Comments for Paper or Plastic? at http://www.randi.org/site , comment 1 to 50 out of 20 comments http://www.randi.org/site Sun, 22 Nov 2009 01:35:25 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-4028 "Recycling" is indeed a red hering when the solution is "Reusable". ;) BJ - BillyJoe Fri, 20 Mar 2009 01:39:50 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-4001 Two different people mentioned 'red herring' although in different contexts. Red herring implies a digression. Plastic bags [i]can[/i] be recycled, and there are collection sites that accept bags in my neighborhood. Paper bags also end of in landfills, and as I pointed out, don't compost all that easily and take up more volume than an equivalent carrying capacity than plastic. To mention that the bags can be recycled endlessly, as compared to paper, is in no way a red herring, when the issue is the [i]overall life cycle impact[/i] of these two options. - Geek Goddess Thu, 19 Mar 2009 03:16:17 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3997 [quote]The paper bags used in the grocery stores begin in the forest, with the clear-cutting of forests.[/quote] Well, as often as not it begins on the pine plantation, with the regular harvesting of pine trees. [quote]The chemicals used in the paper pulp process include sulfur, bleaches, and acids.[/quote] OMG! Teh chemicals! What the author is saying may be true, but the way is is expressed is unconvincing. Every industry where they - you know - [i]make stuff[/i] involves chemicals. [quote]What about plastic? Grocery stores bags are made of polyethylene, which begins as the ethane component of natural gas.[/quote] Plastic produces chemicals not normally found in nature - and which the ecosystem has trouble processing - from fossil carbon, adding to the carbon burden. Pine trees make fibre out of existing atmospheric carbon, which fibre is easily biodegradable. The stuff about recyclablility is a red herring: shopping bags wind up in landfill. In any case - I imagine the best environmentally friendly shopping strategy is * buy [i]less[/i], dammit * buy stuff that does not have excessive packaging * use a string bag (plastic is ok), or canvas, or anything reusable, to carry it home in. - Paul Murray Thu, 19 Mar 2009 02:30:41 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3940 Naomi, You made sense the first time. And I'm with you on the reusable polypropylene bags. BJ - BillyJoe Mon, 16 Mar 2009 17:20:49 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3939 The heck with that. I'll weave the bags from the leftover stalks of my C. indica...if the government would let me. - gebobs Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:22:06 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3938 My two cents worth! There is a lot of faulty logic in the supermarket bag wars. Two main reasons are given for stopping plastic bag use (1) the waste of resources, and (2) the environmental damage – cue picture of turtles strangling in plastic. Both arguments are quite spurious in regard to lightweight supermarket bags. Take issue (1)- waste of resources. People who use lightweight plastic shopping usually take their shopping home in their bags. Most then use those bags to package up household waste for trash disposal, so many bags are recycled anyway. Consider then how many non-users then turn around and buy heavy duty garbage bags instead. The waste of plastic is overstated. In any case if you look at the weight of a shopping bag it is far less than one plastic soft drink (soda) bottle LID so just buying one less of bottle of drink in the shopping will save more resources than a week’s shopping bags. Don’t start me on those proliferating humungous plastic (water filled) road barriers- look how much weight of plastic they use. I SAY BAN THE TUPPERWARE PARTY as well! This issue vastly over-inflated. Take issue (2)- plastic bags only get into the environment if we put them there! How many householders actually fling their empty shopping bags into the wind so they end up in waterways? The overwhelming source of this type of garbage is likely to be from fisher-persons, or lazy people eating takeaway on the waters edge. Why saddle supermarkets with the problem? have a go at bait shops and fish and chip shops. Phillip - ozwire Mon, 16 Mar 2009 14:29:30 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3929 Adrian Lopex and others: When you try to cover a complex topic in 3-4 paragraphs, you can't cover all bases and must make some assumptions. I did not intend to imply a clear-cut forest goes 100% brown paper bags, or that only these bags use chemicals in the paper mill. People tend to focus on what they can SEE, and they see plastic bags blowing in the wind or dramatic pictures of bags ending up in the ocean. The pre-use cycle of paper vs plastic includes such information such as that manufacturing plastic bags uses 6% of the water that paper does, and 71% less energy (ethane to polyethylene is extremely energy-and chemistry efficient), and is essentially non-polluting, compared to the manufacture of paper. Post-consumer, paper bags take up about 5 times the space in landfills for an equivalent carrying capacity, paper decomposition in anaerobic landfills precedes slowly (30-year old newspapers mined from landfills are intact and readable), paper decomposition gives off CO2 and methane gas while plastic does not, the cellulose fibers in bags do not break down and compost, and so on. Ethane does not usually come from petrochemical refineries, it is a component of natural gas, and polyethylene plants are usually built next to a natural gas liquids pipeline, not an oil pipeline. The point of all this is to prod people into investigating the entire story, as you would with any other popular misconception, and not accept what appears to be conventional wisdom. - naomib82@gmail.com Mon, 16 Mar 2009 04:10:14 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3922 Naomi, Your statements about the environmental impact of paper bags begin with a comment about the "clear-cutting of forests", which strikes me as blatant exaggeration. Paper bags aren't the only items produced by the paper industry, nor is paper the only product of the logging industry. To blame clear-cutting on paper bags is a rather like blaming beach-destroying oil spills on plastic ones. It's not an honest comparison. As for your mention of the chemicals involved in the production of paper: can the harmful chemicals used by the paper industry be blamed specifically on paper bags, or are you again ignoring the fact that the paper industry produces many more products than just brown paper bags? Are the chemicals involved in the production of, say, white paper generally the same as those used in producing brown paper bags. - Adrian Lopez Sun, 15 Mar 2009 12:19:39 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3920 While I think it is good for a Skeptic to question all matters, including this, it will get a bad reputation if it keeps coming up with half-arsed commentry like this and the one on solar panels. The problem here is that the manufacture of plastic bags has never been the issue, so the whole article is a red-herring. It is their DSIPOSAL which is at issue, as has clearly been pointed out by several people. Plastic may be recyclable, but I have rarely seen a place that accepts plastic bags. Furthermore where they do the most harm in the less developed nations there is not recycling, they end up all over the land and in the sea where they clog things up, kill turtles and do damage. The simple answer is ban supermarkets form giving any kind of bag. People will bring their own. If they forget they can take a cardboard box - nearly everything that comes to the supermarket does so in a box, the supermarket has to dispose of these having you take one is a great way to get rid of them. - sailor Sun, 15 Mar 2009 00:34:16 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3916 @Naomi: HAHA. What the father of Al Gore and his friends has to do with Al Gore's opinions? Even if Al Gore is a Stalin's relative, does it make global warming (or cooling) not to occur? Vote however you like, but your political views will not make polyethylene decompose any faster. And ad rem: Slow decomposition of polyethylene is a benefit. Do any of you complain that silicon oxide (sand) decomposes too slow? Polyethylene will simply stay as an inert constituent of soil. It is generally rather dirty production of all oil derivatives, and spending non-renewable deposits of oil and gas, which should be our concern. Here, I see paper as a winner, despite its stinking production process. And there is, it seems, nothing better than reusable bags (whatever material they are made of). We are living in the "disposable" civilisation, and we will presumably be sorry because of it sooner or later, but too late for sure. Read Simak's "Children of our children". Makes think a bit. Out of topic a bit: I heard somewhere that we cannot produce more stainless steel products, because people working in steel industry will loose their jobs. That "disposable" civilisation once again. - Appenzeller Sat, 14 Mar 2009 13:37:08 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3912 [quote]written by DrMatt, March 11, 2009 Any choice is an opportunity for critical thinking. Sometimes I deliberately get plastic bags--because I can reuse them to clean up after my dog. report abuse ... written by gabeygoat, March 11, 2009 i just use my handy dandy back pack [/quote] Ewwwww.... - Caller X Sat, 14 Mar 2009 07:18:51 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3901 To repeat, paper and plastic disposables are not in the race. The choice is between reusable polypropylene and reusable hemp bags. My problem with hemp bags is their unavailablitiy and their aesthetics. Hemp stinks, feels terrible, and is not easily folded flat - unless things have changed since the last time I looked. Finally... Some people have a very narrow view of what topics should be covered in Swift. I would get positively bored if all we had here were stories about scam artists, psychics, mediums, and ghosts. BJ - BillyJoe Fri, 13 Mar 2009 22:06:28 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3895 I guess my question is whether this site is for every belief that people have 'wrong'. To me if it gets as wide as some of the topics have been recently, it loses its value in my view. My other critique is in regards to the fact that you acknowledged no downsides to supermarket plastic bags, when some clearly exist. - Otara Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:47:46 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3885 @Otara This isn't drift - I am writing about misconceptions commonly held by people uninformed about the science. Some chains are no longer offering paper bags because of the environmental impact. As an engineer and science buff, my information is based on some research and personal training and knowledge of the petrochemical industry and regulations. @truth64 HAHAHA I have worked 28 years for oil companies and currently run a natural gas processing/ CO2 technology company. It's all about the science. I'm not sure what you want to fire me from, but I tend to vote Republican more than Democrat, and think Al Gore's father was a shill for Armand Hammer (good friend of Stalin) and that Al Gore rose to his position through connections than any actual brain cells. My post had nothing to do with politics, it had to do with the impact. Plastic bags may linger longer, but the paper manufacturing causes more damage up front. - naomib82@gmail.com Fri, 13 Mar 2009 05:48:01 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3874 AND sub a colon and cap P for the wonderfully useful :P. /sarcasm - Radwaste Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:46:20 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3873 Well, nuts. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Population_curve.svg . - Radwaste Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:45:01 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3872 Concern over population is not fear-mongering. Check this graph. It's not the whole story, but the whole story clearly indicates that dismissing the problem is unwarranted. - Radwaste Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:44:30 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3868 Now, I'm no chemist so I can't comment on the veracity of this anecdote, but I did hear that non-biodegradable plastic bags are actually better for the environment than biodegradable ones. The reasoning going like this: non-biodegradable plastic bags sit inertly in landfill (and roadside verges, hedges, etc), whereas biodegradable plastic bags break down releasing all their component chemicals into their surroundings. This seems to make sense, but I'd love to know if the chemistry backs it up. - SionH Thu, 12 Mar 2009 03:43:32 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3867 As I understand you, any time a choice is available it presents an opportunity for hard-headed no-nonsense skeptics to make a real-world decision based on a strict assay of the objective evidence and thus help spread the light of reason and rationality. So, who is YOUR favorite Beatle? - bosshog Thu, 12 Mar 2009 02:42:46 +0100 http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/471-paper-or-plastic.html#comment-3865 "However, if you are faced with a choice between paper or plastic, plastic is the environmentally responsible decision." But only if both the individual and the government actually go to the effort of recycling them. "I will tell you how this relates to "woo'. Aethists are by nature, liberals." Alternatively, there are those that resist the oversimplification of one's entire political thoughts and leanings into a single word. "Can Earth support nine or twenty billion humans? I don't think so. It cannot support four or six realistically. Time to rethink or we are doomed. The time of 'it's someone elses' problem' is over, my friends...." Your scaremongering is not welcome here. We reason by logically sound argument, as opposed to ominous, emotion rich language. As it happens, while this article is a little more tangential to the JREF aims than usual, it is still written with an intent to clarify a topic with plenty of misinformation and hyperbole. By the way, the cloth bags win. - Lee Thu, 12 Mar 2009 02:17:01 +0100