We rarely show much interest in the basis of safety standards, although the safety of almost everything in society is built on them. The reason is simply that we assume these standards to be based on robust science. As a result, complex real-world elements have become obscured behind safety standards, and myths about safety continue to be held. We tend to regard something as perfectly safe as long as it satisfies its safety standard, and perfectly dangerous when it falls short. This attitude often results in overreactions in response to mass media reports pointing out a failure to comply with standards. Safety standards, however, are not criteria based purely on science that invariably separate safety from danger, but instead are artificial creations obliged to balance benefits and risks. Knowledge of the assumptions and processes behind the making of various safety standards is one part of the basic literacy of living success. fully in this complex modern society. Based on these ideas, I started a graduate course at the University of Tokyo on how to set regulatory standards, and in 2014 I and three colleagues published a book explaining the processes of various kinds of standards. It focused on safety in foods, drinking water, air quality, and radionuclides, although it covers traffic-safety-related standards as well (Murakami et al. 2014).
