> His six-year-old daughter, Leide das Neves Ferreira, later ate an egg while sitting on this floor. She was also fascinated by the blue glow of the powder, applying it to her body and showing it off to her mother. Dust from the powder fell on the egg she was consuming; she eventually absorbed 1.0 GBq and received a total dose of 6.0 Gy, more than a fatal dose even with treatment.
Maybe read the article before commenting?
Uncontrolled contamination can also harm innocent bystanders, in this case children.
This is not just virtue-signaling in combat with edginess-signaling for their respective audience. It's more importantly a testament to prevailing sub-ideologies within portions of the population.
Edgy comments in tech forums like these are a signal of larger-scale class warfare (a loaded term, but bear with me). White collar techworkers think nothing of building skinner boxes and ad services all day as they are rewarded handsomely for it. In combination with all sorts of other factors, you end up with worsening social conditions across the board.
Some guy being nonchalant about dead Brazilian families and taking pleasure in signaling it is just a manifestation of overall societal nonchalance about rights and negative externalities among high-skilled workers and capital owners. These are real phenomenons that have consequences regardless of whether I myself might virtue signal about rejecting them.
If you had never been taught about radiation, you wouldn't know what to do about it either. It is not like radioactive materials are a common everyday occurrence for everyone.
What is wrong with you that you cannot see that they are also humans just like us, and were born into horrible circumstances that they never got the education to learn about this, through no fault of their own whatsoever?
There are so many things we could have if we actually could somehow have faith that the required (for safety, pollution mitigation, etc.) full lifecycle was actually honored.
Instead, everything is dominated by lazy jerks. The other day, I noticed my neighbor's house painter digging a hole. I said hello and asked what was up, and he said "Yes, I need to dispose of the water and paint from my sprayer, so I dig holes and pour it in. Don't worry, I will fill the hole back in when I'm done." This was in the bay area.
People just will not do the right thing by default if it is even remotely more work and for most people, thought is the hardest work there is.
I'd assume soil sequestration (we're not talking lead paint here, presumably) is preferable to storm drain dilution?
Paint is explicitly mentioned. SF even has free home pickup for it via Recology.
I was curious, because I know SF has a high enough population:water ratio that stricter treatment is required, but on the other hand modern non-oil paints are relatively chemically safe (at worst, probably the off-gasing parts).
My theory is simply low education.
Since aeons we burried our garbage and it was never a problem. It only started quite recently, that our technology is so advanced, that it simply will not decompose. But rather contaminate.
But only a very low percentage of people actualy understands this.
So sure, that painter surely was "educated" at some point, that doing this is bad. But they simply do not believe it. "Not a big deal, you know". Same with plastic bags, same with climate change.
Maybe we should start proper science education a lot earlier?