[mensetmanusman]

It would be an interesting future historical study to see what caused more harm:

-Manufacturing the best firefighting chemistry (e.g. military purchases for missile warehouses, resorts, apartments, etc.) -Using the chemistry to actually fight fires

It might be a case where sometimes second best should have been the way to go, but it’s hard to know beforehand I imagine, especially in safety scenarios where people are laser focused on optimizing for that.

[dmos62]

Here's an instance of the phenomenon.

> In fact, in the case of the V-2, more than twice as many Allied prisoners died outfitting the factory and producing it than did Allied civilians and soldiers hit by it in rocket attacks.

https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/wonder-weapons-...

[mensetmanusman]

That is amazing, thanks for the link!

[dylan604]

At this point, we have an over abundance [edit: of evidence] that when we as humans do new science in pursuit of good, we tend to overlook the negative aspects. Chemical companies spend a fortune on development of the new chemical and rush it to market to recoup investments. We never spend enough time looking at the down side of these new chemicals even though we have all of the information we currently have that shows these chemicals tend to not do so well in the environment. We also have abundance of examples where these companies knew the dangers and hid them in order to make their money. Yet with all of this information, nothing is done to prevent the release of these chemicals without 3rd party testing.

The citizens being affected have very little recourse.

[mensetmanusman]

Great point.

It seems like we need everyone working together because it’s such a complicated game theory problem.

Is humanity’s goal to march forward with scientific discovery at the risk of inventing risky things?

Or is the goal to make people comfortable? (was going to say healthy, but I think that ship has sailed in the west where we are approaching 50% obesity with no foreseeable counter measure).

[insert other goals from key stakeholders]

E.g. if the civilian government said “we need the best X” but it also can’t by Y,Z,Q, etc. and the more qualifiers you add the less likely that there will ever be something new in the arena (which is good for corporations that rely regulatory capture).