In article , "Doug Kanter"
wrote:

"John Bachman" wrote in message
...


This is all reasonable advice, but realize this:

You're giving it to someone who is completely in the dark, and not just
with
regard to gardening. So, it's important to point out garden chemicals have
not been and can never be correctly tested for safety. I'm sure you're
aware
of that.


Nonsense. If the material is used in strict compliance to the
instructions on the label (and it should not be used in any other way)
safety is assured. Those instructions include dosages, personal
protective equipment requirements and minimum re-entry intervals.

Nonsense.

1) Use the pharmaceutical analogy. The only way to assure the safety of a
new drug is to test it on the target population, and even then, long term
effects can only be determined by waiting and seeing. Yard chemicals cannot
be tested in this way, at least not within the morals of this society. The
chemical companies themselves say that animal testing is irrelevant. Since
they cannot be tested on people, safety cannot be determined.

It is hard to escape old patterns of thought. John really believes apple
maggot MUST be treated with synthetic pesticides because nothing else
works -- it's a claim so many have made so often that just like sasquatch
sightings it MUST be true. If he is shown the conclusive studies from
Cornell & elsewhere that prove this common lore is false, he'll just come
up with yet another pest he believes cannot be controlled except by the
same harshest most harmful methods he is predisposed to believe in. He
strongly believes in the magical incantation "safe if used as directed"
but even he adds so many provisos he clearly knows it's one hell of a big
"if."

John has for many years in this group advocated "the right chemical for
the right job" -- he's a true believer in the trustworthiness of chemical
industry sales pitches. If there's a better organic method, he's not
incapable of realizing it, but he's going to fall behind the learning
curve. I try always to remember this is the same guy who praised cowshit
for "that farmy smell" -- gotta love a guy like that (as for me, I very
swiftly learned never to stop for a hitchhiker in bib overalls near a
dairy, as the car will smell like cowshit for the rest of the day).

-paghat the ratgirl

Note: Somewhere on the web, there *is* mention of one round of tests in
which an agricultural chemical

2) In the early 1970s, the chemical industry purchased legislation which
exempted a long list of so-called "inert ingredients" from what little
testing is done to begin with.
http://www.beyondpesticides.org/lawn...ts&figures.htm This is a
summary for the layman, but with cites. This link will provide you with more
than enough other information to keep you busy for awhile:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...ts&btnG=Search

The "inert" ingredients include quite a few things which are known, beyond
dispute, to be harmful to humans in some way. Toluene, for instance.

I'm not disputing what you say, in terms of what works on which pests, but I
do think it's irresponsible to suggest the use of ANY chemical to a person
who has not demonstrated the least bit of knowledge in terms of which bugs
he's trying to deal with. That, to me, is a prerequisite, and a crucial one.
--
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"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to
liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot." -Thomas Jefferson