My point was that the left wingers in question do not actually "accept" the science; they just happen to have religious beliefs that match the science on a few points. It is not a stretch to imagine that when the promulgated solution to every problem is "fewer people with less industry", regardless of what that problem might actually be, that people who disagree with you will recognize that those beliefs are religious or political rather than scientific. At the point at which science is reduced to a tool of politics, it loses credibility.
Um, OK. Would you care to share any evidence on that? I don't think we're actually vaporizing styrene when pouring hot liquids into it, but I'm willing to be proven wrong.
Well, way to prove my point about it being a religion. You are either ignorant of the content of the reports you linked, or you are deliberately lying.
The EPA report linked by "nasty chemicals" doesn't actually talk about anything involved in the manufacture of styrene, just the end products made from it (e.g., ABS, Styrofoam), and some of its uses, such as "an FDA-approved synthetic flavoring agent and adjuvant for ice cream and candy" (better watch out for those FDA-approved ingredients!). The same source informs us that
Smog chamber experiments with simulated sunlight and auto exhaust as a source of styrene, showed a 55% disappearance of styrene in 2 hours (U.S. EPA 1984).
In water,
Styrene rapidly volatilizes from surface water with estimated half-lives from a river or pond of 0.6 days and 13 days, respectively (U.S. EPA 1984). Microbes isolated from unadapted sewage sludge degraded 42% of the styrene present in 5 days while the microbial degradation with adapted sewage sludge was 80% in 5 days (U.S. EPA 1984).
In soil,
Biodegradation is the major route of removal of styrene from soils. Microbes isolated from landfill soil degraded 95% of the styrene present in 16 weeks (Howard 1989, U.S. EPA 1984).
And in living organisms,
Based on the fish bioconcentration factor of 13.5 (goldfish) and the water solubility of styrene, the chemical is not likely to accumulate in biological organisms (Howard 1989).
Which is to say that the half-life of the styrene monomer, should any dissociate from the polymer, is on the order of a few weeks at most, and that's when it's buried. Unless it's horribly toxic, it's really not anything to worry about.
As for cancer, the EPA classifies it as a possible carcinogen, not a probable or even likely one, as does the IARC - as it says in your link to highcountryconservation.org. From the same EPA report you mentioned
IARC has classified styrene as Group 2B, possible human carcinogen, based on inadequate evidence in humans and on limited evidence in animals.
If that's the level of evidence that we've got - contradictory stories in animal models and nothing at all in humans - for the monomer, it's going to be hard for me to get too worked up about the even more inert polymer.
I want a nice clean environment, but I've seen what paper plants put out, and frankly dioxins are a bigger problem in my book than styrene.
Things that don't break down aren't really a problem unless they are per se toxic - so long as they end up in landfills. (Yes, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a problem.) And those things that should break down often don't - during garbage excavation projects they've come across fifty-year-old newspapers that were as clear as the day they were printed.
And those chemically unchanged bits can be biologically concentrated in ways that can cause serious problems.
Unless by "biologically concentrated" you mean "accumulate in blobs in stomachs", you're wrong. Perhaps you're thinking of heavy metals accumulating up the food chain, but those aren't inert (like plastics generally are).
Have you ever tried to have a conversation about environmental topics with a non-scientifically-literate Green? It's a religion for a lot of them. Sure, they'll say they just believe the science, but they don't even know what it says, and they mostly get a pass because they agree with the basic thrust of the scientific consensus. The problem is that those are the people who actually go out and make people not believe in global warming - because they're fanatics who go into a shrieking rage when anyone disagrees with them or even questions them on minor points, which rather makes the whole thing sound like poorly-defended bullshit regardless of how good the actual scientific evidence is.
A simple example, though on a slightly different topic. Go ask the average "environmentally conscious" person why Styrofoam is supposed to be a bad thing. They'll probably tell you that it takes up too much space in landfills. The US has plenty of landfill space, and Styrofoam is as close to inert as we can come up with. I'd happily live on top of a former Styrofoam dump. No, the reason that Styrofoam was originally considered bad - the reason we were supposed to stop using it - was that it was blown into foam with CFC's. That hasn't been the case for ages, but you still see places that think it's green to use paper instead of Styrofoam cups, even though Styrofoam is a better insulator and requires much less energy to make and transport.
Civil rights worked nonviolently because that was the only way to get the rest of the country to turn against the prevailing opinions in the South. If the KKK had been right - if there really were trigger-happy negroes who were fighting the white race with weapons - well, the chances of the civil rights movement working would have been basically zero.
So, in the midst of a series of amendments that guarantee individual rights, they just happened to write an amendment that actually guarantees no individual rights at all? Why did they need an amendment to allow states to have organized fighting forces?
It's not that you don't have a point - we would be better off if they had just left those words out. But unless you are actually a Supreme Court Justice in disguise, what the words tell "you" is irrelevant and probably incorrect as a matter of law. Of course the 2A doesn't apply to everyone: felons and the mentally ill, for example, cannot possess firearms legally. But there is a presumption that everyone else should be able to.
I'm not an ocular neuroscientist, but I'm not exactly a stranger to eye motion or being drunk. Just because there is a detectable effect does not mean that that effect justifies criminal sanction.
The difference is that a cop can pull you over and say "you were weaving, here's a ticket for reckless driving, and BTW I'm taking you to the station house where you will get some sleep before you get back behind the wheel". I don't have them a problem with doing the same for DUI. But setting up checkpoints where there is a presumption of guilt based not on behavior but on chemistry? We've let the War on Drugs and MADD obliterate the Fourth Amendment. That's not a worthwhile trade. I'd suggest that the most important difference has been that it's no longer socially acceptable to drive when drunk, in a way that was considered OK as late as the 70s. (Watch Saturday Night Fever if you don't believe me.)
Actually, 0.15-0.16 is the inflection point on the curve. 0.08 is a lot when you're 15 and have never touched alcohol in your life, but not for an adult who consumes alcohol regularly.
Are you absolutely sure about that? I know that states have license suspension laws for refusing to blow (which is, in itself, bullshit), but what you just described sounds like an out-and-out violation of the 5A.
By the same logic, we should ban sound systems in cars and require all cellular phones to be placed in a Faraday cage. Children of all ages should likewise be in a soundproof compartment separated from the driver. Well, actually, that last one would probably be pretty popular.
Unusual results, to say the least. Not impossible, of course; he's living proof. Complication: calorie-restriction diets in almost all cases do not work long-term. My penultimate diet was a calorie-restricted one in which I consumed 800-1200 calories a day (as a muscular 6' tall man who is told that I appear ill if I weigh under about 190 lbs). I can wear the same clothes I wore then now, but I eat ad libitum from carbohydrate-free sources, and I've maintained that weight for over a year without further effort. Works for me. You? Don't know. I do encourage people who want to lose weight to give low-carb a month's try if they never have. The first two weeks, most people are breaking a heavy sugar addiction, so they feel like crap. Once that's gone, it's a different ball game - I have far more energy off carbs than I had with them, though I'm also not trying to be an Olympic sprinter. If, after three or four weeks of really strict adherence, you haven't gotten anywhere, then your metabolic defect (the one that's making you fat) is probably not carbohydrate related.
The vast majority of diseases have nothing (directly) to do with pathogens. Your mental model of what a "disease" is is wrong.
Schizophrenia exists, whether you call it schizophrenia or psychosis or dissociation from reality; the underlying reality is always the important thing, not the word to describe it. The purpose of the DSM is not to be a perfect book of diagnosis; it is to create a technical language for describing various malfunctioning states of the brain. As such, there will always be ambiguous cases, but the problems are quite real.
My point is: are you healthier weighing less, with better health markers all around, but eating the "wrong" foods, than eating the "right" foods, but having horrible health markers?
I don't eat well treated food animals (free range, wild hunted, etc) because I find it simpler to draw the line at "I don't eat meat".
It's your choice, of course, and I totally understand why you would say that while in public (it does simplify the explanation), but there's no reason to deny yourself those things at home. I have a local source for pastured chickens. They're delicious.
Slashdot Mirror
My point was that the left wingers in question do not actually "accept" the science; they just happen to have religious beliefs that match the science on a few points. It is not a stretch to imagine that when the promulgated solution to every problem is "fewer people with less industry", regardless of what that problem might actually be, that people who disagree with you will recognize that those beliefs are religious or political rather than scientific. At the point at which science is reduced to a tool of politics, it loses credibility.
Um, OK. Would you care to share any evidence on that? I don't think we're actually vaporizing styrene when pouring hot liquids into it, but I'm willing to be proven wrong.
The EPA report linked by "nasty chemicals" doesn't actually talk about anything involved in the manufacture of styrene, just the end products made from it (e.g., ABS, Styrofoam), and some of its uses, such as "an FDA-approved synthetic flavoring agent and adjuvant for ice cream and candy" (better watch out for those FDA-approved ingredients!). The same source informs us that
Smog chamber experiments with simulated sunlight and auto exhaust as a source of styrene, showed a 55% disappearance of styrene in 2 hours (U.S. EPA 1984).
In water,
Styrene rapidly volatilizes from surface water with estimated half-lives from a river or pond of 0.6 days and 13 days, respectively (U.S. EPA 1984). Microbes isolated from unadapted sewage sludge degraded 42% of the styrene present in 5 days while the microbial degradation with adapted sewage sludge was 80% in 5 days (U.S. EPA 1984).
In soil,
Biodegradation is the major route of removal of styrene from soils. Microbes isolated from landfill soil degraded 95% of the styrene present in 16 weeks (Howard 1989, U.S. EPA 1984).
And in living organisms,
Based on the fish bioconcentration factor of 13.5 (goldfish) and the water solubility of styrene, the chemical is not likely to accumulate in biological organisms (Howard 1989).
Which is to say that the half-life of the styrene monomer, should any dissociate from the polymer, is on the order of a few weeks at most, and that's when it's buried. Unless it's horribly toxic, it's really not anything to worry about.
As for cancer, the EPA classifies it as a possible carcinogen, not a probable or even likely one, as does the IARC - as it says in your link to highcountryconservation.org. From the same EPA report you mentioned
IARC has classified styrene as Group 2B, possible human carcinogen, based on inadequate evidence in humans and on limited evidence in animals.
If that's the level of evidence that we've got - contradictory stories in animal models and nothing at all in humans - for the monomer, it's going to be hard for me to get too worked up about the even more inert polymer.
I want a nice clean environment, but I've seen what paper plants put out, and frankly dioxins are a bigger problem in my book than styrene.
Air is actually a better insulator
What do you think is trapped in polystyrene foam?
It's also butt ugly
Well, now that we're talking aesthetics rather than science...
an asshole
If this is how you talk to people who agree with you, I think I can see the problem you have with convincing those who don't.
And those chemically unchanged bits can be biologically concentrated in ways that can cause serious problems.
Unless by "biologically concentrated" you mean "accumulate in blobs in stomachs", you're wrong. Perhaps you're thinking of heavy metals accumulating up the food chain, but those aren't inert (like plastics generally are).
I'm 38. The original reason not to use Styrofoam (yes, that's polystyrene foam, a brand name, but it's shorter) was that it was blown with CFC's.
It's caricature, not satire.
Have you ever tried to have a conversation about environmental topics with a non-scientifically-literate Green? It's a religion for a lot of them. Sure, they'll say they just believe the science, but they don't even know what it says, and they mostly get a pass because they agree with the basic thrust of the scientific consensus. The problem is that those are the people who actually go out and make people not believe in global warming - because they're fanatics who go into a shrieking rage when anyone disagrees with them or even questions them on minor points, which rather makes the whole thing sound like poorly-defended bullshit regardless of how good the actual scientific evidence is.
A simple example, though on a slightly different topic. Go ask the average "environmentally conscious" person why Styrofoam is supposed to be a bad thing. They'll probably tell you that it takes up too much space in landfills. The US has plenty of landfill space, and Styrofoam is as close to inert as we can come up with. I'd happily live on top of a former Styrofoam dump. No, the reason that Styrofoam was originally considered bad - the reason we were supposed to stop using it - was that it was blown into foam with CFC's. That hasn't been the case for ages, but you still see places that think it's green to use paper instead of Styrofoam cups, even though Styrofoam is a better insulator and requires much less energy to make and transport.
Civil rights worked nonviolently because that was the only way to get the rest of the country to turn against the prevailing opinions in the South. If the KKK had been right - if there really were trigger-happy negroes who were fighting the white race with weapons - well, the chances of the civil rights movement working would have been basically zero.
So, in the midst of a series of amendments that guarantee individual rights, they just happened to write an amendment that actually guarantees no individual rights at all? Why did they need an amendment to allow states to have organized fighting forces?
It's not that you don't have a point - we would be better off if they had just left those words out. But unless you are actually a Supreme Court Justice in disguise, what the words tell "you" is irrelevant and probably incorrect as a matter of law. Of course the 2A doesn't apply to everyone: felons and the mentally ill, for example, cannot possess firearms legally. But there is a presumption that everyone else should be able to.
Most healthy people don't have metabolic defects.
Er, yeah.
With fins!
I'm not an ocular neuroscientist, but I'm not exactly a stranger to eye motion or being drunk. Just because there is a detectable effect does not mean that that effect justifies criminal sanction.
Totally OT, but they're changing the architecture? Man, that was always the best part about the DC Metro. Totally Bladerunner.
Just be careful not to have a horse-drawn carriage. That is considered driving drunk.
The difference is that a cop can pull you over and say "you were weaving, here's a ticket for reckless driving, and BTW I'm taking you to the station house where you will get some sleep before you get back behind the wheel". I don't have them a problem with doing the same for DUI. But setting up checkpoints where there is a presumption of guilt based not on behavior but on chemistry? We've let the War on Drugs and MADD obliterate the Fourth Amendment. That's not a worthwhile trade. I'd suggest that the most important difference has been that it's no longer socially acceptable to drive when drunk, in a way that was considered OK as late as the 70s. (Watch Saturday Night Fever if you don't believe me.)
Just shut up with your reasoned, logical statements. I bet you want to get drunk and mow down pedestrian nuns, you sicko.
They're not isopropyl based; those puppies use ethanol. Read the label.
Actually, 0.15-0.16 is the inflection point on the curve. 0.08 is a lot when you're 15 and have never touched alcohol in your life, but not for an adult who consumes alcohol regularly.
Are you absolutely sure about that? I know that states have license suspension laws for refusing to blow (which is, in itself, bullshit), but what you just described sounds like an out-and-out violation of the 5A.
By the same logic, we should ban sound systems in cars and require all cellular phones to be placed in a Faraday cage. Children of all ages should likewise be in a soundproof compartment separated from the driver. Well, actually, that last one would probably be pretty popular.
Unusual results, to say the least. Not impossible, of course; he's living proof. Complication: calorie-restriction diets in almost all cases do not work long-term. My penultimate diet was a calorie-restricted one in which I consumed 800-1200 calories a day (as a muscular 6' tall man who is told that I appear ill if I weigh under about 190 lbs). I can wear the same clothes I wore then now, but I eat ad libitum from carbohydrate-free sources, and I've maintained that weight for over a year without further effort. Works for me. You? Don't know. I do encourage people who want to lose weight to give low-carb a month's try if they never have. The first two weeks, most people are breaking a heavy sugar addiction, so they feel like crap. Once that's gone, it's a different ball game - I have far more energy off carbs than I had with them, though I'm also not trying to be an Olympic sprinter. If, after three or four weeks of really strict adherence, you haven't gotten anywhere, then your metabolic defect (the one that's making you fat) is probably not carbohydrate related.
The vast majority of diseases have nothing (directly) to do with pathogens. Your mental model of what a "disease" is is wrong.
Schizophrenia exists, whether you call it schizophrenia or psychosis or dissociation from reality; the underlying reality is always the important thing, not the word to describe it. The purpose of the DSM is not to be a perfect book of diagnosis; it is to create a technical language for describing various malfunctioning states of the brain. As such, there will always be ambiguous cases, but the problems are quite real.
My point is: are you healthier weighing less, with better health markers all around, but eating the "wrong" foods, than eating the "right" foods, but having horrible health markers?
I don't eat well treated food animals (free range, wild hunted, etc) because I find it simpler to draw the line at "I don't eat meat".
It's your choice, of course, and I totally understand why you would say that while in public (it does simplify the explanation), but there's no reason to deny yourself those things at home. I have a local source for pastured chickens. They're delicious.
Eat better bacon.