There are people who think it suddenly stopped being bad for your brain? They must be chewing on paint.
Lead is still bad for your brain
41–50 of 192 posts
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#42I live with children in a very old house. I would love to be able to measure my children's lead exposure and check things like window paint or house dust for lead content to see how big a problem there is. How do I do that?
Look for a lead abatement company. The surface test kits only test the surface. A dedicated company should have a X-ray device that can determine if there is lead that has been painted over. Also get soil tests since houses with lead paint will have been scraped and that leads to lead going into the soil around the house.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#43Did you know, the world still mines more lead now than it did 50 years ago, at the peak of 'put lead in everything' mania? To me, this says that we still put lead in too many things. Lead is still used for flashing in roofs. It's still used as a mould release when making plastics. It's still used in making dishware. It's still used in bullets. It's still used for all kinds of things which will one day end up in the e…
We need more government regulations and enforcement to solve this problem. There's no other solution in a capitalist environment
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#44Did you know, the world still mines more lead now than it did 50 years ago, at the peak of 'put lead in everything' mania? To me, this says that we still put lead in too many things. Lead is still used for flashing in roofs. It's still used as a mould release when making plastics. It's still used in making dishware. It's still used in bullets. It's still used for all kinds of things which will one day end up in the e…
When I posted here about how lead pipes during the Roman Empire was bad for the people I was met with a torrent of downvotes right here on Hackernews saying it wasn’t that bad. I’m not optimistic about the future.
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Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#45This is a great article on the biology of lead exposure. Unfortunately on the exposure side research wasn’t done and it propagates the myth that lead exposure is only an issue for those with lead pipes or lead paint. It’s true that these are the main sources of severe lead exposure. However the article points out that there is no safe level of exposure to lead and these aren’t the main ways we are exposed to lead in…
>stop buying things that have a prop 65 warning (I know prop 65 isn’t perfect, but it’s often a lead warning).
That would seem to mean to stop buying an enormous number of things. Extended to locations, it would mean not parking in any enclosed parking lot, or entering a number of different stores. It's not clear to me it's even possible to avoid everything with a prop 65 warning. Unfortunately, the bad incentives involved (private actions mean there is a risk for not putting a warning if some law firm can try to argue to a court in a civil action that you might be exposing people to something, while at the same time there is no penalty or cost at all to putting a completely unnecessary and bogus warning when you don't actually know of any risk) make it so that the safest option is just to put a warning.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#46Did you know, the world still mines more lead now than it did 50 years ago, at the peak of 'put lead in everything' mania? To me, this says that we still put lead in too many things. Lead is still used for flashing in roofs. It's still used as a mould release when making plastics. It's still used in making dishware. It's still used in bullets. It's still used for all kinds of things which will one day end up in the e…
We need more government regulations and enforcement to solve this problem. There's no other solution in a capitalist environment
The US is probably going to put more lead into everything because RFK Jr believes it builds character or something.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
What do you think the regulatory standard should be set to? It is currently set to 10 ppb (parts per billion). Do you think it should be 0? 0.0000 ppb? No detectable lead whatsoever? What do you do if detection technology improves and the minimum detectable level decreases? Even if you go live totally off the grid with your child and grow your own vegetables in your backyard with completely natural ingredients, you w…
Granite has lead at levels of 30,000ppb, fwiw. Lead is a naturally occurring mineral. the only way to fully eliminate lead would be to live in a fully synthetic environment, everything grown hydroponically, etc. https://www.science.smith.edu/~jbrady/petrology/igrocks-tool...
Not only that. Life accumulated those over the eons, as the rocks eroded, the useful metals got saved by life, and the rest was washed down. So the natural levels are way higher. Life is good at hoarding these "heavy metals".
People in this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43631251 have been arguing that these people must have been some top class elite, and I totally get it. They are too good looking. But, that's how it was. The typical of the past would be above celebrity looks today. A lot of curent idols look stunted in comparison.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#48Did you know, the world still mines more lead now than it did 50 years ago, at the peak of 'put lead in everything' mania? To me, this says that we still put lead in too many things. Lead is still used for flashing in roofs. It's still used as a mould release when making plastics. It's still used in making dishware. It's still used in bullets. It's still used for all kinds of things which will one day end up in the e…
When I posted here about how lead pipes during the Roman Empire was bad for the people I was met with a torrent of downvotes right here on Hackernews saying it wasn’t that bad. I’m not optimistic about the future.
I feel the same about leaded solder for hobby electronics.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
We need more government regulations and enforcement to solve this problem. There's no other solution in a capitalist environment
The US is probably going to put more lead into everything because RFK Jr believes it builds character or something.
His whole thing is about environmental toxins probably being the cause of most of our problems, so no that doesn't seem likely.
Re: Lead is still bad for your brain
#50There are people who think it suddenly stopped being bad for your brain? They must be chewing on paint.
The article is more about the fact that the exposure risk hasn’t gone away after banning it in fuel and paint, and that it’s still everywhere and contaminated the soil.