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Poison, Poison Everywhere

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Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#91

Post by Ferret7446 »

hiddencost wrote: post #58
Ferret7446 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a solution. There is no practical solution for this, and has not been for the millennia on human history; it's only been in the recent decades where we've been able the hallucinate about knowing about toxins in our daily lives. Legislation is just paper, you have no enforcement mechanism beyond what you already have currently: suing companies on a case by case basis.

Uh, it used to be until it was gutted in the last 30 years. Legislation and bureaucracy has been one of the most successful interventions for public health for centuries. Read about the hole in the ozone layer. Banning lead paint. Read about the invention of public water authorities. Read Silent Spring and read about its aftermath. Look into the history of air pollution and the EPA. These are some of the crown jewels…

You are mistaken; legislation is not what achieved those. Massive, focused public scrutiny on pinpoint issues is what achieved those.

Passing legislation without the latter is meaningless, and if you have the latter, you don't necessarily need legislation; the free market will force a correction (although politicians will follow the will of the people anyway).

You cannot achieve that across the countless toxins and/or potential toxins that exist in our world; the public does not have enough attention to spare for that.

Or to put it more simply, regular people don't have the time or energy to spare on worrying about every little thing that could potentially, maybe be toxic, in some tiny way over decades.

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#92

Post by 4gotunameagain »

coppsilgold wrote: post #89

Bloodletting is a solution. Donate blood as frequently as they allow you. Plasma donation works even better (higher frequency) if you trust the machines and the process. Sadly, it's not a complete solution as some harmful substances bio-accumulate in other tissues. A benefit may be had regardless as some substances leach back into the blood if the concentration gradient is sufficient.

Source?

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#93

Post by lkuty »

weregiraffe wrote: post #78

What's worse, damage from lead or damage from constant obsession about lead?

This raises the interesting point of finding a balance between knowing/searching and letting go when it comes to health. Lead is a major one but obession about health can lead to anxiety, stress. I think that finding the major factors that affect health is what matters (sunlight, sleep, walking, cooking with stainless steel, etc.) and letting go of all the minor details. This is an issue that has been close to my heart for years, and my perspective on it has changed over time. Anxiety can be a real problem.

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#95

Post by k9294 »

mr_johnson22 wrote: post #61

If the incentives of private business are what got us in this health crisis, why should private business be trusted to get us out of it?

Incentives. I use consumerlab because trust is their product, if they break their trust once - they will ruin their business.

I inclined to trust the business which earns money from me - this means they are aligned with value I get and there is little incentive to break the trust and a high stakes to keep the trust when you get paid to be trustworthy.

I trust more the greedy capitalists than politicians in this question because I don't understand incentives of the latter. At least the business model is fairly transparent - you can check the company and how it makes money, in reverse incentives of the governments and their officials is broken - to get elected, get rich, get power, not lose job and keep producing new laws and regulations because if you want to keep your job you can't say “Everything is working, the best thing I can do right now is to monitor the system, collect the data and do nothing for a few years”.

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#96

Post by rao-v »

The reality is that poison is dose dependent, and we’ve mostly identified all the dangerous things and their doses. That lead in the bottle and the formaldehyde in your cheap clothes is bad … but not in a way that will detectably cause you harm or impair your life

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#97

Post by Flere-Imsaho »

klevertree1 wrote: post #9

I'm tackling part of the issue of food toxin remediation with my new venture, NeutraOat (neutraoat.com). It's a modified oat fiber supplement that selectively traps BPA, PFAS, and plasticizers in the gut and reduces levels in the blood serum. The funding for this is tough, though. Everyone loves the idea, but it's difficult to find people to fund R&D to make sure the product actually works over brand building and mar…

Sounds interesting. I heard about oat's ability to absorb nasty stuff in the gut for awhile. However, in the UK oats are dried out using glyphosate...a known carcinogen!

Feels like modern society makes it nearly impossible to not be exposed to harmful substances...so I hope you're successful.

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#98

Post by cenamus »

AstralStorm wrote: post #74
cenamus wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it would be sort of similar to activated charcoal? And that's surely well studied, and also "eaten"

You might have just filtered off all the nutrients and have yourself a dietary deficiency. Oops. And your supplements might well be contaminated...

I suppose you wouldn't be eating these oats regularly? More like a couple times, then test the levels and maybe repeat after a while?

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#99

Post by noduerme »

BrenBarn wrote: post #82
noduerme wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The 'luxury' you are talking about was called Brands I dunno. Branding was my gig for a long time. I think brands were a weak substitute for artisans / bespoke makers who had to personally stand by their work. Once upon a time there was a guy named Levi Strauss who made sturdy jeans, some guy named McDonald who made good hamburgers, a couple guys named Johnson who sold talcum powder. And that guy Nobel who invente…

> I think brands were a weak substitute for artisans / bespoke makers who had to personally stand by their work. Another way to say that is "companies are too big". When companies become big enough that they don't have to worry about the repercussions of screwing over their customers, they're too big.

Right. Absolutely. But then again, everyone can buy jeans now and you don't have to ride your horse across 500 miles of desert and hitch it up to Levi's store. So no one who orders em online now knows what they were worth then. No one's riding horses around in their underwear anymore.

To be serious: I don't think that overpopulation or delivering better things to more people is really the problem. Big companies are indeed a problem. Along with big governments on the other side. They both rely on rent-seeking methods of extracting value while lowering expectations, rather than providing better services. There needs to be a balance of regulation and innovation, that prevents regulatory capture and prevents monopolies without exploding bureaucracies that hamper small businesses. Small businesses are fantastic drivers of prosperity and creativity. That would be the civic ideal I'd implement if I had any interest in getting into government.

Re: Poison, Poison Everywhere

#100

Post by kgabis »

coppsilgold wrote: post #89

Bloodletting is a solution. Donate blood as frequently as they allow you. Plasma donation works even better (higher frequency) if you trust the machines and the process. Sadly, it's not a complete solution as some harmful substances bio-accumulate in other tissues. A benefit may be had regardless as some substances leach back into the blood if the concentration gradient is sufficient.

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