5 ms·

Climate and plastic pollution are the problems of our time. I see progress made towards number 1, no progress towards number 2.

hahaitsfunny 4y ago
knodi123 4y ago
I see 1 as an existential threat that can crumble nations, wipe out ecosystems, and kill billions of humans. I see 2 as something troubling that may have small negative effects on humans, and may have bad-but-not-catastrophic effects on certain species of fish. So by all means, let's keep working on 2, in our free time, while we focus on 1. (metaphorically - I understand lots of people can work on lots of different things)
- czam 4y ago
  I recently learned that open burning of plastic waste produces lots of soot that might have a non-negligible effect on capturing heat from sunlight. So there's some causality between plastic waste and global warming.
  - hahaitsfunny 4y ago
- marliechiller 4y ago
  Beyond environmental damage, plastic is hypothesized to be one of the main drivers behind the drastically decreasing sperm counts in human males. I think we are only just uncovering the tip of the iceberg for the damage that plastic can do with respect to hormone disruption in the human body https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7967748/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7967748/
  - knodi123 4y ago
    yeah, okay, that's a fine example - so, plastic pollution is bad, because sperm counts. But... at the moment, fertility rates due to sperm count pose absolutely no threat to our species, nor do we foresee that changing. We should absolutely address this! But we don't need to "uncover" or "explore the tip of the iceberg" when it comes to the impacts of climate change - they're big and catastrophic. That's the difference between the two crises.
- avmich 4y ago
  > I see 1 as an existential threat that can crumble nations Agree, yet consider this. During early COVID-19 crisis Earth civilization spent some many billions - I think above some trillions actually - USD equivalent fighting this rather little-known problem. Spending this kind of money on climate crisis can substantially improve things. > I see 2 as something troubling Plastic pollution is somewhat similar to early COVID-19 - we don't know long-term effects from this type of poisoning of our environment, so I'd err on the side of caution. It's not a good idea to keep microplastics in human organs - we just don't know how it could turn out to be, and we have reasons to suspect that our bodies, not evolved alongside the plastics, don't appreciate that.

hahaitsfunny 4y ago

knodi123 4y ago

I see 1 as an existential threat that can crumble nations, wipe out ecosystems, and kill billions of humans. I see 2 as something troubling that may have small negative effects on humans, and may have bad-but-not-catastrophic effects on certain species of fish. So by all means, let's keep working on 2, in our free time, while we focus on 1. (metaphorically - I understand lots of people can work on lots of different things)

czam 4y ago
I recently learned that open burning of plastic waste produces lots of soot that might have a non-negligible effect on capturing heat from sunlight. So there's some causality between plastic waste and global warming.
- hahaitsfunny 4y ago
marliechiller 4y ago
Beyond environmental damage, plastic is hypothesized to be one of the main drivers behind the drastically decreasing sperm counts in human males. I think we are only just uncovering the tip of the iceberg for the damage that plastic can do with respect to hormone disruption in the human body https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7967748/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7967748/
- knodi123 4y ago
  yeah, okay, that's a fine example - so, plastic pollution is bad, because sperm counts. But... at the moment, fertility rates due to sperm count pose absolutely no threat to our species, nor do we foresee that changing. We should absolutely address this! But we don't need to "uncover" or "explore the tip of the iceberg" when it comes to the impacts of climate change - they're big and catastrophic. That's the difference between the two crises.
avmich 4y ago
> I see 1 as an existential threat that can crumble nations Agree, yet consider this. During early COVID-19 crisis Earth civilization spent some many billions - I think above some trillions actually - USD equivalent fighting this rather little-known problem. Spending this kind of money on climate crisis can substantially improve things. > I see 2 as something troubling Plastic pollution is somewhat similar to early COVID-19 - we don't know long-term effects from this type of poisoning of our environment, so I'd err on the side of caution. It's not a good idea to keep microplastics in human organs - we just don't know how it could turn out to be, and we have reasons to suspect that our bodies, not evolved alongside the plastics, don't appreciate that.