California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing • Hacker News Board

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#91

Post by HillaryBriss » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 3:58 PM UTC

JauntTrooper wrote: post #35

I really hate Prop 65. Those warnings appear everywhere without a strong scientific basis backing their claims, so not only does everyone ignore the warnings, it drowns out the real important ones. Those cavalier exaggerations erode public trust.

yes. it's the boy who cried wolf.

one building may have some asbestos fibers in the interior of its walls, used as, say pipe insulation many decades ago. the asbestos is contained and does not enter the air.

another building, say, an auto body repair shop, may have organic solvent vapors floating around at a relatively high concentration on a daily basis.

both have the prop 65 warning. which one should i prefer to work in?

(the real answer is i don't know and i don't care because, like most Californians, i don't pay any attention to those signs. i don't even know what they mean. it's all noise to me. i think i'll have two bags of potato chips on my lunch break today.)

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#92

Post by grenoire » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 3:58 PM UTC

rarrrrrr wrote: post #53

tptacek wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Importantly: you are unlikely to avoid significant acrylamide production in home cooking. It's the potatoes that need the warning, not the chips.

My CIA cookbook begins potato recipes with first blanching them in water prior to roasting, sauté, etc, which is apparently an effective mitigation.

I was not aware of the existence of a Culinary Institute of America, and assumed it was the Central Intelligence Agency.

"Why would the CIA have a cookbook..?"

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#93

Post by notadoc » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:00 PM UTC

Avoiding the various herbicides and pesticides is the reason everyone I know who eats organic and non-GMO food does so.

As always you should do your own research, draw your own conclusions. Be aware there is a shocking amount of astroturfing on this topic.

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#94

Post by yegle » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:00 PM UTC

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #78

cjensen wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Just a clarification: supermarkets, restaurants, bars, and coffee houses already have a single sign warning about cancer-causing agents per Prop 65. The "bag of potatoes" in your example would not have to be individually labeled. The Prop 65 warnings are basically invisible to Californians because they are literally posted everywhere food is sold.

I really want a t-shirt saying in bold letters "This person contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer."

Quick Google search: https://www.zazzle.com/ca_prop_65_t_shirt-235283992142706565

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#95

Post by jcranmer » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:00 PM UTC

striking wrote: post #18

cjensen wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Just a clarification: supermarkets, restaurants, bars, and coffee houses already have a single sign warning about cancer-causing agents per Prop 65. The "bag of potatoes" in your example would not have to be individually labeled. The Prop 65 warnings are basically invisible to Californians because they are literally posted everywhere food is sold.

If everything has a warning on it, what's the point?

The proposition was perhaps a good idea that was horribly executed. The idea is to get companies to stop using potentially dangerous chemicals, so the proposition required that companies give a warning if they use any of a set of chemicals on a certain list. Which might be okay, except it has several problems:

* Private citizens are able to initiate civil enforcement and collect penalties; it's not limited to regulatory agencies. Which virtually guarantees that enforcement is going to be about milking money rather than trying to actually reduce harm.

* There's no consideration for dosing, anywhere. So a potential trace contamination is considered as equal a violation as dumping vats of the stuff in the public water system.

* The requirement for listing a chemical is .001% of causing cancer of 70 years. That is a ridiculously low bar, which means many low-risk chemicals are going to be swept up.

* There's no danger for excessive labelling, and the labels remove the liability for violations.

Taken together, it's a recipe for companies to just slap the warning on everything.

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#96

Post by Crespyl » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:02 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #51

alan-crowe wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alcohol is a poor choice if you are trying to illustrate over labeling, because alcohol, especially heavy consumption of spirits, has some notoriety as a cause of oral cancer. http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Cancer-of-the-mouth/Pages/Cause...

I think it's pretty simple to observe that if you're using the same label for ethylene oxide and potato chips, something is wrong with your system.

In fairness, an equally simple observation is that there might be something wrong with your potato chips.

Not that I think CA's level of labeling is reasonable or at all helpful.

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#97

Post by maxerickson » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:02 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #62

rarrrrrr wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My CIA cookbook begins potato recipes with first blanching them in water prior to roasting, sauté, etc, which is apparently an effective mitigation.

My understanding --- which is casual and mostly comes from Dave Arnold rants on Cooking Issues --- is that acrylamide is produced any time you brown a potato. So: you can eat boiled or mashed potatoes, sure, but if you roast them you're exposed. This is equally true of meat, and other vegetables. You essentially can't avoid acrylamide if you cook. Labeling it is silly.

Potatoes are worse than other foods because they have asparagine and starch together.

https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/d...

So foods with less starch and/or less protein won't end up with as much acrylamide.

There's other carcinogens generated by high temperature cooking though, for example, https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/d...

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#98

Post by rudedogg » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:03 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #87

rudedogg wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It definitely kills grass. I use it for both grass and weeds outside of the lawn. The recipe is from Pinterest of course but it's: 1 gallon white vinegar (the kind we bought is 5% acidity) 1 cup table salt 1 tbsp Dawn dish soap Mix and pour into a spray bottle. I'm not sure about scotch broom - reading says it's more effective on small weeds, but that it kills whatever it contacts. I think the salt is damaging to the…

"I think the salt is damaging to the soil, so don't spray it if you plan to grow something else." "Salt the Earth" is an established phrase in the English lexicon for a reason. The cancer-causing-ness of this mixture vs. Roundup may be in dispute, but this is certainly going to have a longer term effect than spraying Roundup, especially if you repeatedly apply it in the same place.

Thanks for the explanation and pointing that out. I wasn't aware until it was mentioned by you and another commenter.

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#99

Post by sp332 » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:04 PM UTC

jcranmer wrote: post #65

sp332 wrote: post #3

Would this affect produce in a grocery store? I thought the pesticide was supposed to be mostly gone by the time the product is harvested. I mean there are stories of farmers blasting it on crops later in the cycle but those seem to be an exception.

Pesticide residue is absolutely not a concern. If you're still terrified of it, just rinse your fruit and vegetables off first, and that will eliminate it. Glyphosate itself really isn't a problem unless you're dealing with 55-gallon drums of it on a regular basis (and even then, the evidence is less than compelling). But such is chemophobia that we can't treat repercussions in an industrial settings with solely OSHA…

Oh, I meant the labeling requirements. How much glyphosate is allowed to be on the produce before they have to label it? Or once the food has been touched, is it tainted forever (legally speaking)?

Re: California to list glyphosate as cancer-causing

#100

Post by andreasgonewild » Tue, Jun 27, 2017, 4:06 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #84

luckydude wrote: post #34

Last time roundup came up here I made the claim that it killed my dad (healthy guy, came from a healthy long lived family, he died about 15-20 years sooner than his relatives from the cancer that is associated with roundup, you can google "non-hodgkin's lymphoma roundup" and you'll see a zillion lawyers wanting to talk to you about it). Yet hackernews people shouted me down saying that it wasn't possible. I'm not an…

There's very little epidemiological evidence to suggest glyphosate is a human carcinogen. Millions of people are exposed to it, some in significant amounts on work sites. If there's any correlation between heavy occupational exposure to glyphosate and human cancer, it's very weak. Similarly: there's not a lot of first-principles logic to carcinogenicity of glyphosate. It's active in a metabolic pathway that animals d…

The metabolic pathway-propaganda doesn't tell half the truth; there are plenty of living organisms and organs within the human body that are badly affected by Glyphosate; enough to make you wonder if that wasn't part of the plan all along. Nothing good ever came out of Monsanto, it's all harmful crap; it's mind-boggling that these psychos are allowed to continue given their track record.