The return of context and measurement.
Erm…I know it feels like this subject just won’t die, but unfortunately for you, Jeff made a great comment on my last post that sparked another conversation with my wife that brought up yet another facet to this subject.
Tracy told me about a conversation she had with some friends around Radon. Apparently, there is no level of Radon deemed safe. Any exposure leads to increased risks of cancer. Congress passed an act setting the “acceptable level” for Radon at 0.4 pCi/L, which had the unfortunate effect of making 2/3 of U.S. homes unsafe. As a result, the EPA has set “more reasonable” guidelines stating that you should: “Fix your home if you have a Radon level of 4 pCi/L or more.” To put it in context, the risk for smokers at 4 pCi/L is: about 62/1000 to get lung cancer or 5 times the risk of dying in a car. The risk for non-smokers at 4 pCi/L is: about 7/1000 to get lung cancer or the same as the risk of dying in a car crash. Seems reasonable enough, but it turns out that the EPA’s acceptable risk guidelines were calculated, in part, by figuring out health risks and also cost of removal/abatement. Therefore the guidelines are based upon a ratio of:
Cost to your life /Cost to your wallet.
The thing about these is that neither are fixed measures. Better technology and health will prolong our lives magnifying the effect of small risks, meanwhile the cost of removal can actually decrease as we build better techniques and tools. I wonder whether the EPA will monitor these factors and adjust the guidelines accordingly?
I’d guess not, because while the Radon case is an extreme example, I think many of the measurements we use in other areas are also derived from other measurements that aren’t static. Over time, the underlying measurements have shifted and yet this hasn’t been reflected in the bigger measurement. Another example: I wrote a while back about the fact that it now costs more to make a penny than it’s worth – clearly that wasn’t the case when the penny was introduced.
I mentioned earlier, that our sense of value is relative or contextual. While we look at measurements as fixed immutable things, it turns out that these are also relative or contextual and have to be because they are the way we account for value. As we’re able to see the relationships between things more and more clearly, the hidden connections between our various concepts are revealed. The implication is that new information somewhere will almost certainly affect a system of measurement somewhere else. And, taken as a whole, it’s quite possible that almost all of the measurement systems we use that have been in place for any length of time are, to some degree, slightly less relevant than there were when originally conceived.
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Tags: context
