BEWARE THE ENERGY SAVING LIGHTBULBS

[Mammon]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-LOtKIIKcg...feature=related

This video cracked me up. I never knew they were so deadly, and that we need special rules to use them.

[KevinDW78]

This is such a tired old Straw Man argument. Thermometers used mercury inside glass for decades, yet we still shoved them up babies asses. My trash bags are stamped with "This is not a toy". The "warnings" on the CF bulbs just more idiotic exaggeration over something that should be common sense because of trial lawyers like John Edwards to make fortunes suing companies on behalf of brain-dead clients who would be safer if they really were brain dead. People need to be debating the idiocy of the government dictating what lighbulbs we use rather than continuing to bash CF lightbulbs, which personally I love and wouldn't use anything else.

Edited June 18, 2008 by KevinDW78

[D'kian]

This is such a tired old Straw Man argument. Thermometers used mercury inside glass for decades, yet we still shoved them up babies asses.

There's a bit of a difference. Mercury in thermometers is liquid. CF bulbs use mercury vapor to generate UV light, which then makes the phospor coating inside glow in visible light frequencies. Liquid mercury is harmless in small amounts, such as those found in a thermometer. Mercury vapor is toxic.

That said, there's not enough mercury vapor inside a CF bulb to poison an adult if a bulb should break inside a sealed room. To get seriously ill, you'd have to drill a tiny hole in the glass, then suck out and breathe all the vapor inside several bulbs. I've had a CF break in my room and absolutely nothing happened to me (I did open the window, closed the door and left the room for a few minutes). I've also had old tube fluorescents break variously at school and at work a couple of times, and nothing happened then either (the old fluorescents also have mercury vapor inside, possibly more than current CFs). Hell, in chemistry lab we'd heat up mercury oxide, inside a glass bell, to form mercury and oxygen; the remaining mercury droplets were warm enough to evaporate a little. Still nothing.

So, yes, it is a tired straw man argument.

Prolonged exposure to mercury, which evaporates as all liquids do, or ingesting large amounts of it, will cause nerve and brain damage over time. But that's simply not the case with CF bulbs at all.

You want something dangerous, stay away from Pepsi. It's loaded with dihydrogen monoxide. A corrosive compound used to make industrial cleaning products, to clean up floors and machinery, and is found in large amounts inside cancer cells

My trash bags are stamped with "This is not a toy". The "warnings" on the CF bulbs just more idiotic exaggeration

As are most of the warnings palced on every product, accesory, packing materials, etc, etc.

[Steve D'Ippolito]

You want something dangerous, stay away from Pepsi. It's loaded with dihydrogen monoxide. A corrosive compound used to make industrial cleaning products, to clean up floors and machinery, and is found in large amounts inside cancer cells

You forgot to mention how much property damage DHMO causes. Billions of dollars annually. And thousands of people die every year from inhaling it too.

[khaight]

It's not purely a straw man argument, at least not as I see it. These bulbs do contain a small amount of a toxic substance, and yet environmentalists are using law to push them into people's homes. Sure, the actual risk is not significant -- but given the way the viros freak out about insignificant amounts of toxic chemicals in other contexts, it's worth pointing out their inconsistency. If they applied the same standards to CFC bulbs that they apply in other cases, they'd be trying to ban them. And if these bulbs happen to violate various environmentalist-inspired laws (such as California's Proposition 65), we should absolutely insist that those laws be applied consistently and in full.

[D'kian]

You forgot to mention how much property damage DHMO causes. Billions of dollars annually. And thousands of people die every year from inhaling it too.

Oh, yes. It can also dissolve organic molecules as well as minerals. Not to mention it's also used as an industrial coolant. And so much of it gets dumped into the ocean, it might as well be all dihydrogen monoxide by now!

Of course every word I've said about it it's true.

[Mammon]

You want something dangerous, stay away from Pepsi. It's loaded with dihydrogen monoxide. A corrosive compound used to make industrial cleaning products, to clean up floors and machinery, and is found in large amounts inside cancer cells

I'm.... actually drinking Pepsi as I'm reading your post. Thanks for making me horriable!

[John McVey]

You want something dangerous, stay away from Pepsi.

Dammit.

JJM

[EC]

You want something dangerous, stay away from Pepsi. It's loaded with dihydrogen monoxide. A corrosive compound used to make industrial cleaning products, to clean up floors and machinery, and is found in large amounts inside cancer cells

Damn... I drink about a two liter of the stuff everyday.

[Benpercent]

You've ruined all our beverage-drinking lives D'kian. I just drank a Pepsi yesterday with my sandwich.

[Capitalism Forever]

The other day, I was on a Ryanair flight and the crew began selling drinks and snacks.

"I'll have a Coke, please," I said.

"We've got Pepsi, will that be all right?"

After a little hesitation, I said: "Apple juice."

"Juice?" the guy asked, looking somewhat surprised. "Well, we've got orange juice..."

"Sure, that'll do fine."

Edited June 19, 2008 by Capitalism Forever

[D'kian]

You've ruined all our beverage-drinking lives D'kian. I just drank a Pepsi yesterday with my sandwich.

Good! Try a Coke instead. I hear it goes particualrly well with Mentos

[D'kian]

If they applied the same standards to CFC bulbs that they apply in other cases, they'd be trying to ban them.

Remember the viros implicit premise is that man is evil. Some, not all, have the goal of erradicating humanity. More, but still not all, simply want to destroy industrial civilization. Keep this in mind.

Now, for years and years the viros of all kinds really liked wind powered turbines to generate electricity. It's not a bad idea, either. But it's not so simple as to put a rotor together and couple it to a generator. Wind is inconstant in speed and direction, after all, and your design has to manage that. So at first wind turbines were so inneficient as to be more expensive than coal fired plants per killowatt hour produced. In time and with a lot of effrot by researchers and engineers, wind turbines came to be more efficient and reliable, to the opint that they could compete, at certain locations, with coal fired power plants.

Then suddenly the viros who loved the wind turbine when it dind't work, discovered them to be a menace to the very existence of the Planet. Why, they cause visual pollution. Why, they alter the local weather. Why, they are a danger to migratory birds. Why, they don't say, they can now generate industrial-scale power cheaply! Thats' what they dont' want.

So wait for CFs to be widely used, either by force or for some other reason. Wait till incandescent bulb manufacturers stop making them. Then the viros will rasie a hue and cry about the dangerous mercury vapor isnide CFs. It makes strategic sense.

[K-Mac]

Pepsi and Coke suck anyway. Dr Pepper is where it's at!

In all seriousness, the argument here is what Poe brings up in the very beginning...nowhere in the Constitution does it give Congress the right to choose my light bulbs for me. That's it. End of story. The government should not be sticking its nose where it doesn't belong. The fact that the bulbs may or may not be harmful, expensive, efficient, whatever, is really beside the point. All of these issues should be sorted out by the market, not the government. Poe should have stuck to the fundamental problem of this issue and elaborated on it, rather than go off on his other tangents about the potential hazards of the chemicals and China. Typical problem with the Republican Party.

[Steve D'Ippolito]

Ah, but Kelly, those bulbs crossed state lines, so the interstate commerce clause gives Congress the power to....

HEY, PUT DOWN THE GLOCK!! I'M JOKING!!!!

By the way those other drinks also contain DHMO. It pretty much permeates the environment, it's even in the air we breathe.

I've given up. I drink it straight.

[D'kian]

I've given up. I drink it straight.

There's nothing quite like pure Dihydrogen Monoxide, as long as you use vodka as a purifyng agent.

(Because by now I expect everyone has figured it out).

[Maximus]

...nowhere in the Constitution does it give Congress the right to choose my light bulbs for me. That's it. End of story.

Wait 'till Maxine Waters nationalises the light bulb industry.

[Steve D'Ippolito]

Maxine Waters

Looks like he figured it out.

[musenji]

Yeah, and if you need a reason not to drink pop, you don't have to look for some oddly named (or re-named) compound. Sugar and caffeine are horrible for the body.

It's fine in moderation, you say? Okay, but know that there's almost 1/4 cup of sugar in a can of pop.

[Erik Christensen]

Another pet peeve I have with wind power is having to look at those damn things spinning all the time. Not only an eye sore and a distraction, but a headache too.