Radioactive waste takes a long time to decay.
In the meantime, you have to warn people to stay away from it. But how do you make a warning sign that will still be understandable to people 10,000 years in the future?
Linguist Daniel Midgley examines the problem of Yucca Mountain on this episode of Talk the Talk.
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A good intro:
http://www.damninteresting.com/this-place-is-not-a-place-of-honor/
What the experts came up with: (Long PDF)
http://prod.sandia.gov/techlib/access-control.cgi/1992/921382.pdf
A shorter summary of what the experts came up with:
http://downlode.org/Etext/WIPP/
Some info on radioactive waste, including how long it takes to decay:
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/radwaste.html
