[wnewman]

"For no particular reason" may not be quite right. One candidate for a particular reason is the same grouchiness about orthodox[] technology that shows up in many double standards. E.g., chemicals that fail the Ames Test are alarmingly sinister if they are synthetic pesticides, vs. so perfectly fine that only a pedant would ever consider the issue if they are pesticidal toxins present at elevated levels in pest-resistant breeds of crops. Any given number of people killed in a coal mine or nuclear accident is a very big deal compared to the same number killed by bacterial infection related to organic farming. Low-tech paintlike or gluelike goo and gunk is not generally subject to witch hunt standards for sinister toxicity when used to caulk or paint charming fishing boats, but is fair game when used in fracking a formation which contains oil. Microquakes are so irrelevant that only a pedant would ask about them when the facility in question is geothermal, but scary as hell for an oil fracking facility. Bird kills are absolutely intolerable ecological atrocities for oil spills, irrelevant pedantry for wind farms.

[] I don't know a word for the distinction I'm trying to get at here with "orthodox". I mean the way that various important technological niches seem to get a pass: e.g. optics (eyeglasses, cameras), and selective breeding of crop species. It's hard for me to imagine persistent enthusiasm for rumors that eyeglasses cause brain cancer in the way that rumors about low-intensity low-frequency EM radiation (from power lines to cell phones) persist. The distinction seems to be roughly "stuff descended from the early Industrial Revolution, the Scottish Enlightenment, and/or sufficiently hardcore scientific method that the Royal Society would be respectfully impressed."