Say Goodbye to Your Tuna Melts Because We've Ruined the Ocean

The Skeptics Guide to the Universe ^ | September 2, 2014 | Kate Christian

[Smokin' Joe]

If anyone wants to gripe about mercury in stack emissions, I suggest they look to the Far East. And has anyone heard anything about Fukushima lately?

[Nifster]

Re: stack emissions. You have that right

The ‘conspiracy media’ continues to report massive radiation and sea life death in the Pacific. Hard to tell what the true story is due to the conflation by some and denial by others. Probably somewhere in between

[dangerdoc]

The best info I’ve see indicate that ocean levels of mercury are about 50% natural and 50% released from human industry.

If ocean levels have indeed tripled, it would mean that complete regulation of mercury emissions would still leave a significant elevation of mercury levels. And that regulation would not only have to deal with fossil fuels but also mining and refining.

Basically you would have to shut down the world economy and still have mercury levels 150% above baseline.

I’m not dispelling the fact mercury is a serious issue, it is, and even low levels are Bio accumulated in top predators to a levels hazardous to humans. And I’m not dispelling the fact that civilization is releasing too much mercury into the environment.

But, I do think that the cure these people will propose will be worse than the poison.

We will need to reduce emission in a way that does not send us to the stone age and people will need to consider mercury levels when planning their diets for the foreseeable future.

[familyop]

"The best info I’ve see indicate that ocean levels of mercury are about 50% natural and 50% released from human industry."

Thank you. There is a data shortage on total venting through the ocean floors. Maybe some folks in the sciences today should spend more time in the bottom of the Trench. [Yeah, little dark humor there.]

"But, I do think that the cure these people will propose will be worse than the poison.

We will need to reduce emission in a way that does not send us to the stone age and people will need to consider mercury levels when planning their diets for the foreseeable future."

Yes. Biases in controls, dataset revisions and policy implementations for resource gatekeeping (against some) become more common, while two major natural changes continue (magnetic shift increasing speed and extended solar minimum). Some people feel that they have more control than they really have, in my opinion.

So the effort to regulate toward artificial scarcity continues, while strategies for open source equipment are completed. A peek at the future. See the recent SCO vs. Linux case. It was peaceful and hardly noticeable in comparison to what is likely just ahead. Cleaner, more honest, less corrupt, community-based production is going to happen. The socio-political order is in the designs.

Some very clean open source equipment has already been regulated against. Effect? Nada. "Johnny Mnemonic" was fiction, in a way, but then not so much in other ways.