a "You are stupid and I do not have to listen to your points". Further true rationality does not define any goals, because it is just about using reason to come to conclusions or for deducting how to best get to a goal. People that claim to be ideology-free are very dangerous, as they are not ideology free, but cannot accept people seeing different goals. You can see this romantic view of science in a lot of nuclear power advocates. Nuclear power has, standing for progress and a representative of science, become the goal in itself that is needed to be protected. To come back to the dumping of nuclear waste: For a while that practice was not even illegal, contrary to what you claim. Nuclear power leads to nuclear waste, which has to be handled properly. Because that is expensive, there exists a high probability for improper handling to happen. Given how often improper handling of nuclear waste has happened, it seems like a systematic problem that is also very likely to happen again, as nuclear waste is an issue that stays for a very long time, which probably also means different political systems. Your argument that improper handling is only the fault of the bad actors that in the end acted out the dumping is invalid. It ignores on one hand, that the responsibility for toxic waste lies with the producers. If they did not take care for a proper disposal it is their fault. On the other hand it ignores the reasoning of the people that do the toxic waste dumping. Usually that happens in poorer regions and people do it simply because they have no alternative way of earning money.

justicezyx 5y ago
Pardon me? But where did I accuse "lack of rationality"? I was saying the post has little context, and based on relatively mainstream mental response, it's reasonable to assume that the OP intends to arouse emotional response through association, instead of lay out it's argument. > You are stupid and I do not have to listen to your points ... I was saying that the OP did not provide context and concrete meaning. How is that not listening? If someone refuses to talk, then it must be the others is "not listening"?!... > Further true rationality does not define any goals, because it is just about using reason to come to conclusions or for deducting how to best get to a goal. People that claim to be ideology-free are very dangerous, as they are not ideology free, but cannot accept people seeing different goals. I guess this applies to the grand parent post more than mine? > You can see this romantic view of science in a lot of nuclear power advocates. Nuclear power has, standing for progress and a representative of science, become the goal in itself that is needed to be protected. Hah?! Me and every post I saw uses climate change as the main driving force. I have never seen anyone claim that nuclear is just plainly noble or something. Everyone is claiming that tech advanced and nuclear is safer and should be acceptable, if it were to be assessed relatively evenly with alternatives... > Your argument that improper handling is only the fault of the bad actors that in the end acted out the dumping is invalid I never argued this Or I never intended to argue this. But human language is complicated, I blame myself equally as anyone who misunderstood. Back to bad actor. No, bad actor in large scale is just interests misaligned. I never doubt there is fundamental issues with nuclear that caused dumping. But let's discuss in current context: emotional public are under skewed image of nuclear.