It's related to the problem in space colonization that the optimal amount of shielding is maybe 2 meters of lunar soil. Less than that and moderate energy particles are harmful. High energy particles mostly blast right through you but if one is stopped by a nucleus in the shielding, that nucleus will be blasted apart and particles from that could blow up more nuclei so a large amount of dangerous and penetrating (muons, pions) radiation is produced. It seems that some very high energy particles (neutrinos?) can pass through the earth and cause a shower, so it's not reasonable you can stop all of them. The earth's atmosphere is spread out over a long distance that gives particles a chance to decay so a shield that is better than the 2 meter shield would be difficult to construct so space colonists are going to accept a minimum level of radiation than we have on Earth.