Joe Rogan Experience #1992 - Oliver Stone

Oliver Stone joins Joe Rogan to promote his documentary Nuclear Now, arguing that nuclear energy is a safe, clean, scalable solution to climate change that has been wrongly demonized. They walk through Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, claiming the actual death tolls were far lower than public perception and that Hollywood, comic books, and the anti-nuclear movement created lasting misconceptions. Stone praises China, Russia, France, and Korea for building reactors consistently while criticizing Germany for shutting plants and reverting to coal and gas. The conversation widens into radiation science (bananas, tritium watches, radioactive springs), small modular reactors, nuclear-waste batteries, and regenerative farming. It closes on wide-ranging tangents about aliens, octopuses, diet, exercise, and the dangers of clinging to ideological narratives.

• Stone claims nobody died from radiation at Fukushima; the ~15-20k deaths came from the tsunami and earthquake, not the reactor.
  00:04:45
• All US nuclear waste since 1958 amounts to roughly the size of a single Walmart because the energy is so compact.
  00:13:41
• Germany shut down its working reactors under Green Party pressure and replaced them with coal, gas, solar, and wind.
  00:33:59
• Stone made Nuclear Now after reading a NYT review of Joshua Goldstein and Staffan Qvist's book Bright Future.
  00:46:01
• A company unveiled a 'Nano Diamond' battery made from nuclear waste claimed to last up to 28,000 years.
  00:52:48
• Stone reveals Netflix refused to take Nuclear Now, forcing a digital release on iTunes, Amazon, and Google Play.
  01:36:40
• Germany built a 500-acre solar park with 495,000 panels that produces about one-hundredth the power of the reactor it replaced.
  00:34:31

• China has roughly 74 reactors and is investing hundreds of billions to build ~150 more by the late 2030s.
  00:08:28
• France has been ~70% nuclear since 1975, building 56 reactors in 15 years.
  00:28:48
• A single small reactor can power a nuclear submarine for 50-60 years; two can run an aircraft carrier for decades.
  00:29:19
• New York banned natural gas hookups in new building construction.
  00:38:42
• Stone notes electric-car batteries rely on lithium and cobalt often sourced through unethical means.
  00:53:53
• Joe argues brake dust contributes ~20% of fine particulate pollution versus ~7% from exhaust, so no car is truly zero-emission.
  01:26:46
• Ramsar, Iran has some of the highest natural background radiation on Earth, yet residents show no extra health complications.
  01:34:32
• A banana delivers about 0.01 mrem of radiation; you'd need ~100 bananas to equal one chest X-ray.
  01:32:29
• Chimp Empire scientists studied the same chimpanzee group for 30 years until the chimps ignored their presence.
  01:10:40

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