4 ms·

Just remove it completely. We somehow survived without it 60 years ago.

umvi 6y ago
Yeah and 60 years ago we didn't have the robust food supply chain we have now. Plastic is a cheap way to package, transport, and store foods. Without it your options are... glass, metal, wood, ceramic, etc. So "get rid of all plastic" means "jack up the price of all food". This would put us in another situation where the cure is worse than the ill. X people die every year due to microplastics, but abolishing all plastic will probably push hundreds of millions into poverty.
- titzer 6y ago
  But mah dollarzes! > but abolishing all plastic will probably push hundreds of millions into poverty. Citation needed. The very poorest people on Earth living subsistence farming and getting all their food from local sources. Plastic packaging is a way of extending the life of food so that supply chains can be lengthened and food can be sourced farther away: read: nice tomatoes in winter. Long supply chains increase industrialization of farming, push the quality of food down, and profits up. Plastic packaging is a western luxury that allows us to live in a smorgasborg of food oversupply uninterrupted by season. While western societies' main health problems stem from obesity, you argue about food packaging, ignoring the fact that the vast majority of plastic waste in the ocean is from one-time use plastics for goodies like Coke bottles, chip bags, candy bar wrappers, straws, etc.
st1x7 6y ago
Even this oversimplification is wrong. Back then we had a bit over a third of the current world population and a much worse standard of living across the globe. Progress is about making good tradeoffs, not about picking perfect solutions. Otherwise your logic could get rid of any innovation by ignoring its benefits and saying "it has some problems so let's get rid of it altogether, we somehow survived without it in the past".
azornathogron 6y ago
Yes, the human species has survived with far fewer luxuries than we now enjoy. The species also survived before computers and the internet, and before air travel and before automobiles. These things (including plastic) all have widespread costs and widespread benefits. Let's try to find ways to reduce the costs without entirely ignoring and losing the benefits?
- Laarlf 6y ago
  Why not this: try to find ways to reduce the costs without losing any of the benefits. If a different (better) technology does not provide all the benefits, few people might be interested in using it. Forcing technologies like these by law is not good. I now have a few hundred plastic straws because I don’t like the paper straws and their deterioration while drinking forced by the eu.
itsoktocry 6y ago
>We somehow survived without it 60 years ago. 60 years ago we were putting way dumber contaminants in our bodies.
XorNot 6y ago
The device you posted this on has a plastic shell, plastic coated silicon chips, a plastic PCB, uses wiring covered in plastic. The paint on your walls is plastic, as are your sewer pipes, probably water pipes, the insulation in your walls, the glue such makes up structural members of your house...

umvi 6y ago

Yeah and 60 years ago we didn't have the robust food supply chain we have now. Plastic is a cheap way to package, transport, and store foods. Without it your options are... glass, metal, wood, ceramic, etc. So "get rid of all plastic" means "jack up the price of all food". This would put us in another situation where the cure is worse than the ill. X people die every year due to microplastics, but abolishing all plastic will probably push hundreds of millions into poverty.

titzer 6y ago
But mah dollarzes! > but abolishing all plastic will probably push hundreds of millions into poverty. Citation needed. The very poorest people on Earth living subsistence farming and getting all their food from local sources. Plastic packaging is a way of extending the life of food so that supply chains can be lengthened and food can be sourced farther away: read: nice tomatoes in winter. Long supply chains increase industrialization of farming, push the quality of food down, and profits up. Plastic packaging is a western luxury that allows us to live in a smorgasborg of food oversupply uninterrupted by season. While western societies' main health problems stem from obesity, you argue about food packaging, ignoring the fact that the vast majority of plastic waste in the ocean is from one-time use plastics for goodies like Coke bottles, chip bags, candy bar wrappers, straws, etc.

st1x7 6y ago

Even this oversimplification is wrong. Back then we had a bit over a third of the current world population and a much worse standard of living across the globe. Progress is about making good tradeoffs, not about picking perfect solutions. Otherwise your logic could get rid of any innovation by ignoring its benefits and saying "it has some problems so let's get rid of it altogether, we somehow survived without it in the past".

azornathogron 6y ago

Yes, the human species has survived with far fewer luxuries than we now enjoy. The species also survived before computers and the internet, and before air travel and before automobiles. These things (including plastic) all have widespread costs and widespread benefits. Let's try to find ways to reduce the costs without entirely ignoring and losing the benefits?

Laarlf 6y ago
Why not this: try to find ways to reduce the costs without losing any of the benefits. If a different (better) technology does not provide all the benefits, few people might be interested in using it. Forcing technologies like these by law is not good. I now have a few hundred plastic straws because I don’t like the paper straws and their deterioration while drinking forced by the eu.

itsoktocry 6y ago

>We somehow survived without it 60 years ago. 60 years ago we were putting way dumber contaminants in our bodies.

XorNot 6y ago

The device you posted this on has a plastic shell, plastic coated silicon chips, a plastic PCB, uses wiring covered in plastic. The paint on your walls is plastic, as are your sewer pipes, probably water pipes, the insulation in your walls, the glue such makes up structural members of your house...