[ExI] How dangerous is radiation?

BillK pharos at gmail.com
Mon Jul 7 17:50:39 UTC 2014


On Mon, Jul 7, 2014 at 6:25 PM, John Clark wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 7, 2014 at 12:52 PM, Keith Henson wrote:
>> > Research into this would be cheap and easy,
>
> I think it would be difficult to get large numbers of people to agree to be
> exposed to radiation for a study, so we must rely on accidental exposures.
>
>

The radiation hormesis speculation only considers low doses of
ionizing radiation within the region of natural background radiation
levels. So populations in those areas of natural higher background
radiation could be studied.

Although as Anders mentioned, excluding other factors from the study
would be difficult.

Another problem might be - what type and duration of radiation?
Ionizing radiation includes alpha particles, beta particles and
neutrons, as well as mesons that constitute cosmic rays. These have
different penetrative power to affect the human body. If radiation
hormesis exists, it might not be a whole body effect. It might only
affect certain organs or the immune system.

Looks like a long research project.

BillK



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