In a panel session on September 7, the second day of the Forum, four panelists, including ISHII Noriyuki, editor-in-chief of the Atomic Industrial Journal (JAIF\u2019s owned media), discussed space development and public understanding, particularly as it relates to the use of nuclear energy in space.<\/p>\n
The Forum\u2014launched in 2002 to broadly share information and spur interest inside and outside the industry in the state of and prospects for space development\u2014was meeting for the 22nd time. This was the first time that the assembly treated the theme of nuclear use in space.<\/p>\n
Prior to the discussions, YAMAGUCHI Yukino\u2014a sophomore at International Christian University (ICU), who was the planner of the panel and served as moderator\u2014talked about the aim of the gathering.<\/p>\n
Saying that people often react reflexively against the use of nuclear energy on account of the negative images associated with nuclear power and energy, she raised the question of how to present the subject to the public in a way that promotes the understanding of new technology.<\/p>\n
The United States, ahead of other nations, pioneered the use of nuclear energy in space. For example, three nuclear batteries were installed in the space probe Voyager 1, launched in 1977.<\/p>\n
However, Japan\u2019s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) only recently included the topic of developing element technology for nuclear batteries as a Space Strategy Fund Project in April 2024. Concerning that, Professor TAKAKI Naoyuki of the Department of Nuclear Safety Engineering at Tokyo City University pointed out that the MEXT funding referred to the nuclear batteries as \u201csemi-permanent power source systems,\u201d showing that even national projects tend to avoid using the term \u201cnuclear.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the session, JAIF\u2019s Ishii said, \u201cJust like the space engineers of today, nuclear engineers once shared a dream for the future.\u201d He noted that space exploration from now on may also not obtain society\u2019s understanding, citing the examples of unfounded fears concerning \u201cAkitakomachi R\u201d\u2014a kind of rice created with irradiation technology and misunderstandings about food additives.<\/p>\n
Ishii then stated that the lack of scientific literacy was the biggest obstacle in obtaining public understanding on new science and technology.<\/p>\n
A quest for \u201czero risk,\u201d Ishii said, was also a societal distortion, adding that people need a proper understanding of being \u201csafe,\u201d which is objective, and feeling \u201csecure,\u201d which is subjective. Something can be objectively safe and yet people can feel insecure<\/em> about it.<\/p>\n He emphasized that people must have a proper sense that if something is safe, they should feel secure, and went on to say that a society should not be allowed where a sense of \u201cbeing safe but not feeling secure\u201d has currency.<\/p>\n Asked what is needed to promote public understanding on unknown and future technologies, Ishii argued that everyone\u2014across all lines of industries\u2014must work to raise scientific literacy across the board. Otherwise, he said, referring to Niem\u00f6ller’s \u201cFirst they came\u201d confession, \u201cWhen the public comes for the space industry, there may be no one to speak out on its behalf.\u201d<\/p>\n He called on the participating students \u201cto routinely \u2018extend your antennas,\u2019 that is, to pay attention to areas other than space, and then . . . actively speak out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In a panel session on September 7, the second day of the Forum, four panelists, including ISHII Noriyuki, editor-in-chief of the Atomic Industrial Journal (JAIF\u2019s owned media), discussed space development and public understanding, particularly as it relates to the use of nuclear energy in space. The Forum\u2014launched in 2002 to broadly share information and spur […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":7198,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[67,1189,1188],"class_list":["post-7197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry","category-news","tag-jaif","tag-nuclear-battery","tag-sdf"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7197"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7199,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7197\/revisions\/7199"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jaif.or.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}