Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

cam.ac.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 136 posts

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#41

Post by triceratops »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #39
Synaesthesia wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The plastics/oil industry mislead the public and government about how recyclable plastic is (it's not) to prevent legislation from passing which would reduce unnecessary plastics. https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/897692090/how-big-oil-misled-...

It has been at least a decade since the futility of plastic recycling has been known. Any politician that tries to rectify the plastic situation will get voted out because people would experience a reduction in quality of life. It is the same reason why the solution to reducing carbon emissions has not been enacted worldwide, which is increasing taxes on fossil fuels until consumption goes down (which would also solv…

> It has been at least a decade since the futility of plastic recycling has been known.

To you. Not to the general population.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#42

Post by lotsofpulp »

triceratops wrote: post #41
lotsofpulp wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has been at least a decade since the futility of plastic recycling has been known. Any politician that tries to rectify the plastic situation will get voted out because people would experience a reduction in quality of life. It is the same reason why the solution to reducing carbon emissions has not been enacted worldwide, which is increasing taxes on fossil fuels until consumption goes down (which would also solv…

> It has been at least a decade since the futility of plastic recycling has been known. To you. Not to the general population.

I do not think it would make a difference. Replace plastic recycling with the harms of carbon emissions, surely that has been known by sufficiently many people. When push comes to shove, sacrifices on a collective basis are hard to make. Especially when you can point to others that are not making them.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#44

Post by xvilka »

bserge wrote: post #25
hypertele-Xii wrote: post #18

The unnecessary inclusion of 'spider' in the article makes the claim 'vegan' suspect. It's plant-based silk. There are many creatures that spin silk, no need to mention "spider-like" specifically.

At first I thought they taught spiders to eat plants. Afaik, the vast majority are carnivore (by need not by choice).

There is exactly one "vegan" spider species[1].

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagheera_kiplingi

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#45

Post by lotsofpulp »

globular-toast wrote: post #28
pizza234 wrote: post #2

Something I don't fully understand is why single-use plastics are still in use. Every once in a while, a replacement is advertised, but still not used. The reasons I can think of are: 1. cost - this could be an very simple reason; 2. conflictual requirement - the supposition that chemical indestructibility is what makes plastic at the same time necessary but problematic. Is there any other factor/complexity I'm missi…

Cost is a big one because the external costs of plastics are not priced in. Plastic stuff is so cheap that people buy it for nothing more than a brief chuckle before disposing of it (see "secret santa" gifts, party stuff etc.) Taxing it appropriately is hard. I've often thought about a simple blanket markup per piece of tat, raising the price of said piece of tat from amusing chuckle to stupid waste of money. But how…

Conceptually, taxing it is very easy. Increasing taxes on fossil fuels will flow down to all fossil fuel derivatives, including plastic. Politically impossible, though.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#46

Post by triceratops »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #42
triceratops wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It has been at least a decade since the futility of plastic recycling has been known. To you. Not to the general population.

I do not think it would make a difference. Replace plastic recycling with the harms of carbon emissions, surely that has been known by sufficiently many people. When push comes to shove, sacrifices on a collective basis are hard to make. Especially when you can point to others that are not making them.

Oh yeah totally, I'm in agreement with the rest of your post.

It's just that in my personal experience most people are extremely ignorant of what can be recycled. They don't even read the flyer their local garbage company gives them. The state of the recycling bin in my apartment complex is an absolute disgrace.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#48

Post by rootusrootus »

sva_ wrote: post #29
criddell wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe retailer requirements. Walgreens (for example) might require clamshell-type packaging for store displays. I always wonder why it's used on things that don't need the benefits that plastic provides. For example, I just replaced my keyboard and the new one came in a box but the box was taped shut (single-use plastic) and the keyboard was in a bag (another single-use plastic).

Our society seems to associate such a packaging with the feeling of quality/freshness/whatever. The epitome of this may be on airplanes, where they repackage blankets into plastic bags for every flight (allegedly without even being washed.)

> allegedly without even being washed

That seems really unlikely. It wouldn't take long to backfire and the negative PR would destroy what little profit was gained by not washing them. It's unlikely the airline is actually repacking anything, in any case. They almost certainly subcontract the cleaning to a laundry service, and that's who re-bags the cleaned blankets.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#49

Post by ReptileMan »

withinboredom wrote: post #10
pizza234 wrote: post #2

Something I don't fully understand is why single-use plastics are still in use. Every once in a while, a replacement is advertised, but still not used. The reasons I can think of are: 1. cost - this could be an very simple reason; 2. conflictual requirement - the supposition that chemical indestructibility is what makes plastic at the same time necessary but problematic. Is there any other factor/complexity I'm missi…

Here in the NL, plastic bags are an extra charge (at least where I shop), it costs just a tiny bit extra to get nice reusable ones or bring your own - you can return most other single use plastics — like bottled water — and get your money back. This alleviates #1 above, but I don’t think it would ever fly in the US. Here, grocery shopping is almost a daily experience in the city. You can’t walk 10 minutes without pas…

The problem with bags is - let's call it the bachelor shopper. A modern man's clothes may have pockets, but he rarely wears any kind of handbag in which to hold the reusable shopping bag.

So it doesn't matter if they cost 1c, 10c or 1 eur - I am always buying new bags, have nowhere to put the bag when I am going outside. At least I also use them to throw away trash.

Re: ‘Vegan spider silk’ provides sustainable alternative to single-use plastics

#50

Post by rootusrootus »

withinboredom wrote: post #10
pizza234 wrote: post #2

Something I don't fully understand is why single-use plastics are still in use. Every once in a while, a replacement is advertised, but still not used. The reasons I can think of are: 1. cost - this could be an very simple reason; 2. conflictual requirement - the supposition that chemical indestructibility is what makes plastic at the same time necessary but problematic. Is there any other factor/complexity I'm missi…

Here in the NL, plastic bags are an extra charge (at least where I shop), it costs just a tiny bit extra to get nice reusable ones or bring your own - you can return most other single use plastics — like bottled water — and get your money back. This alleviates #1 above, but I don’t think it would ever fly in the US. Here, grocery shopping is almost a daily experience in the city. You can’t walk 10 minutes without pas…

> plastic bags are an extra charge (at least where I shop), it costs just a tiny bit extra to get nice reusable ones or bring your own - you can return most other single use plastics — like bottled water — and get your money back.

All of this is true of where I live in the US, though the 'return single use plastics for money' is fairly specific to beverage containers. And the single use plastic bags are banned outright. Most grocery stores provide paper bags, and charge a fee.

They probably need to bump the fee for bags a bit higher, though. We tried doing the reusable bag thing, but as of yet we haven't successfully built the habit of bringing old bags back to the store, so we just end up buying the paper bags every time. It's something like 5 cents a bag, which is so little that it doesn't inspire.

Post reply on HN