Posts by A.T. Tappman (Chaplain) 15 publicly visible posts • joined 2 Dec 2010
..that we won't.
if you were to have "a paper presenting any discoveries of tsunami casualties as though they're a result of the accident at the plant." , then it would have to include people who died before the nuclear incident.
I suspect that this would probably not pass peer review. Although given the Sokal text affair, you never know.
At every stage it states that the predicted increases of a few percent extra cancer deaths would be unlikely to be detected using the available data and statistical methods.
It then goes on to say that, as it had originally thought, it was unable to detect solid evidence in the data.
This is not UNSCEAR saying that it thinks there were no more than 60 or so deaths due to radiation, but rather that if the overall increase in cancer deaths is only a few thousand, then it won't show up as a statistically significant result in the data of a few hundred thousand cancer deaths.
loving the dig - "If an effect's not measurable, then as a rule, it's best not to assume it exists. I can see why in your profession you might feel differently...."
my profession is in software and electromechanical engineering, A. T. Tappman is the chaplain Yossarian falls in love with at the start of Catch22 ;]
If an effect is not statistically measurable in a given sample population, and you have already calculated that the signal you are looking for is smaller than the noise in that sample, but for another sample population the effect by the same mechanism is statistically measurable, then it would not be a good idea to assume that there is no effect.
To put it another way, if you are looking at respiratory illness among a sample of smokers who do a long commute daily in a polluted city, then you are unlikely to be able to get good statistical evidence for illness caused from tobacco inhalation just from their public health data. That does not mean that there have been no deaths from tobacco within that sample population, but to estimate how many there are in that sample, we have to rely on other population studies as well.
they are only difficult to measure, because several thousand extra deaths across a wide range of conditions is very difficult to measure unless you have a really good idea of how many deaths you are expecting. According to UNSCEAR and the WHO, the deaths are still estimated to be several thousand and not 60, however the direct evidence is hard to glean and so the estimates are based on epidemiological studies instead, which can never give direct causal results by their very nature.
“Given that the Fukushima nuclear power plant is on the ocean, and with leaks and runoff directly to the ocean, the impacts on the ocean will exceed those of Chernobyl, which was hundreds of miles from any sea," - Ken Buesseler, senior scientist in marine chemistry at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.
“Cesium behaves like potassium, so would end up in all marine life, it certainly will have an effect.” - Arjun Makhijani, president of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research in Maryland.
"Depending on its chemical form and by what organisms it is taken up, radiation can also concentrate when it moves through the food chain. A 1999 study found that seals and porpoises in the Irish Sea concentrated radioactive cesium by a factor of 300 relative to its concentration in seawater, and a factor of 3 to 4 compared to the fish they ate." - Elizabeth Grossman, science author and journalist.
"It is impossible to assess reliably, with any precision, numbers of fatal cancers caused by radiation exposure due to the Chernobyl accident — or indeed the impact of the stress and anxiety induced by the accident and the response to it.
Small differences in the assumptions concerning radiation risks can lead to large differences in the predicted health consequences, which are therefore highly uncertain.
An international expert group has made projections to provide a rough estimate of the possible health impacts of the accident and to help plan the future allocation of public health resources. The projections indicate that, among the most exposed populations (liquidators, evacuees and residents of the so-called ‘strict control zones’), total cancer mortality might increase by up to a few per cent owing to Chernobyl related radiation exposure.
Such an increase could mean eventually up to several thousand fatal cancers in addition to perhaps one hundred thousand cancer deaths expected in these populations from all other causes. An increase of this magnitude would be very difficult to detect, even with long term epidemiological studies."
- quoted from the 2005 WHO document, 'Chernobyl’s Legacy: Health, Environmental and Socio-Economic Impacts')
"Actually as we have seen the consequences of a "catastrophic" nuclear accident are either zero (Fukushima, Three Mile Island) or minuscule (Chernobyl actually killed fewer than 60 people)."
- quoted from some noises heard emanating from Lewis Page. Further analysis will be needed to discover the orifice that discharged them.
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Yes, the other effects of the earthquake are a much larger scale disaster than Fukushima.
Yes, the press are being crap and scaremongering.
Yes, the overall health risks will probably be relatively low when compared to other risks.
But this is still a major, albeit localised, nuclear disaster that will, in all probability, have profound effects on local marine life and it still has the potential for serious health concerns due to the concentrating effects of the food chain. If Lewis wants to preach to the converted and play at tabloid journalism, then that is fair enough, it is his column. However he is in no way some shining beacon of truth on this subject.
Wondering the implication of the quote marks in the headline.
Do you not think he really went missing, or that he has not really been released, or what?
Quotes are only usually used in a headline in that way to indicate either euphemism or disbelief, but the articles themselves give little indication. I would have assumed it to just be sloppy headline writing were it not for the fact that the quotes are used in that way in the headlines for the articles on him going missing as well.
There'd be none of us gays about if it wasn't for us breeding all the time. We're just like bunny rabbits in that regard. Evil bunny rabbits that make the baby jesus cry.
Do you think Delgaudio's been getting his biology lessons from the Texas education board perhaps?
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