[mpweiher]

That's a big claim. Do you have big evidence to back it up?

Take into consideration that 2 nuclear bombs dropped on Japan did not cause Japan to not exist afterwards. In fact, the damage and death toll from those two bombs was less than from the wholly conventional Tokyo firestorm.

Yes, nuclear technology is a big lever, and yes, big levers are dangerous. But it's simply not as earth-shatteringly more dangerous as people believe.

Remember that there have been no deaths so far from the Fukushima meltdown, which was about as bad as you can imagine, with bad siting, bad technology, bad safety precautions, awful handling etc. At the same time, the Tsunami that caused the meltdown did cause over 15000 deaths.

[mikeash]

I agree with your position but comparing to bombs is not a good comparison. Nuclear reactors contain far more fissile material than the bombs dropped on Japan. Of the two, Little Boy had by far the most fissile material, with 140lbs of U235. By contrast, a nuclear reactor will contain many tons of fissile material. The possibility for widespread long-term contamination of the landscape is therefore much greater.

Again, I think you've reached the right conclusion, but looking at the lack of long-term damage from the bombs doesn't tell us anything either way about the potential for damage from a reactor.

[mpweiher]

You missed two things:

1) I wrote "take into consideration". That means that this is something to consider, not something that proves my thesis conclusively. So your criticism is misplaced.

2) You also miss the fact that bombs are designed to cause as much damage as possible, whereas reactors are designed to contain damage as much as possible. A candle contains much more energy than a stick of dynamite, yet the former is far more damaging.

[mikeash]

It makes no sense to "take into consideration" the long-term radioactive contamination caused by 150lbs of fissile material when considering the potential damage from a reactor accident. I stand by my statement.

[mpweiher]

You can stand by your statement all day long, that doesn't make it any more sensible.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Chernobyl_and_ot...

Referencing: http://www.iaea.org/inis/collection/NCLCollectionStore/_Publ...

Compare the section: "Chernobyl compared with an atomic bomb".

But what do the IAEA and the WHO know about anything?

[mikeash]

Since both of those links only bring up the Hiroshima bomb to show that Chernobyl was orders of magnitude worse in terms of release of radioactive material, I'd say both of those support my point rather well.

[mpweiher]

Actually, they disprove your point, which you would notice if you'd actually read both the link and what I wrote.

First, they show conclusively that "amount of radioactive material" is not the be-all/end-all measurement that you make it out to be. Nuclear tests put a total of 100-1000 times the nuclear material of Chernobyl into the atmosphere, and yet we are also still here.

> It makes no sense to "take into consideration" [..]

Furthermore, they do exactly what you claim "makes no sense". They "take into consideration" the effects of the bombs, and they compare those effects. They do come to the conclusion that the effects are different, one factor being that Chernobyl had more material, a counter-effect being that the radiation from Chernobyl is much more low-level and thus much less harmful (in fact, there are indications that low-level radiation may be beneficial).

But "into consideration" they certainly take. QED.