4 ms·

Internal combustion engines actually drastically reduced pollution, because they replaced horse poop.

GW150914 8y ago
They reduced shit on the streets and horse carcasses, and increased air pollution. It’s bit disingenuous to conflate pollution as in “horse shit” with pollution as in “TEL, CO2, NO2, etc.” In fact TEL is a great example of just how deveststing move fast and break things can be.
- SamReidHughes 8y ago
  The net harm of pollution was drastically reduced. It's basic sanitation, not even a contest.
  - GW150914 8y ago
    Not getting typhus from a rotting pile of horse is a definite win, but a Pyrrhic victory if we end up trashing the entire planet as a result of global warming. Less horse shit was a boon for sanitation in big cities, but TEL was a bone ride multi-generational disaster, ongoing in some parts. The car solves one problem of big city sanitation and replaced it with slow motion global catastrophe of pollution. Edit: Clarification, TEL is as you said, TetraEthyl Lead.
    - carapace 8y ago
      TEL? ...Tetraethyllead?
carapace 8y ago
You mean this: https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Great-Horse-Manure-Crisis-of-1894/ https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Great... 100 years after the first electric car: > ...Thomas Parker built the first practical production electric car in London in 1884. ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#History Horse manure is a resource. Too much of it in the wrong place was the problem. Car exhaust is deadly. People commit suicide with it. Electric vehicles have the potential (no pun intended) to be powered from non-polluting energy sources. My point still stands: we don't live in the best of all possible worlds in large measure because we refuse to think carefully and deeply about what we value most and how to achieve it.
- carapace 8y ago
  Er, 10 years after, not 100. D'oh!

They reduced shit on the streets and horse carcasses, and increased air pollution. It’s bit disingenuous to conflate pollution as in “horse shit” with pollution as in “TEL, CO2, NO2, etc.” In fact TEL is a great example of just how deveststing move fast and break things can be.

SamReidHughes 8y ago
The net harm of pollution was drastically reduced. It's basic sanitation, not even a contest.
- GW150914 8y ago
  Not getting typhus from a rotting pile of horse is a definite win, but a Pyrrhic victory if we end up trashing the entire planet as a result of global warming. Less horse shit was a boon for sanitation in big cities, but TEL was a bone ride multi-generational disaster, ongoing in some parts. The car solves one problem of big city sanitation and replaced it with slow motion global catastrophe of pollution. Edit: Clarification, TEL is as you said, TetraEthyl Lead.
  - carapace 8y ago
    TEL? ...Tetraethyllead?

carapace 8y ago

You mean this: https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Great-Horse-Manure-Crisis-of-1894/ https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Great... 100 years after the first electric car: > ...Thomas Parker built the first practical production electric car in London in 1884. ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#History Horse manure is a resource. Too much of it in the wrong place was the problem. Car exhaust is deadly. People commit suicide with it. Electric vehicles have the potential (no pun intended) to be powered from non-polluting energy sources. My point still stands: we don't live in the best of all possible worlds in large measure because we refuse to think carefully and deeply about what we value most and how to achieve it.

carapace 8y ago
Er, 10 years after, not 100. D'oh!