I’m not familiar with quilette, but there was a great Washington Post op-ed that broke down exactly why trying to recycle plastic is a bad idea. Here’s a link to it, no paywall: https://wapo.st/3VRnTNl

1.) Plastic breaks down into micro- and nanoplastic particles and get inhaled or consumed by everybody, and we’re just starting to understand how these bits affect our health (like increased systemic inflammation). Recycling facilities breaking down used plastic release untold amounts of plastic bits into their surrounding environments.

2.) “Recycling” old plastic into usable material requires the addition of a LOT of brand new, never-recycled plastic. It’s not a process where you put in used plastics and get some amount of usable plastic out, recycled plastic is like 30% old plastic and 70% new plastic to hold it all together. This is a process we’ve been trying to optimize for 50 years, and the improvements are negligible.

3.) The recycled plastic we get out of it isn’t safe to use for food and drink. (Have you seen those 20 oz. Coke bottles that say “I’m 100% recycled!”? Don’t drink those.) Nobody’s laying down the law and saying they can’t do that, and it’ll be a long time before anyone overcomes the social inertia and corporate lobbyists to stop that from happening.

Plastics are for landfills. I feel like such a piece of shit every time I throw another piece of plastic in the trash, but it’s the option that’s safest for everybody. (I feel like the French climatologist in Project Hail Mary every time.) Recycling isn’t a goal that will help; we need to adapt and reduce how much plastic we use.

It’s time to get ill

This is outstanding

This is indeed a gorgeous friend

Cats can have a little salami

They missed that thing on Matabele ants treating wounds on each other with antibiotics. The ants have done this for so long that they’ve evolved goo pockets to hold their ant-ibiotics https://www.uni-wuerzburg.de/en/news-and-events/news/detail/news/ant-antibiotics/

We’ve done it, everybody! We’ve got an actual Cat Facts subscriber!

There’s at least some truth to it: a little disturbance (like wind or someone talking to them and riffling the leaves) helps plants grow stronger stems. I don’t know if there’s any data that differentiates between the effects of a fan or someone telling their plant that they’re loved and appreciated, but who cares? Your plants do better when you talk to them instead of leaving them standing still. 👍🏼

That’s really incredible stuff, especially given how not-fun that part of the game was 😅

Please tell me they did “thorough”

It probably is still legal, but it’s not something I’ve looked for in like a decade. We do have products that use ground kernels, but those aren’t good to use on skin–the milling process doesn’t produce uniform particles and the pointy bits tend to compromise the barrier skin provides with very small tears.

I completely agree that plastic isn’t necessary for good soap, I just like it. I would definitely buy soap made with ecologically responsible plantstic at least once.

More importantly, using safer, scalable, completely biodegradable, algae-based polymers opens up so many more options for single-use products while simultaneously improving environmental quality. Farming algae and seaweeds removes a lot of contaminants from the ocean, like agricultural fertilizer and solid waste runoff. If we can truly scale up ocean farming responsibly, it’ll be its own “teal cascade” in which the benefits multiply with each step in the process.

1. Farming algae/seaweed doesn’t require the use of inorganic fertilizers when you grow them alongside shellfish like oysters, clams, and scallops

2. Increased protein production through shellfish reduces reliance on agricultural livestock for meat (which is incredibly damaging to the environment)

3. Algae/seaweed can replace fossil carbon in fertilizers and plastics, and reduces cattle methane emissions by 20% or more when added to their regular feed

At each step, we can take more and more petroleum out of the equation just by using methods that are better than sustainable, they actually remediate existing harm.

Plus, I get my scrubby soap back.

I cannot possibly be the only person who misses the soap with the plastic bits in it. If they could do that without the environmental damage (I’m looking at you, Great Lakes ecosystem), I’d be into it

Fuck that, I love all the disturbing pics you post! Peak AI weirdness and I am here for it.

I feel like I’ve been graced with His Noodly Appendage!

Part of me agrees with you; part of me is yelling, “Yeah? Many? Name five!” (Admittedly, that’s the American part and it’s kind of an asshole.)

I feel like IT could yell at OP for a little bit, but would ultimately have to stare the fact that they allowed non-privileged users to just change the operating system square in the face. Like holy hell, 500 employees and anybody can just be like, “Hey, maybe I’ll make a major OS change today because why not?” What else are they letting happen?!

Carl looks like such a bro. 🤜🤛

Truly the happiest place on Earth!

The cynicism is so valid in examples like this. Haha a few years ago, I would’ve assumed that police didn’t want the “extra” work of having to process the assault; now, there are so many other options available for them to not do work!

My point isn’t that SF police are doing what they’re supposed to, it’s that this problem is systemic. It’s not just the police that are fucking this up, it’s not just fire making comments of pure idiocy about how appropriate it is to test for date rape drugs, it’s a problem that city government, police, fire, and health services are all contributing to when they refuse to test a patient who’s clearly been drugged. They have their tiny bit of hope for deniability (“date rape drugs aren’t commonly used in crimes here” and “what can you do when the test isn’t called for?” kinds of garbage) that every person should recognize as dangerous to all of society.