The novelist Sakyo Komatsu, who died July 26 at age 80, first came across the term "genshi bakudan" (atom bomb) during World War II in a magazine for children. The bomb belonged to the realm of fantasy for young Komatsu, but it was dropped on Japan a few years later. "That made me wonder what the development of science and technology meant for the human race," Komatsu once recalled in an interview
The novelist Sakyo Komatsu, who died July 26 at age 80, first came across the term "genshi bakudan" (atom bomb) during World War II in a magazine for children. The bomb belonged to the realm of fantasy for young Komatsu, but it was dropped on Japan a few years later.
"That made me wonder what the development of science and technology meant for the human race," Komatsu once recalled in an interview with the vernacular Asahi Shimbun. "That was one of the reasons why I turned to science fiction."
His final commentary appeared in "3.11 no Mirai" (The future of 3/11), a book recently published by Sakuhinsha. He wrote: "I would like to keep believing in human intelligence and the sensitivities of the Japanese people. I would like to stay alive for a while to see how they are going to resolve this crisis."
While abhorring nuclear weapons, Komatsu was convinced that science and technology could be put to good use. He believed in the utilization of nuclear energy as "mankind's great challenge." His stance was actually quite common in our pre-3/11 society.
Nuclear bombs and nuclear power generation, both inventions of the 20th century, employ heat from nuclear fission--the first to kill people and the second to give us electricity. But radiation cannot tell good from evil. Taming this "beast" in an earthquake-prone country is not easy, as we learned from the disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
Follow-up radiation surveys in Hiroshima and Nagasaki show there is no such thing as a "safe level" of exposure to radiation. According to Tatsuhiko Kodama, a University of Tokyo professor who recently testified before the Diet, the radioactive materials released from the crippled Fukushima plant equaled 20 Hiroshima bombs in the uranium equivalent. Kodama also pointed out that the radiation from the Fukushima plant will remain much longer than the radiation from the Hiroshima bomb. Nobody knows the scope and duration of the harm done by the fallout from Fukushima.
A haiku by Fujiroku Taguchi goes: "I'm not saying nuclear generation is bad/I'm saying it's scary." The almost physical nature of our fear and loathing for nuclear power generation today is making us unable to see the benefits of peaceful utilization of nuclear energy. Our trying to do without nuclear power generation does not spell defeat for science. Rather, I'd like to think it's our sanity kicking in as citizens of a country that had two atom bombs dropped on it in August 1945.
--The Asahi Shimbun, Aug. 6