Re: [asa] $4 gas is here to stay

> And you know, I simply HATE this constant use of informal logical fallacy of
> ad hominem (abusive). So the blinking what if Ditmar is from an ant-nuclear
> lobby????? His mother might be a dog as well. But all of that is totally
> and utterly irrelevant to whether or not his arguments are right.

Glenn,

Cutting out the worst of your invective against me, which I've already
made complaints to the list-owner about, as there is concern about the
tone of debate on this list, I will respond publicly to this one
point. I believe that whether or not Ditmar is in the anti-nuclear
lobby is EXTREMELY important as to whether his arguments are right,
and that there is a serious point to be made here that doesn't deserve
to be dragged down with suggestions about whether his mother is a dog.

First. I was not ad-hominem-ing Ditmar. I didn't even suggest that
he was in the anti-nuclear lobby - you extrapolated that from what I
said.

However, if you say so-what if Ditmar is from the anti-nuclear lobby.
I say it is actually very important, by analogy with the kind of
arguments YEC's make, where they leave out vital bits of evidence that
don't agree with their position. The same thing applies to people who
strongly take one side or the other in a controversial issue, and
nuclear power is such a controversial issue.

My argument is very simple. Ditmar claims that self-sustaining
tritium breeding is IMPOSSIBLE, apparently on the grounds that you
need to use every neutron that burns a Tritium nucleus to breed
another Tritium atom. He even underlines his point by highlighting
that bullet point in red.

The argument is patently nonsense, and it must be obvious that
millions of pounds of research money wouldn't get spent on a
technology that could never work for such a simple reason. Beryllium
is used as a neutron multiplier, and Ditmar omits to tell us this, and
lets us believe that the technology is attempting to achieve the
impossible.

Now I don't know if Ditmar is in the anti-nuclear lobby or not & I
never suggested that he was. But he's either a very sloppy researcher
and didn't bother to find out how you get a breeding ratio > 1, or if
he IS in the anti-nuclear lobby, then I suggest that IF THAT IS THE
CASE, then he is being deliberately dishonest in not giving us the
facts. Reading his talk one might think "How stupid all those
scientists are being expecting to get self-sustaining tritium
breeding!"

And finally, Glenn, I did not miss your point that we probably need
alternative energy much sooner than nuclear can provide. It's a very
worrying situation, and I'm not suggesting that nuclear is going to
save us. I was merely criticizing the evidence you presented.

Iain

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Received on Sat Jun 7 13:25:25 2008