The Teflon Toxin • Hacker News Board

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#181

Post by mikeash » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 6:52 PM UTC

nickles wrote: post #178

mikeash wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sparking train analogy fails because it supposes a single obvious entity causing a large amount of damage to a single person. To modify the analogy to fit the real-world situation, it would be more like if there were a million train tracks going all over the place, and the sparks from each train falls on millions of wheat fields, such that everyone lives in a diffuse cloud of sparks, and no single fire can be bla…

Just wanted to point out that you restated what was said in the parent. >In practice, there may be costs associated with negotiations (e.g. lawyers), it may be infeasible to negotiate between all parties (e.g. if there are many farmers affected), or property rights are not sufficiently strong for one party to bar another from producing negative externalities, all of which can lead to failures of the theorem.

Yes, I was just trying to reinforce and generalize that, not try to argue anything.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#182

Post by Zigurd » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 6:54 PM UTC

lumberjack wrote: post #36

And the settlement reached was around 0.0086 DuPont's yearly revenue to be provided for education, water treatment facilities and medical expenses of the class action members. Is that really going to deter them from doing it again? Where is the real penalty? http://www.hpcbd.com/Personal-Injury/DuPont-C8/C8-Class-Acti...

It surprises me that there are not more cases where the productive assets of a business are turned over to plaintiffs to generate multi-year revenue for mitigation of effects and compensation for victims, especially in cases of serious long-term environmental contamination.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#183

Post by azinman2 » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 6:58 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #166

azinman2 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heat your Teflon pans with nothing in it and it'll kill a canary. Hardly inert.

Heat it with oil and it will kill the canary at a lower temperature than teflon. Ergo oil is toxic. You are using bad logic and bad science.

Where are you getting that info?

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#184

Post by nickles » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:00 PM UTC

jschwartzi wrote: post #130

nickles wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Economics, the Coase Theorem[1] predicts close to this outcome, although it speaks to efficient outcomes and not necessarily harm reducing outcomes. When strong property rights exist (and it is feasible for all parties to negotiate), then parties may reach an efficient allocation of resources regardless of how the resources were initially allocated. To use a typical example, imagine a train track runs through a fa…

So is your example meant to illustrate the need for us to filter our drinking water and air if we live on the same planet as a DuPont plant?

>>Free markets when supported by strong property rights can have strong protections to prevent harm or pollution.

>Can someone explain how this is supposed to work? I don't mean to sound rude/biased but this sounds like one of those cases where the theory is sound but when it meets with reality we get unpredictable(and sometimes disastrous) results.

The example is meant to illustrate the mechanism being asked about by the parent (quoted). Nothing was said about filtering air and water in the example.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#185

Post by nickles » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:01 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #181

nickles wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just wanted to point out that you restated what was said in the parent. >In practice, there may be costs associated with negotiations (e.g. lawyers), it may be infeasible to negotiate between all parties (e.g. if there are many farmers affected), or property rights are not sufficiently strong for one party to bar another from producing negative externalities, all of which can lead to failures of the theorem.

Yes, I was just trying to reinforce and generalize that, not try to argue anything.

Gotcha

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#186

Post by toufka » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:09 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #159

eevilspock wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great. More synthetic and toxic crap in our landfills. All for our myopic convenience. Dupont and 3M love you.

Teflon is not toxic. Some precursors are but once made it's completely inert. And a frying pan is mostly metal, it'll get recycled at some point and the teflon burned away anyway.

'not toxic' - until you heat it above its suggested operating temperature - which as I recall is about the temp of a 'high' setting on a stove.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#187

Post by metasean » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:12 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #153

gambiting wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can buy an original Tefal pan for like $15-20, if it lasts a year that's ok with me. I wouldn't trust the no-brand $5 stuff either, but I would think that Tefal pans should be ok?

That stuff is just more toxicity. The non stick vaporizes at high temperatures (the Teflon website will warn against small birds in the kitchen... And that's the Teflon website!!!), and all those knicks and scratched are material coming off and into your food. There's no need for toxic cookware. Get high quality cast iron and you can give it to your future generations like my grandmother did for me. And if that flake…

"the Teflon website will warn against small birds in the kitchen..."

But Big Bird is okay in the kitchen? ;-)

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#188

Post by codexjourneys » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:21 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #177

codexjourneys wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, precursors are toxic. But it's also easy to overheat a Teflon pan when preparing to fry something up, and it's not healthy: "Use low or medium heat with Teflon skillets and pans. When Teflon-coated cookware is overheated, the cookware releases fumes that may cause flu-like symptoms in humans." http://homeguides.sfgate.com/dangers-scratched-teflon-cookwa... I prefer other types of cookware, for myself.

The problem with that advise is that oil releases MORE toxic fumes at a lower temperature than teflon. Teflon is safer than the oil you are cooking with. If you heated it hot enough to make fumes from the teflon you would have a cloud of smoke from the oil. They know this because did a test and found that oil is more toxic to birds than teflon. So go ahead and cook with teflon on high, it's safer than using a lot of…

Feel free to use Teflon if you like it. I don't like it and don't trust DuPont in general. I'll cook with high-smoke-point oils using cookware I prefer, and take my chances.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#189

Post by nickles » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:24 PM UTC

anentropic wrote: post #116

nickles wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Economics, the Coase Theorem[1] predicts close to this outcome, although it speaks to efficient outcomes and not necessarily harm reducing outcomes. When strong property rights exist (and it is feasible for all parties to negotiate), then parties may reach an efficient allocation of resources regardless of how the resources were initially allocated. To use a typical example, imagine a train track runs through a fa…

so... the farmer gets screwed?

The farmer may achieve a more favorable outcome if assigned the property rights, but the Coase Theorem aims to address the notion of efficiency. In an efficient market, no party can be made better off without another being made worse off.

Re: The Teflon Toxin

#190

Post by criddell » Wed, Aug 12, 2015, 7:36 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #153

gambiting wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can buy an original Tefal pan for like $15-20, if it lasts a year that's ok with me. I wouldn't trust the no-brand $5 stuff either, but I would think that Tefal pans should be ok?

That stuff is just more toxicity. The non stick vaporizes at high temperatures (the Teflon website will warn against small birds in the kitchen... And that's the Teflon website!!!), and all those knicks and scratched are material coming off and into your food. There's no need for toxic cookware. Get high quality cast iron and you can give it to your future generations like my grandmother did for me. And if that flake…

Having a bird in the kitchen is just a bad idea (unless you are going to eat it). If you overheat oil, that becomes toxic as well and will kill a small bird the same as overheating teflon.