Hacker News Reader

Comment by yummyfajitas | Hacker News Reader

The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of wifi worries me, especially with stuff like this and "cellular" phones.

The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of CRT screens worries me, especially with stuff like this and "digital" displays.

The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of GMO food worries me...

The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of inert silicone gel breast implants worries me...

Someone over 30 can fill in earlier examples: "The lack of understanding about possible cancerous effects of $NEW_TECHNOLOGY_I_DONT_UNDERSTAND worries me. I'd just hate to find out 20 years down the road that $NEW_TECHNOLOGY was slowly killing us. "

View on HN

The lack of understanding about possible adverse effects of asbestos worries me...

Oh wait, it is actually pretty nasty stuff. Now, while the "20 years down the road" thing is a bit silly, a lack of understanding about potential adverse effects is a reason to investigate further, not to dismiss anyone who's cautious about it as paranoid.

Huh? Asbestos has been known to be harmful for a long time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos#History_of_health_conc...

Are you suggesting that the health risks of asbestos were known when it started to become widely used?

If not, you missed the point of my comment.

There are like 100 forms of asbestos with 6 types being extremely harmful. The manufactures started using the cheapest of the materials (which are extremely difficult to tell apart).

http://www.asbestos.com/asbestos/types.php

That is, in fact, what he's saying, although it wasn't definitively shown. But clearly it was known to be a carcinogen when they built my high school in the early 70's, and yet they were still using it as a standard insulation and fireproofing material. I have lots of asbestos tape in my house, too.

Lead paint, though - there's a good one. Everybody knew you shouldn't drink it, but nobody suspected the dust was a problem. (Although Japan had already banned it by the 20's, if I recall correctly, while America was still merrily painting everything in sight with toxins).

And of course, the Romans didn't even know you shouldn't drink it. Although the benefits lead plumbing in Rome due to widespread availability of clean water almost certainly outweighed the costs of some stupider Romans.

Cigarettes, DDT, Agent Orange, radium, hormone-leaching plastics, certain pharmaceuticals, antibiotic-laced meat. All were known to be harmful and were subject to a cover up to promote consumption.

You can debate his example, but his point stands.

DDT, Agent Orange, "hormone-leaching" plastics are not harmful to people. Antibiotics in meats are only a problem to a small number of allergic people. Of course, if you are really a vegetable or insect, then I could see why you consider the first two to be threats.

Humans rely on vegetables and insects for survival. Overuse of antibiotics can lead to the development of high levels of resistance.

Society's track record is pretty good, then. Deaths attributable to asbestos are extremely rare in the scheme of things. Sensational headlines and ambulance chasing lawyers fool our primitive brain's broken probabilistic reasoning circuitry into making bad risk assessments. Given the overwhelming improvement in health and lifespan due to new material development and widespread use, I'd say we've been consistently making the right trade-offs. So, yeah, I'm firmly in the "OP is being paranoid" camp.

Extremely rare compared to what? Compared to the entire population of the United States? Maybe. Compared to the population of those directly and continuously exposed? Not so much. We don't use that much asbestos anymore for a reason, and it's not because we found something better to replace it.

I'm not advocating we abandon nanomaterial research by any means. I'm hoping that it's widespread use and adoption doesn't outpace research of it's effects on humans given it's similarities with asbestos.

Extremely rare compared to what? Compared to the entire population of the United States?

Compared to other health threats in the US. Before the 60's and 70's, Asbestosis was a minor concern except for people with occupational exposure (e.g. asbestos miners). Much bigger and more pressing issues were polio, malaria, measles, and the like.

Once we became rich and healthy enough to care about it, we dealt with it. It was hardly an unknown threat, just a minor one.

Yes, the dangers of Asbestos were limited to people exposed to asbestos. It was an occupational hazard, and the uses of asbestos were largely commercial and industrial in nature.

As such, Asbestos was never directly marketed to consumers. Asbestos exposure was also limited because it's relatively narrow scope of usefulness. Asbestos was never a cultural phenomenon.

The extremely wide range of usefulness of nanotech means that it will show up in everything everywhere. Of specific concern should be anything designed to be airborne or directly applied directly on somebody. The product in question directly matches that description. Furthermore, this product is aimed directly at consumers, and the article even mentions how it is about to "revolutionize everything", alluding to widespread adoption and use.

I'd hate for something like this to be plastered over keyboards, door knobs, floors and countertops, sunglasses, shoes, phones, surgical equipment, dishes and silverware, headphones, cosmetics, etc... Those are the targets for something like this. You know, things you touch and use every day.

I guess you'd be happy to break up asbestos sheeting with no breathing apparatus then? Or participate in loose-fibre insulation removal, again with no protection? We'll check in with you in 20 years and see how you're going.

Then take PCB's, or mercury and other hvy metal poisoning. Or radium (maybe a different radioactive) they use to paint on clock/watches to make them glow in the dark.

"Or radium (maybe a different radioactive) they use to paint on clock/watches to make them glow in the dark."

You're thinking of tritium:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium_illumination

Yeah, or radium:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_dials

First off, radio waves have been pervasively bombarding us across a wide spectrum for nearly a century.

Radiation and it's effects are well understood and quantified with fields devoted explicitly to the research of it's effects on humans.

Animals have been continuously eating food food that's mutated since animals have been mutating.

People have not been smearing engineered nanoparticles over their face and putting them into their body in these quantities for any appreciable amount of time, except around places like coal mines, heavy industrial areas (especially where exhaust from combustion), asbestos lined buildings, and all sorts of other fun places directly linked with mesothelioma.

No, humans have been exposed to nanoparticles ever since the invention of fire - combustion of most solid materials generates nanoparticles. Humans have been engineering nanoparticles since the invention of Lustre (a type of pottery). The only novelty with contemporary use of nanoparticles is that we can now create a uniform mix of them - until recently we could only find nanoparticles mixed with larger particles.

You are correct in your observation that dust can be harmful, and I would be surprised if concentrated nano dust behaves differently. In particular, a very real danger from spray on glass might be silicosis - a non-cancerous disease caused by occupational exposure to glass dust.

I'm only responding here to the social phenomenon of "omfg, scary new technology, CANCER", I'm not trying to engage in amateur epidemiology.

And it turned out that the nanoparticles produced by combustion are pretty cancerous. That's the main reason why there are limits on their concentration in the air. The smaller the particles are, the more dangerous. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particulate#Health_effects

What are you trying to say? That there are things that we know are not carcinogenic, such as wifi signals, and therefore, nothing is??

I think it was a perfectly valid comment: we really don't understand biological interactions at nanostructured interfaces all that well. See eg. all these hand-waving explanations for the supposed toxicity of carbon nanotubes http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080520/full/news.2008.845.ht...

(btw, CRT screens emit beta radiation, so if you'd sit close enough...)

Yup, it's probably no more dangerous than printer toner or asbestos or coal dust...

Wifi is known to be safe; we understand what makes UV and higher frequency light dangerous, and know that radio frequencies are fine (ionizing vs non-ionizing). CRT screens I believe use leaded glass to block the xrays they'd otherwise bombard you with.

I'd guess GMO foods are about as safe as anything else intentionally made poisonous to insects and other field pests.

>Yup, it's probably no more dangerous than printer toner or asbestos or coal dust...

I assume this was a tongue in cheek remark. The problem is that we contain these things whilst the article is anticipating covering virtually all contact surfaces with this spray. Which will probably be fine for 20 years or so and then we'll run out of serviceable lungs.

Yeah and this cough medicine from Bayer was working fine with some side-effects:

http://www.bonkersinstitute.org/medshow/bayerheroin1901.html

Reply on news.ycombinator.com