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Text File  |  1992-12-16  |  1.2 KB  |  32 lines
  1. Newsgroups: sci.environment
  2. Path: sparky!uunet!stanford.edu!CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU!CSD-NewsHost!jmc
  3. From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
  4. Subject: Re: toxic spill remediation
  5. In-Reply-To: cdm@pmafire.inel.gov's message of 16 Dec 92 18:10:37 GMT
  6. Message-ID: <JMC.92Dec16113429@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
  7. Sender: news@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU
  8. Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
  9. Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
  10. References: <1992Dec15.195341.4090@head-cfa.harvard.edu> <jmullison.38.0@ucsd.edu>
  11.     <JMC.92Dec15191349@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
  12.     <1992Dec16.181037.12275@pmafire.inel.gov>
  13. Date: 16 Dec 92 11:34:29
  14. Lines: 16
  15.  
  16. How was mercury used in making hats?  Was it heated?  Did it get
  17. ionized?  Probably the answers to these questions are not easy to
  18. obtain.  The Minimata disaster was caused by mercury that was
  19. methylated.
  20.  
  21. I suppose it should be possible to make a realistic assessment
  22. of the amount of poisoning produced by playing with the stuff
  23. in junior high school.  Maybe it was trivial.  Maybe it was
  24. harmful though not directly observable.
  25.  
  26. I would like an estimate of actual danger and not just panic.
  27. --
  28. John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
  29. *
  30. He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
  31.  
  32.