4 ms·

Yeah, if people can throw around "deaths due to air pollution" it seems pretty legitimate to throw around "lives saved due to nuclear".

runarberg 5y ago
It might seem legitimate but I disagree that it is. It needlessly promotes one alternative over unmentioned others, giving people the sense that the only mentioned alternative is the only sensible one. Take a version of the trolley problem for example. A trolley is heading towards group of people tied to the tracks. You have the option to pull a lever and divert the trolley to another pair of tracks, but it will hit an engineer working on those tracks. You state that pulling the lever saves all these lives, but unmentioned is the alternative to derail the trolley to a runaway zone which saves everybody. In this version of the trolley problem you can count the deaths due to inaction. Is it right however to shift the rhetoric and talk about how many lives saved due to one particular action without mentioning there was an alternative?
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  It's an understandable impulse to assume that every article is framed in reference to the thing you're passionate about, but considering renewables weren't generally feasible (i.e., hydro and geothermal are older but not generally available for obvious reasons) until relatively recently (and even still, its feasibility for reliable base load generation is dubious), it's a certainty that this article is positioning nuclear relative to fossil fuels, not renewable energy. Even if renewables were available the whole time, it's perfectly reasonable to talk about the lives saved by nuclear even if renewables would save a few more (and to be very explicit, the renewables-only crowd reliably exaggerates the lives saved--some renewable energy sources kill more people than nuclear, even when accounting for disasters like Chernobyl).
  - ZeroGravitas 5y ago
    By the same logic, Hydropower has saved 3 Million lives in the last 50 years. Efficiency and insulation probably saved even more.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      Sure. Did you think this was a counterpoint to my comment? Or what's the relevance?
      - ZeroGravitas 5y ago
        You said: > to be very explicit, the renewables-only crowd reliably exaggerates the lives saved--some renewable energy sources kill more people than nuclear, even when accounting for disasters like Chernobyl.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        I don't see how that's meant to be a rebuttal. I don't know the figures, but I wouldn't be surprised if hydro (replacing carbon) has saved a lot of lives. My quote was referring to people claiming that per unit energy, renewables are dramatically safer. Hydro is great where available, and renewables are important. There just isn't a compelling reason to rule out nuclear energy at this point.
  - runarberg 5y ago
    One thing that always bugged me about the trolley problem is that it omits the question: “Why are all these people tied to the tracks? Who is responsible for tying them? Why am I responsible for pulling the lever, but not the criminal for tying the people? Or even the police for failing to stop the criminal?” This is the same sense that I get when I see people promoting nuclear as live saving technology. It is not on nuclear plants to save people from pollution, it is on the coal industry to stop polluting.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      If people were angels, there would be no need for government. Unfortunately, the fossil-fuel industry is going to pollute unless they're prevented by regulation. The industry selects for people who are willing to put profits over moral responsibility, so society can't rely on them not to pollute any more than we can rely on murderers not to murder.

runarberg 5y ago

It might seem legitimate but I disagree that it is. It needlessly promotes one alternative over unmentioned others, giving people the sense that the only mentioned alternative is the only sensible one. Take a version of the trolley problem for example. A trolley is heading towards group of people tied to the tracks. You have the option to pull a lever and divert the trolley to another pair of tracks, but it will hit an engineer working on those tracks. You state that pulling the lever saves all these lives, but unmentioned is the alternative to derail the trolley to a runaway zone which saves everybody. In this version of the trolley problem you can count the deaths due to inaction. Is it right however to shift the rhetoric and talk about how many lives saved due to one particular action without mentioning there was an alternative?

throwaway894345 5y ago
It's an understandable impulse to assume that every article is framed in reference to the thing you're passionate about, but considering renewables weren't generally feasible (i.e., hydro and geothermal are older but not generally available for obvious reasons) until relatively recently (and even still, its feasibility for reliable base load generation is dubious), it's a certainty that this article is positioning nuclear relative to fossil fuels, not renewable energy. Even if renewables were available the whole time, it's perfectly reasonable to talk about the lives saved by nuclear even if renewables would save a few more (and to be very explicit, the renewables-only crowd reliably exaggerates the lives saved--some renewable energy sources kill more people than nuclear, even when accounting for disasters like Chernobyl).
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  By the same logic, Hydropower has saved 3 Million lives in the last 50 years. Efficiency and insulation probably saved even more.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    Sure. Did you think this was a counterpoint to my comment? Or what's the relevance?
    - ZeroGravitas 5y ago
      You said: > to be very explicit, the renewables-only crowd reliably exaggerates the lives saved--some renewable energy sources kill more people than nuclear, even when accounting for disasters like Chernobyl.
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        I don't see how that's meant to be a rebuttal. I don't know the figures, but I wouldn't be surprised if hydro (replacing carbon) has saved a lot of lives. My quote was referring to people claiming that per unit energy, renewables are dramatically safer. Hydro is great where available, and renewables are important. There just isn't a compelling reason to rule out nuclear energy at this point.
- runarberg 5y ago
  One thing that always bugged me about the trolley problem is that it omits the question: “Why are all these people tied to the tracks? Who is responsible for tying them? Why am I responsible for pulling the lever, but not the criminal for tying the people? Or even the police for failing to stop the criminal?” This is the same sense that I get when I see people promoting nuclear as live saving technology. It is not on nuclear plants to save people from pollution, it is on the coal industry to stop polluting.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    If people were angels, there would be no need for government. Unfortunately, the fossil-fuel industry is going to pollute unless they're prevented by regulation. The industry selects for people who are willing to put profits over moral responsibility, so society can't rely on them not to pollute any more than we can rely on murderers not to murder.