The planet will be here for a long, long, long time after we’re gone and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed, and if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the Earth plus Plastic. The Earth doesn’t share our prejudice towards plastic. Plastic came out of the Earth; the Earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the Earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place: it wanted plastic for itself, didn’t know how to make it, needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old philosophical question: “Why are we here?” Plastic, assholes!
– George Carlin
How old is that? I’ve been looking for one for years. I think that’s it, but I don’t remember the last panel like that
Gosh, I wanna say I saw it at least as far back as 2010, possibly older.
I really miss that guy
So many of us do, but if he was alive in 2016, Trump winning would have killed him.
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Earth, is in fact, Earth/Plastic, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, Earth plus Plastic. Earth is not a planet unto itself, but rather another component of a fully self-correcting paradigm made useful by Plastic and it’s human manufacturers, compromising a full ecosystem defined by Mother Nature.
Til that OP has no concept of what a particle is or how small it is or how many of them there are in any given scenario because our brains did not evolve to process that kind of scale accurately.
Just posted the article. Why not be constructive and post something more informative?
Because pop science articles often throw out bullshit like “blowing your nose can cause you to expel over 100 germs” because they know that 100 sounds like a big number and will get clicks.
People not questioning the actual context and meaning behind those numbers and how they connect back to something we actually care about leads to a lot of bullshit science reporting.
Damn, how have I not heard of this before? I always thought it got dumped into landfills and eventually degraded to tiny particles. If it’s released so directly, it feels a lot more viable to reduce exposure by avoiding plastics…
That’s the thing, when people hear the term micro they still (for some reason) assume its something they can see with their naked eyes. Kind of like those plastic pellets put into handsoaps a while back that are now band.
In reality microplastics are everywhere there is plastic, and they are released all the time at a microscopic level. Meaning you actually need a microscope to see them. Its like a fine dust.
Now think of all the plastic items you use and come in contact with.
Toothbrushes for example, each time you brush your teeth the brisels break down at a microscopic level and are released. The plastic utensils you use either in the kitchen on your pans, or the single use ones for food, they all slowly release plastics. That plastic cutting board, or boiling water in a plastic kettle, yup they all also release plastic.
Pretty much everything breaks down at a microscopic level, that is how knives become dull, or how items show wear and tear over time.
for some reason
it’s probably because the limit for the category of microplastics is “now widely defined as pieces ≤5 mm in size”.
It’s insane to me that people actually have plastic kettles.
Food in plastic containers seems really bad for you, and microwaving food in plastic seems worse.
oh well
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