[jotm]

Yeah, it is certainly possible that it affects health. However, since we decided to live with such technology as a society, we'll have to deal with it.

People living in cities (or anywhere really) don't complain much about the massive amount of exhaust from cars, which is definitely proven to be bad for everyone's health despite all attempts at reducing it. It's just there, we won't give up cars, so everyone just kind of ignores it.

[hosh]

Well, we didn’t complain about 70 years of leaded gasoline exhaust either … but maybe our society had collectively lost the capability to understand the damage.

[politician]

We’re ready to hyperventilate about spent nuclear fuel stored hundreds of miles away at the bottom of a vault under a desert, so I don’t think we’ve collectively lost the ability to be persuaded by charismatic people.

[rixed]

It seemed to me we are getting rid of exhaust gases in big cities, via stricter regulations on engine emissions, exhaust gas recirculation, catalytic converters, stop and go systems, lower speed limits, car free areas, electrification, etc, with very visible results.

So the car analogy seems a bad exemple to discourage progress.

[jotm]

As I said, it's not enough. As long as they exist, they're causing health problems. You just can't filter enough of the gases. But moving to full electric can solve that quite well (putting the dangerous emissions far away).

Batteries are getting safer, too.