COMMENTS ON SUBMISSION PH2PUB.021 BY CCEER

"SECTION 3. ESSAYS: DEEPER INTO THE ISSUES"

"What I tell you three times is true." - The Bellman in "The Hunting of the Snark" by Lewis Carroll

The same misunderstandings, errors and unjustified allegations are repeated time after time in submissions to the Panel, not just between submissions but even within the submission of a single organization. The submission by the Canadian Coalition for Ecology, Ethics and Religion (CCEER), of which this is Volume 2, Section 3 is an example of this.

"Don't confuse me with facts; my mind is made up." - anonymous

As the author of several submissions myself, I have been meticulous in reading and offering comments on others as one means of helping to resolve differences. The same cannot be said for the CCEER, whose submissions ignore other submissions along with any criticism of its earlier submissions. Its disregard for reasoned argument, for positions contrary to its own, and even for verifiable facts, is inappropriate for those pontificating on ecology, ethics and religion. In my comments dated July 5 I welcomed the CCEER's first submission as a well organized, relatively moderate presentation of nuclear critics' views, "permitting a civilized discussion of the issues". Unfortunately, this has not occurred.

"With just enough of learning to misquote." - in "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers" by Lord Byron

If my comments include repetitive and nit-picking detail, it is because of my conviction that sound conclusions can be drawn only from sound premises. To demonstrate the fallacies in the authors' conclusions I have to document the weaknesses in their premises. A charitable view of the CCEER submissions is that its conclusions are based on an uncritical reading of the anti-nuclear literature, indicating poor scholarship; alternatively they result from a deliberate distortion of the available evidence, indicating poor ethics.

This section of their submission is entitled "Essays: Deeper into the Issues". One definition of "essay" is to try. Certainly, I was hard tried, challenging the same statements endlessly, without any dialogue with the authors. There are 12 essays:

1. The Regulation of Concern
2. Ethical Backgrounds
3. Reaching for the Longer Term - the Ethical and Spiritual Tradition
4. The 1991 Workshop and After
5. The Problem of Entrusting
6. Exposure to the Ionizing Radiation Resulting from Human Activities
7. The Quality of AECL's Social Science
8. Risk Assessment Standards
9. The Debate over Scientific Uncertainty
10. Excess Weapons Plutonium, MOX Fuel, CANDU Reactors, UFDC
11. The Question of Importing Nuclear Waste from CANDU Reactors
12. Financial Burden

The main conclusion that I draw from these essays as a whole is that there should be an ethical principle:

There is a responsibility on those in positions of trust to make sure of their facts before pontificating on matters of public policy.

Otherwise, and according to Josh Billings:

"It is better to know nothing than to know what ain't so"

J.A.L. Robertson

1996 October 29