home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
/ NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #3 / NN_1993_3.iso / spool / alt / activism / d / 4519 < prev    next >
Encoding:
Internet Message Format  |  1993-01-22  |  1.5 KB
  1. Xref: sparky alt.activism.d:4519 talk.environment:5647 sci.environment:14734
  2. Newsgroups: alt.activism.d,talk.environment,sci.environment
  3. Path: sparky!uunet!portal!truffula!cls
  4. From: cls@truffula.sj.ca.us (Cameron L. Spitzer)
  5. Subject: Re: 11/92 interview w/Dr. Ernest J. Sternglass, author of "Secret Fallout"
  6. Organization: Save the Humans!
  7. Date: Fri, 22 Jan 93 07:58:36 GMT
  8. Message-ID: <1993Jan22.075836.13640@truffula.sj.ca.us>
  9. Followup-To: talk.environment
  10. Summary: garbage in garbage out
  11. References: <1993Jan20.152046.8384@mont.cs.missouri.edu> <1993Jan20.191653.18483@gn.ecn.purdue.edu> <1993Jan21.015635.18905@gn.ecn.purdue.edu>
  12. Lines: 28
  13.  
  14.  
  15. Here's an example of a specious appeal to arithmetic, nonsense due to bad
  16. input data.
  17.  
  18. In article <1993Jan21.015635.18905@gn.ecn.purdue.edu>
  19.  constant@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Tino) writes:
  20. >According to this calculation, there should be NO ONE ALIVE IN THE U.S., due
  21. >to natural background radiation.
  22. >
  23. >Here's the numbers:
  24. >
  25. >The collective dose of TMI on the U.S.: 3300 person-rem (best estimate)
  26. >                                        2000-5000 person-rem (estimate range)
  27. >
  28. ...
  29. >By Sternglass' approximation, the death count from nature:
  30. >                                     70,000,000,000 dead Americans in 10 years
  31.  
  32.  
  33. Trouble with this analysis is the "collective dose of TMI" is actually
  34. unknown because the amount of radioactive material released is unknown.
  35. The instruments at TMI were disabled during some releases and
  36. off the scale during others.
  37.  
  38.  
  39. * Any problem soluble solely by arithmetic is unimportant.
  40. --
  41. Cameron Spitzer
  42.