An otherwise-intelligent Russian woman made an equally asinine assertion about second-hand smoke to me six years ago.
She claimed that, because the smoker’s lungs only absorb about 30% of the cigarette smoke and exhale the other 70% into the surrounding air, that therefore anybody sitting next to the smoker inhales the entire remaining 70% of the smoke and so gets 7/3 as much smoke in their lungs. :rolleyes:
A properly designed fireplace doesn’t release any smoke at all.
Ahem.
I beg pardon, but the implication I stated is EXACTLY the one made in the OP.
Jim B. is attempting to set the truth value of the statement “ETS is harmful” to “false” by placing it as an assumption in an argument and attempting to show that it leads to a contradiction:
ASSUMPTION: Second-hand smoke is harmful
FACT: No one has been to have become addicted to nicotine through exposure to second-hand smoke.
ERGO: Second-hand smoke can not be as harmful as implied in this more or less anonymous opinion piece lifted from some website who quoted it from a Down-Under youth message board.
Without even touching the straw-man nature of the cited source as far as an objective measure of the hazards of second-hand smoke, the flaw in the reasoning here is obvious. There’s a hidden assumption that something harmful is inherently addictive. Therefore since the addiction is not manifesting itself, the perceived harm must be bunk.
So, all we need is some proof that harmful substances are universally addictive, and we may be on to something. Otherwise, the original post is horseshit.
Is the hazard to the smoker measured in density of smoke in the lungs? Let’s get a cite for that please (and from someone in more of a position to know that Mr. “Is She Really Going Out With Him?”, mmmkay, CheapBastid)
If true, then the density of ETS, generated by the smoker in the section of the room, is proportional to X/Y. What of the case, then, where there are at least X smokers in that section of the room?
If not true, (and I don’t see how it can be since that should mean that one good puff would be as dangerous as a chronic habit), then there is a time factor involved. What is the compared risk between a smoker whose lungs are exposed to mass of smoke A for time Z, and and a non-smoker’s lungs exposed to amount of smoke AX/Y for time W, where W is greater than or equal to ZY/X?
What’s passing for logic in this thread is abysmal.
The only thing the smokers and smoking apologists are proving here is purer air is better for brain function.
Wait a minute.
I’ve waited twenty, your argument is still crap.
OK, try to follow along now…
Inhaled cigarrette smoke is known to contain a number of harmful chemicals, including some known carcinogens, as well as at least one addictive substance, nicotine.
There are indeed claims about the harmfulness of second-hand smoke. That’s what’s up for discussion.
I have not heard any reputable claims that second-hand smoke is addictive, so that’s not up for discussion.
There are two things that happen when a smoker takes a drag: They get whatever satisfaction they get from the nicotine (which means that, get ready now, it most likely STAYS IN THEIR BODY, accounting for the lack of addiction in passersby) and a cloud of gray-colored, sooty gas comes out of their mouth and nose.
a)What’s at issue here is whether the gray sooty gas is any better for those who are inhaling it after the smoker exhales it than it is for the smoker when inhaled the first time. Since the smoker may get cancer, it might be argued that a certain amount of carcinogen is absorbed by the smoker’s body, leaving less for the rest of us, but that is only a comfort if it can be shown that there is only enough carcinogen present for one person to become afflicted. Arguments about volume, mass and exposure time come into play as well here.
b) You see, the gray gas is whatever is leftover once the lungs have absorbed whatever they are going to. A gas, you must understand, is made up of individual entities called molecules, some of which…
Oh never mind, step out for a breath of fresh air and read book on it.
<correction>
Goofed here, shoulda been “…at least Y smokers…” to make the math work.
</correction>
I was asking for input on my line of reasoning. Polite, or at least insightful input, I had hoped. :dubious: :rolleyes:
And, I do not smoke, and never have.
None the less, I fail to see the logic in the secondhand smoke argument.
Two lungfuls of smoke, scattered throughout a room, leaves very little material to be inhaled secondhand. The denser particulate matter would tend to settle out.
Did you read the cite, or just dismiss it with your oh so witty and well written ad hominem?
:rolleyes:
Your contention then, is that your average smoker lights up, puffs once, then leaves? Because otherwise your scenario is irrelevent to the question of the effects of ETS.
I did, and I found the information presented therein to be a specious and unsubstantiated as the random teenager cited in the OP.
My, my, don’t he sound authoritative! Numbers and such, and sweeping critiques of methodology. He doesn’t name a single one of these studies or his reasons for critique, of course, so he leaves us little with which to judge the credibility of his statements. But surely he wouldn’t be so bold as to fire such a broadside unless he had the credentials to back it up.
Unfortunately, I fail to see the connection between spending a quarter century writing pop songs and expertise in physiology and atmoshperic pollution. Unless you’ve got some information connecting the two disciplines, I can’s see him as anything but someone who has been reading anti-anti-smoking propaganda as voraciously as the teen in the OP has obviously reading anti-smoking literature.
Opinion columnists are not the most reliable source of facts. Neither are the glossy pamphlets they like to quote.
Here is the bibliography(PDF file) of the original 1993 EPA report, “Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking”, (link leads to page where the report and rebuttal to its critics can be found) that classified ETS as hazardous. Find some of the studies, and tell us why the EPA made a mistake in using their results.
Then we’ll have something to talk about.
At least some of what’s passing for logic in this thread is both snotty and abysmal, it seems to me. What syllogism have you constructed that could possibly lead you to conclude that nicotine is most likely absorbed completely by the smoker, but carcinogens are not? Using the same logic, we’d conclude that the carcinogens are completely absorbed (“They get cancer from the carcinogens they inhale(which means that, get ready now, it most likely STAYS IN THEIR BODY”). If nicotine is not completely absorbed, then your point is ridiculous. No amount of bluster will conceal that, unfortunately for you.
The OP’s question is a fair one, I believe, which does not at all imply that there isn’t a good answer that would still lead us to conclude that second-hand smoke is dangerous. Asking the question (and the reasonable speculation offered in response) is no cause for all your huffing and puffing. But if it makes you feel better, go right ahead.
By the way, this statement…
…is also logically fallacious. The argument may well be weak or poorly stated, as you suggest, but the argument stands or falls on its own. Doesn’t matter if the person making the assertion is a scientist a pop star or a pastry chef.
My contention is that the ammount of material inhaled has an obvious connection to the degree of risk. Given that the particulte matter is precipitating out of the air, and that the density of the smoke inhaled from a cigarette is greater than the density of the same smoke dispersed throughout the room, the exposure to the chemicals in the soke is lessened, and therefore the risk is lessened.
BTW, scotandrsn --this is Great Debates, not the BBQ Pit. Please respond with a little more civilty, as is customary in this Forum.
From the Rebuttals section:
(italics mine)
How are these statement honestly tenable? Am I correct in interpreting this statement that:
Smoking CAUSES cancer? Is this the most honest way to present the evidence? The implication is that if one smokes one will get (and then die of) cancer. Isn’t it more intellectually honest to say that it is a known carcinogen and smoking increases the risk of contracting cancer? Yes, it can be said that the statement is not a false one, but the implications are false.
There is NO THRESHOLD? If I smoke a single cigarette at the age of 24 I am now at risk of getting lung cancer? Had I not, I would not have been at risk?
Risk factors are vaunted with numbers (e.g. 2,000%) that make one pause and often more than pause just plain freak out. If one were to be very skeptical, all of the human studies might be classified as Post Hoc Ergo propter Hoc. Correlation is not Causality. Simple numbers here regarding lung cancer (the largest cause of death used in these studies) in males:
Number of deaths by Lung Cancer in Males in the U.S.A. = 100 per 100,000.
Simple chance of getting lung cancer with no risk factors taken into account:
.1%
Simply put, a male is 99.9% sure he will not get Lung Cancer not considering any risks involved at all.
Of those 100 men who died of Lung cancer 89% of the dead men have cigarette smoking in their history.
So if one is a non smoker the best case scenario of risk of getting lung cancer can be calculated as
.011%
Now this does not take into account the fact that the 89 men who died of lung cancer that were smokers might still have died of lung cancer had they never smoked.
A quote from smoke-hating Cecil’s Article regarding the risks
Another direct quote from the Rebuttals section:
And this is what we’re arguing about?
In the absence of a response by Jim B. to my comments on the OP, I have addressed points in its support brought up by Parental Advisory and Dog80. the post you quote comes from my commentary on the latter’s post:
Here, Dog80 expresses apparent incredulity that inhaled smoke could possess two properties, whereas exhaled smoke could possess only one of the two, as shown by what little evidence we have (smokers get addictions and cancer, whereas second-hand smokers don’t seem to get addicted). It does not seem to have occurred to any of the above-named posters that, being a gas mixture, the components of different varieties of smoke may be different due to different substances reacting with the human body in a different way.
The entire OP is designed to declare that there can be no legitimate danger from ETS because it seems to lack an addictive agent, not even allowing for the possibility that the nicotine might be absorbed into the body while other harmful substances within the inhaled smoke are not. Unless proof exists that every component of inhaled smoke leaves the body entirely, then that possibility must be retained.
The mechanism for the biological effect of ANY kind of smoke is going to have its basis solidly in chemistry. Any argument related to these results that is based on a complete lack of understanding of the basics of that subject is not worthy of serious consideration, and I have treated each such argument accordingly.
Mr. Jackson’s comments mention a number of studies, and a laundry list of reasons they are to be ignored. He names not a single one, describes nearly nothing of them, and does not mention any firm benchmark by which their undisclosed methodologies should be considered dismissable. Without such detail, one has nothing to go on to judge even the basic strength or weakness of his arguments other than his authority on the subject.
The fallacy here was CheapBastid’s appeal to that authority as something by which we might decide the dangers of second-hand smoke. I have three or four Joe Jackson albums at home, and, through friends, have had a chance to listen to the greater part of the body of his recorded work. Some great tunes, but nothing that suggests I should just take his word for it on anything related to ETS.
[QUOTE=Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor]
My contention is that the ammount of material inhaled has an obvious connection to the degree of risk. Given that the particulte matter is precipitating out of the air, and that the density of the smoke inhaled from a cigarette is greater than the density of the same smoke dispersed throughout the room, the exposure to the chemicals in the soke is lessened, and therefore the risk is lessened.
[QUOTE]
But the risk due to the sheer mass of smoke involved can not reduce according to the proportion you have described unless there is only one smoker and they behave as I have described.
The mass A of smoke exhaled does indeed disperse throughout a closed space, reducing the density of smoke as you have laid out. Then, on the second puff, the mass of smoke in the room is 2*A, and the density correspondingly doubles. Or, if more than one smoker is present with comparably sized lungs, then the mass exhaled is double as well.
Enough puffs, and you get the room density up to the same level as that in the lungs.
Of course, there’s also the possibility that the other harmful substances are absorbed more efficiently than nicotine by the smoker’s lungs, making other people in the room even less likely to get cancer than to become addicted. Without any real facts on the matter, we’re just stabbing in the dark.
[QUOTE=scotandrsn]
[QUOTE=Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor]
My contention is that the ammount of material inhaled has an obvious connection to the degree of risk. Given that the particulte matter is precipitating out of the air, and that the density of the smoke inhaled from a cigarette is greater than the density of the same smoke dispersed throughout the room, the exposure to the chemicals in the soke is lessened, and therefore the risk is lessened.
No. The cigarette could not last long enough to equal the volume of even a modestly-sized room.
My point in linking the essay was not to supply a scientific cite, but rather a well reasoned personal opinion. I consider it interesting reading, which is why I titled my post such.
Your reply was to post an ad hominem attack to (what it now appears to be) what you considered to be an appeal to authority? What authority does Joe Jackson hold? What authority did I claim that he holds?
It is not a study. I did not claim that it was a study. It is not a collection of studies. I did not claim that it was a collection of studies. It is one mans rational argument that goes against the current flood of arguments. I found it interesting, worth reading, and worth sharing. It nourished the skeptic in me, and seems (to me, again) to be in the spirit of the Straight Dope, not accepting popular conclusions, but investigating and coming to one’s own conclusion based on research.
He also did the song “Everything Causes Cancer”.