Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 1: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
Speaker 1: My name is Matt, my name is they called me Ben.
Speaker 1: We are joined as always with our super producer Paul
Speaker 1: Mission Control decade. Most importantly, you are you. You are here,
Speaker 1: and that makes this the stuff they don't want you
Speaker 1: to know. Uh. Suspected serial killer Benjamin Franklin once famously wrote,
Speaker 1: in this world, nothing is certain except for death and taxes.
Speaker 1: And it's it's such an interesting thought exercise to imagine
Speaker 1: what he, or truly anybody from the seventeen hundreds would
Speaker 1: think about the modern day. Like Benji Frank's example, I
Speaker 1: personally think the guy would have loved Twitter and probably
Speaker 1: tender too, probably like things even more specific than tender,
Speaker 1: you know, might he might have gone grinder occasionally, you know,
Speaker 1: I think he can see as an equal opportunity um romantic.
Speaker 1: I can imagine him adding an addendum just for the
Speaker 1: purposes of this episode, to be like and glass jars
Speaker 1: or right exactly. Yeah, it's it's because it's easy for
Speaker 1: us to imagine what someone from the seventeen hundreds would
Speaker 1: find impressive in the modern day. You know, things like
Speaker 1: airplanes or electric lights, or space shuttles, or the fact
Speaker 1: that some people can survive diseases that used to be
Speaker 1: a death sentence. But it's also easy to forget the
Speaker 1: commonplace stuff that would absolutely like destroy their brain for
Speaker 1: a few days. And one of those big things is plastic.
Speaker 1: We live in the age of plastic. It's all around
Speaker 1: fund us. If he was confronted with this, Ben Franklin
Speaker 1: might have to revise that quote and say nothing is
Speaker 1: certain other than death taxes, and I guess plastic. Now.
Speaker 1: We did an episode on a real conspiracy surrounding recycling,
Speaker 1: and it's about microplastics. Please check it out. That's where
Speaker 1: you'll learn a lot of the basics of plastics history
Speaker 1: and it's composition. But there's still a ton of stuff
Speaker 1: they don't want you to know about plastic, billions of
Speaker 1: tons actually. And today we're taking a slightly more meditative approach,
Speaker 1: and we're asking a question that many of our fellow
Speaker 1: conspiracy realists have probably thought about, which is this what
Speaker 1: would the world be like without this? Stuff. Could we,
Speaker 1: as a global civilization ever turned back the clock and
Speaker 1: live in a world without plastic, and then perhaps is
Speaker 1: it something that we would actually want to do? Well,
Speaker 1: here are the facts. It's uh, we've got a lot
Speaker 1: of numbers here, but we're gonna try to make sure
Speaker 1: they're not the kind of numbers that make your eyes
Speaker 1: glaze over. Yes' because plastic is absolutely everywhere. I mean
Speaker 1: just look around your workspace, or your bedroom, or your
Speaker 1: house anywhere. I mean, right in front of my eyes
Speaker 1: is like a ring light that's made of plastic. The
Speaker 1: lens part that the light filters through this webcam that
Speaker 1: we're broadcasting into made of plastic. You know, all of
Speaker 1: the pieces that make up the case of my monitor,
Speaker 1: any of our monitors, plastic inside the guts of the thing,
Speaker 1: so many plastics. The printed circuit boards that electronics are
Speaker 1: mounted on made of plastic, um or various you know,
Speaker 1: types of plastic. They're there. There are obviously several categories,
Speaker 1: but the fact is it is absolutely everywhere, and it's
Speaker 1: an incredible miracle of innovation. Uh. It's lightweights, it's easy
Speaker 1: to manufacture, you can shape into just about anything, and
Speaker 1: it's sturdy. Um then you point out that it's up
Speaker 1: there with say the wheel or you know, the basic
Speaker 1: tool tools that we use are things like pully or
Speaker 1: a lever. You know, important innovations that allowed us to
Speaker 1: kind of step outside of our limitations as human beings.
Speaker 1: I want to jump into the six basic tools real fast.
Speaker 1: I'm off the top of my head without looking at
Speaker 1: the list. The hammer, hammers, one bottle, opener, Scott number two,
Speaker 1: instant opener, ice, ice pick, or some sort of stabbing tool.
Speaker 1: I imagine, right, I think we're talking. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I know we're not talking about those things. Are being jokey,
Speaker 1: but sorry about that. Guys, what don't apology? Don't ever
Speaker 1: apologize for a good joke. No joke left behind. Hashtag
Speaker 1: it tweeted it's it's true that it's easy for us
Speaker 1: to underestimate the profound impact of plastic in all its
Speaker 1: various forms and genres. I mean, I I don't think
Speaker 1: some people disagree with me, but I don't think it's
Speaker 1: exaggerating to say that in terms of importance to civil wization,
Speaker 1: both positive and negative, plastic might be up there with fire.
Speaker 1: It might be up there with the time somebody figured
Speaker 1: out how to create fire. But it also begs the question,
Speaker 1: like all the things that we're describing, all of those
Speaker 1: things that I'm looking in my room and and and
Speaker 1: rattling off, are these things that we necessarily need? I mean,
Speaker 1: if you look back to you know, bake light, the
Speaker 1: earliest version of plastic, it was kind of designed to
Speaker 1: make sort of chintzy crap that we could be sold
Speaker 1: and and convinced that we needed it. It is very
Speaker 1: much a product of like the material age, you know,
Speaker 1: the materialistic age that we need to acquire all this stuff,
Speaker 1: and certainly the idea of computers and the plastics that
Speaker 1: are used and things like a monitor. I mean, you
Speaker 1: could certainly be hard pressed to turn back the clock
Speaker 1: and live without those things. But you know, when you're
Speaker 1: talking about the basic simple machines, things like a screw
Speaker 1: or a wedge, you know, or a plane or a
Speaker 1: pulley or whatever, these are I think much more necessary
Speaker 1: than plastic. But you can't really put that genie back
Speaker 1: on the bottle, now, can't you, because we're used to it. Yeah, No,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna It's probably not going to happen. And
Speaker 1: that is the most optimistic way I can phrase that response. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the most solid reports right now estimate that there is
Speaker 1: a little north of eight point three billions of tons
Speaker 1: of plastic on the planet. Of that eight point three billion, uh,
Speaker 1: six point three billions of those tons are straight up trash.
Speaker 1: It's garbage. No one's gonna use it, no one's gonna
Speaker 1: recycle it, no one's gonna burn it. Uh. This is
Speaker 1: just to give you the image in your mind, folks,
Speaker 1: this is the equivalent of like fifty five million jumbo jets.
Speaker 1: And uh, if that, if that doesn't really bring it home, Uh,
Speaker 1: pull up a picture of Mount Everest and realize that
Speaker 1: if you stacked all this plastic up in one place,
Speaker 1: you would easily get a pile literally bigger than the
Speaker 1: tallest mountain in human experience. Uh, there's already an insane
Speaker 1: amount of trash just on that actual mountain itself from
Speaker 1: all the would be uh you know, Everest summitters, you know,
Speaker 1: out there and like leaving all their their droppings behind.
Speaker 1: It's it's become a real problem. I get an image
Speaker 1: of that movie Wally, with all the trash mountains that
Speaker 1: exists on the planet at that point in the future.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm seeing. The three of us recently went
Speaker 1: to a friend of ours art studio that happens to
Speaker 1: be situated right next to what is supposedly a recycling dump,
Speaker 1: I guess, for lack of a better term, uh, And
Speaker 1: yet it never seems to get smaller. Um. And there's
Speaker 1: a reason for that, isn't there? Yeah? There is uh
Speaker 1: the numbers that we just named. If they're not troubling,
Speaker 1: or if there are things you've heard before and it's
Speaker 1: easy to shake off, think of it this way, this time,
Speaker 1: five years from now, that may well be referred to
Speaker 1: as the good old days. Uh, when it was when
Speaker 1: only of the trash in the world's ocean was some
Speaker 1: form of plastic. Right now, as we speak, every second,
Speaker 1: a hundred and sixty thousand plastic bags are getting used
Speaker 1: by someone somewhere. That means that each year, just every
Speaker 1: single lookout under year, five trillion plastic bags new ones
Speaker 1: are made. And this means this leads experts to project
Speaker 1: that pound for pound, by the weight of the plastic
Speaker 1: and the oceans alone will outweigh the mass of all
Speaker 1: the fish not hyperbole. Literally, all of the fish dell
Speaker 1: weigh less than the trash and that's particularly puzzling to
Speaker 1: my mind when you imagine the weight of a plastic bag.
Speaker 1: But think about that, Just picture that scene American beauty.
Speaker 1: You know that that that lighter than air plastic bag
Speaker 1: just wafting through the ease, you know. Um. And one
Speaker 1: of the reasons that plastic bags, I mean, I think
Speaker 1: most people know that plastic bags are not recyclable. Um
Speaker 1: it is because in order to recycle a thing, they
Speaker 1: have to weigh enough for you to actually be able
Speaker 1: to kind of chop them up into little bits. And
Speaker 1: can you imagine trying to chase around the gazillion plastic
Speaker 1: bags and some sort of centrifuge like it just wouldn't
Speaker 1: wouldn't work. So plastic bags are like the least recyclable
Speaker 1: and most popular plastic item. Maybe that's not exactly accurate,
Speaker 1: but that certainly feels like it's up there. Um it's
Speaker 1: it's very troubling with those numbers, you know, especially considering
Speaker 1: how light they are. Yeah, and let's twist the knife
Speaker 1: a little bit, you know what kind of shows those
Speaker 1: folks that's the optimistic projection that what they really saying
Speaker 1: is by it could happen sooner than that And Uh,
Speaker 1: it's a shame that environmental concerns have been sort of politicized,
Speaker 1: or they've been appropriated for different people's agendas, whatever those
Speaker 1: agendas may be. But if you look at the numbers,
Speaker 1: which no no ideology, then you should be concerned. This
Speaker 1: growth is part of an accelerating pattern. In nine fifty,
Speaker 1: the world, the whole shebang made about two million tons
Speaker 1: of plastic per year, and since then annual production has
Speaker 1: increased two hundred times two d cks. Uh So, just
Speaker 1: in twenty for example, the world was making not two
Speaker 1: million tons, but three d eighty one million tons. Just
Speaker 1: for comparison, three eighty one million tons is about the
Speaker 1: same weight as two thirds of the entire human population.
Speaker 1: That's what I was going to ask. I mean, obviously,
Speaker 1: in part this this has to be a product of
Speaker 1: population growth, but not to that degree. How do you
Speaker 1: go from two million tons a year to three hundred
Speaker 1: eighty million tons a year um? Even given explosion and
Speaker 1: population It seems to me that it means that the
Speaker 1: production and usage of plastic has gone completely unchecked um.
Speaker 1: And no one's really thinking about the future at all. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just not for a long time they weren't and just
Speaker 1: works so well for so many things. Will will explore
Speaker 1: this too, uh. We it should go without saying, but
Speaker 1: we have to point it out. The plastic game is
Speaker 1: not distributed equally. The biggest producers of plastic uh, plastic
Speaker 1: waste at least are the wealthy countries, just because because
Speaker 1: of consumer culture, because of economic booms. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you look at the US and so an agency the
Speaker 1: e p A reports that Americans generate thirty five point
Speaker 1: seven million tons of plastic in one year. And as
Speaker 1: we pointed out the microplastics episode UH study show that
Speaker 1: nowadays plastic particles might be inside your body before your board.
Speaker 1: I think they might go through your or mother and
Speaker 1: go across the barrier and get into while you're in
Speaker 1: the womb. What long term effects will that have? People
Speaker 1: aren't too sure. That's the scary part. And before it
Speaker 1: sounds like we're dumping on plastic. Yes, it's like any
Speaker 1: other technology, at least until the day we get to AI.
Speaker 1: Plastic has no moral compass. It's just like a gun.
Speaker 1: It's just like I'll pop it. Those are two very
Speaker 1: different examples. It can do wonderful and terrible things depending
Speaker 1: on how it's used I've definitely pictured somebody using a
Speaker 1: pop it as a bludgeoning device. Yeah, it's a menacing toy. Actually,
Speaker 1: if you think about it, it could be psychological warfare.
Speaker 1: I think some of those toys, when the kids get
Speaker 1: really into them, can probably do things to their parents
Speaker 1: or caretaker's minds. But this is okay. So as think
Speaker 1: of an analogy, Tell me when you think of this,
Speaker 1: Plastic in a way is a lot like advertising. You
Speaker 1: are almost certain to be unaware of how much of
Speaker 1: it surrounds you, how much you touch on a daily basis,
Speaker 1: how much you just see passing by, how much you encounter,
Speaker 1: and if you want to be incredibly depressed or profoundly
Speaker 1: impressed or both at the same time, take our old
Speaker 1: advertising game and apply it to plastic. Wake up, start
Speaker 1: a clock for twenty four hours, and start trying to
Speaker 1: count every example of plastic you see. I don't know
Speaker 1: about you, guys. I don't want to speak for everyone,
Speaker 1: but I am personally so convinced that this is an
Speaker 1: impossible task that I you have my word, if you
Speaker 1: can accurately count all the plastic you see over a
Speaker 1: period of twenty four hours, right to us, and I
Speaker 1: will send you a prize. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: going to be fancy, but it might because I doubt
Speaker 1: anyone can actually do this. Will it be made of plastic?
Speaker 1: I was gonna win. I'm gonna win this. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go out and I'm gonna go camping and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: stand my tent for twenty four hours and I'm just tent. Right,
Speaker 1: You're definitely going to get a Dakota ring from men
Speaker 1: and Dakota Rick. Yes, Uh, it's I mean, it is
Speaker 1: really tough, and it has a lot in common with advertising,
Speaker 1: and there's you know, to be fair. Um, if we
Speaker 1: look at the pros and cons, plastic has helped people
Speaker 1: accomplish so many things. It's saved countless lives in the
Speaker 1: field of medicine. It's helped humans reach space that would
Speaker 1: not have happened. But there's also no question that plastic
Speaker 1: is universally causing profound harm to just about every thing
Speaker 1: human or not on the planet except for the bank
Speaker 1: accounts of several very powerful corporations. They're making out like gangbusters,
Speaker 1: places like SABIC, the Saudi Arabia Basic Industries Corporation. Money
Speaker 1: hand over fist, you know, they're the largest single manufacturer plastic,
Speaker 1: but most of the other you know, like the Captain
Speaker 1: Planet villain types are also in on the game dw
Speaker 1: X on mobile, you know, all the it's all the
Speaker 1: good ones. Uh. And we know that it's despite the
Speaker 1: statements that you see from international organizations and in g
Speaker 1: o s and even these companies themselves, we know the
Speaker 1: pattern is set to accelerate even further. We're looking at
Speaker 1: a Jacob here. This is exponential growth. Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: So if we look at and we look at the
Speaker 1: global plastic market size. Okay, so it was five hundred
Speaker 1: and two billion US dollars and then four years later
Speaker 1: in it was five hundred and seventy nine point seven
Speaker 1: billion dollars. So that's a nice little jump in the billions.
Speaker 1: But here's the deal. Uh, the this global plastic market
Speaker 1: will likely increase to seven hundred and fifty billion dollars
Speaker 1: are a little bit more actually by t and that's insane. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: eighth largest industry in the U, US, the world's richest country,
Speaker 1: and every day around one million people in the US
Speaker 1: alone wake up and they work on plastic. And they're
Speaker 1: not bad people at all. It's their job. In fact,
Speaker 1: there's some of the smartest people around. Uh. The this
Speaker 1: argument about what to do, this dilemma is often bogged
Speaker 1: down in politics ideological tribalism. You know, you might have
Speaker 1: someone who's more on the conservative side saying like, uh,
Speaker 1: these uh it's an outdatd phrase, but like these tree
Speaker 1: hugging hippies are choosing you know, obscure amphibians over actual
Speaker 1: human beings who need this job to survive. But that's
Speaker 1: so misleading when it comes to plastics, civilization, us making
Speaker 1: the show you listening, everybody is in a crabs in
Speaker 1: a bucket scenario. I mean, this is the same species
Speaker 1: that can't stop killing itself over things like religion or
Speaker 1: resources or in name disagreements over the dumbest things, like
Speaker 1: this is a species that has gone to war over
Speaker 1: one guy's ear. It's true story. It's called the War
Speaker 1: of Jenkins Ear. You can check it out on Ridiculous
Speaker 1: History wherever you find your favorite podcast. Always be closing
Speaker 1: so you get the cot. Yeah, but there's no, there's
Speaker 1: not really if you look at realistically, as as terrified
Speaker 1: as it maybe to admit, there's no plausible chance of
Speaker 1: this species cooperating long enough to right the ship of
Speaker 1: humanity before it sinks irrevocably into the deep waters of extinction.
Speaker 1: But what if, what if somehow people did manage to
Speaker 1: walk back from the precipice, What would the world actually
Speaker 1: look like without plastic? We're gonna pause for a word
Speaker 1: from our sponsors. Uh, maybe we can come back and
Speaker 1: count some of the plastic stuff we found, but we'll
Speaker 1: see when we return. Here's where it gets crazy. All right,
Speaker 1: did you guys counting plastic things? I mean I don't
Speaker 1: stopped counting and counting ever since we started. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: free easily, just like in my purview, just on my desk,
Speaker 1: just not even moving, rolling the chair anywhere. No. Yeah, man, guys,
Speaker 1: before we get back into this, I just want to
Speaker 1: make a point here. I guess that maybe we haven't
Speaker 1: hit enough in this episode yet. And it just it
Speaker 1: reminded me when we mentioned Saudi Arabia Basic Industries Corporation,
Speaker 1: just that the plastics industry is inextricably connected to the
Speaker 1: petroleum industry, to gasoline, and just how you know, where
Speaker 1: we find ourselves with plastic use, we also find ourselves
Speaker 1: with oil usage. And like what those those are the
Speaker 1: effects that both of these industries are having, or maybe
Speaker 1: this one industry is having on the planet and on
Speaker 1: the human species. I just want to like make sure
Speaker 1: that's in the back of our minds as we're going
Speaker 1: throughout the rest of this episode. Yeah, well said, and
Speaker 1: it'll be in uh, it'll be on the front of
Speaker 1: your mind at the end of this episode, for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah they are. There are fingers on a hand. Um.
Speaker 1: And with the question we left at the break, what
Speaker 1: would happen if the world what would the world actually
Speaker 1: look like without plastic? Well, you know, put it bluntly,
Speaker 1: let's just rip off the band aid. Also with plastic,
Speaker 1: things would suck. They would suck so bad and so hard,
Speaker 1: and they would suck for a long long time. It
Speaker 1: would be, there's no way around it, a hard cut
Speaker 1: off on plastic use. First, it would cripple industries and
Speaker 1: economies alike. The Great Depression would be nothing compared to
Speaker 1: this innovation, and countless areas of research would crying to
Speaker 1: a halt. And there's honestly a good chance a lot
Speaker 1: of that innovation would not pick up again for decades
Speaker 1: or maybe even centuries. That's the level the impact we're talking,
Speaker 1: think about how much it would affect the price of things.
Speaker 1: You know, it's plastic is used as a cheap alternative
Speaker 1: to maybe more durable, long lasting materials. Are heavier materials,
Speaker 1: like all of the side panels you know, and um
Speaker 1: dash boards and things in like, you know, affordable mid
Speaker 1: level cars are all made of plastic. Everything's housed in plastic.
Speaker 1: It's not until you start getting up into the like
Speaker 1: super bespoke kind of higher end cars that things start
Speaker 1: to be made out of wood or metal. You know. Um,
Speaker 1: it would just it would like make so many things
Speaker 1: not affordable for so many people instantly. Oh yeah, worse
Speaker 1: than we might assume. This is one of those things
Speaker 1: where the stuff we're gonna say might be might sound alarming,
Speaker 1: but unfortunately, the odds are we will be vindicated tending
Speaker 1: on believers sooner than we'd like, like the like think
Speaker 1: about this. So it's difficult historically to pinpoint the exact
Speaker 1: moment when a monumental global change occurs. So for some folks,
Speaker 1: the way forward is grassroots. It's kind of a each one,
Speaker 1: teach one approach. If you're familiar with the saying, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of people in my mind, noble people
Speaker 1: who have either minimized their use of plastic or cut
Speaker 1: it from their lives almost entirely. That is definitely a
Speaker 1: herculean effort, But it also, at the same time points
Speaker 1: out one of the biggest problems with addressing this global
Speaker 1: plastic addiction. Class. You know what, I hear about a
Speaker 1: lot on the local news programs, Because as fringe as
Speaker 1: it may sound for me to point this out, there
Speaker 1: are some things that you know, mainstream news media is
Speaker 1: is totally fine not mentioning in these conversations, and class
Speaker 1: is one of those. It's one of the number one
Speaker 1: complicating factors in a war on plastic. Any attempt to
Speaker 1: argue otherwise is either incorrect or it is purposely misleading.
Speaker 1: Like imagine, it reminds me of the like take the
Speaker 1: situation of the brick countries, right the Brazil's, Russia's, India's,
Speaker 1: China's there as emergent superpowers. In the case of China,
Speaker 1: for like a century, China, like any other place on
Speaker 1: the planet, suffered long term consequences of plastic pollution from
Speaker 1: other countries, and it was a side effect of enormous
Speaker 1: economic boons for these countries. So if you look at
Speaker 1: it in very simple and real terms, China was paying
Speaker 1: the price for this progress and receiving no benefits from it.
Speaker 1: There's a similar argument with um, what you could call
Speaker 1: the climate change conuntrum, just because alliteration is dope. And
Speaker 1: you know, countries like China definitely have a valid argument
Speaker 1: when they point out that industrialized nations raped the benefits
Speaker 1: from things like coal, Um, so why shouldn't they be
Speaker 1: able to do the same. It's not fair And then
Speaker 1: I would tend to agree with that on paper, um,
Speaker 1: at least from their perspective, you know. But it's also
Speaker 1: it's sort of a do as I say, not as
Speaker 1: I do approach, and I think that always kind of
Speaker 1: you know, leaves a bad taste in countries mouths. Uh. So,
Speaker 1: you know, China's argument as they should have access to
Speaker 1: the same strategy also putting politics aside, just objectively, this
Speaker 1: approach restricts their access to further economic success. Um. It's
Speaker 1: not even to say they don't care about pollution or
Speaker 1: they're completely callous about these things. It's just kind of
Speaker 1: like a you know, well you you you know, other
Speaker 1: countries have laid the groundwork to where we are now
Speaker 1: and if you've just been a little more responsible about
Speaker 1: it than maybe we wouldn't be in this position or
Speaker 1: something like them. Yeah, it's like, uh, let's freestyle, uh
Speaker 1: imperfect analogy. Okay, Let's say let's say there's like a
Speaker 1: marathon and the people who ran the race and got
Speaker 1: first place, uh, didn't actually run. They had a car
Speaker 1: and they drove to the finished slide they said we won,
Speaker 1: and uh, You're like, well, we want to also winners.
Speaker 1: And they say, okay, but you can't drive a car,
Speaker 1: right and and and uh and and but if you
Speaker 1: get a better time than us, will say one, it's
Speaker 1: just we used a car. That's like that argument is
Speaker 1: valid from their perspective. Is important to think about that.
Speaker 1: And then if you take it back to the individual
Speaker 1: to like microscopic or microplastic level, being able to live
Speaker 1: a life like this without interacting and plastic requires a
Speaker 1: certain amount of privilege an individual agency. It's sort of
Speaker 1: like when people say like, hey, why um, why do
Speaker 1: actors in Blockbuster action movies look so in shape? They
Speaker 1: have a team of people who helped mold them into
Speaker 1: that personal trainers, dietitians, uh, probably therapist hopefully therapist as well. Uh.
Speaker 1: And it's like how eating healthy requires privilege in terms
Speaker 1: of money or time. You have to be able to
Speaker 1: pay someone for that stuff. You have to pay a
Speaker 1: premium for healthy food, or you have to have the
Speaker 1: time to figure out and how to pre parent yourself
Speaker 1: and do it consistently. So there is there is privilege
Speaker 1: on every single level that impacts this conversation. But if
Speaker 1: we try to stick to optimism as best we can,
Speaker 1: just as a thought experiment, let's give it a go.
Speaker 1: Let's say there's some unprecedented miracle which is also simultaneously
Speaker 1: a disaster. Literally everybody, same day, same hour, said we're gonna, um,
Speaker 1: We're at least gonna just stop making plastic. Okay. Uh,
Speaker 1: let's assume civilization doesn't collapse. What would happen. First, The
Speaker 1: environment would love us, you know, the Smoky the bears,
Speaker 1: the ranger ricks, the I think in the UK it's
Speaker 1: a frog, not Smoky the bear. But all the animals
Speaker 1: that you can think of, their lives would get better. Uh.
Speaker 1: Life for oil companies would go down the tube would
Speaker 1: be terrible because, as we point out, plastic is a
Speaker 1: petroleum product. In fact, big oil. If you want to
Speaker 1: just use that name to group all these producers together. Uh,
Speaker 1: they're well aware of the push for alternative power for vehicles.
Speaker 1: You know, they knew that Ford was making an electric
Speaker 1: f one fifty way before the public. And you know,
Speaker 1: they know all this stuff. They hang out with each other.
Speaker 1: So their idea is that plastic will become plastic use
Speaker 1: will accelerate such that that replaces the money they see
Speaker 1: themselves losing with straight up oil and gas. But it's
Speaker 1: likely that these corporations, if this thing happened, they would
Speaker 1: use their political influence to kind of phase in a
Speaker 1: manufacturing ban until they could find a new replacement or
Speaker 1: a series of alternatives that could be made around the
Speaker 1: same cost. That's the big important thing for them. And
Speaker 1: without an alternative in place, losing plastic is an existential
Speaker 1: threat to these companies. There's a great article that came
Speaker 1: out last your Vox called big Oils Hopes are pinned
Speaker 1: on plastics. It won't end well. Hats off to you
Speaker 1: David Roberts, the author of that article, because you know
Speaker 1: he calls him out and do recommend reading it. So
Speaker 1: so that would happen. And second, if you're listening to
Speaker 1: this show, to date, there's a disturbingly high chance you
Speaker 1: would lose your job even if you have nothing to
Speaker 1: do with the plastics industry. So even like in in
Speaker 1: the best case scenario that you know, the world slowly
Speaker 1: weans itself off of petroleum products as a fuel, this
Speaker 1: is always going to be their fallback at least that's
Speaker 1: the way the business model is set up, right, Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the that's the idea. The idea is that you
Speaker 1: can as the profits of oil for gas and fuel
Speaker 1: diminish than the profits for using that same petroleum to
Speaker 1: create plastic rises, and the numbers are there. It's not
Speaker 1: a bad for them to make from their perspective, it's
Speaker 1: bad for the planet. It's it's like bad for you
Speaker 1: if you're hearing this, and it maybe it's a silly question,
Speaker 1: but I mean, you know, petroleum is not a completely
Speaker 1: you know, endless resource. I mean, it is not considered
Speaker 1: her it's a it's a non renewable resource. You can
Speaker 1: tap out an oil well, I mean, you just keep
Speaker 1: looking forward elsewhere. But there is gonna come a day
Speaker 1: or we're not gonna be able to get it out
Speaker 1: of the ground anymore, right, especially if we keep you know,
Speaker 1: pulling it out willy nilly the way we are m
Speaker 1: That's why stuff like nesting with shale and fracking enjoyed
Speaker 1: a renaissance of sorts because the cost of oil she
Speaker 1: had a threshold where it was profitable to try to
Speaker 1: pull it out of the ground that way. And that's
Speaker 1: what it all goes down to. As as silly as
Speaker 1: it sounds, it goes down to money. So yeah, massive
Speaker 1: rise and unemployment unfortunately a given because these folks who
Speaker 1: would lose their jobs don't have to be working in
Speaker 1: the plastics industry. They have to be working on something
Speaker 1: that needs plastics somewhere at any point in their job.
Speaker 1: So for a lot of people, that's gonna be bad news. Third,
Speaker 1: there would be this huge waste management program, be on
Speaker 1: a scale of something that has never existed before. Stay
Speaker 1: in your laying Pyramids of Giza. There's a new impressive
Speaker 1: human initiative in town. Um because make managing to stop
Speaker 1: making new plastic is not enough. It's the plastic that's
Speaker 1: already here that is killing people. Recycling would have to skyrocket.
Speaker 1: The I was thinking about this when I realized I
Speaker 1: need to clean my room. Imagine having to clean all
Speaker 1: the world's oceans and the glaciers and Mount Everest, oh
Speaker 1: and under the South Pole because the plastics there too,
Speaker 1: you would like, there's not a way to clean it
Speaker 1: all um and then forth. And this is something that
Speaker 1: you don't see talked a lot about on the environmental
Speaker 1: side beforely like the people are very pro plastic free lifestyles,
Speaker 1: which again I applaud, uh, they don't. They tend not
Speaker 1: to point out that the fourth uh immediate consequences that
Speaker 1: a lot of people will die, and they will die
Speaker 1: as a direct result of living in a world without plastic,
Speaker 1: primarily due to plastics prevalence in medical equipment, very basic stuff,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, forget cat scans, we're talking
Speaker 1: about syringes, gloves, stuff like that. Plastic is very sterile,
Speaker 1: and this means that these things, some of which have
Speaker 1: to be single use, like syringes and so on, they
Speaker 1: would become the rarest of pokemon. They would be much
Speaker 1: more difficult to find them in the beginning, and be
Speaker 1: much more expensive to use them or to buy them
Speaker 1: if you could find them. Imagine a world in which
Speaker 1: basic medical supplies become like a PS five in terms
Speaker 1: of what a hassle it is to find them. And
Speaker 1: that means again, yeah, class is one of the determining
Speaker 1: factors now of who gets to live and who has
Speaker 1: to go. People won't just die because of medical resources.
Speaker 1: They'll die due to medical problems caused by the plastic
Speaker 1: that is already here. It accumulated so quickly, we had
Speaker 1: that Fantasiam Mickey Mouse Sorcerer's Apprentice moment. Uh. Humanity does
Speaker 1: not fully understand the long term effects of things that. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, Matt, you used to point this out all
Speaker 1: the time, like B P A s right, and what
Speaker 1: what are their effects on people? Are the plastics they're
Speaker 1: in food that when he did admit these various harmful substances, um,
Speaker 1: And it goes on. It's just important to know it's
Speaker 1: not all good stuff. Prices for things will explode, you
Speaker 1: know what they're not. Literally you will point to any
Speaker 1: almost any consumer product and say they don't make them
Speaker 1: like they used to because they can't. So like in
Speaker 1: the pandemic, if you were someone who had to buy
Speaker 1: a car, you probably saw that you whose car prices
Speaker 1: spiked tremendously. Um, that's still happening. That's part of the
Speaker 1: supply chain. But in this case that will apply to
Speaker 1: everything shoes, baby toys, makeup, um, feminine hygiene products, boats, planes, dirigibles,
Speaker 1: you name it. I don't know why we had to
Speaker 1: throw dirigibles in there, but you know, just to give
Speaker 1: a sense of the scope, UM and for someone for
Speaker 1: people like us who make a living online, we would
Speaker 1: be in a really bad spot. In many ways, the
Speaker 1: world would revolve back into life as it was in
Speaker 1: the seventies. Electronics are going to be a real pickle
Speaker 1: because plastic is great for this stuff, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. It's like you said, it's ductile, it's easily molded,
Speaker 1: you can do you can make really precise stuff with it,
Speaker 1: and it's also non conductive. Well, for all the reasons
Speaker 1: we've just laid out here, it makes a reasonable person
Speaker 1: imagine I would argue, well, what if we hepped plastic
Speaker 1: manufacturing for things like cars, for medical use, for you know,
Speaker 1: the most important things, the technologies UM and the big, heavy,
Speaker 1: expensive things that don't get replaced all the time. What
Speaker 1: if we just start removing from the system anything that's
Speaker 1: a single use plastic item or packaging or you know,
Speaker 1: the stuff that just gets thrown away and becomes trash
Speaker 1: almost immediately. What if we just get rid of that,
Speaker 1: we keep the other stuff, would we would be be okay?
Speaker 1: But doesn't not include the medical stuff that we talked
Speaker 1: about that's so important. Well, that stuff comes in plastic containers,
Speaker 1: like you know, with the you know, like a single
Speaker 1: use syringe comes in a little plastic thing. When that
Speaker 1: you rip off the top and then throw that away. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's that was an innovation to protect humans from
Speaker 1: possibly hurt you know, hurting themselves by causing infections. Right
Speaker 1: because if you imagine back in the day, the syringe
Speaker 1: was a piece of metal and glass, right that that
Speaker 1: was reused over and over and over again. And if
Speaker 1: if you imagine somehow going back to that system where
Speaker 1: there's just an emphasis on uh, cleaning the tools thoroughly
Speaker 1: between every usage, maybe there's a future for that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, But there are so many things pieces of
Speaker 1: plastic you used has been already pointed out within the
Speaker 1: medical industry that it would be I think impossible to
Speaker 1: go back, especially given just the more advanced stuff, the
Speaker 1: the advanced tools, you would have to continue using plastic
Speaker 1: for them totally, things like caffiners, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: like so many. And that's the thing, Like all of
Speaker 1: this stuff is required to be able to scale a production,
Speaker 1: you know, of of any type. You know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like if we were still using glass and metal and
Speaker 1: ceramic and all that, it's just much more difficult to
Speaker 1: scale because you can't just poop them out, you know,
Speaker 1: in a in a machine. I mean you can, but
Speaker 1: it's just a lot more costly, and you can't make
Speaker 1: quite as many of them. Um. It's because creating a
Speaker 1: couple of versus. That's what I think of when I
Speaker 1: hear the words scale. I usually think of scaling something
Speaker 1: as just making something, making as many of a profitable
Speaker 1: thing as you possibly can for as cheap as possible,
Speaker 1: and that's gonna up you know, your profits like significantly. Um.
Speaker 1: And as we know, nobody like there's a line I
Speaker 1: always think of from Mr. Show whereas somebody like there's
Speaker 1: a there's these film executives and it's like they've greenlt
Speaker 1: this movie about coupons and and it's gonna tank. And
Speaker 1: this is executive says, I swear to God, if I
Speaker 1: have to go from being super rich just rich, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna kill myself. That's that's that like kind of you know,
Speaker 1: personifies that thinking you can't go backwards. You can't go backwards. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like like your same Matt, you brought up a wonderful point.
Speaker 1: People who are on whatever side of this argument usually
Speaker 1: tend to end up proposing a phased, nuanced approach, and
Speaker 1: then that approach typically focuses on disposable or single use plastic.
Speaker 1: Some countries are doing this through market forces, like in Bangladesh,
Speaker 1: plastic bags are banned they got the g t FO order,
Speaker 1: or in places like parts of Europe and places like China,
Speaker 1: people are charged for disposable bags. In the case of China,
Speaker 1: that program started in two thousand eight and it's already
Speaker 1: reduced the amount of plastic bags in the country by
Speaker 1: that's nothing to sneeze at. They do that in California. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: in California did that as well. Um, it's going state
Speaker 1: by state in the US. But the weird thing is
Speaker 1: that there definitely at some point becomes a conflict of
Speaker 1: interest for companies because think about it, if your SAPIC
Speaker 1: or a subsidiary thereof, and and you go from making
Speaker 1: trillions of plastic bags to making a smaller number of
Speaker 1: reusable containers, than what what you're doing is essentially leaving
Speaker 1: money on the table, because every customer who would have
Speaker 1: just kept getting bags, whether they're a business or an individual,
Speaker 1: now they just buy them once and they and maybe
Speaker 1: maybe they by by them again a few years later
Speaker 1: as things break down. But that's why people want a
Speaker 1: nuance thing and people and institutions and NGOs or at
Speaker 1: least signaling the intent to do something. The question is
Speaker 1: how sincere are these attempts, and if they are sincere,
Speaker 1: will they be sufficient? And that's where another conspiracy comes
Speaker 1: into play. So I propose we take a break for
Speaker 1: a word from our sponsors, uh, and then we'll return
Speaker 1: to crack down on the genuine conspiracy holding humanity in
Speaker 1: such a dire straight. Okay, here's the problem, quiet, part
Speaker 1: out loud. I feel like everybody knows this. The problem
Speaker 1: is that the people and the organizations with the most
Speaker 1: power here, the relatively small group of entities that are
Speaker 1: capable of addressing this problem in a meaningful way, are
Speaker 1: also the ones making the most money off the system
Speaker 1: as it is. And to be soup like crystal clear transparent,
Speaker 1: we're not talking about people who are working on oil rigs.
Speaker 1: And we're not talking about people working in plastic bag
Speaker 1: factory or people making plastic cutlery for takeout and picnics.
Speaker 1: We're talking about the people in the institutions that own
Speaker 1: those oil rigs, the people in the institutions that own
Speaker 1: those factories. They spent a great amount of time and money,
Speaker 1: first accurately predicting this problem. They knew about it, and
Speaker 1: then they spent they spent some time covering it up
Speaker 1: or trying to spin it to it their advantage. In
Speaker 1: corporate parlance, the phrases getting in front of it. That's
Speaker 1: what they tried to do. They tried to get in
Speaker 1: front of it. And there's a playbook for these situations.
Speaker 1: It is common a cross industries and it is so
Speaker 1: simple and it is so effective. It's just switching out
Speaker 1: that revenue stream. Like R. J. Reynolds we did recently,
Speaker 1: Uh I think it was strange. News segment talked about
Speaker 1: how it was R. J. Reynolds right who said they
Speaker 1: supported the UK ban on tobacco right, And there was
Speaker 1: even talk of one of the big tobacco manufacturers limiting
Speaker 1: their production of combustible cigarettes. And they wouldn't have done
Speaker 1: that on day one. Heavens, we've discovered that cigarettes are
Speaker 1: bad for the health of our citizenry. Shut it down, boys, No,
Speaker 1: they bided their time and downplayed it until they had
Speaker 1: a viable alternative. They could also make tons of money
Speaker 1: on a k A vaping Yes, exactly, exactly. We need
Speaker 1: to hit that point again. They only did this once
Speaker 1: they knew they could generate income some other way, and
Speaker 1: they did it with a disposable plastic thing. But I'm
Speaker 1: holding in my hand right now that gets used by
Speaker 1: millions of people. Probably I don't know the exact numbers
Speaker 1: of people who use these kinds of disposable vaping things,
Speaker 1: like myself part of the problem here, but this is
Speaker 1: part well. But I'm just saying this particular thing, this one,
Speaker 1: the jewel one, all the others. It's becoming a massive
Speaker 1: plastics problem. Yeah. And this, this strategy, this kind of
Speaker 1: transference of income strategy plays out across multiple industries. It's
Speaker 1: applied to the world of plastics as well. Mark our words.
Speaker 1: As soon as a one to one inexpensive alternative to
Speaker 1: plastic is found, it will probably become proprietary and whomever
Speaker 1: is lucky enough to own the rights to that material
Speaker 1: will immediately press their advantage. They will end up in
Speaker 1: pursuit of profits, maybe swinging the needle to make the
Speaker 1: world a better place. And it's like desperation makes strange bedfellows. Man,
Speaker 1: imagine be one of those environmentalists who is like, uh,
Speaker 1: now I have to go to a rally for Dow Chemical. Yeah.
Speaker 1: That's the thing though, because they'll masquerade it out as
Speaker 1: some like you know, grandstanding, like doing something about it,
Speaker 1: you know, stance which is under horses. You know that
Speaker 1: we know how long they've known they don't actually care.
Speaker 1: But then they'll like you know, spend a bunch of
Speaker 1: time workshopping the language around their big pivot, and then
Speaker 1: they'll you know, you know, trot it out there as
Speaker 1: some sort of benevolent act of good. Yeah. And we're
Speaker 1: not saying I don't think any of us are saying that. Um,
Speaker 1: the people working in these companies or even the people
Speaker 1: at the top, are necessarily evil individuals, and I think
Speaker 1: some of these efforts are in good faith, you know,
Speaker 1: like um, Matt and the research earlier you have pointed
Speaker 1: out Coca Cola had a plan to recycle a can
Speaker 1: and the women in can for every can they created
Speaker 1: by Um, that seems like a good faith effort, But
Speaker 1: make no mistake, there is not a for profit company
Speaker 1: in the world that would do something like this if
Speaker 1: it meant it would damage their profits, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. There is always a calculation at play. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think the Coke thing was only they would recycle everything,
Speaker 1: but then by twenty thirty they would create all of
Speaker 1: their products with recycled plastic, which is like, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: a great idea, sure, And like, didn't Legos say they
Speaker 1: were going to pivot away from using plastic bags and
Speaker 1: their packaging obviously not you know, away from using plastic
Speaker 1: in their legos. And then McDonald's I think, is going
Speaker 1: to start using cardboard as their toys, make them little
Speaker 1: puzzles or assemblable you know, do dads, rather than plastic,
Speaker 1: because that's a big drain as well. Um. And again
Speaker 1: I'm not saying these efforts I think are are cool
Speaker 1: and obviously there's some goodwill behind them and prs obviously positive.
Speaker 1: I'm sure someone in the company does care and and
Speaker 1: and think that's a good idea, you know, big picture.
Speaker 1: But I'm just a little jaded. I tend to think
Speaker 1: these are just kind of like marketing stunts rather than
Speaker 1: them actually giving it. Yeah, unfortunately, that's they're doing what
Speaker 1: they were designed to do, the same way that fish swim. Uh.
Speaker 1: That's what That's why company or for profit corporation exists.
Speaker 1: But here's the other thing. If you were to go
Speaker 1: into the back room of some of these executive offices
Speaker 1: and you were just say, hey, you know, just between us,
Speaker 1: what do you think the chances of getting off plastic
Speaker 1: are really when what you would find is that yet,
Speaker 1: because not all plastics are created equally, they're viable alternatives
Speaker 1: for some, but until that economy of scale kicks in,
Speaker 1: the price is going to be a big problem for
Speaker 1: these companies. So the secret is the best way to
Speaker 1: solve this dilemma. The holy grail, if there were a
Speaker 1: holy grail for this quest, is not to find an
Speaker 1: alternative for these various kinds of plastic in their in state,
Speaker 1: but rather to find an alternative to the oil used
Speaker 1: to create them in the first place. That's that's the
Speaker 1: spice in this dune universe. And who knows what it is,
Speaker 1: you know, knowing the humors of humanity as we do, Um,
Speaker 1: how messed up would it be if it was water.
Speaker 1: And they're like, okay, we figured out somehow, there's some
Speaker 1: sci fi chemical shenanigans. We've figured out a way to
Speaker 1: make basically anything that you can make with plastic from water.
Speaker 1: It has to be fresh water, so people might be
Speaker 1: thirsty it though. That's how messed up is that? Okay?
Speaker 1: So how important is this? Having control over this whatever,
Speaker 1: this thing, this holy grail would be would be the
Speaker 1: equivalent of becoming the first country or company to wield
Speaker 1: nuclear power. And yeah, and that might sound a little
Speaker 1: like hyperbolic, right, but without being alarmists, that is the
Speaker 1: level of impact we're talking about. And when this thing
Speaker 1: is discovered and whatever these things are, the world will
Speaker 1: again be irrevocably changed. If that is, the technology goes
Speaker 1: public and isn't purposely suppressed. Shout out to the National
Speaker 1: Invention Secrecy Act. Check that one out if you want
Speaker 1: to be a lot of not fun at parties. That's
Speaker 1: that's the reality here. While this bickering and this research
Speaker 1: continues to play out, the clock is ticking. And if
Speaker 1: you look past the noise the theater of domestic politics,
Speaker 1: those glossy PR presentations and p s A S. The
Speaker 1: facts are undeniable. If these power systems are not dismantled,
Speaker 1: if these conspiracies are not busted, there is a strong
Speaker 1: possibility that we won't be talking about a world with
Speaker 1: out plastic for long. We'll be talking instead about a
Speaker 1: world without humans. I don't want to sound preachy, but
Speaker 1: that's like, that's that's where we are at. These companies
Speaker 1: have to be incentivized by profit or their hands forced
Speaker 1: by undeniable disaster that affects the wealthy as much as
Speaker 1: it affects the poor. And um, yeah, I just don't
Speaker 1: I don't know where it would I don't know where
Speaker 1: it would go. It's quite a pickle, it feels like
Speaker 1: to me. And I am not somebody who knows anything
Speaker 1: about any of this and can't recommend any of these things.
Speaker 1: But if you had to increase the price of products
Speaker 1: overall because of the phasing out of plastics, the only
Speaker 1: way to really solve that thing without the version you're
Speaker 1: talking about ben where some other alternative that is like
Speaker 1: at that same price point would be to raise all
Speaker 1: ships by somehow instituting universal income in some way for
Speaker 1: every person on the planet to make sure they can
Speaker 1: afford the absolute necessities and even then, I mean, there
Speaker 1: are ways to go about that, but they're not very
Speaker 1: fun for everyone. Yeah, the people who they're not fun
Speaker 1: for the people who would have the sufficient power to
Speaker 1: fight back against it. So it really does feel like
Speaker 1: we're in that dire of a situation at this point. Well,
Speaker 1: there there is another possibility, right while plastics are still around. Uh.
Speaker 1: Elon Musk just came out and suggested to folks who
Speaker 1: want to go to Mars they can't afford the projected
Speaker 1: one million dollar price tag for the trip, He said, well,
Speaker 1: you could just fly to Mars and maybe work it
Speaker 1: off once you get there, go to join a company
Speaker 1: town Mars as an indentured servant. Yeah, worth more things change, man,
Speaker 1: You'll only owe as much as you know, an above
Speaker 1: average person makes in their lifetime. It's fine, fine, right, Uh?
Speaker 1: This is so will will the world be without plastics?
Speaker 1: Probably not? Um and and a lot And we pointed
Speaker 1: this out. I'm really glad we point this out on
Speaker 1: our last episode. A ton of time went into trying
Speaker 1: to convince individual consumers that they were the problem and
Speaker 1: we're part of a problem. But the majority of that
Speaker 1: waste is not necessarily coming from you. It's like blaming
Speaker 1: the person who just has a job on an oil rig,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. That person is not big oil,
Speaker 1: They're just doing a job. And so there was one
Speaker 1: statement we could end on here that comes from Roland
Speaker 1: guy Or, a professor at the Britains School of Environmental
Speaker 1: Science and Management at the University California, Santa Barbara. He's
Speaker 1: pretty bleak, guys. Just to let you know before we
Speaker 1: hit it, he says, you can't just leave this up
Speaker 1: to households. They have no chance. Plastic producers should share
Speaker 1: a significant part of the responsibility at this point. I
Speaker 1: don't see that happening without policy intervention. So the politicians
Speaker 1: have to get involved. The corporations have to say yes,
Speaker 1: if every person you know, uh, did there level best
Speaker 1: to separate plastic from their lives. Is a serious question
Speaker 1: about how much of a difference it would actually make.
Speaker 1: It's not saying you shouldn't do it, it's just saying
Speaker 1: that's not going to stop the current operation we're in. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: if companies are still producing small disposable plastic things they
Speaker 1: just sit on shelves at stores, they're going to be
Speaker 1: thrown away at some point. And the the only think,
Speaker 1: the only good thing is that if consumers aren't buying
Speaker 1: those things and they sit on the shelf for long enough,
Speaker 1: the whatever store that is won't order more, which means
Speaker 1: there won't be a demand from the company to buy more.
Speaker 1: So there that is a route. I mean, it's not
Speaker 1: the most viable one necessarily, but it is a route.
Speaker 1: If you stop the demand, then hopefully they'll stop the supply. Yeah. Well, uh,
Speaker 1: we want to hear what you think, folks. Uh, If
Speaker 1: you I will be so impressed. I think we will
Speaker 1: all be so impressed if there is anyone in the
Speaker 1: audience today who manages to count every piece of plastic
Speaker 1: in their normal life without cheating. I don't know. No,
Speaker 1: you know, it's so tough. If you do the Matt
Speaker 1: Matt strike and get away with it and go in
Speaker 1: a tent bully for you, that's I think that's good.
Speaker 1: But I mean there's the under the hood stuff, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. You know, you're not even gonna
Speaker 1: have a sense sense of of how much there is
Speaker 1: like inside my monitor, inside my computer, inside my guitar amplifier,
Speaker 1: you know, inside this MIDI controller in front of me.
Speaker 1: I mean, each each there's like good dozens of buttons
Speaker 1: on and each one is made of like a polymer
Speaker 1: rubber type situation. Um, the chassis is steel, but inside
Speaker 1: you know it's gonna be just dozens and dozens of
Speaker 1: plastic parts. But I can't even see. Yeah, and shout
Speaker 1: out to the scientists who wrote to us after our
Speaker 1: episode on microplastics. That was sobering and important information. But
Speaker 1: the public is not aware of the depth of this problem. Uh.
Speaker 1: And at this point, um, we don't civilization doesn't know
Speaker 1: what a world without plastic would look like and how
Speaker 1: we would get there. What are your thoughts? Can you
Speaker 1: solve this problem? If so, we'd love to hear from you,
Speaker 1: and we wanna we want to elevate your message. If
Speaker 1: there's somebody listening to days like, oh yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: figured it out, I know how to fix it, then
Speaker 1: tell us, tell us immediately, Tell the world leaders, tell
Speaker 1: the business leaders. You can start by talking to us.
Speaker 1: We try to be easy to find online. That's right.
Speaker 1: You can find us on the Internet and the usual
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