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There are many forms of plastic made from many different chemicals. Fortunately some of the most common ones like polyethylene are chemically harmless to life.
by morpheos137 5y ago
There are many forms of plastic made from many different chemicals. Fortunately some of the most common ones like polyethylene are chemically harmless to life. Some plastics like PVC and some synthetic rubbers may contain hazardous additives but most plastics are quite harmless.
- danwills 5y agoIt seems to me that with humans making so much of these 'harmless' (or at least relatively-low-toxicity) plastics, we have essentially created a giant niche waiting there for the first micro (or even perhaps macro) organism(s) that can live off this stuff, they are srsly going to have a massive field day once their day roles around! It could of course be fairly troubling when pieces of our various machines/buildings/etc start to decompose earlier than expected! This assumes quite some luck in terms of mutation to be fair, and maybe humans might also help with speeding that up too? could be good!?
- morpheos137 5y agoWhy don't people worry about sand? Nothing eats it. It can mechanically irritate animals (see pearls). How is polyethylene different? The reddit driven hysteria about plastics in general is vastly out of purportion to the actual harm done by plastics.