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/sci/ - Science & Math

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[ERROR] No.3591877 [Reply] [Original]

I'm raging right now.

Last night, my girlfriend revealed her opposition to any form of nuclear power. When told that most nuclear accidents are mishandling or flukes, she says it doesn't matter.

When told that wind/solar/geothermal cannot realistically meet energy demand meaning that we'll need powerplants running on something else, she says that maybe we should learn to live with less.

When told about LFTR's, reprocessing, and the potential for fusion power, she shuts down and starts screaming that it's still nuclear and radioactive.

How can otherwise intelligent people be so stupid?

>Sorry if irrelevant, just raging.
She also says alternative medicine is bullshit, but refuses to take what she deems "unnecessary drugs" to help with common things like allergies.

>> No.3591882

ignorance is a hell of a thing

>> No.3591886

>woman
>intelligent

pick one

>> No.3591892

>>3591877

Lol. You are a Thoriumfag.

>> No.3591899

Refusing to take modern medicine for trivial things like that isn't all that stupid.

Also, does she know that even if we stopped using cars, and used barely any electricity, we still need energy to produce 1/3 of the worlds food?

>> No.3591901

>>3591882
Yeah, why would OP be raging about fairie dust solutions that've never been proven on a large scale?

>christ, people are ignorant.

>> No.3591904
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[ERROR]

>>3591886
Cry more virgin

>> No.3591905

>>3591899

energy to produce food....gee.. I wonder how the Amish do it?

>> No.3591911

>When told that most nuclear accidents are mishandling or flukes, she says it doesn't matter.
Well she is right on that.
>When told that wind/solar/geothermal cannot realistically meet energy demand meaning that we'll need powerplants running on something else, she says that maybe we should learn to live with less.
ahahaha.. not possible in a capitalist system.
>When told about LFTR's, reprocessing, and the potential for fusion power, she shuts down and starts screaming that it's still nuclear and radioactive.
Well thats just retarded. Who cares about that bit of radioactivity?

She fell for the fear mongering of green activists.
Genes,radioactivity etc. they are an invisible enemy and thats the reason people get irrational about it.
Hundreds of people die in traffic everyday, but if there is even the slightest risk that someone somewhere will die because of radioactivity or genetical engineered food its too much.

>> No.3591912

Also, guys. Where's cold fusion? Should be here by now, no?

>> No.3591916

>>3591905
magnets

>> No.3591919

>>3591905
Number of amish people in the world
>249,000
Number of people in the world the rely on the harbor process
>2258411900

>> No.3591923

>>3591905
Not on a large scale or with loads of fertilizer captured fron nitrogen extraction of the atmosphere and lots of bat dung for phosophorus?

>> No.3591930

>>3591905
Try it on a worldwide scale, bub.

>> No.3591929

Yeah, nuclear power is pretty great. Though you're a wimp for thinking you need a cure for even the mildest sniffles.

>> No.3591925

You really should just show her the deaths/TWh numbers.

She believes that nuclear power is dangerous. Truth is it that it's the least deadly energy source we have.

>> No.3591933

>>3591882
Indeed, its one of the most baffling things I've ever come across.

A top of their class PHd in molecular biology or something could star comparing fukushima to Chernobyl and base their arguments around "nuklears r bad" with a completely straight face.

It makes fissionfags like me really depressed and more than a little confused

>> No.3591938

Troll her, OP. Avocados and bananas are radioactive because of their potassium content. Smoke detectors contain radioactive materials. Just taking a long plane flight, you get about half a chest x-ray's worth of radiation.

>> No.3591941

>>3591892
I wasn't at first. The /sci/ shit and TED talks were interesting but didn't exactly win me over. That was until I actually met one of the original guys from back in the 60's that worked on the MSR.

I'm a convert, I think it would work. I'm still in favor of fast breeder reactors using the uranium fuel cycle though, as it has its own uses.

You'd think living in Tennessee would be like living in a sea of ignorance, but the Oak Ridge people more than make up for that. Some of those old timers are stone badasses.
>>3591911
Comparing that to "alternative" energy solutions there is still an unseen death toll. People die mining the rare earths necessary for alternative energy, people die mining for coal, natural gas extraction does loads of damage to the environment, and traditional coal powerplants shit out FAR more toxins to the general public over their lifetime than even a nuclear disaster-stricken plant would. How someone can ignore facts about a technology they don't even understand is beyond me.
>>3591919
Yup. Going "back" to sustenance organic farming would likely only increase our population growth problems. People would have large families to tend the farm. It's all well and good to preach about sustainably living with less, but it's simply not realistic.
>>3591933
Yup. She isn't in the most rigorous of fields (forestry/botany) but she should still know the basics about radiation, how nuclear power actually works, what transgenic crops really are, etc.

>> No.3591948

Dump her? This is why you don't get into discussions with fucktoys.

>> No.3591977

>>3591948
She (and women in general) can sometimes have well-thought-out and reasonable opinions.

I just don't think she realizes the economics of energy or the science underpinning that energy. The saddest thing is that anti-nuke has taken on an almost "religious" overtone with its rejection of basic reality.

>> No.3591985

>>3591977
I think the problem there is that you've come to strongly associate religion with ignorance, which is understandable because its usually true, but not always.

>> No.3591996

>>3591985
I associate religion largely with unfounded conviction.

This isn't to say there aren't exceptions. K-8 for me was at a Jesuit school, they are FAR from ignorant. A similar private, religious school run by Southern Baptists or some other protestant sect... not so much.

>> No.3592085

i sometimes wonder if this problem is actually solvable, or tied to the human psyche.
it seems to be the same reason why people are often afraid of crashing in an airplane, it's statistically non existent but it's heavily televised and focused on when it does happen.

>> No.3592096

>>3592085
So uh, wheres your statstics on number of safe LFTR's ?

>you have one? ok.

>> No.3592103

>>3591977
>women in general can sometimes have well-thought-out and reasonable opinions.

How generous of you, good sir.

>> No.3592104

>>3592096
uh, none because they haven't been built yet?

i'm not sure what kind of burn you were attempting

>> No.3592117

Remind your girlfriend that even if all of America went back to pre-industrial no-energy consumption society, China and India will gladly still fuck everything up without ever inventing a proper replacement.

Nuclear is our only hope to prevent a worldwide collapse of civilization.

>> No.3592128

>>3592104
So you have no evidence that they're safer than any other nuclear material handling, except your magical belief that they're inherently safer.

Not to rain on your parade, but society isn't as retarded as you'd like to believe.

>> No.3592140

>>3591919

might be time to go back to human labor intensive farming.

>> No.3592149

>>3592128
Actually, LFTRs use passive cooling, so that by itself bypassed a HUUUUUGE number of vulnerabilities in the currently operating water reactors.

Water reactors need to circulate water constantly, which means if the power goes down, or you spring a leak, you're in trouble.

If the power goes down at a LFTR, they can simply remove the fuel and the plant will power down on its own without incident.

>> No.3592150

>>3592140
No I don't think you get it, there's not enough viable land area to feed the current population on natural fertilixer

>> No.3592172

>>3592150

Malthus.

>> No.3592206

Hah, nuclear power. It'd be nice, but today's technology only looks nice and cheap because somehow operators of nuclear power plants don't have to pay for insurance or disposal or security costs.

Makes it very easy to say all other technologies would be too expensive and so on, if you exclude all the real costs for one technology...

Let's re-evaluate this technology at the VERY earliest when we have defined the operating cost for a secure nuclear power plant _realistically_ has. That means full insurance up to the worst case (with the actual economic buying power being present in reality), paying for all of the disposal and security issues associated with the plant. Normal waste disposal sites don't need to be guarded, well these do. Normal plants don't need military air and ground defense, well these do... and so on.

And no, I don't mind doing the same for hydroelectric plants. They also have risks that are currently unaccounted for.


Besides, the world is rightfully scared of the prospect of having more nations with nuclear weapons capability, unfortunately about all the nuclear technology "going forward" seems to be fairly easily weaponizable, and "only the US may have such reactors" is not going to work.

>>3591877
>When told that wind/solar/geothermal cannot realistically meet energy demand meaning that we'll need power plants running on something else, she says that maybe we should learn to live with less.
Why not? We'll still have a lot of power at our disposal. I see no real issues.

Besides, the theoretical potential for solar and geothermal power is massively above and beyond current world power consumption. Why you'd not create the incentive to really tap into that would be incomprehensible.

>>3591941
>People die mining the rare earths necessary for alternative energy, people die mining for coal

Clearly, nuclear power doesn't have a problem with mining. And mining deaths cannot be prevented.
Yea, right.

>> No.3592213

If you don't like her ideas, break up with her.

>> No.3592221

Easy fix. Cold fusion. lol

>> No.3592224

>>3591919

I think you meant Haber Process

>> No.3592226

>unfortunately about all the nuclear technology "going forward" seems to be fairly easily weaponizable

Now of course if you actually based your statement on reality instead of pulling them out of your ass you'd know that almost all new reactor types are designed around the idea that a mass-market device can't be used for weaponization.

Did you know that the iron in solar cells are extracted from blood bought from poor people in third world countries, and because it's not a medical device they can contain HIV and other deadly viruses!

>> No.3592233

>>3592128
no honest to goodness state right at it and say it's safe evidence, no.

i'm just going by the really superfluous stuff, like the schematics and materials used and how any kind of accidents are limited by the very laws of thermodynamics, really flimsy shit like that.

>> No.3592240

>>3592149
actually the fuel removes itself both in a potential run away scenario and in a total power loss scenario. Potentially in a terrorist bombing scenario too, which is great.

and you're sort of trivializing light water reactors. stop that

>> No.3592244

>>3592206
herpderp enrgy in 1plc cn pwer all teh wolrd!!!!!1

>> No.3592255

>>3592206
>unfortunately about all the nuclear technology "going forward" seems to be fairly easily weaponizable, and "only the US may have such reactors" is not going to work.

unfortunately you're completely correct, lots of next generation reactors are breeders in some sense, or at least heavy neutron sources.

Of course, arguing against nuclear power in the US because of this reason is kind of retarded. Subversive elements will simply go to other countries where it's more readily available.
Same goes for something like LFTR, which china is already putting 2 billion a year into researching. We're in an energy arms race scenario at the moment, and the losers will be footing the bill, something we cannot afford

>> No.3592260

>>3592240
>and you're sort of trivializing light water reactors. stop that

not really.
the newer LWRs are pretty safe, but we don't actually have many of those in service.

We're still using reactors built in the 60s and 70s.
They ARE dangerous and stupid.

>> No.3592299

>>3592260
>We're still using reactors built in the 60s and 70s.
no, actually, they work just as well.
they're obviously inferior to current designs, but NPP managers know their facilities very well.
Of course they'll need to be decommissioned eventually, no reactor runs forever, at least not safely.

the older you get though, the more worrisome. see; fukushima daichi 1

>> No.3592304

>>3592255
>Of course, arguing against nuclear power in the US because of this reason is kind of retarded.
In some ways. Yea, you can already nuke the world to oblivion.
But unfortunately, as soon as it becomes an economic concern, it will be a different matter than the old "MAD" balance in nukes where 3rd parties were happy enough with being protectorates of major powers, not protecting themselves. Either no one will have this advantage, or everyone will.

That is something I think of being a good reason NOT to try and be faster with adopting next generation nuclear technology, and instead try and put actual effort into solar power and other such technologies.

There is FAR more power coming from the sun than we can hope to get even by fusing and fissioning everything on earth.
The technology could realistically exceed consumption of non-energy guzzling countries right now.
And the technologies involved aren't really a threat to world peace.


If we actually hit an impossible snag with all the renewable technologies and get stuck, we can reevaluate then.

>> No.3592309

>>3592096

Watch the 3 hours of lectures and presentations on LFTR's on Youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHs2Ugxo7-8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU3cUssuz-U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZR0UKxNPh8

>> No.3592315

>>3592304
i agree, the theoretical potential of solar is absolutely enormous.
but for now, and probably the next half century even with intense research, the best solar will be is pretty ok residential power. it simply is not going to be useful for a grid power infrastructure. and no, changing the infrastructure fundamentally isn't a good idea either.

nuclear is here, proven, and ready to go. Nuclear loves you, why won't you love it back? ;_;

>> No.3592316

>>3592304
Even Bill Gates doesn't think we can rely on just solar.

>> No.3592350

>>3592315

This.

Also, for DATFUTURE.JPG

Micro Dyson Spheres

>> No.3592356

>>3592350
i always liked dyson swarms better, they're more hands-free in terms of construction, specially if the array can replicate itself from asteroids towed into orbit. exponential growth is a hell of a thing.

>> No.3592397

>>3592356
dyson swarms?

>> No.3592400

>>3592397
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_swarm#Dyson_swarm

>> No.3592436

>>3592400
That dyson ring looks pretty cool. So it's just a bunch of solar-energy collecting satalites rigged up to collect energy?

>> No.3592443

>>3592356
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson%E2%80%93Harrop_satellite

SATELLITE POWER MASTERRACE