Monday, May 7, 2012

A Critique of My Lessons of Fukushima Powerpoint


I was just contacted by an individual from a site titled Nuclear Power Yes Please

Someone at the site has put hours into "debunking" my Lessons of Fukushima Power Point

The critique also attacks my credibility, implying that my social science background makes me unqualified to critique nuclear power.

I would agree that I have little to offer on the technicalities of nuclear plants. However, I'm very well qualified to analyze media and crisis communications and my very extensive background in the area of autism enhances my qualifications for evaluating bio-medical research on radiation.

If you've not seen the power point, here is a link to me delivering the the power point at the conference. I was the 2nd speaker on day 2:
http://www.willamette.edu/events/fukushima/stream/index.html
 
My extended power point presentations can be found on these two websites:http://www.powershow.com/view/3813de-MmI2M/Lessons_of_Fukushima_Powerpoint_Majia_Nadesan_flash_ppt_presentation and
You have to have thick skin in academe and so I am not irked by the critique.

Indeed, I'm elated because it means that someone is concerned enough about the content of the power point to warrant spending hours attempting to critique it.

I will save the critique and perhaps learn from it as I turn the power point into a publishable research manuscript. Research goes through peer review in order to enhance its quality.

Good criticism is, in fact, constructive. However, it is worth noting again that the point of the critique at Nuclear Power Yes is to discredit both me and the presentation.

My response is this: As a whole, it stands with integrity as an argument against the arrogance and deceit of an industry capable of producing ecocide.

Moreover, it stands with integrity as an argument about the incompetence and callous disregard of the Japanese, American and Canadian governments.

Many of the criticisms that I make were made by Japanese media, citizens, and scientists.

For example: 

Japan today “Japan ignored Japan ignored own radiation forecasts from very beginning. Japan Today (2011, August 10): http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/japan-ignored-own-radiation-forecasts-from-very-beginning.

“Fukushima Residents' Urine Now Radioactive,” Japan Times (2011, June 27): http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110627a2.html


“Radiation Detected in Fukushima Children’s Urine,” NHK (2011, June 30): http://www3nhk.or.jp/daily/english/30_35.html

“45% of Kids in Fukushima Survey Had Thyroid Exposure to Radiation,” Mainichi (2011, July 5): http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20110705p2g00m0dm079000c.html

“Nuclear Commission Erases Children's Exposure Data,” NHK (2011, August 11): http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/11_14.html

Kenichi Ohmae (BBT University President) “Lessons of Fukushima Dai-ichi” (2011, October 28): Full report index available here:  http://pr.bbt757.com/eng/
In Japanese available here:  http://pr.bbt757.com/2011/1028.html
Appendix of conditions at various plants around Japan http://pr.bbt757.com/eng/pdf/apdx_chronology_and_power-loss.pdf.

Perhaps readers might recall the censored NHK video that was made by a Japanese scientist who ventured into the contaminated areas in the Spring of 2011 in order to document fallout levels? Why did that video disappear from the NHK website?

I would also like to know why the IAEA removed their March 2011 press releases about the burning spent fuel pool at Fukushima? The fire was reported here: http://www.iaea.org/press/?p=1248. The fire was reportedly extinguished later on March 15 (IAEA http://www.iaea.org/press/?p=1252). Both press releases are missing now.

I think it is worth noting that Japanese citizens would not be petitioning the United Nations for assistance if they had faith in their government and their nuclear power industry.

Akio Matsumura “Fukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 is 85 times greater than at Chernobyl Accident,” Akio Matsumura: Finding the Missing Link (2012, April 3): http://akiomatsumura.com/2012/04/682.html.

The letter “Urgent Request to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon May 1, 2012” was released publicly and was made available at Reader Supported News (2012, May 1): http://readersupportednews.org/off-site-news-section/209-209/11240-urgent-request-for-un-intervention-to-stabilize-fukushima-unit-4-spent-nuclear-fuel-


I understood that there would be consequences for advocating against this industry and for critiquing governments complicity.

I know that I tread on dangerous ground.

However, there are times when one has to speak up and this is surely one of them.



3 comments:

  1. I'd wouldn't think this would get through your censorship but perhaps you should consider it anyway...

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

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  2. Oh Matte...your cryptic little URL is as opaque as your nom de plume. I frequently chastise forum novices who post URLs without any description like they are doing the world of forum and blog readers a great favor.

    Usually I ignore URLs without a lead-in, but since you seem so sure you would be censored for your "intellectually critical" post *;-) I looked at what you had to offer.

    Hmm..a couple of fairly funny psychologists got their PHDs in 1999 by interviewing Cornell students and finding out they actually exaggerate their own abilities. Astounding findings! A new Peter Principle of the common man! Get those men an ignobel prize!(they did).

    Ok...Kruger got smart and has moved into the money world:

    http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~jkruger/

    Dunning is still smelling the ivy...

    http://www.psych.cornell.edu/people/Faculty/dad6.html

    And you know what? Neither of them is talented enough to have a webpage page equal to long dead Timothy Leary! (dead since 1996, yet his fans keep his website alive).

    Yes, that's right...a dead man's legacy surpasses their own puny technobabble skills.

    Their 15 seconds of Wikipedia fame reminds me of another egghead...Clifford Stoll and his infamous 1995 book Silicon Snake Oil and his premise on why the Internet will fail. Our weary cyberspace traveler Stoll is now selling glass bottles online for a living and mainly just living out the rest of his manic life. See a clip of this now debunked debunker and you will wonder how he keeps from running into the street and getting nailed by a bus: http://www.ted.com/talks/clifford_stoll_on_everything.html

    And as for Cornell's finest...I have debunked online far more illustrious folks than Stoll, Kruger and Dunning...Piaget being one of my most notably famous intellectuals who I roughed up quite a bit in a magazine article over some of his early childhood theories. Do I think I am smarter than Piaget or will leave a legacy longer than him? No. But neither do I accept every Tom, Dick, and Harry noveau idea about human behavior. As I said in another national magazine article (about block scheduling) and the many educational theories that have risen and died since 1890...this too shall pass.

    Incidentally I turned down an offer to go to Cornell. They offered me a four-year scholarship many, many years ago. Great schoool and has fine professors. But the "discovery" of a human behavioral principle that essentially states the dumb are too dumb to know they are dumb is very unlikely to get a real Nobel Prize. Nice class for the kiddos though.

    Perhaps they should have had some of the "dumb" students show them how to actually create and maintain a viable professional website. Or was that too difficult?

    Matte...don't hesitate to speak your own mind...I can assure you Majia and myself have been critiqued by very skillful posters and at times we might even throw them a bone. But not very often. Ciao!

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