11–20 of 42 posts
(Side: Why is it that so many people go "ooh it's neurotoxic!" and when I mention fillings they say "oh but that's different, it's a stable form of mercury mixed with {arsenic, radium, cyanide, other weird thing I don't really want embedded in my flesh}?)
Guess I'd better leave my fillings behind next time I fly. (Side: Why is it that so many people go "ooh it's neurotoxic!" and when I mention fillings they say "oh but that's different , it's a stable form of mercury mixed with {arsenic, radium, cyanide, other weird thing I don't really want embedded in my flesh}?)
Guess I'd better leave my fillings behind next time I fly. (Side: Why is it that so many people go "ooh it's neurotoxic!" and when I mention fillings they say "oh but that's different , it's a stable form of mercury mixed with {arsenic, radium, cyanide, other weird thing I don't really want embedded in my flesh}?)
Well, it's true -- mercury in an amalgam (normally with silver & tin) doesn't leach out. Most of the heavy metals that are dangerous by themselves can by alloyed or chelated to make them biologically safe.
I sure hope I'm missing some secret reason why this wouldn't work well.
This is really scary stuff (and I was hoping that it would never make it on HN). I heard from an aeronautical engineer once that if one drop of mercury somehow gets let loose in an airplane that the whole plane needs to be basically taken apart (and possibly scrapped). Mercury by itself is very toxic. There was a custodian who broke a thermometer in our office building once. That would have been ok - had she not spre…
This is really scary stuff (and I was hoping that it would never make it on HN) I saw this on reddit today and a few of the better comments debunked the scare mongering hype: http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/85clw/why_mercury_i... And yet here we are with pop sci near the top of HN. I blame Jeff Atwood.
The scariness of the article seems to reside mostly in the comments here and choice of headline. (although the picture of the dissolving I-beam isn't particularly reassuring...)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is really scary stuff (and I was hoping that it would never make it on HN) I saw this on reddit today and a few of the better comments debunked the scare mongering hype: http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/85clw/why_mercury_i... And yet here we are with pop sci near the top of HN. I blame Jeff Atwood.
Note that the comment "debunking" the article is by the author of the article itself (or so he claims). The debunking seems to consist of repeating what is in the article: the FAA doesn't allow large amounts of mercury, as is present in a professional barometer. The scariness of the article seems to reside mostly in the comments here and choice of headline. (although the picture of the dissolving I-beam isn't particu…
Both of these comments (in the same thread) do debunk it:
http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/85clw/why_mercury_i...
http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/85clw/why_mercury_i...
So if you're Al Queda, the play here seems obvious. Get as many sleeper agents in the U.S. as possible (which I'm sure they're constantly working on) and each day send a couple on a plane armed with an old thermometer. How many could you take down before people realized what was going on? And after they did, how much damage would it do to the economy when nobody flew anymore? I sure hope I'm missing some secret reaso…
This is really scary stuff (and I was hoping that it would never make it on HN). I heard from an aeronautical engineer once that if one drop of mercury somehow gets let loose in an airplane that the whole plane needs to be basically taken apart (and possibly scrapped). Mercury by itself is very toxic. There was a custodian who broke a thermometer in our office building once. That would have been ok - had she not spre…
It's important to clean it properly (good ventilation, don't spread it around, don't vacuum clean), but unless you do something really stupid (that would get significant amount vaporized and inhaled), it should be ok.
Perhaps the most important thing to remember if you break a household thermometer is do not panic. The amount of mercury contained in an oral thermometer is small and does not present an immediate threat to human health.
http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxprofiles/phs46.html (CDC Public Health Statement for Mercury)
I'm glad we have a 100ml limit on liquids to be carried on airplanes