3 ms·

I think we need to stop seeing this (and many other things) as a personal choice behaviour. Why is this seen as "leave it to informed choice reflected through

I think we need to stop seeing this (and many other things) as a personal choice behaviour. Why is this seen as "leave it to informed choice reflected through the market" and not simply "No, you can't sell that".

sacrosancty 4y ago
Is there any evidence that plastics we use for food containers are harmful? The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small. This study wasn't feeding them food from a plastic container, it was feeding them two of the isolated chemicals in a solution, so it really doesn't show any harm in itself. Even drinking water from lead pipes is safe as long as there aren't failures that cause the lead to get carried away by the water. Same with asbestos building materials, etc. Just touching a toxic substance doesn't necessarily poison you.
- reedjosh 4y ago
  > The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small Life expectancy is a bad measure for two reasons. 1). The major bump in life expectancy of the 20th century is largely due to the number of infants that survive compared to the past. 2). We wouldn't see a decline in life expectancy that's due to exposure in womb until said children were of an age that mattered. Not to mention pure quality of life issues.
- rajup 4y ago
  Harm does not necessarily mean only life threatening issues IMO. There have been a bunch of studies recently indicating dropping male fertility with strong links to plastic consumption.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  > The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small. This is terrible logic. If something causes deafness, blindness, or missing toes it will not affect life expectancy. Additionally, suppose in same year a drug against cancer i.proves life expectancy by 5 years and plastic pollution causes it to go down by 5 years - so you will never find out.
  - sacrosancty 4y ago
    That's what I mean by very small harm - hard to isolate from other factors, so no really relevant to individuals' lives. Disabilities can obviously be treated the same way - we don't have an epidemic of blindness. Maybe it's coming when all those plastic-bottle-using-mothers'-babies reach 80 years old, but the chance of anything dramatic happening is shrinking as time goes by.
- pengaru 4y ago
  > Is there any evidence that plastics we use for food containers are harmful? Would you consider underdeveloped male fetuses a harmful consequence? Because we have some pretty strong evidence that Bisphenols are causing exactly that.
  - sacrosancty 4y ago
    Bisphenols aren't food from plastic containers. I'm sure if you set fire to your water bottle and inhale the fumes, some thing worse could happen than if you just drink the water.
- loa_in_ 4y ago
  The effects are probably counteracted by increase of charity funded additional health care disabled people get thanks to network effects
jjoonathan 4y ago
Let's get the FDA a bigger lab budget and some sharper teeth -- but at the same time, we should not legislate based on hunches. If we do that, it will quickly devolve into every year we get a new brand of government-mandated Asbestos Free Cereal. No thanks.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
I hear ya. But in no time, using any rational analysis, we'd be banning burgers and smartphones. One mans meat, another mans poison etc. Change has to come first as an informed choice. Once a critical, educated mass rejects a harmful product, a consensus to say "you can't sell that" can be sought. Problem is, as we've seen with oil, unhealthy foods, and now digital technologies, big, rich and influential companies will throw whatever money it takes to undermine research and messaging to disrupt rational choice from taking place. That's very frustrating.
- lifeisstillgood 4y ago
  There are always smart regulations between "banning" and "yeah that kills babies but laissez faire". I mean the harmful effects of smartphones are what radiation that we can find no effects in rats ? Or is it social media ? I am more dubious as to that being social media fault (as opposed to "hey we have taken every pub conversation on the planet and made it available to anyone on the planet. Imagine listening to Einstein and Dirac as they walk home from Princeton each day. Oh wait there are a lot more drunk aholes screaming about immigration than Einsteins in the world - who knew" Smart regulation there simply says "you are not a common carrier, but if you make a choice to show one post to a user and not show another post then ... that makes you a publisher" Will it destroy business models - yes. But that's not the same as destroying the social value of recording every human to every human
bergenty 4y ago
Because there isn’t really a good way to package liquids besides plastic. Glass would work but it’s bulky and brittle. Paper and aluminum work but they cost the inside with plastic anyways. This might be the extremely rare thing where it makes sense for consumers to do at our level.
- loa_in_ 4y ago
  Going with this line of thought, who should eat plastic anyway? Nobody. So how does it make any sense to ever use plastic? I don't understand.
- geden 4y ago
  Glass is completely fine for liquids. It's only relatively recently that plastic became ubiquitous. In my UK childhood (70s/80s) most drinks, milk etc were in glass bottles that were re-used and/or recycled. It's mostly the desire to save a few pennies per product that drove plastic. There are several brands in Europe now that sell water in aluminum cans rather than plastic bottles.

sacrosancty 4y ago

Is there any evidence that plastics we use for food containers are harmful? The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small. This study wasn't feeding them food from a plastic container, it was feeding them two of the isolated chemicals in a solution, so it really doesn't show any harm in itself. Even drinking water from lead pipes is safe as long as there aren't failures that cause the lead to get carried away by the water. Same with asbestos building materials, etc. Just touching a toxic substance doesn't necessarily poison you.

reedjosh 4y ago
> The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small Life expectancy is a bad measure for two reasons. 1). The major bump in life expectancy of the 20th century is largely due to the number of infants that survive compared to the past. 2). We wouldn't see a decline in life expectancy that's due to exposure in womb until said children were of an age that mattered. Not to mention pure quality of life issues.
rajup 4y ago
Harm does not necessarily mean only life threatening issues IMO. There have been a bunch of studies recently indicating dropping male fertility with strong links to plastic consumption.
ClumsyPilot 4y ago
> The continued life expectancy of humans seems to show that any harm is very small. This is terrible logic. If something causes deafness, blindness, or missing toes it will not affect life expectancy. Additionally, suppose in same year a drug against cancer i.proves life expectancy by 5 years and plastic pollution causes it to go down by 5 years - so you will never find out.
- sacrosancty 4y ago
  That's what I mean by very small harm - hard to isolate from other factors, so no really relevant to individuals' lives. Disabilities can obviously be treated the same way - we don't have an epidemic of blindness. Maybe it's coming when all those plastic-bottle-using-mothers'-babies reach 80 years old, but the chance of anything dramatic happening is shrinking as time goes by.
pengaru 4y ago
> Is there any evidence that plastics we use for food containers are harmful? Would you consider underdeveloped male fetuses a harmful consequence? Because we have some pretty strong evidence that Bisphenols are causing exactly that.
- sacrosancty 4y ago
  Bisphenols aren't food from plastic containers. I'm sure if you set fire to your water bottle and inhale the fumes, some thing worse could happen than if you just drink the water.
loa_in_ 4y ago
The effects are probably counteracted by increase of charity funded additional health care disabled people get thanks to network effects

jjoonathan 4y ago

Let's get the FDA a bigger lab budget and some sharper teeth -- but at the same time, we should not legislate based on hunches. If we do that, it will quickly devolve into every year we get a new brand of government-mandated Asbestos Free Cereal. No thanks.

nonrandomstring 4y ago

I hear ya. But in no time, using any rational analysis, we'd be banning burgers and smartphones. One mans meat, another mans poison etc. Change has to come first as an informed choice. Once a critical, educated mass rejects a harmful product, a consensus to say "you can't sell that" can be sought. Problem is, as we've seen with oil, unhealthy foods, and now digital technologies, big, rich and influential companies will throw whatever money it takes to undermine research and messaging to disrupt rational choice from taking place. That's very frustrating.

lifeisstillgood 4y ago
There are always smart regulations between "banning" and "yeah that kills babies but laissez faire". I mean the harmful effects of smartphones are what radiation that we can find no effects in rats ? Or is it social media ? I am more dubious as to that being social media fault (as opposed to "hey we have taken every pub conversation on the planet and made it available to anyone on the planet. Imagine listening to Einstein and Dirac as they walk home from Princeton each day. Oh wait there are a lot more drunk aholes screaming about immigration than Einsteins in the world - who knew" Smart regulation there simply says "you are not a common carrier, but if you make a choice to show one post to a user and not show another post then ... that makes you a publisher" Will it destroy business models - yes. But that's not the same as destroying the social value of recording every human to every human

bergenty 4y ago

Because there isn’t really a good way to package liquids besides plastic. Glass would work but it’s bulky and brittle. Paper and aluminum work but they cost the inside with plastic anyways. This might be the extremely rare thing where it makes sense for consumers to do at our level.

loa_in_ 4y ago
Going with this line of thought, who should eat plastic anyway? Nobody. So how does it make any sense to ever use plastic? I don't understand.
geden 4y ago
Glass is completely fine for liquids. It's only relatively recently that plastic became ubiquitous. In my UK childhood (70s/80s) most drinks, milk etc were in glass bottles that were re-used and/or recycled. It's mostly the desire to save a few pennies per product that drove plastic. There are several brands in Europe now that sell water in aluminum cans rather than plastic bottles.