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The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

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Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#91

Post by naremu »

lazide wrote: post #83
naremu wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What is the difference between lye (dangerous), sand (not dangerous unless it suffocates things or gets crushed and inhaled), water (can cause flooding or drowning, otherwise harmless), and sodium bicarbonate (quite basic, generally harmless), and hydrazine (mutagenic, highly toxic, highly flammable)? The MSDSes will elaborate on this and you probably know that. This thread chain has gotten impressively disingenuous…

No, you’re just being disingenuous. How do you create a MSDS for a chemical that hasn’t been made yet? How do you decide it’s safe to create a large enough quantity of a chemical to figure out what even should be in that MSDS? How can you know if something is mutagenic without exposing it to DNA? Or cancer causing without exposing it to a living organism? Or causes reproductive harm without exposing it to organisms a…

So, let me get this straight: I've claimed reducing everything to "chemicals" is disingenuous, and in response, I'm immediately told "no, you" and then challenged with debates over topics or ideas I haven't actually talked about like

>How do you create a MSDS for a chemical that hasn’t been made yet?

What argument that I've made do you present this logical fallacy to?

> Deciding if ‘freezing’ it in place, or letting it continue to develop new and interesting applications is the discussion

This is not my viewpoint and was never mentioned by me. This is an argument you're either making in reference to another comment, a point not addressed by myself, or you're talking to your own strawman, who doesn't seem to have a significant stance other than "well, it's basically unsolveable!".

That is the discussion I was having. You're doing exactly what I mentioned, being disingenuous about the literal technical definition of chemicals and muddying waters because water is a chemical too, man!

Well watering my lawn doesn't kill it or give organisms that live mere decades cancer. That's a reasonable measurement to start.

And if you're really saying there can't be more in depth, slower research to chemicals that people will end up having in their bloodstream, then I don't even know what to say to that, other than Andrew Ryan would be proud.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#92

Post by littlestymaar »

TylerE wrote: post #37
littlestymaar wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is talking about banning them outright for all purpose here though.

People here, like tehjoker, are proposing total bans in this very thread.

The thread starts here:[1].

There's no comment from a user called “tehjoker” nor any comments talking about total bans, in this thread.

Also, in another, different, threat, “tehjoker” is also not proposing a total ban, you're reading his comment wrong.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39231091

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#93

Post by naremu »

bawolff wrote: post #84
naremu wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What is the difference between lye (dangerous), sand (not dangerous unless it suffocates things or gets crushed and inhaled), water (can cause flooding or drowning, otherwise harmless), and sodium bicarbonate (quite basic, generally harmless), and hydrazine (mutagenic, highly toxic, highly flammable)? The MSDSes will elaborate on this and you probably know that. This thread chain has gotten impressively disingenuous…

> The line to be crossed is obviously at least a few blocks up the way from "what is the difference between water and hydrazine though". Do you actually have a line? We can't make a law out of people saying "you know what i mean".

> the colloquial definition of chemicals which if we're not being pedantic, we know brings up ideas of substances damaging to other substances or life itself.

From the comment you're responding to. Damage is quantifiable, if it wasn't, the OP (EPA proposing hazardous substance classification) wouldn't even exist.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#94

Post by littlestymaar »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #60
llbeansandrice wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very bad faith paraphrase of their single comment in this thread: > For what it's worth, depending on the harms, a sudden total ban is not out of the question as being beneficial to humanity as a whole. It would just be disruptive to enterprise, boo hoo. We don't need to always treat bad actors with kid gloves. Hardly the extremism you're implying.

They are quite literally proposing a total ban. And then following it with some simplistic and emotionally charged rhetoric.

No they aren't! This comment isn't proposing anything!

They are arguing that even total bans should not be dismissed by default, and that there can exist situations “depending on the harms” that justifies a total ban.

And they did not say that in a vacuum, but as an answer to another comment that straight out dismissed total ban as an option.

This comment is in no way advocating for a total ban of PFAS in particular.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#95

Post by marcosdumay »

kube-system wrote: post #44
newZWhoDis wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one thing I’m hopeful about for EVs. Plastic is cheap because of massive demand scaling the oil industry, collapse the demand for oil and plastic becomes more expensive.

Oil supply is fairly demand inelastic, if demand for oil drops, we'll almost certainly see cheaper oil. And if OPEC sees the writing on the wall they're going to price aggressively as long as they can.

For a while, yes. On longer timespans, the production is quite elastic as wheels dry and new ones have to be created all the time.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#96

Post by marcosdumay »

RetpolineDrama wrote: post #58
richardw wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The auto industry is a competing use of oil, isn’t it? So halving demand is more likely to reduce prices. Car industry obviously helped to build the infrastructure but I think now that it’s there, fair chance there’s going to be a lot of oil supply looking for a use. Infrastructure won’t disappear overnight.

>So halving demand is more likely to reduce prices. 1) Halve demand 2) Price plummets 3) Sources shut off 4) Prices climb again, _but at lower volume_ Plastification requires $x/barrel oil _at insane volume_ to work.

The key thing people are talk over each other here is that step #3 takes years.

But also, plastics can pay much more for oil and gas than fuel can. It's currently not scarce at all, and the economic restrictions are all around using the plastic in some way. So don't expect the plastic industry to suffer like your last paragraph implies.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#97

Post by naremu »

bawolff wrote: post #88
naremu wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you know what the word "chemical" means? This intentional nitpicking of the colloquial usage of the word chemicals is a favorite of both, disingenuous conversationalists who like to take a chance to feel correct rather than participate earnestly, and lobbyists. At least one of them gets paid for it though.

Its hardly a nitpick, you're being so vauge that its impossible to understand what you are actually proposing. Why not just use more specific language? If indeed everyone is acting in bad faith, using clear language would shut them up. If instead they are being ernest and cannot understand you because of the "colloquial" language, then being rigorous would further your stated goal of ernest participation. Either way…

I didn't propose anything, I'm just nitpicking HN's nitpicking of attempts to have a real conversation.

Which, since HN is a place for technically minded people, has resulted in people arguing that chemical contamination of PFAS is categorically the same as watering my lawn.

You are technically correct, but this is called a "gotcha": it's not about continuing the conversation in earnest, if anything, it shuts down conversation about the important details by, in the writing of mike judge, "playing lawyerball" instead.

In reality we all know that none of us are writing the technical legislation, so any of us becoming enamored with defending for profit entities against hazardous chemical classification through technical usage of language is...basically the core spirit of corporate lobbyism.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#98

Post by reissbaker »

Semaphor wrote: post #77
varelse wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a ton of contaminants in our drinking water that the EPA recommends you remove and we know they are harmful but they are not mandated to do so. Get yourself a water filter because they're not going to filter it for you.

Do you have a list?

If you live in California you likely have an enormous amount of chloroform in your water (I tested my water, was horrified, and bought a whole-house water filter; apparently this is just generally true in the Bay Area, and I suspect SoCal as well since we pipe our water down there).

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#99

Post by andersrs »

satellite2 wrote: post #34

Title could be changed as "The EPA is proposing that nine PFAS be considered hazardous substances"

What a joke. Companies like 3M and Dupont just switch up a few atoms. Teflon becomes 'GenX'. One has to conclude that the EPA are complicit in this.

Re: The EPA is proposing that 'forever chemicals' be considered hazardous substances

#100

Post by jan3024-2r »

rrr_oh_man wrote: post #18
freitzkriesler2 wrote: post #6

As a society we're going to have to have a come to Jesus moment about all of these estrogenic chemicals that make up the plastics we consume.

Fucking hell. I half wish I wouldn’t have read what I read after googling "estrogen plastics"

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