On 19/12/2018 19:33, Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn wrote:
Jan Panteltje wrote:
Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn wrote
Jan Panteltje wrote:
We see in WW2 for example V1 V1, invention of microwave radar (magnetron),
basically one part of the species trying to outsmart the other part.
War being part of evolution,

It is not. It is *a* way for the development of a species, but it certainly
is not the best way as it can easily lead to the species’ extinction by
self-destruction.

And may yet do so.
He forgot to mention the jet engine and Colossus computer too.

Maybe you are thinking that the modern weapons like nuclear will kill everything
and everybody.
This is likely not the case, […]

Sorry, but you have no clue what you are talking about.

He might well be right. A few people have survived well over LD50 for
acute radiation exposure during Chernobyl and other nuclear accidents
like the criticality at Tokaimura. We don't actually know for sure what
percentage of the population are radiation tolerant or to what extent.

You can tolerate a much larger dose over a longer period of time too. A
rough heuristic is that for every 7 fold increase in time after a
nuclear detonation the fallout radioactivity is an order of magnitude
lower. You only need to stay hidden whilst it is very hot outside. A
couple of days to a fortnight later makes a very big difference.

experiments with radiation have shown that new mutations can happen

Your cells cannot mutate if you are dead. Simple logic.

No but some people may be further from the direct effects and their
repair mechanisms better than average and they will go on to breed.

As a concrete example the place where my father worked handled a
chemical that is now banned called beta-naphthylamine to make a
particularly good red dye. It was exceptionally carcinogenic to males
and some salesmen who only visited the site once died of characteristic
bladder cancer soon after as a result. It was shown to be that chemical
at fault and it was ulitmately banned worlwide as were some other
compounds that made it as an unintended byproduct somewhat later.

However, just a handful of people were unaffected including a guy who
shovelled it most of his working life and my father who lived to be 92.
The retirement age for the entire site was lowered to 62 because almost
noone who worked there ever lived to reach 65.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2-Naphthylamine

--
Regards,
Martin Brown