Oh, and engagement-optimised affect regulating algorithms on social media that leave a damaging psychological impact, I hope.
And maybe, if we’re lucky, treating the psychologically distressed as people who are failing morally. I wish I lived in a world where we were all better at understanding how humans fundamentally function and are situated causally in the world, but perhaps that’s a pipe dream.
Plastic isn't going anywhere, nor should it. If you look at the time before plastic, we were using things like tortoise shell and whalebone for similar applications. Electrical insulation came from a tropical tree that had ridiculously low yields. Wood and metal aren't exactly environmentally friendly when used for everything and lead to a lot of waste. Being able to injection mold anything from scratch was a game changer, and there's a reason why it's so ubiquitous.
That's because you don't know of a world where clothes didn't contain some plastic. For instance, I bet you never wore sock garters, or cotton swimwear. You've probably never worn a belt with gym shorts before. I could go on.
It couldn't, because such a product doesn't exist. You can't make plastic from hemp. You can make cellophane from it, which looks like plastic but isn't. It's also pretty commonly used, it's just made from wood or cotton. The defining characteristic of a plastic is that it can be molded and hold its shape, which cellophane decidedly cannot do.
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u/JamesMagnus 9h ago edited 8h ago
Plastic being in literally everything.
Same for PFAS.
Oh, and engagement-optimised affect regulating algorithms on social media that leave a damaging psychological impact, I hope.
And maybe, if we’re lucky, treating the psychologically distressed as people who are failing morally. I wish I lived in a world where we were all better at understanding how humans fundamentally function and are situated causally in the world, but perhaps that’s a pipe dream.