Live data from Hacker News

3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

bloomberg.com

61–70 of 115 posts

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#61

3M knowingly poisoned every single person in the world for decades. Let them burn, and salt the earth where they fall. These fuckers don’t deserve a second chance. How could they have done it better? Acknowledge the science when the problem was discovered in the 70s, publish the findings, let the scientific community study the problem and let people make informed decisions about the dangers. Had they done that PFAs m…

[deleted]

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#62

I don't think most people understand that the damage from PFAS is generational and cumulative. You can isolate zebrafish, expose the first generation, and you'll see abnormalities generations later even those those fish were never exposed. That is their legacy - it's civilization-level harm.

I've been struggling to understand why people care more about Gaza, Ukraine, BLM, or trans bathrooms than issues like PFAS proliferation and ultimately came to the conclusion that people really just don't care about hypothetical future generations as much as the present. You can point and say "look, this action doesn't affect you much and just makes a 0.01% difference, but it will effect 100,000 future generations of life on this planet and can never be reversed" and people will still say "wow that's sad, but there are people starving in Country A" and be much more concerned.

I guess it's us that are the weird ones.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#63

I don't think most people understand that the damage from PFAS is generational and cumulative. You can isolate zebrafish, expose the first generation, and you'll see abnormalities generations later even those those fish were never exposed. That is their legacy - it's civilization-level harm.

I've been struggling to understand why people care more about Gaza, Ukraine, BLM, or trans bathrooms than issues like PFAS proliferation and ultimately came to the conclusion that people really just don't care about hypothetical future generations as much as the present. You can point and say "look, this action doesn't affect you much and just makes a 0.01% difference, but it will effect 100,000 future generations of…

A person’s toothache means more to that person than a famine in China which kills a million people. A boil on one’s neck interests one more than forty earthquakes in Africa. Think of that the next time you start a conversation.

- Dale Carnegie

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#64
post #12
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let them burn Who is "them"? The scientists at the time? The managers at the time? The managers now? The stockholders who have already sold and made their profits?

If we can have a murder investigation and assign partial blame for people that are just there while the crime is being committed, why cant we do it for something that harms the entire human race? Just because we don't have a great framework for something today doesn't mean we should not have it, just that incentives have been against it up to this point.

We won't get there by just saying "they" should be punished; most people can agree on that. Be specific on who and how.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#65

3M knowingly poisoned every single person in the world for decades. Let them burn, and salt the earth where they fall. These fuckers don’t deserve a second chance. How could they have done it better? Acknowledge the science when the problem was discovered in the 70s, publish the findings, let the scientific community study the problem and let people make informed decisions about the dangers. Had they done that PFAs m…

[dead]

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#66

I don't think most people understand that the damage from PFAS is generational and cumulative. You can isolate zebrafish, expose the first generation, and you'll see abnormalities generations later even those those fish were never exposed. That is their legacy - it's civilization-level harm.

I've been struggling to understand why people care more about Gaza, Ukraine, BLM, or trans bathrooms than issues like PFAS proliferation and ultimately came to the conclusion that people really just don't care about hypothetical future generations as much as the present. You can point and say "look, this action doesn't affect you much and just makes a 0.01% difference, but it will effect 100,000 future generations of…

People do care about climate change and lots of other long term things.

People care about things that there are campaigns about, that get media coverage. They also avoid thinking about things that they think cannot be changed. These are correlated: if there is a campaign to change something people think it cannot be changed.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#67
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the physical process that leads to PFAS ending up in the rain?

The planetary hydrological cycle. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-62391069

That article's only citation is a review paper, and it doesn't answer my question or substantiate your claim. It only covers how much PFAS is found in rainwater, and not how it got there.

The sources cited includes https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2020.116685, which is paywalled, but the snippet of the conclusion that is shown indicates that a possible major cause is industrial emissions:

> As local sources were determined to be significant, the results imply that local action can have an impact on PFAS contamination in precipitation. A three-way ANOVA model determined that functional group, chain length, and location were significant predictors of PFAS concentrations

If you can get the full text I'd be very interested in reading about it.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#68
post #8

3M knowingly poisoned every single person in the world for decades. Let them burn, and salt the earth where they fall. These fuckers don’t deserve a second chance. How could they have done it better? Acknowledge the science when the problem was discovered in the 70s, publish the findings, let the scientific community study the problem and let people make informed decisions about the dangers. Had they done that PFAs m…

> Let them burn Who is "them"? The scientists at the time? The managers at the time? The managers now? The stockholders who have already sold and made their profits?

A recent article in The Atlantic said that one scientist would know it's harmful to humans and another would know it's in all human blood and 3M made sure they'd never meet.

So the scientist who knew it was harmful didn't know it was everywhere and the scientist who knew it was everywhere didn't know it was harmful.

Point is that it's possible to silo scientists in this way so they can't see the big picture.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#69
post #19

If you want more context on PFAS, I recommend this Veritasium video [0]. It expanded on my usual thought of "PFAS = bad," explaining why non-stick cookware is probably fine while other forms of PFAS are problematic. The video also covers the environmental damage caused by PFAS manufacturing. [0]: https://youtu.be/SC2eSujzrUY

skiers have been putting teflon wax on their skis for decades now it's in the snow, ground, and water-supply forever

It's not like this is going unnoticed either, though.

The International Ski Federation (FIS) now bans fluorinated wax in all their competitions, and this wax is explicitly called out alongside cookware in much of the legislation that's going around in places like CA/CO for PFAS bans.

Re: 3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

#70
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

skiers have been putting teflon wax on their skis for decades now it's in the snow, ground, and water-supply forever

According to the linked Veritasium video, Teflon is not directly problematic, it’s the chemicals used to manufacture Teflon that are the problem.

"Teflon" ski wax (fluoro-wax) contains PFOA impurities, which is that same problematic chemical. It's expensive to remove so most manufacturers don't bother.

https://skiracing.com/future-without-fluoros-a-complete-guid...

Post reply on HN