"anton" wrote in message
...

Franz Heymann wrote in message ...

"anton" wrote in message
...


Why is it significant that organochlorines such as aldrin and dieldrin
have 'half-lives' measured in years?


With respect to this argument, the half-lives of those compounds are of
no
significance whatsoever..


It is possible that you misunderstood the concept of "half-life" in this
context. I (possibly wrongly) understand it to mean that if I ate a 1gm
of
a substance now, the half-life of that substance in me is the time after
which there will still be 1/2 gm of it left in me. [Franz Heymann]


I understood it to mean the half-life in the soil, water, etc, but
you might be right in believing it to be the half-life in our bodies.
Either way, with respect to this argument, the half-lives of those
compounds
are of no significance whatsoever.

If the term does in fact involve the time for halving the quantity in your
body, then you ahould think again. The longer the half-life, the higher the
equilibrium level in your body, for a given rate of intake. [Franz Heymann]


To return to the point, the kneejerk classification of synthetic
pesticides as 'poisons' is merely hysterical when there are so
many natural poisons in the garden, and so many other
'poisons' in all other aspects of modern life.

--
Anton