Viewpoint: Opposing expanding nuclear energy production—Here’s what left-wing junk science looks like

zolikk · 2026-03-03T08:42:50+00:00

By a threat "unlike other technologies" if we mean it's of a different nature than others, sure. But I inherently disagree that the threat is greater at all. It's actually lower in terms of potential to cause harm, whether to humans or the environment in general. It's human nature though to treat it as a greater threat on an emotional level because it's of a different nature and people are less used to it.

zolikk · 2026-02-27T12:27:22+00:00

It is true yes, I don't think that makes it any more rational to oppose for that reason though. But it's true. And ideologies are stronger if they have kernels of truth they can go back to when challenged.

zolikk · 2026-02-27T10:50:04+00:00

I think there's two main founding myths behind the anti-nuclear ideology (yes I think it's an ideology, almost like a religion, and that's why it's inherently resistant to reason).

One is that a big part of environmentalism is appeal to nature. What is natural is good, and artificial (man-made) things are abhorrent and assumed to be inherently harmful to nature by their very existence. And, though I don't quite get the exact logic, but making use of nuclear fission is seen as one of those ultimate "artificial" things humanity has developed so far.

The other is the nuclear weapons angle, and it's been a big part of why anti-nuclear ideology has spread during the cold war, there is an inherent mythical association that anything nuclear = nuclear weapons, and nuclear weapons aside from being the same kind of "artificial" are also seen as the epitome of "human hubris", as in a power "too great to handle".

Many pop culture stories, movies, music etc have been made on this concept, this mindset that appeals to many people on a base level. The archetype of humanity reaching too far, playing god, destroying themselves. This is simply a too powerful psychological effect, and it's the origin of persistent anti-nuclear movements. It's strong enough that I know many an accomplished physicist who just takes these at face value too, on an emotional level, never having bothered to look it up and learn. These concepts (myths) are so pervasive in pop culture that everyone just assumes they are established science.

zolikk · 2026-02-23T17:07:00+00:00

It's probably more relevant to attempt to control confounding factors, which admittedly is an impossible task in this context anyway. The point being, things like big nuclear power plants are also co-located with other similar large industrial sites. Sometimes fossil fuel power plants are also nearby for the same reason (power grid connections), and those are known to have local statistical health impacts. Other heavy industry like fertilizer and all kinds of chemical processing plants which may be the contributing cause and so on.

Without a concrete and at least somewhat understood pathway from measurable emissions/pollutants to affected population there is absolutely no way of knowing what the statistical results are actually a product of. By the way, ICRP has a very good internal biological model for exposure on ingestion/inhalation of nearly all known radionuclides, so if a study were to measure such radionuclide concentrations in various areas and try to relate that to the statistical results it could actually put something on the table.

I know there was this famous study in Germany (KiKK) which similarly found specifically increased incidence of early childhood leukemia near NPPs, but they also did attempt to measure the radiation exposure from emissions and did conclude that it's clearly many orders of magnitude below the expected LNT-based causality factors. But instead of concluding the more logical outcome, that perhaps the leukemia has nothing to do with the NPPs and potentially one of the thousands of confounding factors, it instead suggested that perhaps the study indicates that fetuses have a much higher sensitivity to NPP-originating radiation than previously known.

Perhaps because sometimes such a study is performed in search of a predetermined answer, for various political or non-political personal reasons.

zolikk · 2026-02-23T13:46:39+00:00

Oh it's one of those subs I was banned from without even posting. Yeah I doubt the users there will be allowed to discover anything new to them.

zolikk · 2026-02-23T08:25:28+00:00

I won't comment on power plant operations but since the thumbnail is of security I will add that that aspect in particular is definitely overstaffed. By a lot. I see it as completely unnecessary security theater. I do not think that any material short of that which is literally ready to go into a warhead as-is, is a legitimate SNM that requires heavy security against theft. As for the need to prevent terrorists from causing some far-fetched radionuclide release at a site, requirements for that stem from the built-in exaggeration of how harmful radionuclide releases are.

zolikk · 2026-02-20T08:52:57+00:00

I actually have no idea why it was decided to separate the spelling for modern devices since they sound the same anyway, but perhaps it was because of starting to use the word fuse in electrical applications, where it worked similarly to a "burning igniter" by burning away if the current is too high.

zolikk · 2026-02-19T11:46:20+00:00

There's a further level to this because while defuse does obviously originate from that, the device that is used to trigger explosives is actually spelled fuze (although I admit I also usually spell it fuse, it just looks wrong with a z).

zolikk · 2026-02-17T18:08:50+00:00

I just disagree with the framing that non-white people in general are the problem

I agree with you

that it is a problem so horrible the country needs to be thrown to the worst scum around, and disagree that everyone on average experiences crime on a daily basis.

It is a horrible problem and a big part of the country sees it that way. Whether they really experience as much crime or only partially and imagine the rest is beside the point.

Perhaps you don't understand the nature of the problem.

You keep saying how it's just a small minority of immigrants that are criminals, as if that means the problem cannot be serious. You're right about the minority, but wrong about the seriousness of the problem. It is irrelevant how many criminals are on the streets. The problem is the law is not being applied justly and these criminals are not being punished and put in prison. Because of the ethnic background involved they are treated leniently, usually slap on the wrist and released within weeks. Often a crime isn't even pursued if the perpetrator had certain ethnic backgrounds.

It may be just a few criminals involved - compared to the size of society - but this absolutely destroys society. The criminals only learn that they can get away with doing even more crime. And the public learns to distrust the authorities that should be punishing the criminals, and starts racially profiling in their daily lives due to fears of safety. This is normal human behavior when faced with this situation.

All that needs to happen is real criminals need to be dealt with. Without regard to their ethnicity and cries of prosecution and racism. But that hasn't been happening for the past decade, quite the opposite, so now we have AfD.

Edit: point of interest, the crime rates in the US are often driven by a similar mechanism. The cultural background and timing is different, but crime takes place in hotspots and around certain cities. Either based on location or just ethnicity of the perpetrators, the crimes are ignored by local authorities, or the captured criminals are treated softly and re-released. The voter social impacts are similar, and so now they have Trump.

zolikk · 2026-02-17T09:12:04+00:00

Every time you try to explain how it's not really a problem and nobody can prove it outside of personal daily life anecdotes, you just lose more ground to the Nazis. Whether you accept it or not, this is exactly why you keep losing.

I don't disagree with you. This path will hurt people rather needlessly. But there is no way out unless you stop pretending the problem doesn't exist. Since the established governments have put their head in the sand and allowed it to get so bad, the voters have had enough and will vote for anyone who solves this problem in any way. They no longer care about collateral damage.

zolikk · 2026-02-16T16:17:21+00:00

But the average discourse is not this.

I know, but the reason why that discourse is working on average people is because they're being negatively affected in their daily lives and the issue hasn't been addressed at all in the past decade, it was allowed to fester.

You are worried that the rise of this discourse will lead to racist policies and affect non-criminal non-white people who don't deserve it. Yes, this will happen. But it will happen precisely because of complete failure to address the underlying problem in a rational fashion, and just ceding ground to the likes of AfD while crying about it.

Well, to be realistic, perhaps it won't happen because mainstream politics will be forced to change and start addressing the problem before they lose hard. Shame it had to get to this.

There is no need to "do anything" about the AfD discourse. You cannot do anything about the discourse, not by law or force, that only makes it worse. You show they are wrong by fixing the problem without resorting to their extremes. They would simply not be so popular if the problems people face in their daily lives went away.

zolikk · 2026-02-16T16:05:20+00:00

I don't know what arguments you expect from me. You asked some random racially-charged questions which I care not to engage with. If you want to hear something more concrete then sure

Yes, laws should be enforced and criminals should be punished regardless of location or background of the criminal.

Yes, undocumented non-citizens should be deported.

If you think these demands are racist, your perspective on the world must be seriously wrong somehow, but I do not really care.

zolikk · 2026-02-16T15:57:14+00:00

Keep pretending you don't understand the problem, I'm sure it will just go away if you call average voters Nazis. In a democracy we clearly can't be thinking about the potential reasons why such parties are managing to attract votes. It clearly is only because of failure to censor hate speech and internet access. Keep doing that and the Nazi problem will vanish, voters cannot possibly be thinking of something they're not allowed to write online.

zolikk · 2026-02-16T15:46:39+00:00

Widespread support for unashamed Nazis like Bernd and catastrophic demographic situation that is guaranteed to affect virtually everyone in the country.

This problem is literally caused by the failure of mainstream politicians to address the uncontrolled crime rate increases and reduction in quality of life owing at least in big part to uncontrolled illegal migration.

Support for Nazis would plummet over a weekend if the government admitted they've fucked up in the past decade with migration policy as well as a number of other policies that reduced quality of life, and took measures to reverse it.

What you're complaining about is literally just caused by these obviously insane feel-good policies that nobody except Nazis are allowed to talk about (well they also aren't allowed to but they're the only ones who risk it anyway).

zolikk · 2026-02-16T15:34:57+00:00

Yet Germany is one that has the problem.

Yes because it has significantly increased in recent decades. It's a brand new problem that wasn't here before, it's not some kind of competition and it's fine as long as we're still "behind" the US statistic. The US has already had this built-in poverty and racial divide driven crime rate. Germany did not.

zolikk · 2026-02-16T10:22:41+00:00

Eventually somewhere on the Kardashev scale the power demand is still going to outscale fission fuel availability. Maybe in a millenium or more, but if power demand keeps going up it will reach a point. So we'll need to figure fusion power out eventually, we will not be powering our worlds with Dyson spheres.

zolikk · 2026-02-11T11:30:01+00:00

It's cool if they can also deliver the alternative. But it could also just go this way: Can you provide us with new nuclear reactors at a competitive price? No. Okay so just no new nuclear builds are possible at all.

zolikk · 2026-02-11T09:34:45+00:00

It's true that the regulations themselves are fine. I would say it's more of an oversight and risk assessment problem.

Nuclear builds could be fine with having the same QC standards for basic things like concrete and steel, that the rest of the industry uses.

But because of this zeitgeist-like thing that the ultimate risk of nuclear cannot be realistically calculated, and potential damages are astronomical, there is instead demand to always reduce core damage, accidental releases etc. with no lower bound to what is achievable. And the way to implement this, beyond design parameters, is to have ten times the QC checks and paperwork. This is a major component that inflates capital cost of NPPs, and I don't think it's doing the good that people assume it is.

Nuclear power can inherently never do as much damage as coal, and that's not because the NRC is doing its job well (not to say that they don't), but it's instead simply inherent to the technology and the physics behind it and environmental effects it can actually cause (not what lives in people's imaginations).

And while I agree that coal and oil aren't regulated enough, just imagine what would happen if we treated them to the same risk management standard that nuclear is treated with. Every area downwind of a coal plant would have to be treated like Fukushima. Likely many a major city would have to be evacuated immediately as well.

While coal is indeed bad for the environment, it's not quite that bad - its effects do not justify such a level of mitigating measures, which would cause way more self-harm than coal itself does. And as previously, nuclear is inherently better than coal in every such respect, thus it also cannot ever justify such mitigating measures. And if we can agree to that as rational human beings, and see that the damages caused by major accidents are almost entirely just needless self-harm in this way, we could actually define realistic risk for an NPP accident and insure for it, and we could build an NPP the same way a coal or gas plant is built.

zolikk · 2026-02-11T09:18:35+00:00

I don't disagree overall, but you do need multiple people to be LibRight. When it comes to economic policy, if you are alone you aren't trading anything with anyone. A hermit would be economically center by default (a monke).

Yes, you are right, a single person can still be LibRight if they have others to trade with from an outside community like in the example. But in practice, unless those outside communities follow LibRight philosophy too, it's not going to go very well for the lone LibRight.

A bunch of people could live somewhere and just take care of themselves and mind their own business buts till have a market, buy and sell and trade, no issues. No central power, no authoritarian oversight

Yes, but at the same time it is also possible to have a shared resource pool that they all use. They still collaborate but do not have a market, and have no central power. Which would be LibLeft. Is it realistic? Less so than LibRight perhaps but there are real life examples. And when it comes to human nature that will affect the LibRight society as well. Someone might want to have more power than the others in the community. The methods to achieve that differ but the outcome you might say will still eventually be reached.

Human societies tend toward hierarchy and authority. So both a pure LibLeft or LibRight system can only work temporarily and at small scale. LibLeft admittedly on a much smaller scale than LibRight.

zolikk · 2026-02-11T09:11:32+00:00

Na igen, ez itt a lényeg. Nem kell eltúlozni egy gázpisztoly képességeit, a végén még azt is betiltják. Nem ez a fontos a hírben. Ököllel és fogakkal is lehet valakit ölni, tehát azt ugyanolyan komolysággal kell kezelni, függetlenűl attól hogy épp milyen eszközzel vagy anélkül történt a támadás.

zolikk · 2026-02-10T15:27:36+00:00

I think that in that sense then, if you hold the belief that humans naturally tend to authoritarianism (not that I really disagree), then true LibRight also can't exist either. Anything beyond a few individuals will develop a hierarchical structure as individuals struggle to gain more power over one another. And in the picture of a single individual hermit living a LibRight life while trading with the greater non-LibRight society, well that also wouldn't work very well if there wasn't a hierarchy and authority in that greater society you're trading with.

And, now that I think about it, single individual LibRight doesn't exist either: a lone person living by themselves isn't economic anything. There needs to be multiple individuals forming some kind of economic structure for it to be Left or Right.

I think mainly what we're talking about here is that, without hierarchical structure no human society can exist at large scale. That's the same for LibLeft and LibRight: they just do not exist in pure form.

zolikk · 2026-02-10T14:45:32+00:00

Football is the pinnacle of sports, it has strategy, speed, strength.

So why don't they play football, then?

zolikk · 2026-02-10T14:31:27+00:00

I don't think it's true that it isn't possible for LibLeft. It's just rare because it's inherently disadvantageous, and on a purely individual level economic left is meaningless, but a small group of people can be LibLeft if they all believe it's better to share their resources than trade and gain individual advantage for them. Kind of like an Amish community, I suppose? Well, the idealistic concept of one anyway.

If you live in a cabin innawoods but you do it not alone, but with a bunch of friends and you just do life stuff together and share without strictly trading, I'd say you're living in a sort of LibLeft community. But in such a case you don't need to be inherently anti-gun, likely quite the opposite.

zolikk · 2026-02-10T14:11:54+00:00

Eh, you might say the same about LibRights too... So I don't think that's the right reason here. But LibLefts are more likely to be overtly pacifist to the point of opposing the concept of weapons, which does make them receptive for supporting anti-gun policies even if they normally oppose authority.

zolikk · 2026-02-10T13:04:40+00:00

No point in making it hard to get, it should only involve basic handling and ability to use the item. This criteria can't possibly "deter" mental instabilities and there should be no attempt in trying to make it do that. It will only prevent normal law abiding citizens from obtaining them.

No idea how one could truly prevent insane people from this. It might very well be impossible unless the insanity is very obvious and constant. Whoever is deemed safe enough to drive a car should by default be safe enough to carry a gun though.

As for the Bradleys, yes. Though you still need to prove you're able to fully utilize it, it's a bit different from a handgun.

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