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Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

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Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#381

Post by sacrosancty »

screye wrote: post #347

Has widespread use of lead been exclusive to the US ? I'd imagine that there are other countries which still haven't transitioned off lead, and that they can be used as control. Alternately, are there states that never embraced widespread lead use and if they can be used as a control too ? Some also attribute the removal of lead to substantial decrease in violence over the last few decades. So, I am not surprised tha…

> Might an impolite question to ask

> controlled for [...] protected classes

I hope not. This fear of not fitting in with contemporary politics is toxic to science. Social science is already badly broken and is filled with it. If somebody can't be objective because of fear of being labelled a heretic for not deferring to the law to decide which factors must be controlled for, they have no business doing science on that topic. Are you aware that genetic information is a protected class in America, despite the fact that it influences IQ? Why would you arbitrarily control for that, but not for other factors that influence IQ such as maternal care? It's complicated to decide what to control for, but the law is absolutely not the place go to make that decision.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#382

Post by adamsmith143 »

javert wrote: post #239
adamsmith143 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even comparable. You an ignore the fact that far more people use Alcohol regularly, that it has countless other deleterious health affects and just look at pure death rates directly attributable to Alcohol. It's just not even in the same universe. >(I'm pretty sure you'll find studies arguing for both sides, so we can only go on personal wisdom.) This is blatantly false. Find me 1 study that shows definitive…

You're being aggressive. Please stop. I wouldn't contest that more people die from alcohol than marajuana. That wasn't the issue under discussion. The issue is, which is worse for society. Part of why I find your comment so aggressive is because you're being very sharp with me, but you don't realize you aren't talking about the same thing. > This is blatantly false. Find me 1 study that shows definitively that MJ is…

>You're being aggressive. Please stop.

If my comment is what you consider to be overly aggressive maybe you need to get out more.

All research is BS therefore opinion is king is one of the weakest arguments I have ever heard.

BTW your not so subtle digs are uncalled for.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#383

Post by mixedCase »

pathartl wrote: post #374
mixedCase wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is optional to eat those foods for the vast majority of people, but it isn't as convenient.

Not just inconvenient, but expensive and out of reach.

Not really. That's exactly when I had in mind when I said "vast majority of people". The biggest problem is access to a cooking fire and some sort of refrigeration you can rely on for most of the year.

It does require spending a little time cooking and probably to shop around rather than getting everything from a (possibly overpriced) supermarket depending on how much you can spend. So it's strictly an inconvenience, it requires stretching the argument really thin to view it otherwise.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#384

Post by adamsmith143 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #94
javert wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The societal risks are the same and additional worse ones with alcohol I don't think this is correct, personally. (I'm pretty sure you'll find studies arguing for both sides, so we can only go on personal wisdom.)

Would you rather deal with someone high on cannabis or drunk on alcohol? To collect data, visit all the hotels, restaurants, bars, police, security guards, and entertainment venues in your area and ask all the front line employees this question. Or even who you would rather drive around. I guarantee everyone would rather deal with someone high on cannabis, who might ask for extra snacks or drive slow and be unlikely…

But omg cannabis users get so lazy and have no motivation... /s

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#385

Post by mkr-hn »

aidenn0 wrote: post #343
Krasnol wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So this is all historical and not being removed because of the cost?

Correct. Though note also that lead paint was being phased out already earlier than 1978, so single-family homes built after 1960 or so are less likely to have lead. That still leaves a lot of dwelling units, particularly those that were not renovated recently (i.e. cheaper places).

I still remember the school shutting down the playground to get rid of lead paint back in K-12. In the 1990s.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#386

Post by JPKab »

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #174
JPKab wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An adult can choose to eat it or not (I'm ignoring the addictive nature of concentrated sugar), but our public health establishment has been foolishly stupid (combined with industry marketing) at making people think that fruit juice is natural or healthy. It's about as natural as cocaine is. Sure, it comes from a plant, but it gets refined and concentrated into levels that are unheard of in nature and toxic to the bo…

> public health establishment has been foolishly stupid (combined with industry marketing) at making people think that fruit juice is natural or healthy. Can you cite specific examples of the public health establishment pushing juice as healthy? I got a minor in nutrition over a decade ago and back then, public health officials were very quick to call out the juice industry for its predatory tactics on kids and false…

You're exactly right. Public health in general has not pushed juice, but what I should have stated is they have been complicit in not condemning it and pushing for prominent labeling on juice. They've sat back and allowed it to be marketed aggressively, to a point where the mayor of NYC exempted fruit juices from the proposal for a sugar tax. The general public thinks juice is healthy. That's easily remedied with public health messaging, but we all know why it hasn't: farmers/USDA/lobbyists.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#387

Post by ch4s3 »

ElephantsMyAnus wrote: post #379
ch4s3 wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See my other reply[1]. I'm not gloating, simply conveying facts about numbers. The increase in incarceration is mostly due to tougher sentences for non-violent crime. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30605054

Maybe the tougher sentences worked? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States#/...

Then why did Europe, Canada, Australia, and Japan see the same drops in crime? They all lock up a minuscule fraction of their populations by comparison and had larger or similar drops in crime.

The timing is also wrong, the drop in crime started before incarceration ramped up.

Also as I mentioned the plurality of incarceration is for nonviolent crime, a lot of which is simple drug possession.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#388

Post by dionidium »

LordDragonfang wrote: post #361
dionidium wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What has never made sense to me is that the IQ effects aren't equally visible across income/class groups, but we know there are millions of wealthy people living in old housing in Boston and NYC and Providence and so on. Lead levels in those houses must be just as high, right? But those kids aren't experiencing the same IQ effects. Surely this suggests that something else is a bigger factor?

Wealthy people are more likely to have good childcare (nannies, after school activities) where kids spend less time unsupervised and able to, for example, eat paint chips. For that matter, stuff like chipped paint is less likely to be left in a deteriorating state by more affluent owners.

Just as a matter of common sense and gut-check plausibility, what are we talking about when we talk about "eating paint chips?" Does eating a couple flakes lower your IQ in a measurable way? Seems very unlikely. What are we talking about, then? Do we imagine kids to be shoveling paint chips into their mouth day after day? Surely that's a pretty small number of children (if it's any), nowhere near enough to suggest generational, cohort-level effects. So what is it that we really think is happening here?

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#389

Post by aidenn0 »

mkr-hn wrote: post #385
aidenn0 wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct. Though note also that lead paint was being phased out already earlier than 1978, so single-family homes built after 1960 or so are less likely to have lead. That still leaves a lot of dwelling units, particularly those that were not renovated recently (i.e. cheaper places).

I still remember the school shutting down the playground to get rid of lead paint back in K-12. In the 1990s.

Unless it was a 20 year old playground, the playground was probably made in SE Asia. We got miniblinds around 1990 that were manufactured in China, but sold in the US that were recalled due to lead paint.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#390

Post by mkr-hn »

aidenn0 wrote: post #389
mkr-hn wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still remember the school shutting down the playground to get rid of lead paint back in K-12. In the 1990s.

Unless it was a 20 year old playground, the playground was probably made in SE Asia. We got miniblinds around 1990 that were manufactured in China, but sold in the US that were recalled due to lead paint.

The school was built in 1979. It was probably the original playground. All chippy-paint metal aside from the rubber swing seats.
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