Disaster and the Politics of Expert Inquiry, Essay Example

Knowles points out that there should be a positive relationship between technology and risk during disasters, but this is not the case. Overall, the purpose of technology is to make our lives easier, but is has increased the ability for people to experience harm. An important example of this is the purpose and impact of nuclear power plants. Knowles describes ““They should have been saying that nuclear energy was dangerous.  Instead they said that nuclear power was safe.” Ultimately, nuclear power plants represent a safety issue in the wake of natural disasters. These disasters disrupt plant actions which could result in a serious loss of life and contamination of the area.

This knowledge of failure gives us an important perspective during disaster investigations. This understanding allows investigators to determine what could go wrong with technology during disasters, which allows them to also plan ahead for such problems. As a result nuclear power plants could be made to withstand these disasters, or their use should be removed altogether. These disasters help us gain an understanding of how our safety should be protected and this knowledge could be reasonably incorporated into future models of these systems to make them more effective.

Ultimately, whether a disaster is natural or otherwise, it is important for technological innovators to understand how these risks can impact the lives of people around the world. Nuclear power plants are an inherent risk to this safety and it is therefore important to determine how the risk can be reduced. Overall, efforts must be put forth to either make alterations, gain a greater understanding of risk related to natural disasters, or to remove these power plants from use.