I hope to find the time to watch this video series on the history of the Linear No-Threshold Model.

[NNadir]

It's Ed Calabrese lecturing on the subject of the linear no threshold model of the effects of radiation. It's kind of a serious bête noire with Dr. Calabrese.

The History of the Linear No-Threshold (LNT) Model Episode Guide

The series is presented by the Health Physics Society, (HPS) an association of Health Physicists working in radiation protection.

I just watched the part one of the series, introduced by the present President of the HPS, and episode 1, where he's interviewed by a past President, and was surprised to learn that Dr. Calabrese not only accepted the LNT as received wisdom after graduating with his Ph.D., but actually worked for Ralph Nader's PIRG group for six months, before joining the faculty of the University of Massachusetts of Amherst in 1976.

I will not demur in stating that I consider Ralph Nader to be one of the most toxic people ever to rise to prominence in the late 20th century world, and not just because of the role he played in placing George W. Bush in the White House.

The blasé acceptance of the LNT by regulatory agencies has had serious environmental effects all around the world. The origins and the nature of this acceptance of a hardly proved model has seldom been questioned, although the assumptions underlying them may be fallacious. This is clearly Dr. Calabrese's take, that the model is nonsensical. (As I frequently point out, a low level of radiation is required for human and all other life, since potassium is essential to it, and all of the potassium on this planet is radioactive.)

Reading Dr. Calabrese's papers through the years - he's widely published in the scientific literature - one feels that he is offering a slightly conspiratorial take on the origins of the LNT, but - and let's be clear I'm biased in his favor - but these are questions that need to be asked, since they have had very profound effects on humanity, exacerbating what is clearly, in my opinion, an irrational fear over what should be a profound fear, climate change.

I'm looking forward to seeing these lectures.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Potassium does not mean "a low level of radiation is required for human life"

It means that a low level of radiation is concomitant with human life.

The radiation of potassium is not the necessity.
The potassium is the necessity.

[NNadir]

2. I'm not into a semantic argument at this point. My point is without radiation exposure one dies.

Unless you are here to announce either that potassium is not radioactive, or that potassium is non-essential, this quibble is completely without meaning.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. Point is to be clear AND accurate. Radiation exposure is not necessary but is also not avoidable. nt

[NNadir]

4. Thanks for your opinion, but in my opinion the point is to nitpick and quibble.

Last edited Sun Apr 17, 2022, 02:45 PM - Edit history (2)

As I have read a large number of Dr. Calabrese's technical papers, he makes a very different argument than the one that I regard your tiresome quibble as making, but no matter.

Life has always been bathed in radiation, in earlier eons in a far larger flux, and again, I find your quibble rather useless. To assert the statement does not have profound effects is hubris.

Here is an eighth grade level logical syllogism:

Potassium is essential to all life.

All potassium is radioactive.

Therefore exposure to radiation is essential to all life.

I may have omitted the word "exposure" and if that upsets anyone deeply to the point of generating disinterest about what the OP is intended to do, an offer explore the work of a scientist, I can't help it.