Health hazards associated with interviewing antinuclear activists.

[Goth]

http://www.philrutherford.com/Activi...lth_Hazard.pdf

Caldicott et al. would be horrified.

[phextwin]

Haha, awesome. Reminds me of the 'ban DHMO' thing.

[holdennutta]

"Should two activists explode, our
country could be wiped out instantly."

Bwaha!

Quite a funny little article.

[Dr feelgood]

Hmmm, I've seen stuff like this before. Its the inteligent Mocking the naive, while out there the wise mock the inteligent and the Naive are amused by how the wise lack relative experience. unfortunately only the inteligent will get this Joke and only the wise will be offended. who cares about the naive, they neither understand nor see the joke, thus they don't realise they are being mocked.

[Goth]

It's not really out-and-out mocking, it's designed to illustrate a valid point, which it illustrates quite well.

[King of Cool]

Ha ha, thats absolutely hilarious, maybe reporters should be required to obtain a radiation use license and wear a radiation dosimeter. Ominously glances towards a XX GBq Cs137 source which I get to use on an all too frequent basis.

KoC

[MR CHILLED]

Originally Posted by Goth

it's designed to illustrate a valid point

And what point is that? That anti nuclear protesters do indeed expose themselves to risk, and as such others can be affected?

[Goose1981]

Originally Posted by MR CHILLED

And what point is that? That anti nuclear protesters do indeed expose themselves to risk, and as such others can be affected?

Probably more that the vocal minority on these issues (and most of the usual fashionable causes) are not terribly well informed of the issues against which they rally. I find it pretty funny in the way it comes across as alarmist and shocking (to the ill informed) when in fact the content is describing relatively harmless things (to the well informed).

To me its comparable to using the same scare tactics usually seen coming from the protesting side, but in a giggly way (yes, i made that word up just for this post).

Once again Goth.. love your work.. this is why i love this part of the forum.

[Ze.]

Goddam this is great

I love it.

[Assasinator_2]

I no longer feel safe to walk the streets. I might become contaminated.

[Glock]

Oh, I did laugh. Quite a bit.
I think you've gone abit far with the joke however, in that, unlike the "Ban DHMO" campaign, you've used some pretty wide stretches, rather than simply relied on public ignorance to illustrate the point.

For example the "Should two activists explode, our country could be wiped out instantly." line, is obviously stretched beyond misunderstanding. You're plainly inducing a response.
Whereas the DHMO campaign was more about the presentation of some well selected facts, leaving out the key detail that this "absorbtion into the lungs" was infact DROWNING.
There's no natural phenomena whereby people scatter their atoms across continents - sure, it's possible (given winds, etc.) but it's not always happening.

Al that said though, nice effort.

[Goth]

Originally Posted by Glock

...you've used some pretty wide stretches...

...obviously stretched beyond misunderstanding. You're plainly inducing a response....
...
There's no natural phenomena whereby people scatter their atoms across continents - sure, it's possible (given winds, etc.) but it's not always happening...

Go and get something like this and read it. You'll see. Therein you'll see the point that we're trying to illustrate.

Here are some choice quotes.

When uranium is packed tightly together and the moderating rods made of boron are slowly removed, the uranium reaches critical mass

The design for an atomic bomb can easily be found on the Internet; some basic materials purchased at the local hardware shop will complete production

With sophisticated technology the minimum amount of plutonium is 1 to 3 kilograms (2.2 to 6.6 pounds), however the generally accepted amount is 5kg of weapons grade plutonium and 8kg for reactor grade plutonium

The design is available on the Internet; the essential materials can be bought at any hardware store.

In addition, it is dangerous to use fast neutrons rather than slow neutrons. Slow neutrons provide greater response time for equipment and operators, in the event of a reactivity excursion accident, which could possibly be stopped before reaching a tragic release of radiation. Fast neutrons, on the other hand, provide very little time or margin for error.

Yes, this is actually what the book says. Word for word. And there's more. A lot more. My thorough analysis, critique and rebuttal will be released to the public in coming weeks. Stay tuned.

Until then, read this book. It will make you think. It will disturb and frighten you. It's ripped straight from the exploits of Jack Bauer. Yes, it's supposed to be factual. It's factual in the same way the Naomi Robson is factual, and it makes Baby Science Jesus cry.

[Dr feelgood]

The design for an atomic bomb can easily be found on the Internet; some basic materials purchased at the local hardware shop will complete production

wicked, I'm going down to mitre10 tomorrow, How much plutonium do you think they stock? I only need 6 Kilo's.

Also has someone got a URL to this site that shows how to build and arm a nuclear device?

In addition, it is dangerous to use fast neutrons rather than slow neutrons. Slow neutrons provide greater response time for equipment and operators, in the event of a reactivity excursion accident, which could possibly be stopped before reaching a tragic release of radiation. Fast neutrons, on the other hand, provide very little time or margin for error.

Are these slow neutrons still faster than me, during a nuclear crisis I can do the following in less than a second:

Panic, Shit my pants, pray for deliverance, push everybutton in front of me in desperate hope that something better will happen, shit my pants a second time, go through a phase of denial, remember what the china syndrome is, go through a stage of acceptance.

On a serious note how fast is a neutron once it has been split from the nucleus? I'm guessing as fast as an electron or photon?

[Goth]

Originally Posted by Dr feelgood

On a serious note how fast is a neutron once it has been split from the nucleus? I'm guessing as fast as an electron or photon?

A fast neutron is a free neutron with a kinetic energy level close to 1 MeV , hence a speed of 14,000 km/s.

If a neutron gets say 60MeV of kinetic energy from a fission reaction, it could be going a lot faster than that, let's say 20% of c.

A thermal neutron is a free neutron with a kinetic energy level of ca. 0.025 eV, hence a speed of 2.2 km/s.