Environment:Science & Policy

Some of the most important takeaways from the Tom's River discussion included the degree of difficulty surrounding the study of cancer clusters. With small sample sizes, skepticism from the local and state government, and an uphill battle against the chemical companies who had so many resources in the scientific community and a strong legal force, the scientists struggled to influence policy change. We feel that although there were some statistically significant results, the evidence was somewhat of a stretch as the sample size was not very large, making it hard to persuade different groups about the intensity of the problem. Some of the data was also qualitative since certain factors such as water consumption could not be measured in exact metrics.

Our group focused on the fact that science is not about uncertainty, it is about reliability. This is contentious because in the case of Tom's River, the scientific research was not necessarily reliable. The sample size was not big enough and the results were not statistically significant. This might be because the study was not conducted timely. The researchers may have gotten more accurate data if it was collected closer to when these women would have actually been pregnant. The relationship between scientific uncertainty and environmental policy is turbulent. In order to create new environmental policy, usually policy makers require a certain level of scientific certainty. However, it is often difficult for scientists to collect statistically significant data because they do not have enough resources. These resources are usually provided by the government. Therefore, scientific uncertainty and a lack of resources is a cycle.

Group: What did you learn about Tom's River? What did you think was most important? Was there enough evidence to reach the decision they made? Solo: Do a follow up on  Chongqing, China or in any other area in the world. Search up statistics about cancer clusters in this area. Present your findings and your ideas on what the statistics mean. Is there enough evidence to prove these cancer clusters?  

Group 5: We misidentified the metal as Iron, when it is in fact Zinc. This occurred because we calculated the volume incorrectly which thereby translated to the wrong density. In addition, we observed that the metal did not melt. Our metal also fell apart onto the table which could have been a sign of possible meltage. As for our mineral, we believed that it was quartz, when it was actually Fluorite. We did not believe it had dissolved into the test tube; however, it in fact was slightly soluble. The largest error we made, which would have helped us determine correctly what the quartz and the metal were, was incorrectly calculating the density. If we would have done this part correctly, we likely would have determined the correct mystery materials.

Our metal is iron and our mineral is calcite. Our group believes that mass and conductivity are the most reliable because they are the most helpful in our identification process. Conductivity was good because it was a binary so there was not much error. Mass used the scale so was more accurate than our observations. Density was not so helpful because the scale was hard to read. Additionally, qualitative observation was important because it helped us identify both mineral and metal when our data was a little off compared with the tables.

Our metal was copper, which conducted electricity, is lustrous, is malleable, is not crystalline, and melts. Our mineral was quartz, which did not conduct electricity, but is lustrous like copper. It was also not malleable (it is considered a hard material, which we found through it's high hardness rating of 7), and is crystalline. Both materials were not water soluble. Our observed densities were 2.24 g/mL for copper and 1.47 g/mL for quartz, which are both lower than the specified observed densities. Solubility and conductivity helped us narrow down our options to copper and quartz, and we were correct!

Based off our data, the most reliable physical characteristics of our unknowns were the appearance of the mineral and metal. The metal was malleable and did not rust as some of the other unknown metals did. We originally thought our metal was aluminum, because it was malleable and we were unable to determine a melting point, but our unknown's coloring was not as blue-tinted as the aluminum. We then determined that our metal was tin based of its malleability and coloring. We determined that our mineral was halite based off its solubility and hardness. The mineral was not hard, as its hardness on the Moh scale was between 2 and 3. It was also soluble like halite. The density we recorded for both the metal and mineral was incorrect due to the size of our sample, so we were not able to use density to determine our unknowns.