Cycling UK Forum

pwa wrote:

Vorpal wrote:

pwa wrote:Semantics. A "by-product" is a product, but not the main intended product.

Is there a product other than pollution?

If we are talking about transport related pollution, the intended product is transportation, and the unintended and unwanted by-products include pollution. The process of moving a vehicle and its load is the product we want, but it comes with by-products we dislike. Or are you thinking that a product can only be stuff?

Semantics.

A non-stuff result of an organised and realised intent is a service not a product.

A non-stuff unintended side-effect of goods and service implementation is a ..... ?

For example, a Hollywud Filum is intended to be an entertainment service (albeit rendered through production of some special celluloid) but what is the generic name for the (possibly) unintended side-effect of infantilising adult minds with goodguy-badguy "thinking"?

Cugel, chopping wildly at the nomenclatures.

pwa wrote:

pete75 wrote:

pwa wrote:Unless someone is using a polluting vehicle primarily to pollute, rather than to get about, the pollution is a by-product. That is the only point that was being made. Hardly worth talking about really and I can't remember how we got onto it.

No it was not the only point you were making. You also stated pollution is unintended when clearly it is not. Whenever someone makes a choice to use a vehicle they know is polluting then that pollution is intended. If they didn't intend to pollute they wouldn't use a polluting machine.

This tangental discussion was only about the small and academic point of what "by-product" means. Pollution is a by-product of driving a normal car because the user, while knowing about the pollution, does not see it as their motivation for using that vehicle. The pollution is not the product they are aiming for, so it is a by-product. That is not saying it is insignificant or that the car user is excused.

I'm not denying it's a by product. What I take issue with is your claim, in a previous post, that the pollution is unintentional.

I can not think of a better word for pwa to have used in this context.
If somebody can come up with a word that describes an unwanted result of an action that we have chosen to take despite knowing of its drawbacks, I am sure that pwa would willingly abandon his choice of the word unintended, until then it seems that the definition of unintended doesnt actually exclude its use for this scenario. Even if others believe that it does, it is clear what pwa meant and this is a semantic argument of no value to anybody.

pete75 wrote:

pwa wrote:

pete75 wrote:
No it was not the only point you were making. You also stated pollution is unintended when clearly it is not. Whenever someone makes a choice to use a vehicle they know is polluting then that pollution is intended. If they didn't intend to pollute they wouldn't use a polluting machine.

This tangental discussion was only about the small and academic point of what "by-product" means. Pollution is a by-product of driving a normal car because the user, while knowing about the pollution, does not see it as their motivation for using that vehicle. The pollution is not the product they are aiming for, so it is a by-product. That is not saying it is insignificant or that the car user is excused.

I'm not denying it's a by product. What I take issue with is your claim, in a previous post, that the pollution is unintentional.

Unintentional only in the sense that it is not a goal. It is accepted but not wanted.

pwa wrote:

pete75 wrote:

pwa wrote:
This tangental discussion was only about the small and academic point of what "by-product" means. Pollution is a by-product of driving a normal car because the user, while knowing about the pollution, does not see it as their motivation for using that vehicle. The pollution is not the product they are aiming for, so it is a by-product. That is not saying it is insignificant or that the car user is excused.

I'm not denying it's a by product. What I take issue with is your claim, in a previous post, that the pollution is unintentional.

Unintentional only in the sense that it is not a goal. It is accepted but not wanted.

Or in most cases of no concern. Though if someone does something with no concern for any consequences are they unintentional?

Environmental group Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) brought a case to the German court, which says Frankfurt must ban older diesel cars...

The court ruled that Frankfurt must ban from next February diesel cars that meet Euro-4 and older emission standards, and petrol cars that meet Euro-1 and 2 standards, while Euro-5 diesels must be banned from next September.

“The driving ban is necessary because all other measures considered by the state will not lead to a significant reduction of nitrogen dioxide emissions in an appropriate time,” said presiding judge Rolf Hartmann.

https://in.reuters.com/article/us-volks ... NKCN1LL2GC

The motor industry has so much power in Germany, folkswagen wants to take dirty diesels (perfectly usable) in px, scrap them, sell even more brand new vehicles

Elsewhere Cugel and others describe getting hay fever in November
Could well be to do with air pollution

Vorpal wrote:Environmental group Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) brought a case to the German court, which says Frankfurt must ban older diesel cars...

The court ruled that Frankfurt must ban from next February diesel cars that meet Euro-4 and older emission standards, and petrol cars that meet Euro-1 and 2 standards, while Euro-5 diesels must be banned from next September.

“The driving ban is necessary because all other measures considered by the state will not lead to a significant reduction of nitrogen dioxide emissions in an appropriate time,” said presiding judge Rolf Hartmann.

https://in.reuters.com/article/us-volks ... NKCN1LL2GC

Frankfurt/M of course
Politrickians are fighting hard to ban the bans

Yet more shame on the spineless UK government....


https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/nov/14/diesel-pollution-stunts-childrens-lung-growth-london-study-shows

Mark R wrote:Yet more shame on the spineless UK government....


https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/nov/14/diesel-pollution-stunts-childrens-lung-growth-london-study-shows

Of course it's easy to knock the UK government, but this is a result of policies of successive governments for (literally) generations, and not just in the UK:

The results of the study would apply to many cities, Griffiths said: “Air quality in London is bad, but it is similarly bad in other UK cities and cities across Europe, and of course in India and China it is notoriously bad.”

In fact the final paragraph shows that the headline and first paragraph are simply wrong:

The new research has “many notable strengths”, including detailed air pollution measurements and high quality data on the children’s respiratory health, according to a commentary in the Lancet Public Health by Hanna Boogaard and Annemoon van Erp, at the Health Effects Institute in Boston, US.

But they noted it was not possible to include control groups in the study and that the NO2 reductions were quite small, making it harder to link air pollution to stunted lungs. Nonetheless, a statistically significant link was shown. Evidence from California suggests it is a causal link, because children’s lung damage there reduced as air quality improved between 1994 and 2011.

A causal link is suggested because one (different) study shows the statistical link moving in the other direction as well, but this study does not show (as the headline says it does) that "Diesel pollution stunts children’s lung growth", it shows that there is a statistical link (which may be caused by other factors which have changed over the same period). It would be better if the Guardian's writers actually understood how science works.

Not just the Guardian, the Times was happy to report it as well.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/inner-city-children-s-lungs-stunted-by-diesel-pollution-mg6cqwqxd

The conclusion is correct, there is no hope of decent urban air quality without specifically targeting diesels.

Mark R wrote:Not just the Guardian, the Times was happy to report it as well.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/inner-city-children-s-lungs-stunted-by-diesel-pollution-mg6cqwqxd

The conclusion is correct, there is no hope of decent urban air quality without specifically targeting diesels.

There is no hope of decent urban air quality without specificall targetting motor vehicles with internal combustion engines.

True. But what we absolutely do not need is yet another generation of 'clean diesels' which will surely become gross polluters as their emission control systems progressively begin to fail.

Also....once we have got rid of non-essential vehicles, what about the ones which are actually required (Buses, trains and taxis for example)? Are you happy for them to continue using diesel? I'm not...

Volkswagen is investing € 44 000 000 000 to convert several factories to produce electric vehicles, the first vehicles are to be produced at Zwickau in 2019
A price of € 20 000 was mentioned, but where shall the power come from?