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Medicine

Short-Term Exposure To Diesel Fumes Causes Changes In Gene Expression 132

BarbaraHudson writes: The Vancouver Sun is reporting on experiments using human volunteers showing that just two hours of exposure to diesel exhaust fumes led to biological changes; some genes were switched on while others turned off. The air quality during the diesel fume exposures is said to be comparable to a Beijing highway or shipping ports in British Columbia. The next step is for researchers to study how changes in gene expression from air pollution affect the human body over the long term, since the study shows genes may be vulnerable to pollution without producing any obvious or immediate symptoms of ill health."
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Short-Term Exposure To Diesel Fumes Causes Changes In Gene Expression

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  • Let's try two hours of exposure to Slashdot and see what sorts of gene expression changes are detected.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by ColdWetDog ( 752185 )

      It's kinda a dumb study. Expose asthmatics to diesel fumes. Something happens at the gene level. What did they expect? Midoclorians?

      • Are they going to stop at diesel fuel? What else should be on the list of things that cause gene expression changes? How long and useful would that list be?
      • by BarbaraHudson ( 3785311 ) <barbara.jane.hud ... minus physicist> on Saturday January 10, 2015 @12:55PM (#48781855) Journal
        Maybe you should consider that asthma is on the rise, and that people with asthma are like the "canary in the mine shaft".

        It showed that just two hours of exposure to diesel exhaust fumes led to biological changes that meant some genes were switched on while others turned off.

        So, how much exposure before it happens to the rest of us? What can we do to lessen the effects? There are relevant questions.

        • by X0563511 ( 793323 ) on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:04PM (#48781911) Homepage Journal

          Rather I think the important bit here is the revelation that common air pollutants affect gene expression, not the effects of such expression. The mechanism is the important part.

          I assume they had a control group... is that a correct assumption?

        • There are relevant questions.

          Not to the bean counters we put in charge. The economy is all that matters. No matter what happens, no matter how disastrous, there's always a profit to be made from it.

          • So the task at hand is to show how it can be profitable to be less polluting, the same as was done when businesses were complaining about new sulfur emission regulations, but then found they could sell the sulfur collected at a profit.
            • by MightyMartian ( 840721 ) on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:12PM (#48781981) Journal

              Why should making a specific industry stop causing us harm require the industry find profit in it? Shouldn't it be enough to demonstrate the harm and industry then stop the harm? Frankly if an industry requires a profit motive to stop hurting us, then that industry needs serious reforms at a root level.

              • My point is that it's easier to use a carrot than a stick. If anti-pollution controls can make them a profit, then you really only have to convince a few, and the others will hop on the bandwagon because of the financial incentive, rather than trying to work around the issue.
              • Why should making a specific industry stop causing us harm require the industry find profit in it?

                Because corporations write bills and buy politicians to submit and support them. These bills then become law.

                Frankly if an industry requires a profit motive to stop hurting us, then that industry needs serious reforms at a root level.

                Name an industry in which more than a couple dozen people are employed which is not hurting "us".

              • In the Libertarian Paradise, there are no external costs.

              • Shouldn't it be enough to demonstrate the harm and industry then stop the harm?

                Maybe the study went further than the article, but Im not clear where you got "harm" from. The article mentions gene changes-- that doesnt mean they were harmful.

                You know what they say about assumptions.

                Frankly if an industry requires a profit motive to stop hurting us, then that industry needs serious reforms at a root level.

                If you think you can expect institutional altruism out of anyone, I have a bridge to sell you.

              • Not everyone has the same harm vs benefit outlook. You might want a perfect green earth but I like cheap energy today and can live with the health risks. We are all going to die someday and at least I want to be warm. So the short answer is, I don't care about your genes and you don't care if people freeze. To each his own. There is no "we".

            • So, we should pay off the bully so he'll stop beating us up just because he 'creates jobs'?

              • No, we should show the bully that it's in his self-interest. Better than trying to beat it in them with a stick.
                • Non-violence is always best, but making the current methods unprofitable also works. It gets around the 'leading the horse to water' problem.

        • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:54PM (#48782209) Homepage Journal

          Maybe you should consider that asthma is on the rise, and that people with asthma are like the "canary in the mine shaft".

          I own both [old school indirect-injected, pollution control-free] diesels and [modern, multiple heated O2 sensor] gasoline vehicles, and I also have activity-induced bronchial asthma which can also be set off by allergies, like my allergies to dogs and cats. And what I've noticed is that gasoline fumes are probably an order of magnitude more likely to kick off my asthma. Which is why I'm wondering why they're studying this with regards to diesel fumes. I want to know who's footing the bill for this bull. It's not that it's bad science, it's that the motivations are probably evil if they're not looking at gasoline, which any asshole who's been to a filling station more than twice can tell you is more volatile than diesel. Diesel clings to your hands, but you can feel gasoline in your brain.

          • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

            Gasoline engines have higher levels of carbon monoxide than diesel or propane engines. You don't want your test subjects dying on you, right?
            • Gasoline engines have higher levels of carbon monoxide than diesel or propane engines. You don't want your test subjects dying on you, right?

              Well, it's not my test. I guess I'll just take the fact that they'll do this test with diesel because it doesn't cause any significant primary health effects but won't do it with gasoline as yet another sign that diesel is safer than gas.

              • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

                It's a game of 'pick your poison'. I too, prefer compression ignition over the spark. It's just more reliable and natural with more fuel flexibility. Continuous combustion of a steam or stirling engine would be the least polluting though.

                • Continuous combustion of a steam or stirling engine would be the least polluting though

                  I'd really like to have a steam-powered pickup truck, although I fear it would not be particularly practical. I do have one which would be a decent candidate for steam conversion, because it's big and it's an old diesel so no emissions controls. I lack some of the equipment I'd need to fab up the bits, though, let alone the most important parts.

              • You'll see diesel equipment operating in mines and warehouses, specifically because the CO from gasoline engines will kill you in enclosed spaces. Same reason why Zambonis use propane to clean the ice in hockey arenas.
              • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

                Diesel tends to be better for particulate matter now, although I'm surprised your older one is apparently better for you... Must be something in the gasoline that causes your reaction, rather than just the amount of particulate matter.

                What diesel sucks for though is carcinogens.

          • I don't really see how diesel vs. gas is a good vs. evil debate that warrants you throwing suspicion on their "evil" motivations.... They ran a test against Diesel. That doesn't mean they aren't going to run one against gasoline too.

            It's not like there's an evil Gasoline lobby buying up scientists to destroy the good name of Diesel.....

            • It's not like there's an evil Gasoline lobby buying up scientists to destroy the good name of Diesel.....

              As far as I can tell, there is. Anyone who cares and is paying attention has seen all the different diesel hit pieces circulating lately. Some of them are probably the fault of the French, they're trying to ban diesel in the name of emissions controls right now instead of just banning diesels without emissions controls on them, which are the problem. The US federal government is also rabidly anti-diesel, and has been for decades.

    • Let's try two hours of exposure to pornhub and see what sorts of jeans expression changes are detected.
  • by Anonymous Coward

    Short term exposure to a common pollutant causes massive mutation possibilities, and coupled with the rise in cancers (noted along major highways for example) perhaps you're too dumb to study this study instead?

  • by Anonymous Coward

    That can't be good either.

  • ... to express themselves and gassing them with diesel fuel is is just wrong because 1st amendment.

  • Well duh! (Score:5, Funny)

    by smooth wombat ( 796938 ) on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:27PM (#48782045) Journal
    Hopefully all those morons who are ""rollin coal [urbandictionary.com]" will be sterile so they can't pass on their defective genes to another generation.
  • Why diesel fuel? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:29PM (#48782059) Homepage Journal

    âoeDiesel engine exhaust is a known carcinogen that is responsible for two-thirds of the lifetime cancer risk from air pollution in our region,â Moore said. âoeThe prohibitions that come into effect in 2015 are essential to protect human health by reducing emissions of harmful diesel soot from industrial and construction machines.â

    Why is this witch-hunt against diesel fuel? Why not gasoline? Can someone explain to me why the world is up in arms about diesel fuel but calmly ignoring the fact that gasoline engines produce just as much soot, but with finer (and thus more hazardous) particulates? And that they release more unburned hydrocarbons into the atmosphere, although to be fair, direct gasoline injection is erasing that particular problem. Is this just about preventing us from using biofuels?

    • by drnb ( 2434720 )
      In the US we could greatly reduce pollution in the very near future with existing technology by switching our heavy trucks from diesel to natural gas. Such trucks aren't going electric anytime soon. Biodiesel might be interesting but its not ready to scale up as necessary anytime soon. We'll probably have to wait some number of decades as the US military breaks ground with respect to large scale use of biofuels.

      That said we probably need to cleanup our natural gas production so that any gains on the back
      • In the US we could greatly reduce pollution in the very near future with existing technology by switching our heavy trucks from diesel to natural gas.

        False. We could switch them to biodiesel from algae, though.

        Biodiesel might be interesting but its not ready to scale up as necessary anytime soon.

        False. We could scale it up in very short order if we wanted to. You pump seawater into the desert and grow algae in raceway ponds. The USDoE proved this technology at Sandia NREL in the 1980s, and showed that it should be profitable by the time diesel fuel hit $3/gal. It is over that now.

        That said we probably need to cleanup our natural gas production so that any gains on the back end (trucking) are not lost on the front end (production).

        Natgas production is today based on fracking. Fail, fail.

        • by drnb ( 2434720 )

          In the US we could greatly reduce pollution in the very near future with existing technology by switching our heavy trucks from diesel to natural gas.

          False. We could switch them to biodiesel from algae, though.

          No we could not do that in the very near future.

          Biodiesel might be interesting but its not ready to scale up as necessary anytime soon.

          False. We could scale it up in very short order if we wanted to. You pump seawater into the desert and grow algae in raceway ponds. The USDoE proved this technology at Sandia NREL in the 1980s, and showed that it should be profitable by the time diesel fuel hit $3/gal. It is over that now.

          No. The fact that the technology is proven does not mean that it is ready to scale up to necessary levels any time soon. We are only now just beginning to experiment with large scale production as part of US military pilot programs. Your algae ponds will be tied up in court for a decade or more before the first shovel touches desert tortoise or kangaroo rat habitat. Let alone all the necessary engineering that still needs to take place.

          That said we probably need to cleanup our natural gas production so that any gains on the back end (trucking) are not lost on the front end (production).

          Natgas production is today based on fracking. Fail, fail.

          No, the fracking techniq

          • No we could not do that in the very near future.

            Yes, yes we could. It's cheap and easy.

            No. The fact that the technology is proven does not mean that it is ready to scale up to necessary levels any time soon.

            Yes. The test was applicable to large-scale production. If you had read the report [nrel.gov] then you would know this. I've read the whole thing, how much have you read?

            No, the fracking techniques could be cleaned up.

            [citation needed]

            Regulations are need to ensure proper shaft creation

            There's no such thing.

            non-toxic fluids being pumped

            So, only water then?

            fracking is at proper depths and below proper impermeable layers, etc

            There's no such thing, and no such thing.

            There is nothing wrong with the fracking concept, its the current implementation that is screwed up.

            No, implementation of the idea is screwed up.

            An implementation based on low costs not safety.

            It's never safe, because the repercussions are never clear, because our remote sensing technology will not tell us everything we need to know to frack intelligently. May

            • by drnb ( 2434720 )

              No we could not do that in the very near future.

              Yes, yes we could. It's cheap and easy.

              Your own old citation proves otherwise. Your citation mentions various open questions moving from lab conditions to field conditions. Swings in desert temperatures were very disruptive, hostile to many species. At best your citation claims they have shown large scale plausibilty. As I said, much work remains.

              Wiki shows that more recent government cost estimates approach US$200 a barrel pricing.

              No. The fact that the technology is proven does not mean that it is ready to scale up to necessary levels any time soon.

              Yes. The test was applicable to large-scale production. If you had read the report [nrel.gov] then you would know this. I've read the whole thing, how much have you read?

              You need to re-read. They claim nothing more than plausibility of large scale production from the olympic sized

              • Swings in desert temperatures were very disruptive, hostile to many species

                This is not a serious problem, because over time the best species will colonize the ponds and you simply harvest the dieoffs.

                The US military is only now attempting large scale production and anticipates **decades** of work ahead.

                Because the military will do something slow and expensively, it can't be done right?

                I'd love to see it happen but for the near future we could move to natural gas or continue to use petroleum.

                Actually, the best solution would be to produce Butanol. We'd be able to buy that already but a holding company owned jointly by BP and DuPont is suing a company owned by GE ventures to prevent them from selling it to us. It's a less polluting 1:1 replacement for gasoline made by bacteria since the 180

                • by drnb ( 2434720 )

                  Swings in desert temperatures were very disruptive, hostile to many species

                  This is not a serious problem, because over time the best species will colonize the ponds and you simply harvest the dieoffs.

                  No, the goal is not to simply get something to grow. The point is to get specific species that produce desired byproducts efficiently to grow. Selection for the environment is one thing, selecting for efficient industrial production is something else. This is one of the differences between basic scientific research that demonstrates feasibility and engineering that produces a product, in academia a certain amount of hand waving, of leaving secondary problems for the next researcher (or engineer), is allowed

                  • No, the goal is not to simply get something to grow. The point is to get specific species that produce desired byproducts efficiently to grow.

                    If you had read the report instead of searching it for terms on which to attack it, you'd know that the major discovery of the study was that there's no point to selecting organisms deliberately, because the most efficient algae for your location will just show up and colonize the pond.

                    Like it or not the military is leading the effort to industrialize biofuels and do large scale production.

                    But they want to do algae in "reactors" (which is generally the focus of the industry) because it's a more controlled environment. They don't want to use the cheap, easy way we have to do it already for all the usual reasons.

                    • by drnb ( 2434720 )

                      ... because the most efficient algae for your location will just show up and colonize the pond

                      The most efficient with respect to survival in the environment. That is not the same thing as the most efficient with respect to production of the desired chemicals and the efficiency of use of the injected CO2.

                      But they want to do algae in "reactors" (which is generally the focus of the industry) because it's a more controlled environment. They don't want to use the cheap, easy way we have to do it already for all the usual reasons.

                      You are making many assumptions about your very dated and very early stage research citation. There are still many technical problems with ponds and reactors are expensive. If quality control and non-seasonality are more important than cost then in the short term reactors are the way to go, this see

                    • The most efficient with respect to survival in the environment. That is not the same thing as the most efficient with respect to production of the desired chemicals and the efficiency of use of the injected CO2.

                      So far, it is the same thing. The cost of building and maintaining the reactor is not justified by the output. All we need to implement the existing plan is cheap stuff. You want it to make more sense to build expensive reactors.

                      You are making many assumptions about your very dated and very early stage research citation.

                      You are the one making assumptions. And dated doesn't mean bad. Nothing fundamental has changed. They've GM'd up some algaes, but none of them are actually living up to their promise. That's because we're trying to outdo nature, which has several billion years on us, especially in t

                    • by drnb ( 2434720 )

                      ... You are the one making assumptions. And dated doesn't mean bad. Nothing fundamental has changed ... because the technology is so simple. There's very little engineering involved. We're talking about problems which were solved twenty years ago ...

                      OK, you have lost all credibility. Any mild amount of googling proves you wrong. Try it some time. Once you get remotely familiar with the topic you will find that both paths need significant research and engineering and cost reductions. The old swimming pool sized study you cling to proves little.

                    • OK, you have lost all credibility.

                      You have none to lose.

                      Once you get remotely familiar with the topic you will find that both paths need significant research and engineering and cost reductions.

                      The problems of pumping water from pool to pool are well-solved in agriculture. Again, there is no significant research needed for that approach, and only from an ivory tower view can you imagine that there is. These were well-solved problems before the program even began.

                      The old swimming pool sized study you cling to proves little.

                      It proves just how simple the process is: you can do it anywhere that will hold water. They didn't have to build anything out of the ordinary. That proves the viability of the concept. No new technologies whatsoever a

      • by DogDude ( 805747 )
        We could easier and more quickly reduce pollution by pushing a shift from gasoline to much more efficient diesel engines in the meantime, though, with no added infrastructure. I already get 50 mpg with my awesome TDI.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • Since the late 90s, gasoline engines have advanced to the point where the exhaust is cleaner than air it ingests.

        Nope. See my last comment in this discussion for a citation... a link right back here to slashdot, so you have no excuse for mouthing off while being ignorant.

        To be fair, that metric was true around the introduction of the Honda ZLEV when older cars were still belching out unclean exhaust.

        To be fair, that metric was bullshit around the introduction of the Honda ZLEV. The methods which have been used to measure soot coming from engines have not accurately measured the PM2.5 counts, which are vastly higher than previously believed.

        All newer vehicles from mid 2000s on up employ similar technologies to ensure that just pure water vapor and CO2 remains.

        Ah yes, and unicorn farts and fairy skeet, no doubt.

        If you could ice-pack the exhaust, you could theoretically collect the water condensation and drink it!!!

        You first. Please do it a lot.

    • Re:Why diesel fuel? (Score:5, Informative)

      by caseih ( 160668 ) on Saturday January 10, 2015 @07:07PM (#48783545)

      But gasoline doesn't produce the same soot. Plainly put, diesel particulates are more toxic than particulates from gasoline combustion. Modern diesels, however, are much, much more clean than older diesels. I drove a diesel rental car in Turkey recently that was diesel and its exhaust just smelled like steam.

      Diesel engines have two problems when it comes to pollution. Particulates and NOx emissions. Particulates can be eliminated with by increasing the heat and pressure of combustion. That takes care of most immediate, toxic product of combustion right there. However, increasing heat and pressure also leads to more N2 reacting with O2 to make NOx, which causes smog and acid rain, also serious human health concerns. If you go the other way and cool combustion way down, you can virtually eliminate NOx, but you get tons of particulates. So either reduce NOx by cooling combustion with recirculated exhaust gasses and stick on a filter to catch and burn particulates (the dreaded regen cycle that truckers can tell you about), or turn up the heat and treat NOx separately using a catalyst, urea. Most auto makers are finding that urea into the exhaust works best because the engine can be super simple again. However the big problem with this is that in northern climates (most of the western world), cars don't drive far enough to warm up completely, so you still have unwanted pollution.

      Gasoline (petrol) does emit some particulates but they seem to not be as dangerous. Petrol engines also emit NOx but modern catalytic converters convert it to N2 and water.

      And of course all fossil fuels emit net CO2. Biofuels can theoretically be carbon neutral, but if they are diesel-like (burn in a diesel engine) they still very much have the same pollution issues as diesel, and will have to be treated in the exact same way, using EGR, SCR (with urea), or some other technology. Likewise gasoline-like biofuels will still have to have the same pollution control systems as regular gasoline engines.

      • But gasoline doesn't produce the same soot.

        False [slashdot.org].

        Gasoline (petrol) does emit some particulates but they seem to not be as dangerous.

        False again. See previous link. Gasoline engines produce just as much soot as diesels, and more of it is PM2.5, which is the most hazardous kind of soot particle.

        • by caseih ( 160668 )

          Okay, maybe that's true, but come on, referencing a slashdot article as a citation? I hadn't read up on this before, so it was interesting. Apparently filtering technology does exist to filter gasoline particulates.

          • Okay, maybe that's true, but come on, referencing a slashdot article as a citation?

            That's obviously the most logical thing to do, because it links you to the metadiscussion in which most of the obvious objections will be raised and possibly dispelled, but it also links you to the citation. Plus, it hammers home the fact that we've discussed this very issue here on slashdot in the past.

        • by Anonymous Coward

          "False again. See previous link. Gasoline engines produce just as much soot as diesels, and more of it is PM2.5, which is the most hazardous kind of soot particle."

          I see you are still repeating this falsehood. That's not what the link says, it says that cars produce more PM2.5 than previously thought.

          Even if that study were correct (It never directly measured black carbon (just general particulates) and never directly measured black carbon from petrol engines (they directly measured diesel engines, then ind

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

        I drove a diesel rental car in Turkey recently that was diesel and its exhaust just smelled like steam.

        Not that I doubt your assertion, but I do wonder about your methodology and specifically the equipment used. When was your nose last calibrated?

      • by MercTech ( 46455 )

        True, the burning of cetane in diesel fuel results in soot.. fine carbon which settles out. Whereas gasoline engines produce carbon monoxide and nitrous oxides that become nitric acid upon combining with the water in the air.

        It is the colorless stuff that is more of a hazard than the soot from accelerating diesel engines.

    • Why is this witch-hunt against diesel fuel? Why not gasoline? Can someone explain to me why the world is up in arms about diesel fuel but calmly ignoring the fact that gasoline engines produce just as much soot, but with finer (and thus more hazardous) particulates?

      Because your argument dates back to the 80s. Diesel was long understood to be the healthier cleaner fuel with gasoline having all manner of carcinogens. Filtration, catalytic conversion, changes to injection strategies and engine design, and even changes to the fundamental mixture of gasoline (replacement of tetraethyllead with more benzine, and then the saturation of benzine in favour of other non-carcinogenic aromatics) have all lead to a cleaner gasoline engine. By contrast diesel has remained relatively

      • (replacement of tetraethyllead with more benzine, and then the saturation of benzine in favour of other non-carcinogenic aromatics)

        Let's be clear on what we're talking about here when we say "other non-carcinogenic aromatics" — ethanol. Ethanol is best-case around 15% energy-positive, and it is based on destruction of topsoil. Therefore, it is horribly harmful. It's already up to 10% in many fuels, and the government would like to increase it to 15% in spite of the fact that this level will cause serious problems for owners of most modern vehicles, let alone slightly old ones — and the average age of the American passenger

  • by PapayaSF ( 721268 ) on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:32PM (#48782079) Journal
    We already know something about long-term exposure, based on observing career truck drivers: diesel fumes don't cause weight loss.
    • I was a maintenance tech at a produce packing plant where we received bulk semi loads of potatoes. We weighed the trucks in and out to calculate the delivery weight. One guy was HUGE! I made sure I watched the digital scale readout as he got out of his truck to get his scale ticket. He was over 600 lbs. He took his papers and then climbed the stairs to the second story office.
  • Ultrafine particles (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 10, 2015 @01:47PM (#48782161)

    Ultrafine particles (UFP) are probably both the least well-studied and least regulated form of air pollution (IIRC, they're somewhat tricky to reliably measure at all in an uncontrolled environment, let alone measured by a means that can be deployed for routine large-scale monitoring), and there's a small pile of studies showing that they do have health effects, though no one seems to know exactly what the mechanisms or dose-response curves are, or how the short-term effects translate into identifiable disease etiologies. For example, there are studies in both rats[0] and humans[1] consistent with the presence of UFP inhibiting the exercise-stimulated production of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a neurological growth factor that is believed to play a key role in multiple psychiatric disorders and even some forms of obesity. There are other studies showing other effects; those were just the ones that particularly came to mind.

    I bring this up because although modern diesel engines are far cleaner than the classic models, they are known to produce considerable amounts of UFP pollution. Gasoline engines and various other technologies (laser printers / photocopiers, various forms of precision machining...) aren't entirely innocent, either.

    [0] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22867973
    [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21708224

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Another study found that gene activity changes by 25% when you have the flu.
    The old view that genes are static and never change during your life seems less and less accurate.

    • Another study found that gene activity changes by 25% when you have the flu.
      The old view that genes are static and never change during your life seems less and less accurate.

      Wrong idea:

      Gene EXPRESSION = making proteins (and some other stuff that we will ignore for now)
      Gene CHANGE = mutation (very roughly) and we had thought that you the structure of your genes did not change during your lifetime. We know that this isn't true anymore (methylation, transposons, CASPR and a bunch of other neat things).

      So gene EXPRESSION has to happen for your body to do anything. Which is why this study is pretty dumb. Yes, the genes involved seemed to be associated with inflammation but th

  • another gas pedal gone spongy on you, sorry.

    you ARE killing us.

    park it.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Oh but tobacco smoke is so much more evil. It is the evilest of all airborne contaminants. *fake cough* Oh your tobacco smoke is making me sick! Nevermind all the trucks chugging black exhaust and partially combusted diesel fuel.

    No nothing is worse than tobacco smoke. If we execute all the smokers the world will be a perfect utopia.

    • Let's not forget the hundreds upon hundreds of nuclear bomb tests which have no doubt added some interesting ingredients to our atmosphere.

      Interesting that lung cancer spiked like crazy starting around the 1940's.

      But yes, tobacco is killing you. It's all about the smokes. Because people only started smoking in the 1940's, right?

  • There are many occupations that should be available to correlate this -rather direct- attack on one fuel type. Truck Mechanics... Exposed to liquid and exhaust Tunnel operators that sit by many idling diesel trucks Truck drivers that drive older / dirtier vehicles. Volkwagen TDI drivers vs gas powered cars Sea Captains and deckhands that get exposed to bunker The direct assault on Diesel only seems callous at first glance. Am assuming that none of the Study participants never had exposure to diesel ever
  • "600 bucks", they said. "You'll get new jeans", they said. Such a deal!

  • Morlocks.

  • I love the smell of diesel fumes. It reminds me of Chicago, and why I don't live there.
  • So they're going to defend freedom of speech by denying others their freedom of speech, right?

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