Over the past fortnight I’ve made a deeply troubling discovery. The anti-nuclear movement to which I once belonged has misled the world about the impacts of radiation on human health. The claims we have made are ungrounded in science, unsupportable when challenged and wildly wrong. We have done other people, and ourselves, a terrible disservice.
I began to see the extent of the problem after a debate last week with Helen Caldicott(1). Dr Caldicott is the world’s foremost anti-nuclear campaigner. She has received 21 honorary degrees and scores of awards, and was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize(2). Like other greens, I was in awe of her. In the debate she made some striking statements about the dangers of radiation. So I did what anyone faced with questionable scientific claims should do: I asked for the sources. Caldicott’s response has profoundly shaken me.
More moonbat epiphany here.
h/t Eric A.
More wheels coming off the AGW crowd’s fraud bus?
More wheels coming off the bus? Hardly. Moonbats 2nd last paragraph reads:
“Failing to provide sources, refuting data with anecdote, cherry-picking studies, scorning the scientific consensus, invoking a cover-up to explain it: all this is horribly familiar. These are the habits of climate change deniers, against which the green movement has struggled valiantly, calling science to its aid. It is distressing to discover that when the facts don’t suit them, members of this movement resort to the follies they have denounced.”
But the possibilty of a green on green civil war is very attractive and could be hugely entertaining! :o)
As I read the article I thought Monbiot was finally starting to look into the green agenda with an honest and open mind. When I got to that second last paragraph I was dissapointed that he failed to recognize the tatics he denounced as his own.
Oh well, he’s made a step in the right direction. We can hope someone will challenge him to follow the same process in investigating the claims of the AGW fear mongers and that he will accept.
If the integrity of the IPCC is the life raft he is clinging to then, to preserve his sanity, he is better off not investigating their evidence too deeply.
BTW, coal is 100 x more damaging than nuclear? Sure. People in and around coal plants in North America are dropping like flies. I suppose these poor souls life expectancy is significantly lower than the rest of the population. For some strange reason I suspect these figures are as exaggerated as the nuclear power threat and deaths attributed to Chernobyl. How many times are well-meaning but clueless progressive journalists going to let environmentalists make fools out of them?
Antinuclearism has always been the core belief uniting the environmental movement. While there are lots of arguments among themselves about other things, this is the one issue on which they have always agreed. For Monbiot to come out with this condemns him to the same enviro-hell that they’ve already placed Patrick Moore and a bunch of others.
All we need now is for some more of the leftists to have an epiphany and realize that Karl Marx was wrong about everything too.
If you’re lumping in anti-nuclear views, AGW, and Karl Marx all under the category of “typical leftist”, there is something very wrong with your understanding of the world.
It’s a long climb down off that globo warmn bandwagon, but as it carreens toward the cliff there will be more SCAM artists clamouring to get off quicker. As the lawsuits they are launching backfire. Like the frivolous lawsuit against the reputable Dr. Tim Ball by visible SCAM artists, backed by The Big Kahuna of SCAM artists. Moonbats mea-culpa will be a little slow now but wait till the lawsuits are lost by the SCAMsters, it will ge very busy at the exit door. There is big money being gathered for Dr. Ball, and he will win. Did these SCAM artists never see a John Wayne western or what?
Alex, one of the central tenets of Marxism is that the history of humanity is the story of class struggle. This is demonstrably wrong, as are all his economic theories. The story of AGW is that we are all going to die because of man made global warming caused by CO2 emissions from my SUV. This is demonstrably wrong. Anti nuclear activism is the result of ignorant leftards thinking that nuclear power plants are somehow the same as nuclear bombs. This is also demonstrably wrong. Again, if they finally realize they are wrong on nuclear power, maybe they will figure out they are wrong in all their other beliefs.
Caldicotts documentary “If You Love This Planet”, is a good read, but focuses on nuclear weapons. “Mother and child” quotes throuout.
Rational thought and analysis winning out.
Mankind advancing on the twin horses of innovation and technology while those who would control the state and mankind as philosopher kings are in retreat.
Who is John Galt?
A case of a blind squirrel finding a nut. Don’t expect an epiphany on AGW from him.
I read an article the other day that opined cracking natural gas was worse than coal.
Let’s just agree we disagree and then go away. I’ll heat my house and drive my car and live my life and you can sleep in a hole in the ground and live on roots and berries. Choices.
“If you’re lumping in anti-nuclear views, AGW, and Karl Marx all under the category of “typical leftist”, there is something very wrong with your understanding of the world.” Every one of those ideological views, and they are ideological, are the basis of the left’s world view.
The Anti-Nuke stance has a Catch 22 component…
If plan A is the AGW, Windmill, Clown car, and the leeching of public funds into the useless R &D controlled by the Eco-terrorists… The backup plan B for society & the economy “must” be Nuclear …Yes we are totally wasting billions, but we have an ace in the hole.
If you remove the Nuclear option (no Backup) Then plan A dies because it becomes caught between a rock and the hard reality that it’s a Mickey mouse scam. No production.. No future..
Sometimes winning requires losing a fictitious argument.. Just saying!
In the end, science always wins and ideology loses.
Monbiot will continue to cling to his proveably false ideology while the science will pass him by.
Nothing left to do but laugh at his ignorance.
“In the end, science always wins and ideology loses.”
Unfortunately, hundreds of millions die violent deaths in the process.
“This is not just because we owe it to other people to represent the issues fairly, but also because we owe it to ourselves not to squander our lives on fairytales.”
Save this article Mr. Monbiot,some day you can just change the words from “nuclear” to “global warming” and you’ll get paid again for your remarkable insight.
This is too funny. Here Monbiot is “profoundly shaken” about the lack of evidence behind Caldicott’s ravings, and yet remains stalwart about AGW and a man-made climate apocalypse.
dmorris@11:12 hits it.
Alex says “If you’re lumping in anti-nuclear views, AGW, and Karl Marx all under the category of “typical leftist”, there is something very wrong with your understanding of the world.”
Well, I have to say that when I see three drug dealers standing on a corner, I tend to lump them together. Anti-nuclear, AGW and Karl Marx are the three drug dealers.
I guess Moonbat Monbiot is ignoring all the people who died from the radioactive toxicity of depleted uranium rounds – which were said to be as safe as kid’s candy.
Depleted uranium ammunition has nothing to do with nuclear power either. DU ammo is used for the same reason that lead is used in ammo and tungsten carbide is used in ammo. Its heavy, and kinetic energy equals mass times muzzle velocity squared. Depleted uranium is barely radio active – hence the depleted part. Uranium is, however toxic, like lead or any other dozen different metals that are used for wide range of different things in the modern world.
And unless you eat the stuff, or have it fires at you, it is as safe as kids candy.
Alex
[…..If you’re lumping in anti-nuclear views, AGW, and Karl Marx all under the category of “typical leftist”, there is something very wrong with your understanding of the world……]
But your silly world view endorses all of this……
Occam
[……I guess Moonbat Monbiot is ignoring all the people who died from the radioactive toxicity of depleted uranium rounds – which were said to be as safe as kid’s candy…….]
Impossible ignore something that does not exist.
It is more or less a given that lead is toxic but……lead is what depleted uraium eventually decays to. In the mean time depleted uranium is just that….depleted…for all practical purposes radioactive if sensitive enough instruments are used.
Much like the twits who confuse nuclear reactors with nuclear weapons…..ignorance is not bliss…or helpful………
Depleted uranium is not spent fuel from a reactor. It is more or less the “slag” residue that is the byproduct of refinning raw uranium into reactor fuel or weapons grade.
It is a resonable tough, hard metal but it’s incredible density makes it the “silver bullet” against tank armour.
Most enviro-clowns are unaware that all coal has a uranium component…..and are unaware of the constant shower of C14, Be10 and uranium from the interaction of nitrogen and solar/cosmic rays.
Monbiot perhaps has had an epiphany of sorts but he is just conceeding information he has been assailed with for years.
England’s Salisbury Plain was once a vast forest…cleared by stone age farmers….resulting in a landscape unfit for anything other than a play ground for main battle tanks.
I remember an argument against carbon sequestration and enhanced oil recovery from the environmentalists stating that it was a bad idea, because it created more oil which would add to the CO2 in the atmosphere.
‘Enviro Mac truck’ meet ‘granite wall of reality’
Kaboom!
It is apparent, in conversation with many urban greenies,That they think it is possible to live an ideal agrarian lifestyle based on a couple of 4’x8′ raised beds and a square meter 1000 watt solar panel.
What scares me is that,to their way of thinking,it is not much of an extension to then support depopulation(60% worldwide) and a forced return to a mid 17Th century agrarian existence. Of course the good news is this puts them only one or two hundred years ahead of their Muslim ideological allies.
The good news is that fossil fuel phobia will not last as long as nuclear phobia. The only reason anti-nuclear forces were so long-lived (sorry) is because petroleum and coal were able to provide the same level of comfort and convenience at a lower price. Solar and wind are experimental and premature technology that has not proven itself to be superior to fossil fuels in any way – cost, reliability, or even CO2 reduction.
IMO, people will realize the best power source is the one that makes sense in their country or region. This will be nuclear in areas with few natural resources (Europe, Japan), coal on the Canadian prairies and many US states and hydro in water rich regions. It is more efficient to re-engineer existing, proven technology to make it safer than to attempt to magically transform “sustainable” but inferior power sources into a viable alternative to convention energy. So far, environmentalists and politicians have only proven that this green energy path is financially unsustainable for consumers and taxpayers.
George Moonbat proving once again that a broken clock is right twice a day, and even the blindest pig will find the odd acorn.
The words “ungrounded in science” issuing from his mouth arouse an unpleasant sensation in my digestive tract. I suspect he has shares in Cameco, or some such.
Upon RTFA, I see Georgie only found one little acorn. Still pushing the frickin’ transformer exploding, power-line melting, bird chopping giant fans.
Truly this man is a disgusting propagandist. May he reap a full heaping measure of what he’s sown. Alone, if at all possible please.
minuteman @ 12:12 – to add to your post (which is correct) I’m thinking that if you’re hit by a DU round, the least of your problems would be radiation sickness….
“shares in Cameco” – Phantom
Considering the abundance of business class environmentalists, you may very well be right.
For the Marxist-enviro tribe though the war is against fossil fuels itself, or more accurately, to put the fossil fuel industry in the service of the state alone. Once they control it they will exploit it in the same manner as the USSR or the PRC.
The tree-huggers, well, they are just a useful distraction; the youthful,idealistic face that hides the ugliness of the statists and crony capitalists financing them.
Arcade Fire and other moonbats are on a cd to help “Doobie” Dave’s Suzuki Foundation.
Saving the planet one plastic disk at a time…
http://www.amazon.ca/Canadian-Music/b?ie=UTF8&node=13779501
I’ll pick my copy up after it recycled in the local pawn shop.
Perhaps Monbiot has read the just published book by Patrick Moore “Confessions of a Greenpeace dropout”
Didn’t Delingpole have his AGW epiphany?
“Alex, one of the central tenets of Marxism is that the history of humanity is the story of class struggle. This is demonstrably wrong, as are all his economic theories.”
Well, for starters, Marx didn’t really propose any economic theories per say – his works were largely sociological / philosophical in nature. If you’d actually read his work, you’d know that he was a proponent of capitalism; that is to say, he understood that capitalism was necessary for human societies going through an industrialized age. Your view of him and his writings seems to be based on some pamphlet you picked up on a street corner. The socialist / communist aspects of his writings come at a later stage – he essentially predicted that industrialized nations which achieved a certain measure of wealth would end up transitioning from capitalism to socialism, and eventually into communism. That’s why he opposed violent revolutions – he saw socialism / communism as the natural state of wealthy societies, and believed that trying to hurry the process through revolution would actually hurt (slow down, or stop) that natural progression. So far history has proven him right. Whether we look at the socialization of 1st world nations, or the collapse of nations which instituted communism by force, it’s quite clear that the last 60 years have been in line with his predictions. Whether the type of socialism we have now is sustainable in the long term is a different question entirely. He believed it was – I tend to disagree, though I’m less certain these days. So far it seems like the LEAST socialized 1st world nation (if we don’t count Hong Kong, which is a special case) is experiencing the worst economic meltdown, which is leading me to re-evaluate some of my basic economic premises.
“The story of AGW is that we are all going to die because of man made global warming caused by CO2 emissions from my SUV.”
No, it’s not.
“This is demonstrably wrong.”
Yes, that is.
“Anti nuclear activism is the result of ignorant leftards thinking that nuclear power plants are somehow the same as nuclear bombs.”
No, it’s not. At least, not for the most part, though I’m sure there are exceptions.
“This is also demonstrably wrong.”
Yes, that is.
“Again, if they finally realize they are wrong on nuclear power, maybe they will figure out they are wrong in all their other beliefs.”
Unlikely. Beliefs aren’t linked in that manner. If I can prove to you that Santa Claus isn’t real, that doesn’t mean you’ll stop believing in gods. In addition to that, the anti-nuclear views have never had the backing of mainstream science, whereas AGW is solidly supported by the overwhelming majority of scientists. And as horrible as trying to link the anti-nuke loonies to AGW is, trying to link Marx to them is even more ridiculous. It’s as if I were to claim that all conservatives are bible-thumping, gun-toting, anti-AGW, creationists who think Mein Kampf was the best book ever written. Sure, each of those labels will apply to some portion of the conservative voter-base, but it’s ridiculous to lump them together and claim that they’re intrinsically linked, or that all conservatives hold all of those views, or that those views are only held by conservatives. You can’t split people into that kind of dichotomy, and if you insist on doing it then it’s obvious that you don’t care about what’s true; you only care about pushing your own ideologies, and are more than happy to lie and demonize everyone else in order to do it.
Echoes of the cold war. Nuclear winter and exaggerated radiation fear mongering were successful misinformation campaigns by Soviet leaning “peace activists”. 20 years later and we’re still waist deep in that muck.
Papa Moonbat’s recent change of heart has more to do with desperation than genuine objective pragmatism, I think.
Some beliefs are linked, Alex. Attendance at any COP conference, for example, would show you just how deeply linked AGW and anti-nuclearism is. As a further illustration, in their submission to the Ontario Energy Board in 2007, the Green Energy Coalition said it would prefer to retain coal and gas as a transition fuel in Ontario rather than have any continuation of nuclear power.
The fact that these two intellectual diseases are not confined to the left doesn’t refute that the link exists.
*sigh* I’m not sure how to put this any more politely: that is really, really stupid. It’s the same as saying “go to any KKK rally and you’ll see how closely racism and religion are linked”. If you can’t see how stupid that is, I doubt there’s any way for me to explain it to you.
Can we persuade Alex to campaign for the Conservatives. After listening to him, everyone will vote Conservative.
Are socialism and other groupings under AGW community formally linked? Probably not. But there certainly is enough of an alliance that they agree to not attack each other, even when the ideas are counter-productive to the cause. It is the rare voice on the AGW side that dares to say that No Pressure style campaigns are crazy, or computer models are not adequate substitutes for observations, or that Climategate revealed a rotten core within the climate research community and IPCC.
Frankly I don’t really care how the various forces of AGW are aligned, I just want them all to fail. In Kate’s words, “When the Communists show up to protest the Nazis, you’re supposed to pray for an asteroid”
I vote conservative you idiot.
cgh, I wrote a response to you, but it got snagged by the filter. If it pops up later, I’m sure you’ll recognize it.
“That’s why he opposed violent revolutions – he saw socialism / communism as the natural state of wealthy societies, and believed that trying to hurry the process through revolution would actually hurt (slow down, or stop) that natural progression. So far history has proven him right”
Where has history proven him right Alex? Just because he opposed violent revolution doesn’t mean that that is the way it works. States that have become communist have gone that way through violent revolution.
“- he saw socialism / communism as the natural state of wealthy societies, and believed that trying to hurry the process through revolution would actually hurt (slow down, or stop) that natural progression.”
Socialist societies are not wealthy societies. Societies that are wealthy may become socialist – that is true, but they tend to not stay wealthy for very long after they do. Britain is the perfect example of this. Britain may follow the Marxist path and become communist. I understand that Marx saw this as the final, perfect form. History may prove him right, but a more likely outcome is total economic collapse and mass starvation. This is what is happening in North Korea.
Communism is not a sustainable economic system because states have never been good at producing the means of production. They usually steal them “nationalize” and then run them into the ground. We have historical experience with this in many countries, but using Britain again as an example, they had thriving steal, coal, ship building aircraft building and car industries that were “nationalized” and destroyed.
History hasn’t proven Marx right yet. It is true that it might, but a more likely outcome is that when all the wealth has been stolen from the productive and squandered people, will throw off their chains and go back to producing their own means of production for fun and profit.
Alex, you talk like a liberal or a federal bureaucratic manager, same difference, not like any conservative I’ve ever met, except Joe Clark.
@minuteman:
“Where has history proven him right Alex?”
I already explained that – the natural slide of capitalist nations into socialism over the last 60 years, combined with the failure of nations where communism was instituted by authoritarian or violent means.
“Societies that are wealthy may become socialist – that is true, but they tend to not stay wealthy for very long after they do.”
I used to believe that too, but the data doesn’t support that conclusion. As I said – the least socialist 1st world nation is currently experiencing the biggest economic issues. While it’s possible that the US will see some amazing recovery while Canada suddenly plummets into the abyss, this seems unlikely.
“Communism is not a sustainable economic system because … ”
I never said it was – I said history has proven Marx right SO FAR. I think his conclusions about “stateless communism” are probably completely wrong.
@fart:
“not like any conservative I’ve ever met”
Obviously – I’m not a moron. You need to expand your circle of acquaintances.
Hey Kate, bad day today with the AG report leak and all, then the attempt to misquote her with a line that was actually praise for the liberals…hmmm..well at least it’s not happening right before the debate. Oh wait… hmmm.
Did Christmas just come in April? Well I’ll be!
Alex – The United States is going through a very bad economic situation because of really bad government, and arguably because of the socialist tendancies of that government. The banking crisis was caused in part by government regulations making banks lend money to people who couldn’t afford to pay it back and extended by the government bailing out banks and car companies that they should have let die. The US may be the most capitalist country in the western world, but that is not the cause of their economic woes. I would also argue that western Europe is worse off than the US.
LC Bennet said: BTW, coal is 100 x more damaging than nuclear? Sure. People in and around coal plants in North America are dropping like flies. I suppose these poor souls life expectancy is significantly lower than the rest of the population. For some strange reason I suspect these figures are as exaggerated as the nuclear power threat and deaths attributed to Chernobyl. How many times are well-meaning but clueless progressive journalists going to let environmentalists make fools out of them?
Well, no, people aren’t dropping like flies.
Know why?
Because “100x as dangerous as nuclear power” is still relatively safe. Modern first-world coal power plants don’t exactly choke and kill their neighbors Real Bad, fortunately for everyone.
(Much of coal’s death-toll is to miners, who at least knew what they were getting in to – plus the occasional death when a fly-ash dam collapses and kills some people.
Likewise, I’m sure if the nuclear industry were bigger we’d find occasional deaths in uranium mines, simply because mines are dangerous.
But the scale matters – the world uses about seven BILLION tons of coal a year.
That’s a lot of mining and a lot of room for production and transit-related deaths, simply from scale.
And of course in the developing world, standards for emissions are more lax and thus more damage is done.)
Alex. Learn some manners, and stop talking like a liberal. Insults are not arguments. All you do is sneer and scoff, just like the late and unlamented Trudeau “mangez la merde!” as the old fraud said. Communism, socialism and bureaucrat don’t work, just like Trudeau. Iceland, Greece, Ireland and Portugal are already bankrupt, with more to follow.