[extropy-chat] Rachel Carson

Damien Sullivan phoenix at ugcs.caltech.edu
Sun Oct 16 15:46:58 UTC 2005


On Wed, Oct 05, 2005 at 12:21:03AM -0400, David Lubkin wrote:

> http://www.malaria.org/news132.html [quoting Bruce Ames]
> http://www.junkscience.com/ddtfaq.htm [citing studies]
> http://reason.com/rb/rb061202.shtml

Conversely:
http://timlambert.org/category/science/ddt/

One key point: there's a global ban on DDT use for agriculture, not for
disease control.

Another point:
http://junkscience.com/malaria_clock.htm
seems to blame 90 million deaths on the EPA's DDT ban.  But malaria was
eradicated in the US before the ban, and the EPA only affects the US, not
anyone else.  And the fifth footnote openly admits using inflated numbers.

"However, certain in the knowledge that even one human sacrificed on the altar
of green misanthropy is infinitely too many, I let stand the linear
extrapolation of numbers from an instant start on the 1st of the month
following this murderous ban."

Estimates have their place in science, but not on a page whose first
impression is of a clock with exact numbers.

-xx- Damien X-) 



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