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Assorted Links

Thanks to David Archer.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 8th, 2011 at 5:36 am and is filed under Assorted Links. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

5 Responses to “Assorted Links”

  1. Kim Øyhus Says:
    August 8th, 2011 at 10:46 pm

    The insecticide my parents used in our cabin many years ago was just a couple of atoms different from a neurotoxin developed for warfare, and it was very efficient against insects. But if it is that close to being directly lethal to humans, then it is likely to be damaging to humans, just not obviously so, because they test against that. And then there are all the random chemical reactions happening everywhere, surely changing some the insecticide to variants of the one for killing humans.

    And then there is the farmer branch of my family tree, with a lot of clearly inherited aquired genetic defects. The farmer who was said to be sloppy with insecticides.

  2. dearieme Says:
    August 9th, 2011 at 2:45 am

    “a couple of atoms different from a neurotoxin developed for warfare, …. But if it is that close to being directly lethal to humans..”: chemistry doesn’t work like that. Common salt is just one atom different from a toxic gas and a flammable metal.

  3. Kim Øyhus Says:
    August 9th, 2011 at 7:01 am

    Example of a nerve toxin similar to an insecticide:

    Organophosphates are fairly complex poisons, where small differences can give similar properties.

    Sarin is a potent nerve toxin for humans.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarin

    Diisopropyl-fluorophosphate is an insect poison, but to humans it is a medicine. It has a molecule very similar to Sarin, except it has two iso-propane groups instead of one.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diisopropyl_fluorophosphate

  4. Seth Roberts Says:
    August 10th, 2011 at 12:39 am

    “Common salt is just one atom different.” But common salt has just two atoms — obviously changing 50% of a molecule will make a huge difference. The pesticides that Kim is talking about have far more than two atoms.

  5. Alrenous Says:
    August 10th, 2011 at 10:02 am

    I want to see that justice study, except done on judges on a paleo diet or otherwise not sugar-addicted.

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