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New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

sustainableplastics.com

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Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#131

Post by rthomas6 »

bhouston wrote: post #75

There are two macro population health trends that suggest we are somehow poisoning ourselves at a large scale. Most people do not relate the two, but I personally wouldn't be surprised if they have related causes. The first is the Flynn effect, which was rising IQ levels decade over decade, which halted and then reserved for most Western nations around 1990s/2000s and is now declining: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F…

Also the metabolic syndrome/obesity epidemic. 40% of US adults have obesity. By 2030 about half of US adults will, and in 29 states more than half of adults will be obese.

We see obesity becoming increasingly normalized. People feel powerless to stop it and that we should just accept it.

It feels to me like there is something besides diet changes happening to us. That's part of it, but I wonder if microplastics or some kind of gut biome disruption is playing a role as well.

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#132

Post by bhouston »

tmikaeld wrote: post #124
bhouston wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My suggestion, which isn't rocket science: Ban plastic food containers for any type of long-term storage or anything that gets heated up (and different plastics have different microplastic shedding profiles, so ban the worst first) and also ban PFAS in anything that gets close to food. It will increase costs, but the alternative is we poison ourselves, so it is sort of needed. Phase it in so that industries have time…

Considering the alternatives are metal and glass, I'd assume that the cost difference would be exponential, especially if the most common alternative is banned and transport will be much heavier.

Banning DDT was also incredibly inconvenient for farmers as DDT worked amazingly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring

Human ingenuity knows no bounds and it will be a market opportunity for new entrants and innovators.

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#133

Post by bowsamic »

superhumanuser wrote: post #59
ethanbond wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ideally, governments armed with scientists are capable of making key judgments like this one without “my child’s arm fell off” levels of apparent, individual harm.

Scientists are wrong... a lot. The harm should be obvious to the layman IMHO in order to be legislated away. Otherwise, it should be left up to personal choice.

> The harm should be obvious to the layman IMHO in order to be legislated away. Otherwise, it should be left up to personal choice.

I'm not sure if this is sarcasm but if it's not, this is really the peak of anti-intellectualism ideology, i.e., that if a thing is not immediately obvious without studying then we should remain ignorant of it. I don't think that kind of opinion is a good fit for this forum to be honest, which has learning and information sharing as an important goal, so I will have to flag your message, which is an extremely rare thing for me to do (actually this may be my first time ever)

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#134

Post by purpleflame1257 »

bhouston wrote: post #75

There are two macro population health trends that suggest we are somehow poisoning ourselves at a large scale. Most people do not relate the two, but I personally wouldn't be surprised if they have related causes. The first is the Flynn effect, which was rising IQ levels decade over decade, which halted and then reserved for most Western nations around 1990s/2000s and is now declining: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F…

Obesity itself is oestrogenic. It's the calories, stupid!

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#135

Post by [deleted] »

ethanbond wrote: post #82
superhumanuser wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scientists are wrong... a lot. The harm should be obvious to the layman IMHO in order to be legislated away. Otherwise, it should be left up to personal choice.

This is an absolutely horrible heuristic. Let’s put radioactive toys, toys painted with lead, leaded gasoline, DDT, and thalidomide back on the market. None of these were “obvious to the layman.” Individual scientists are wrong a lot. Science as a process continues to be the (imperfect) reigning world champ of truth discovery, no matter what contrarianism du jour memes are spreading over the internet.

[deleted]

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#136

Post by konschubert »

trickstra wrote: post #128
konschubert wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't help with ocean pollution at all, because plastic rubbish from Germany and other EU countries wouldn't end up in the ocean either.

That is unless they sell it to Philippines who promptly dump it into rivers, which is exactly what happens. https://www.dw.com/en/german-plastic-floods-southeast-asia/a...

Today I learned, thank you.

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#139

Post by myshpa »

gcau wrote: post #106

I think we really need a big and aggressive government response to this issue, possibly more important than climate change.

Climate change is just one symptom of the overshoot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_boundaries#Nine_boun...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_overshoot

Biodiversity loss is the worst of them all.

Re: New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour

#140

Post by bamboozled »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #112
bamboozled wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you just make someone else more poisoned then ? Seems shit...

Presumably, alive and full of microplastics is still better than just being dead, which is usually what happens when you don't get blood transfusions when you need them.

Not all transfusions are used in emergency situations.
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