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A Critical Look at Catastrophe Risk Assessments
CERN-TH/2000-029 DAMTP-2000-105 hep-ph/0009204 A critical look at catastrophe risk assessments Adrian Kent Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge, Silver Street, Cambridge CB3 9EW, U.K. (September 15, 2000) Recent papers by Busza et al. (BJSW) and Dar et al. (DDH) argue that astrophysical data can be used to establish small bounds on the risk of a \killer strangelet" catastrophe scenario in forthcoming collider experiments. The case for the safety of the experiments set out by BJSW does not rely on these bounds, but on theoretical arguments, which BJSW find sufficiently compelling to firmly exclude any possibility of catastrophe. However, DDH and other commentators (initially including BJSW) have suggested that these empirical bounds alone do give sufficient reassurance. We note that this seems unsupportable when the bounds are expressed in terms of expected cost | a good measure, according to standard risk 8 analysis arguments. For example, DDH's main bound, pcatastrophe < 2 10− , implies only that the expectation value of the number of deaths is bounded by 120. × We thus reappraise the DDH and BJSW risk bounds by comparing risk policy in other areas. 15 We find that requiring a catastrophe risk of no higher than 10− per year is necessary to be consistent with established policy for risk optimisation from radiation≈ hazards, even if highly risk tolerant assumptions are made and no value is placed on the lives of future generations. A respectable case can be made for requiring a bound many orders of magnitude smaller. We conclude that the costs of small risks of catastrophe have been significantly underestimated in the physics literature, with obvious implications for future policy. -
CURRICULUM VITAE, ALAN W. HARRIS Personal: Born
CURRICULUM VITAE, ALAN W. HARRIS Personal: Born: August 3, 1944, Portland, OR Married: August 22, 1970, Rose Marie Children: W. Donald (b. 1974), David (b. 1976), Catherine (b 1981) Education: B.S. (1966) Caltech, Geophysics M.S. (1967) UCLA, Earth and Space Science PhD. (1975) UCLA, Earth and Space Science Dissertation: Dynamical Studies of Satellite Origin. Advisor: W.M. Kaula Employment: 1966-1967 Graduate Research Assistant, UCLA 1968-1970 Member of Tech. Staff, Space Division Rockwell International 1970-1971 Physics instructor, Santa Monica College 1970-1973 Physics Teacher, Immaculate Heart High School, Hollywood, CA 1973-1975 Graduate Research Assistant, UCLA 1974-1991 Member of Technical Staff, Jet Propulsion Laboratory 1991-1998 Senior Member of Technical Staff, Jet Propulsion Laboratory 1998-2002 Senior Research Scientist, Jet Propulsion Laboratory 2002-present Senior Research Scientist, Space Science Institute Appointments: 1976 Member of Faculty of NATO Advanced Study Institute on Origin of the Solar System, Newcastle upon Tyne 1977-1978 Guest Investigator, Hale Observatories 1978 Visiting Assoc. Prof. of Physics, University of Calif. at Santa Barbara 1978-1980 Executive Committee, Division on Dynamical Astronomy of AAS 1979 Visiting Assoc. Prof. of Earth and Space Science, UCLA 1980 Guest Investigator, Hale Observatories 1983-1984 Guest Investigator, Lowell Observatory 1983-1985 Lunar and Planetary Review Panel (NASA) 1983-1992 Supervisor, Earth and Planetary Physics Group, JPL 1984 Science W.G. for Voyager II Uranus/Neptune Encounters (JPL/NASA) 1984-present Advisor of students in Caltech Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship Program 1984-1985 ESA/NASA Science Advisory Group for Primitive Bodies Missions 1985-1993 ESA/NASA Comet Nucleus Sample Return Science Definition Team (Deputy Chairman, U.S. -
Efficient Responses to Catastrophic Risk Richard A
University of Chicago Law School Chicago Unbound Journal Articles Faculty Scholarship 2006 Efficient Responseso t Catastrophic Risk Richard A. Posner Follow this and additional works at: https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/journal_articles Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Richard A. Posner, "Efficient Responseso t Catastrophic Risk," 6 Chicago Journal of International Law 511 (2006). This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty Scholarship at Chicago Unbound. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal Articles by an authorized administrator of Chicago Unbound. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Efficient Responses to Catastrophic Risk Richard A. Posner* The Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004 has focused attention on a type of disaster to which policymakers pay too little attention-a disaster that has a very low or unknown probability of occurring but that if it does occur creates enormous losses. Great as the death toll, physical and emotional suffering of survivors, and property damage caused by the tsunami were, even greater losses could be inflicted by other disasters of low (but not negligible) or unknown probability. The asteroid that exploded above Siberia in 1908 with the force of a hydrogen bomb might have killed millions of people had it exploded above a major city. Yet that asteroid was only about two hundred feet in diameter, and a much larger one (among the thousands of dangerously large asteroids in orbits that intersect the earth's orbit) could strike the earth and cause the total extinction of the human race through a combination of shock waves, fire, tsunamis, and blockage of sunlight wherever it struck. -
Elements of Astronomy
^ ELEMENTS ASTRONOMY: DESIGNED AS A TEXT-BOOK uabemws, Btminwcus, anb families. BY Rev. JOHN DAVIS, A.M. FORMERLY PROFESSOR OF MATHEMATICS AND ASTRONOMY IN ALLEGHENY CITY COLLEGE, AND LATE PRINCIPAL OF THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCE, ALLEGHENY CITY, PA. PHILADELPHIA: PRINTED BY SHERMAN & CO.^ S. W. COB. OF SEVENTH AND CHERRY STREETS. 1868. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by JOHN DAVIS, in the Clerk's OlBce of the District Court of the United States for the Western District of Pennsylvania. STEREOTYPED BY MACKELLAR, SMITHS & JORDAN, PHILADELPHIA. CAXTON PRESS OF SHERMAN & CO., PHILADELPHIA- PREFACE. This work is designed to fill a vacuum in academies, seminaries, and families. With the advancement of science there should be a corresponding advancement in the facilities for acquiring a knowledge of it. To economize time and expense in this department is of as much importance to the student as frugality and in- dustry are to the success of the manufacturer or the mechanic. Impressed with the importance of these facts, and having a desire to aid in the general diffusion of useful knowledge by giving them some practical form, this work has been prepared. Its language is level to the comprehension of the youthful mind, and by an easy and familiar method it illustrates and explains all of the principal topics that are contained in the science of astronomy. It treats first of the sun and those heavenly bodies with which we are by observation most familiar, and advances consecutively in the investigation of other worlds and systems which the telescope has revealed to our view. -
January 2006-2.Indd
Vol. 35, No. 1 January 2006 PHYSICSHYSICS& SOCIETY A Publication of The Forum on Physics and Society • A Forum of The American Physical Society EDITOR’S COMMENTS Anybody willing to look beyond the point of their nose will tween science and society. A prime, much debated, possible recognize that the question of supplying suffi cient energy for solution to the problem is the wide spread use of nuclear a growing world, hungry for universal prosperity, without energy. The problems inherent in such a solution are long choking that world on the byproducts of the production and run resource availability, safety, waste disposal, and the use of that energy, is the major problem at the interface be- continued on page 2 IN THIS ISSUE IN THE OCTOBER WEB ISSUE EDITORS’ COMMENTS ELECTIONS Candidate Statements. Please Vote! FORUM NEWS Vote via the Web at: http://physics.wm.edu/ballot.html. Please Vote! 3 Election Results, by Marc Sher 3 Project on Elements of an Energy Strategy, by Tony Nero EDITOR’S COMMENTS ARTICLES ARTICLES 4 The Status of Nuclear Waste Disposal, by David Bodansky Introduction to a Sequence of Articles in Physics & Society on 7 Nuclear Power and Proliferation, Science Input to Government, W.K.H. Panofsky Scientifi c Integrity in Government and Ballistic Missile Defense, by Gerald E. Marsh and George S. Stanford Edwin E. Salpeter 9 4S (Super Safe, Small and Simple LMR), by Akio Minato Physics in Theater, Harry Lustig 12 Strawbale Construction — Low Tech vs. High Tech or Just Better Physical Properties? by Ken Haggard The Great Fallout-Cancer Story of 1978 and its Aftermath, Daniel W. -
Polyhymnia, and the Mass of Jupiter
ASTRONOMISCHE NACHRICHTEN. N2 3249. Band 136. On the Elements of (33) Polyhymnia, and the mass of Jupiter. By Simon Newconzb. More than twenty years ago, I called attention to the In the work as first done I used general perturbations great value of observations on the planet (33) Polyhymnia by the Earth, and omitted the action of Uranus entirely. for determining the mass of Jupiter (.4. N.Bd. 79, S. 245). It was found, however, on examination, that decimals enough I hoped by doing so to secure a continuous series of ob- had not been used in one term of long period in the servations at each opposition from that time onward; but general perturbations by the Earth, and I deemed it better this hope has been disappointed. Still, enough of obser- to reject them entirely, and use special perturbations. At vations have been made to afford a value of the mass the same time the opportunity of introducing the action of which I think is entitled to greater weight than any other Uranus was taken advantage of. single determination. In order to lessen thelabor of computing these small The work of making this investigation, like several perturbations, the disturbing forces were not computed for other works in which I am engaged, has been carried on intervals of an integral number of days, as usual, but for piece-meal, in a quite irregular way, for more than ten years. equi-distant mean anomalies of Polyhymnia (5" in the case As far back as 1884-8j, the special perturbations of the of the Earth; IOO in that of Uranus). -
(2000) Forging Asteroid-Meteorite Relationships Through Reflectance
Forging Asteroid-Meteorite Relationships through Reflectance Spectroscopy by Thomas H. Burbine Jr. B.S. Physics Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 1988 M.S. Geology and Planetary Science University of Pittsburgh, 1991 SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF EARTH, ATMOSPHERIC, AND PLANETARY SCIENCES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN PLANETARY SCIENCES AT THE MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY FEBRUARY 2000 © 2000 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. All rights reserved. Signature of Author: Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences December 30, 1999 Certified by: Richard P. Binzel Professor of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences Thesis Supervisor Accepted by: Ronald G. Prinn MASSACHUSES INSTMUTE Professor of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences Department Head JA N 0 1 2000 ARCHIVES LIBRARIES I 3 Forging Asteroid-Meteorite Relationships through Reflectance Spectroscopy by Thomas H. Burbine Jr. Submitted to the Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences on December 30, 1999 in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Planetary Sciences ABSTRACT Near-infrared spectra (-0.90 to ~1.65 microns) were obtained for 196 main-belt and near-Earth asteroids to determine plausible meteorite parent bodies. These spectra, when coupled with previously obtained visible data, allow for a better determination of asteroid mineralogies. Over half of the observed objects have estimated diameters less than 20 k-m. Many important results were obtained concerning the compositional structure of the asteroid belt. A number of small objects near asteroid 4 Vesta were found to have near-infrared spectra similar to the eucrite and howardite meteorites, which are believed to be derived from Vesta. -
The Minor Planet Bulletin, It Is a Pleasure to Announce the Appointment of Brian D
THE MINOR PLANET BULLETIN OF THE MINOR PLANETS SECTION OF THE BULLETIN ASSOCIATION OF LUNAR AND PLANETARY OBSERVERS VOLUME 33, NUMBER 1, A.D. 2006 JANUARY-MARCH 1. LIGHTCURVE AND ROTATION PERIOD Observatory (Observatory code 926) near Nogales, Arizona. The DETERMINATION FOR MINOR PLANET 4006 SANDLER observatory is located at an altitude of 1312 meters and features a 0.81 m F7 Ritchey-Chrétien telescope and a SITe 1024 x 1024 x Matthew T. Vonk 24 micron CCD. Observations were conducted on (UT dates) Daniel J. Kopchinski January 29, February 7, 8, 2005. A total of 37 unfiltered images Amanda R. Pittman with exposure times of 120 seconds were analyzed using Canopus. Stephen Taubel The lightcurve, shown in the figure below, indicates a period of Department of Physics 3.40 ± 0.01 hours and an amplitude of 0.16 magnitude. University of Wisconsin – River Falls 410 South Third Street Acknowledgements River Falls, WI 54022 [email protected] Thanks to Michael Schwartz and Paulo Halvorcem for their great work at Tenagra Observatory. (Received: 25 July) References Minor planet 4006 Sandler was observed during January Schmadel, L. D. (1999). Dictionary of Minor Planet Names. and February of 2005. The synodic period was Springer: Berlin, Germany. 4th Edition. measured and determined to be 3.40 ± 0.01 hours with an amplitude of 0.16 magnitude. Warner, B. D. and Alan Harris, A. (2004) “Potential Lightcurve Targets 2005 January – March”, www.minorplanetobserver.com/ astlc/targets_1q_2005.htm Minor planet 4006 Sandler was discovered by the Russian astronomer Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova in 1972. (Schmadel, 1999) It orbits the sun with an orbit that varies between 2.058 AU and 2.975 AU which locates it in the heart of the main asteroid belt. -
An Access-Dictionary of Internationalist High Tech Latinate English
An Access-Dictionary of Internationalist High Tech Latinate English Excerpted from Word Power, Public Speaking Confidence, and Dictionary-Based Learning, Copyright © 2007 by Robert Oliphant, columnist, Education News Author of The Latin-Old English Glossary in British Museum MS 3376 (Mouton, 1966) and A Piano for Mrs. Cimino (Prentice Hall, 1980) INTRODUCTION Strictly speaking, this is simply a list of technical terms: 30,680 of them presented in an alphabetical sequence of 52 professional subject fields ranging from Aeronautics to Zoology. Practically considered, though, every item on the list can be quickly accessed in the Random House Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary (RHU), updated second edition of 2007, or in its CD – ROM WordGenius® version. So what’s here is actually an in-depth learning tool for mastering the basic vocabularies of what today can fairly be called American-Pronunciation Internationalist High Tech Latinate English. Dictionary authority. This list, by virtue of its dictionary link, has far more authority than a conventional professional-subject glossary, even the one offered online by the University of Maryland Medical Center. American dictionaries, after all, have always assigned their technical terms to professional experts in specific fields, identified those experts in print, and in effect held them responsible for the accuracy and comprehensiveness of each entry. Even more important, the entries themselves offer learners a complete sketch of each target word (headword). Memorization. For professionals, memorization is a basic career requirement. Any physician will tell you how much of it is called for in medical school and how hard it is, thanks to thousands of strange, exotic shapes like <myocardium> that have to be taken apart in the mind and reassembled like pieces of an unpronounceable jigsaw puzzle. -
New Strangelet Signature and Its Relevance to the CASTOR Calorimeter
214 octants. Each octant is longitudinally segmented into 80 layers, the first 8 (~ 14.7 Xo) comprising the electromagnetic section and the remaining 72 (~ 9.47 A/) the hadronic section. The light output from groups of 4 consecutive active layers is coupled into the same light guide, giving a total of 20 readout channels along each octant. Fig. 1: General view of the CASTOR calorimeter construction *""•••••-....... including support. The outer plates (one omitted for clarity) constitute the support for the light guides and photomultip- liers. This work has been supported by the Polish State Committee for Scientific Research (grant No 2P03B 121 12 and SPUB P03/016/97). References: 1. A.L.S. Angelis, J. Bartke, M.Yu. Bogolyubsky, S.N. Filippov, E. Gladysz-Dziadus, Yu.V. Kharlov, A.B. Kurepin, A.I. Maevskaya, G. Mavromanolakis, A.D. Panagiotou, S.A. Sadovsky, P. Stefanski, and Z. Wlodarczyk, Proc. 28-th Intern. Symposium on Multi- particle Dynamics, Delphi (Greece), 1998, to be published by World Scientific; A.L.S. Angelis et al., 10-th ISVHECRI, Gran Sasso, 1998, to be published in Nucl. Phys. B, Proc. Suppl.; 2. E. Gladysz-Dziadus, Yu.V. Kharlov, A.D. Panagiotou, and S.A. Sadovsky, Proc. 3-rd ICPA- QGP, Jaipur, 17-21 March 1997, eds B.C. Sinha et al., Narosa Publishing House, New Delhi, 1998, p. 554; 3. A.L.S. Angelis, J. Bartke, J. Blocki, G. Mavromanolakis, A.D. Panagiotou, and P. Zychowski, ALICE/98-46 Internal Note/CAS, CERN, 1998. PL9902552 New Strangelet Signature and Its Relevance to the CASTOR Calorimeter E. -
CATASTROPHIC RISK and GOVERNANCE AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA: a Postscript to Terrorism Risk in a Post-9/JJ Economy Robert J
CATASTROPHIC RISK AND GOVERNANCE AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA: A Postscript to Terrorism Risk in a Post-9/JJ Economy Robert J. Rbeet In an earlier article, published with this fine journal, I analyzed terrorism risk and its economic consequences with the caveat that the "greatest risk of exogenous shock to the industry is from a natural mega-catastrophe."! Since the article addressed terrorism risk, this idea was expressed only in passing. During and since publication, a number of stunning catastrophes have occurred in various comers of the world, including the South Asia tsunami, human-to-human transmission of the H5NI avian flu virus, and Hurricane Katrina. 2 In this essay, I expand my original idea and inquire into the political economy and system of governance that have made catastrophes more frequent and severe. The nature of catastrophe, whether manmade or natural, has changed and so too must our perception and response. Like manmade catastrophes, natural disasters are not merely acts of God; rather, mortal activity can influence their causality or consequence. Individual choices and government action can amplify natural catastrophic risk. This is seen in government risk-mitigation efforts such as flood insurance and response to catastrophes, including the recent failures in New Orleans. The system of governance that is designed to mitigate risk and respond to catastrophes can be ineffective, or worse, increase the risk of harm through unintended consequences. Human influence must be considered a source of collateral risk, the kind that leads to a systemic crisis or exacerbates one. In an increasingly complex society, governance may not always entail the delivery of services so much as the coordination and management of various governmental and nongovernmental entities, and so the lack of complete control may limit the effectiveness of governance and perhaps t Associate Professor of Law, Washburn University School of Law; M.B.A., University of Pennsylvania (Wharton); J.D., George Washington University; B.A., University of Chicago. -
Catastrophe: Risk and Response; Collapse
Book Reviews John D. Donahue Editor Note to Book Publishers: Please send all books for review directly to the incoming Book Review Editor, Eugene B. McGregor, Jr., Indiana University, School of Public & Environmental Affairs, 1315 E. 10th Street, Bloomington, IN 47405-1701. Katherine Kaufer Christoffel Private Guns, Public Health, by David Hemenway, Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2004, 344 pp., $27.95 cloth. “The public health approach is ideally suited to deal with our gun problem. Public health emphasizes prevention rather than fault-finding, blame, or revenge. It uses sci- ence rather than belief as its basis and relies on accurate data collection and scientific analysis. It promotes a wide variety of interventions—environmental as well as individ- ual—and integrates the activities of a wide variety of disciplines and institutions. Most important, public health brings a pragmatic attitude to problems—finding innovative solutions . .” (p. 25) Based on that laudable view, David Hemenway wrote Private Guns, Public Health to provide an authoritative overview of public health thinking about gun injuries and deaths in the United States. The perspectives and data summarized were developed over several 20th-century decades, and refined over the last 15 years, that is, in the wake of the tsunami of urban youth gun homicides in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The material is well-known to those who were involved in gun injury pre- vention research and advocacy during this time. It is not as well-known to the gen- eral public, policymakers, or young public health professionals. This book is an excellent summary for all of us and a good introduction to the field for newcomers.