Facts Vs. Fears: A Review of the Greatest Unfounded Health Scares of Recent Times

Facts Vs. Fears: A Review of the Greatest Unfounded Health Scares of Recent Times PDF Author:
Publisher: Am Cncl on Science, Health
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 65

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Facts Vs. Fears: A Review of the Greatest Unfounded Health Scares of Recent Times

Facts Vs. Fears: A Review of the Greatest Unfounded Health Scares of Recent Times PDF Author:
Publisher: Am Cncl on Science, Health
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 65

Get Book Here

Book Description


Facts Versus Fears

Facts Versus Fears PDF Author: Adam J. Lieberman
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Health attitudes
Languages : en
Pages : 44

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The Real Environmental Crisis

The Real Environmental Crisis PDF Author: Jack M. Hollander
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520243285
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
"Jack Hollander has written a lucid and path-breaking book. He is completely convincing in his thesis that it is poverty we should be addressing, both for the environment and for moral reasons, and that science, technology, markets, and affluence are the friends of the environment and poverty is the enemy. The book is of the highest scholarship and gets the big picture right; the arguments on both sides are addressed with clear thinking and clear prose. Though he is an eminent scientist, Hollander has a wonderful talent for keeping technical jargon to a minimum yet making the essence of technical arguments clear. Both the intelligent layman and the environmental scientist will learn much from this book. I did, and enjoyed the book immensely."—Bruce Ames, Former Director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Center, University of California, Berkeley "This book is a much-needed reminder that declining environmental integrity is not—and certainly need not be—an inexorable attribute of economic progress. Throughout the book the author dispels a number of closely related myths, such as that of steadily increasing scarcity of energy resources. Hollander provides a corrective to the simplistic and unbalanced treatment of environmental and natural resource topics one encounters all too often in the media and in public debate."—Joel Darmstadter, Resources for the Future; editor, Global Development and the Environment: Perspectives on Sustainability "This work is extremely important and makes a major contribution to the debate and decision-making surrounding efforts to eradicate poverty and protect the environment. In a uniquely balanced manner, Hollander adds to the general understanding of how poverty and wealth contribute to sustainable management of natural resources."—Per Pinstrup-Andersen, author of Seeds of Contention: World Hunger and the Global Controversy over GM Crops "Jack Hollander puts forth two simple hypotheses. The first, explicit, is that environmental sustainability depends on extending prosperity to the developing world. The second, implicit, is that the sustainability of environmentalism depends on transparent and objective science. Both are well defended in Hollander's clear, well researched and timely book."—Richard S. Lindzen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

How to Sell a Poison

How to Sell a Poison PDF Author: Elena Conis
Publisher: Bold Type Books
ISBN: 1645036758
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 369

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Book Description
The story of an infamous poison that left toxic bodies and decimated wildlife in its wake is also a cautionary tale about how corporations stoke the flames of science denialism for profit. The chemical compound DDT first earned fame during World War II by wiping out insects that caused disease and boosting Allied forces to victory. Americans granted it a hero’s homecoming, spraying it on everything from crops and livestock to cupboards and curtains. Then, in 1972, it was banned in the US. But decades after that, a cry arose to demand its return. This is the sweeping narrative of generations of Americans who struggled to make sense of the notorious chemical’s risks and benefits. Historian Elena Conis follows DDT from postwar farms, factories, and suburban enclaves to the floors of Congress and tony social clubs, where industry barons met with Madison Avenue brain trusts to figure out how to sell the idea that a little poison in our food and bodies was nothing to worry about. In an age of spreading misinformation on issues including pesticides, vaccines, and climate change, Conis shows that we need new ways of communicating about science—as a constantly evolving discipline, not an immutable collection of facts—before it’s too late.

The Precautionary Principle in the 20th Century

The Precautionary Principle in the 20th Century PDF Author: Paul Harremoes
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134207786
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
The precautionary principle is widely seen as fundamental to successful policies for sustainability. It has been cited in international courts and trade disputes between the USA and the EU, and invoked in a growing range of political debates. Understanding what it can and cannot achieve is therefore crucial. This volume looks back over the last century to examine the role the principle played or could have played, in a range of major and avoidable public disasters. From detailed investigation of how each disaster unfolded, what the impacts were and what measures were adopted, the authors draw lessons and establish criteria that could help to minimise the health and environmental risks of future technological, economic and policy innovations. This is an informative resource for all those from lawyers and policy-makers, to researchers and students needing to understand or apply the principle.

The Ethics of Protocells

The Ethics of Protocells PDF Author: Mark A. Bedau
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262292297
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 381

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Book Description
Experts explore the potential benefits, risks, and moral aspects of protocell technology, which creates simple forms of life from nonliving material. Teams of scientists around the world are racing to create protocells—microscopic, self-organizing entities that spontaneously assemble from simple organic and inorganic materials. The creation of fully autonomous protocells—a technology that can, for all intents and purposes, be considered literally alive—is only a matter of time. This book examines the pressing social and ethical issues raised by the creation of life in the laboratory. Protocells might offer great medical and social benefits and vast new economic opportunities, but they also pose potential risks and threaten cultural and moral norms against tampering with nature and “playing God.” The Ethics of Protocells offers a variety of perspectives on these concerns. After a brief survey of current protocell research (including the much-publicized “top-down” strategy of J. Craig Venter and Hamilton Smith, for which they have received multimillion dollar financing from the U.S. Department of Energy), the chapters treat risk, uncertainty, and precaution; lessons from recent history and related technologies; and ethics in a future society with protocells. The discussions range from new considerations of the precautionary principle and the role of professional ethicists to explorations of what can be learned from society's experience with other biotechnologies and the open-source software movement. Contributors Mark A. Bedau, Gaymon Bennett, Giovanni Boniolo, Carl Cranor, Bill Durodié, Mickey Gjerris, Brigitte Hantsche-Tangen, Christine Hauskeller, Andrew Hessel, Brian Johnson, George Khushf, Emily C. Parke, Alain Pottage, Paul Rabinow, Per Sandin, Joachim Schummer, Mark Triant, Laurie Zoloth

Newspaper-Real Estate Schemes of the 1920s

Newspaper-Real Estate Schemes of the 1920s PDF Author: Margaret B. Barker
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 147664179X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
In the 1920s, newspapers and real estate developers colluded in a scheme to sell tiny vacation lots to subscribers. A zealous advertising campaign spawned a land-buying frenzy that sprouted dozens of waterfront summer colonies across the country. The resulting legal, social and environmental mayhem caused some of these communities to disappear or be drastically altered in character, while others managed to survive more or less intact. Drawing on newspaper accounts of the day, this book explores how the scheme eluded accusations of fraud, creating an assembly line for middle class resorts through a lucrative merger of real estate and journalism. Pell Lake, Wisconsin, serves as a case study that yields the best evidence for determining if it was all a scam. Told here for the first time, the story of this unusual alliance and the communities it created offers lessons for today's entrepreneurs, journalists, advertisers, real estate developers, environmentalists and anyone who has ever lived in a resort community.

Bountiful Harvest

Bountiful Harvest PDF Author: Thomas R. DeGregori
Publisher: Cato Institute
ISBN: 9781930865310
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 284

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Book Description
Debunking the myths of frankenfood.

Pseudoscience and the Paranormal

Pseudoscience and the Paranormal PDF Author: Terence Hines
Publisher: Prometheus Books
ISBN: 1615920854
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 516

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Book Description
Television, the movies, and computer games fill the minds of their viewers with a daily staple of fantasy, from tales of UFO landings, haunted houses, and communication with the dead to claims of miraculous cures by gifted healers or breakthrough treatments by means of fringe medicine. The paranormal is so ubiquitous in one form of entertainment or another that many people easily lose sight of the distinction between the real and the imaginary, or they never learn to make the distinction in the first place. In this thorough review of pseudoscience and the paranormal in contemporary life, psychologist Terence Hines teaches readers how to carefully evaluate all such claims in terms of scientific evidence.Hines devotes separate chapters to psychics; life after death; parapsychology; astrology; UFOs; ancient astronauts, cosmic collisions, and the Bermuda Triangle; faith healing; and more. New to this second edition are extended sections on psychoanalysis and pseudopsychologies, especially recovered memory therapy, satanic ritual abuse, facilitated communication, and other questionable psychotherapies. There are also new chapters on alternative medicine, which is now marketed in our drug stores, and on environmental pseudoscience, with special emphasis on the evidence that certain technologies like cell phones or environmental agents like asbestos cause cancer.Finally, Hines discusses the psychological causes for belief in the paranormal despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This valuable, highly interesting, and completely accessible analysis critiques the whole range of current paranormal claims.

A Reader for the Politically Incorrect

A Reader for the Politically Incorrect PDF Author: George Zilbergeld
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
Calls attention to the dangers of the politically correct movement.