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writing for godot

Our Messy Divorce from Nature - Will Skeptics Deny Her Three Times?

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Written by John Glassco   
Thursday, 30 April 2015 04:31
Nothing bothers me more than people who dismiss obvious signs of change. The statement; "climate change is natural and has existed for centuries" is a dismissive statement that really says: "I don't care about your concern. I have already made up my mind without having to understand any details." People proud of their scientific ignorance drive me crazy, especially when they have no frigging idea of which they speak.

A related dismissive attitude to accumulating, dangerous, and long-lived waste concerns radiation. According to Wiki, since the first nuclear test explosion on July 16, 1945, at least eight nations have detonated 2,053 nuclear test explosions at dozens of test sites from Lop Nor in China, to the atolls of the Pacific, to Nevada, to Algeria where France conducted its first nuclear device, to western Australia where the U.K. exploded nuclear weapons, the South Atlantic, to Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, across Russia, and elsewhere.

With all of these releases, regardless of Chernobyl, Fukushima, and the shady list of nuclear accidents, we are adding to lingering nuclear contamination in many many places around the world. Even coal fired power plants emit radiation in their exhaust. Some of us just don't care. I still hear people claiming: "radiation is natural - the sun bombards us daily without hurting us - and all of the Chicken Little fears of the timid scientists are simply unfounded."

Why oh why can so many people not see relationships in nature. They seem completely blind. Well there is finally scientific proof of cause and effect between high background radiation and environmental health, although it will probably take the skeptics years to catch on.

A new study of Chernobyl by Timothy A. Mousseau, Gennadi Milinevsky, and others has proven that the increase in radiation from the explosion of 1986 has had profound effects on the health of the Red Forest nearby. The spike in man made radiation due to the Chernobyl disaster has messed up the normal development of microbial life that is part of food chain on the forest floor. The fallen trees and leaves around Chernobyl are not decaying. This is causing a build-up of forest litter in radiation affected areas, and this team of scientists has measured it.

About the only way one could read through this breakthrough article and not get it, is to believe that the authors are lying. Dismissive individuals often claim a conspiracy when the facts contradict their internal hunch. If pressed, they may vilify the author without actually knowing anything about the person or their subject. The negative reaction of the ignorant to certain articles involving scientific facts can be automatic, and charged with righteous indignation.

If we continue to elect this kind of person to represent the scientific arms of our governments, we are surely lost. We could not have got to the moon without the government. In spite of the teachings of staunch conservatives, some undertakings, like landing men on the moon, and building nuclear power plants are simply too expensive for private industry.

Lately, we seem to have lost our will to explore and understand our world. We are not able to reach out as a country like we have in the past. We are ignoring and dismissing the obvious challenge of solving our fossil fuel addiction, and its accompanying disruptive effect on our climate. Time is running out, and the proof is all around us. In the words of Dylan; "you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows."
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