In my opinion the danger of nuclear energy is only one of the chapters, even if the most dramatic one, which is indicating in which direction we are headed in today’s era of technology. As we are warned by Gunther Anders in The Outdatedness of Human Beings “Our ability to do is largely superior to our ability to foresee the effects of our doing”.
This highly dangerous situation removes man's opportunities for foresight
and therefore also the responsibility and mastery that result from the ability to foresee. Technology, in fact, which has no other goal to obtain other than its own strengthening and expansion, is supported today by the economy, which has an ever larger need for energy for its own aims (amongst which the well being of men is not contemplated, but only the increment of its profit); therefore from the economic front we can not expect any self limitation.
The misfortune is that we cannot expect any limitation from politics either, which, for a long time already, has not been the place where decisions are made anymore, because in making a decisions politics looks to economics, where every decisional process has been transferred. If to this we add the scarce knowledge, or even simply the lack of interest for themes such as nuclear energy, which by far exceed the competences of each one of us, I do not see how it is possible to stem this very dangerous “inability to foresee and forecast” that characterizes the choices that are made simply because they are feasible, regardless of the uncontrollable consequences that, except for the catastrophic accidents, are not easily perceptible.
This deficiency of perception is the highest risk we are taking without knowing how to control it.
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