The Irrational Fear of Radiation
[reprinted from nullsession.net]
Radiation is natural, yet the very word itself generates an irrational fear in most people. Why? Nuclear science is still a relatively young science, and people picture exploding atom bombs when they think of radiation. They think of Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl and a thermonuclear holocaust. Yet, as this BBC documentary points out, this fear is not rational and often it is the fear of radiation that causes psychological trauma.
Radiation is all around us. In nature, something is either matter or radiation. Electromagnetic radiation includes radio waves, microwaves, infrared, visible light, ultraviolet light, x-rays and gamma rays. We are submerged in an ocean of radiation fields. Energetic charged particles are also all around us, from the breakdown of heavier elements, yet most do us no harm at all. There are four tons of uranium in the top foot of every square mile of land. People live in regions with higher background radiation than the well-known reactor accident caused in the Russian city of Chernobyl, and they thrive. Some even suspect, as I have suggested before, that some level of background radiation is important to the stimulation of the body’s immune system.
Dr. John D. Johnson has a background in nuclear, experimental & accelerator physics. He worked for Los Alamos National Laboratory in the 1990s and founded Docent Institute to raise awareness about the ethical use of advanced technology.