Fukushima
I found the pictures fascinating, but the accompanying text marred my enjoyment. Considering the circumstances of the Fukushima disaster, the anti-nuclear sentiment really irked me. The Tōhoku earthquake & tsunami killed close to 20,000 people. The author <i>completely ignored</i> those victims. Instead, he focused on Fukushima, which will cause around 150 deaths from cancers. For every tragedy created by Fukushima, there are over a hundred created by the earthquake itself. Yet coverage is warped in the opposite direction. It's absurd.<p>I think Scott Alexander put it best. Before starting Slate Star Codex, he had this to say about Fukushima and nuclear power[1]:<p>> You know what kills more people per year than nuclear plants?<p>> <i>Everything.</i><p>...<p>> When you hit a nuclear plant with the fifth largest earthquake ever recorded, then immediately follow that with a twenty foot high tsunami, and then it explodes, it still kills fewer people than an average coal plant does every single year when everything goes perfectly.<p>Nuclear power is far from perfect, but it is the safest energy technology in existence. Curtailing it creates more suffering and death, but in a diffuse way that can't be photographed or humanized.<p>1. <a href="http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html" rel="nofollow">http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html</a>