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The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

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Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#21

Post by throwup238 »

anthropodie wrote: post #9

How did we fail to forsee the effects of plastic before unleashing it on humanity and the world? Is there some org or body that would prevent such thing from happening in future with other material? If we have not learn anything from this we are doomed to repeat it.

Plastic is a miracle material on par with wood and fossil fuels. We didn’t stand a chance! The economic incentives to use it would have overrode anyone who brought up concerns, even if they had the scientific evidence back then.

Likewise with other chemicals like tetraethyllead in gasoline. We’ve known lead is toxic since Vitruvius but the first anti-knocking agent was just too useful so everyone kind of ignored it.

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#22

Post by TeMPOraL »

anthropodie wrote: post #9

How did we fail to forsee the effects of plastic before unleashing it on humanity and the world? Is there some org or body that would prevent such thing from happening in future with other material? If we have not learn anything from this we are doomed to repeat it.

We're still to identify any meaningful effects of microplastics other than them being everywhere and looking foreboding.

That on top of what others said - it's hard to predict effects and their scale before actually doing the thing that causes them. Also, it's only in the last 100 years that we learned that large-scale effects and environmental damage of various chemicals are a thing in the first place; it was hard for people to even conceptualize or imagine such things.

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#23

Post by xkcd-sucks »

anthropodie wrote: post #9

How did we fail to forsee the effects of plastic before unleashing it on humanity and the world? Is there some org or body that would prevent such thing from happening in future with other material? If we have not learn anything from this we are doomed to repeat it.

Consider that CTE chronic traumatic encephalopathy was discovered only a couple decades ago, despite the fact it could in principle be physically observed with stone age technology [0]. Knowing and caring where to look are important, and its tricky if there's no conceptual framework for it

[0] gently bash someone on the head for decades, cut out their brain, notice it's all shrunken and weird in composition ... maybe in a culture with strong warrior and ritual cannibalism practices

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#24

Post by JackMorgan »

spacephysics wrote: post #3

Is there food safe plastics that don’t leach microplastics? My RO filter uses plastic tubing, I imagine within the filters themselves there’s plastic

This is why I switched to a countertop electric water still. It boils a gallon of water in a few hours, then I just refill and plug it back in. The water tastes great too.

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#25

Post by labawi »

franckl wrote: post #6
spacephysics wrote: post #3

Is there food safe plastics that don’t leach microplastics? My RO filter uses plastic tubing, I imagine within the filters themselves there’s plastic

Fyi you can get a stainless steel under sink RO system for less than 200usd on amazon, no plastic piping either.

I would be wary of using a stainless steel RO system. Extremely pure water tends to leach more. You may avoid a bit of plastic in exchange for heavy metals. Stainless steel tends to be 10% Nickel, 10% Chromium, which are bad and worse for you. If you do so, I would recommend getting the water tested.

Otherwise I would recommend a good plastic RO system. One where the plastic doesn't leach loads of harmful plasticizers.

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#27

Post by lotsofpulp »

legitster wrote: post #18
CalRobert wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plastic is used intensively to make the food too. This is a sea of plastic in Spain used for growing. https://vertical-farming.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/alme... Plastic stops weeds, stops birds, is the skin of greenhouses - every step of growing seems to involve another damn square kilometer of plastic. A lot of it just degrades in to microplastics in the soil, too. (My wife and I did a market-garden type smallh…

One of the ironies is that organic agriculture has increased plastics use dramatically in farming. https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/06/07/729783773/or...

As far as I can tell, organic is mostly a mechanism to price discriminate produce and animal products. If you label one organic, then some people will be willing to pay more for it.

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#28

Post by dandandan »

op00to wrote: post #8
franckl wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fyi you can get a stainless steel under sink RO system for less than 200usd on amazon, no plastic piping either.

Do the filters introduce microplastics?

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00431...

Re: The Most Disturbing Places We've Found Microplastics So Far

#29

Post by itishappy »

JackMorgan wrote: post #24
spacephysics wrote: post #3

Is there food safe plastics that don’t leach microplastics? My RO filter uses plastic tubing, I imagine within the filters themselves there’s plastic

This is why I switched to a countertop electric water still. It boils a gallon of water in a few hours, then I just refill and plug it back in. The water tastes great too.

What happens to all the tasty tasty minerals?
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