Now we're going to end up with plastic butterflies.
Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
91–100 of 329 posts
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
Principles are pointless if there is no price to pay. By your reasoning you can excuse away any behavior. Which of course plenty of scientists and other horrible people tried to do. And then there was the collective amnesia epidemic of 1945.
And by your reasoning, you should get locked away the second your research can get weaponized. Shockingly, it's not a black and white world with many layers of gray in between, which is what I was trying to show. That a lot of research can get twisted for evil. In your earlier post, you claimed there was "no upside". That's patently false, since these started with the ideal of getting rid of pests more efficiently. Y…
> And by your reasoning, you should get locked away the second your research can get weaponized.
No, the second people start weaponizing your research you have the option to stop participating.
> Shockingly, it's not a black and white world with many layers of gray in between, which is what I was trying to show. That a lot of research can get twisted for evil.
Chemical weapons research is pure evil, I don't doubt that at all.
> In your earlier post, you claimed there was "no upside".
Yep.
> That's patently false, since these started with the ideal of getting rid of pests more efficiently. Yes, there's a point where it turns from this generic research to weaponizing, but that might not be immediately obvious at the time, nor what the repercussions might be 50 years later.
It was obvious within the lifetime of the scientists involved because they were the ones to help weaponize it. And for that there are no excuses.
I really don't understand why you're twisting so much to come up with excuses for these people here, their role and position in all this is pretty well documented. If not for the Germans fear that allies would be able to retaliate in kind that stuff would have been used.
This is one of the best documented era in the history of mankind, there are people who deserve the benefit of the doubt but this particular group isn't one of those.
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
I, for one, have never understood the problem with landfills. There's tons of unused space left, and landfills take up a tiny fraction of that. Who cares if we make a trash hill somewhere and styrofoam sits there for a million years?
One of the better solutions, but nobody wants a landfill near them. They're disgusting.
The buffer zone around a landfill doesn't have to be that large. A couple kilometres and you're good to go. less if you put some industrial at the edge of the buffer instead of residential.
In Victoria, BC they've taken that buffer around their landfill and built some pretty great mountain bike trails. Whenever I'm out there I always go for a ride at the dump.
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
I, for one, have never understood the problem with landfills. There's tons of unused space left, and landfills take up a tiny fraction of that. Who cares if we make a trash hill somewhere and styrofoam sits there for a million years?
"I, for one, have never understood the problem with landfills. " Says the person who doesn't have to live near a landfill.
Are advanced cities even allowed to have landfills in a residential area?
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ever killed a fly because it annoyed you? This is not much different. In fact, this was done for science.
Do we really need the /s tag on something so obvious?
Unfortunately, yes. Keep in mind that in text any vocal tone and visual clues are lost, and a lot of sarcasm is signaled those ways, so some additional indication in text is useful.
Also, Poe's law is alive and well here. You assumed it was sarcasm, but I'm not so sure. It's not too far fetched for me to imagine someone thinks mashing up bugs to spread on a plastic bag is horrible. See my first paragraph for the solution to this...
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#96I am skeptical that any sort of bacteria/insect based plastic decomposition project will address the problems with plastic waste. The biggest problem with plastic is not with the products that make it into the landfill, where bacteria could be used. The problem is with what happens when they don't make it into a landfill, and they end up as basically permanent pollutants in the water.
I, for one, have never understood the problem with landfills. There's tons of unused space left, and landfills take up a tiny fraction of that. Who cares if we make a trash hill somewhere and styrofoam sits there for a million years?
Landfills are actually not that bad of an idea. If we someday find a way to recycle that stuff we can just dig it up again and use it. If a caterpillar eats it who knows where it ends up. In the water? In the ground? In our food? In our blood?
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#97File under “Diet of Worms”
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
I, for one, have never understood the problem with landfills. There's tons of unused space left, and landfills take up a tiny fraction of that. Who cares if we make a trash hill somewhere and styrofoam sits there for a million years?
Think of all the carbon that is sequestered because of landfills. Makes you think twice when recycling paper products.
This. Recycling is important, and the net value must be properly calculated (how much you spend producing paper, recycled paper, and which one ends consuming more CO2, for a specific area, since the impact isn't the same everywhere).
But sometimes producing new paper must be beneficial.
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#99One day, landfills are vibrant ecosystems that completely break down whatever is placed inside them. As a compost pile today is to plant waste, a landfill one day could be to plastic, glass, metal, styrofoam, etc. We just need to save the planet long enough that evolution can run its course and some lifeforms start taking advantage of all the energy locked inside our "waste".
Re: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting solution to plastic pollution
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the biggest issue people have with landfills is that it's basically banking on the things being dumped there not having an adverse effect on the environment, ground water, etc over a long period of time. Even if no one really knew/knows/ensures what is entirely safe to dump.
Yeah, I'm not sure why anyone would think burying waste underground is an okay solution. It made sense when most household waste was fabrics, wood, old food etc but nobody stopped quick enough to evaluate the impacts when our waste got more and more toxic and non-biodegradable. I've recently move to the Netherlands from the UK and was amazed to discover they don't recycle household metal items (e.g. soft drinks cans,…
Depending upon the facility. Some places do quite a bit of sorting on trash. Especially things like metals. While they don't have a separate bin. They might still filter or export some components to be recycled?