[EPWN3D]

The various "OMG MICROPLASTICS" studies always smacked of alarmism. No one has actually identified tangible harms from microplastics; it's just taken as a given that they are bad. So this fueled a bunch of studies that tried to find them everywhere. Even the authors of this study go to great pains to not challenge the dogma that microplastics are existentially terrifying. So I fully expect we'll still be panicking over vague, undefined harm whenever we find microplastics somewhere.

This type of research requires very little creativity or study design -- just throw a dart in a room and try and find microplastics in whatever it lands on. Boom, you get a grant for your study, and journalists will cover your result because it gets clicks. Whenever this type of incentive exists, we should be very skeptical of a rapidly-emerging consensus.

[eigenspace]

So, I think that while it's true that we haven't really demonstrated any tangible harms of microplastics, and there is a lot of alarmism around it, I think the concern is more rational than it might appear.

If it's true that microplastics are everywhere and in everything (which maybe that's now not actually the case), even a very small chance that there's some serious harm we're not aware of should be taken extremely seriously, because at this point there's (apparently) no practical way to avoid or get away from them, or to even stop producing them. And since they're such a new phenomenon in these quantities, we haven't really had the time to really drill down and figure out *if* there are longterm negative effects.

IMO, we should be intellectually humble about our lack of knowledge on these microplastics, and part of that humility should involve being cautious about introducing them to our bodies and environment.

[_DeadFred_]

We aren't really looking. In the most well known case we were able to identify they were killing salmon because the salmon were dieing and worked back from that, not because some study led there first.

https://www.ehn.org/toxic-tire-chemicals-threaten-salmon-as-...

[RobGR]

That is a case of a specific chemical in tires, not microplastics generally, or even rubber tire particles generally.

[kevinob11]

Isn't [bad thing is happening] let's work backwards and find [difficult to find cause] a really solid approach?

[ip26]

Good when the damage is done, bad as a method of approving new chemicals.

[zahlman]

> and part of that humility should involve being cautious about introducing them to our bodies and environment.

What does that look like today, pragmatically speaking?

[achenet]

asking, for all tasks shown to introduce large amounts of microplastics in our bodies and environment, "can we accomplish this task in a way that doesn't introduce microplastics in our bodies and environment"?

For example, using a reusable metal gourd instead of plastic water bottles for the task of 'portable hydration'.

and because this is Hacker News, I'll kindly welcome the comment: 'well actually metal gourds have some toxic substance in the lining that's worse than microplastics' and reply: ok, Cardboard bottles then. Or a gourd made of a sheep's bladder like back in the good ol' days, whatever they used back in the bronze age.

[queenkjuul]

I think we avoid the whole "personality responsibility" and "these paper straws fucking suck" angle with water bottles and the like and instead focus on "do we need a factory in China making 15,000,000 plastic trinkets for happy meals" or "does literally every single item for sale on the entire planet have to come in plastic wrapping", etc

[stinkbeetle]

Gourds were made from gourds back in the day. Or possibly ceramic.

[sfink]

Stone tires.

[randomNumber7]

I tell you a secret. There are chemicals called PFAS which we all have in our body, they affect the body negatively (not in the current usual levels as far as I know) and they are so chemically stable they stay in the environment forever.

[sophrosyne42]

I agree very strongly with intellectual humility. I just wish the microplastic fear mongerers would also take that lesson.

[queenkjuul]

Given the track record of other things we introduced to the environment in mass quantities only to realize later were horrifyingly detrimental (CFCs and tetraethyl lead, etc) -- i think people are right that we should not take such a thing lightly

Not that it really matters, climate driven ecological collapse will probably make it irrelevant by the time it would matter

[orbital-decay]

Beware of the confirmation bias, it works both ways. Reporting might be alarmist (it always is), actual research is largely not. This study doesn't discredit the entire field, it's pretty obvious that microplastics are everywhere and different types are harmful to an unclear extent, even if the amount might be overestimated in some studies.

>This type of research requires very little creativity or study design -- just throw a dart in a room and try and find microplastics in whatever it lands on. Boom, you get a grant for your study

Precisely, and mapping of that kind is entirely valid and required in huge amounts to have the full picture. Somebody has to do the grunt work.

[sophrosyne42]

Unfortunately too often authors of non alarmist research end up promoting alarmist interpretations of their work in science media.

[garte]

Look up on fish and the consequences of microplastics on water animals. From starvation to sex change, microplastics wreak havoc there.

Just because you as a single consumer may not seem impacted by microplastics does not mean it's alarmism to suggest that it's a really bad phenomenon.

[cowsandmilk]

> Even the authors of this study go to great pains to not challenge the dogma that microplastics are existentially terrifying.

What great pains are they going through? The study is a discussion of measurement techniques and makes no comment on whether they are harmful because that’s irrelevant to the paper.

This could just as easily be a paper on how wearing the wrong type of gloves results in overestimating calcium in soil. You’re the one injecting a political agenda.

[Barbing]

I’ll breathe tires a little easier today :)

Hey remember what happened with BPA? That was frustrating. We saw ostensibly legitimate concern, then manufacturers telling us they got rid of it. Maybe it would’ve inspired confidence if the removal adverts came with data sheets on the replacement chemicals.

[calibas]

It was largely replaced with it's molecular analog, BPS.

Just like BPA, BPS is an endocrine disruptor. The idea that it's less harmful than BPA is mostly due to lack of research.

[willrshansen]

Off the top of my head, wouldn't it be super easy to expose lab rats to microplastics and measure results?

No way this isn't heavily studies by now.

Edit: found a whole meta-study in like 30 seconds of searching: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/public-health/articles/...

[matt_kantor]

There's a lot more to the linked study than this, but since I know a lot of people won't bother to click the link:

> Micro/nano-plastics negatively affected the blood glucose metabolism, lipid metabolism, and reproductive function in mice.

[suzzer99]

Peter Attia (I know, but I trust his ability to synthesize medical research) did a whole deep dive on this and IIRC determined that for the most part, it wasn't a big concern for anyone with remotely normal consumption patterns.

[queenkjuul]

Good, glad human consumers are the only life on earth that could be affected

[andai]

Testosterone is down by about half since 1970. (Unclear if related, but I think a bunch of these plastics are endocrine disruptors.)

[genodethrowaway]

Testosterone has not fallen. That idea is mainly a result of bad sampling and incomparable measurements. See: https://xcancel.com/cremieuxrecueil/status/19804871302092350...

[andai]

Thanks, I'll have to take another look at it. Last I checked, the ~2000-2020 situation was unfortunately consistent with the previous trend.

[andai]

Fallen or not, it may apparently be doubled, with great benefits to mental and physical health.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/-x6TKr35J9I

No affiliation, just thought this was extremely interesting. This seems to boil down entirely to nutrition, from what I gathered.

[userbinator]

One could say that all living beings are made of naturally occurring microplastics, long before humans even existed. After all, where else did that oil in the ground come from?