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cozworthington t1_iu6hlgf wrote

Things like this always make me wonder what kinds of things we're doing now which people will look back on as ridiculous and dangerous like we are now with ragwort-killer coated trousers which explode

EDIT: thank you Gwaydms for catching that!

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RollinThundaga t1_iu6l6l4 wrote

I read a comment or something once from a chemical engineer who said that, of gasoline/petrol hadn't become ubiquitous a century ago, there's no way regular people would want to buy or handle it without tons of safety precautions.

It's toxic as shit and a flammable solvent.

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ramriot t1_iu77qhf wrote

A biologist friend once told me that many small rodents cannot tolerate certain antibiotics including penicillin.

Thus if this first great antibiotic had been required to be tested as thoroughly as modern pharmaceuticals are we likely would not have it until far later, possibly too late to treat infected WWII soldiers & thus put at rist the allies winning the war.

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CorpseOnMars t1_iu6zvwl wrote

Then they decided putting lead in it was a good idea. Guess that made for good serial killer podcasts, so we got that.

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arvidsem t1_iu7j3jx wrote

Don't worry, they knew that the lead was a bad idea when they started. Leaded gasoline should probably be considered a crime against humanity.

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Bowfinger_Intl_Pics t1_iu7nlap wrote

Thomas Midgely Jr, the principal developer of lead in gasoline, also developed one of the first CFCs (Chlorofluorocarbons.) In 1940, at the age of 51, Midgley contracted polio, which left him severely disabled. He devised an elaborate system of ropes and pulleys to lift himself out of bed. In 1944, he became entangled in the device and died of strangulation.

So he kind of took care of himself. The one man who probably caused more harm to the environment than any other individual in history.

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Regolith_Prospektor t1_iu7d4gs wrote

Gasoline used to be sold at drug stores (late 1800s) and was used as a delousing agent. It was a byproduct of refining crude oil (they were mainly after kerosene to use as lamp oil). When Bertha Benz took her famous road trip in the first automobile in 1888, she topped up at drugstores along the way.

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saschaleib t1_iu7s72d wrote

She literally had to stop in every village to buy out the supply, because they only sold it in small bottles and their engine wasn’t exactly fine-tuned for fuel-efficiency.

The legend goes that following that experience she suggested to set up what we would now call “gas stations” along the roads…

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markhewitt1978 t1_iu83xfs wrote

If it were today it would be used as an argument as to why gas cars are impossible as there's no infrastructure.

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War_Hymn t1_iugdzae wrote

Funny enough, the early diesel tractors with hot bulb ignition they had back then could pretty much run on any kind of oil.

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ArkyBeagle t1_iue19jb wrote

They barely handle it now. Lotta engineering in fuel delivery.

> a flammable solvent.

Gasoline has weird properties as both. It has a strange set of heats of ignition.

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gwaydms t1_iu6ilwt wrote

>ragwort-killer coated trousers which explode

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cozworthington t1_iu6izwy wrote

dangit, we love to have reading comprehension don't we

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Brickie78 t1_iu862yh wrote

It's OK, I read the chemical in question as "Sodium ChlorIDE" not "Sodium ChlorATE".

Was wondering how table salt killed weeds then made trousers explode...

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gwaydms t1_iu6jqhl wrote

It's the herbicide, not the herb.

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cozworthington t1_iu6kclp wrote

yeah as soon as I saw your comment I reaslied what I'd done, the joy of a long day looking at a screen, haha

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Ricky_Rollin t1_iu6m6tj wrote

Cars will be one of them.

1000 years from now, “TIL people use to strap themselves to a tank of highly combustible fluid using combustion engines to get around, they would literally give licenses to drive these things to just about anybody”.

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cozworthington t1_iu6nii8 wrote

Ha! For sure, "millions of big metal blocks on wheels propelled by explosions... wow how did they even survive".

This article brought to my mind the exploding Android phones from a couple years back as something I'm certain will be looked at in the same way

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ZDTreefur t1_iu6pptw wrote

What will they be replaced with, teleporters?

2000 years from now, "TIL people use to actually destroy themselves, killing themselves in the process, and digitally print an exact replica of themselves, just so they can buy some ice cream at the 7-11."

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Stralau t1_iu7tcbu wrote

Cars.

So back then, people got inside these metal boxes which they drove themselves, hurtling them around even residential areas. There were licenses, but almost anyone could get one and everyone had one.

That sounds dangerous.

Oh yes, thousands of people died every year. But AI wasn’t good enough to steer them yet.

But why did the use them in cities???

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Arthiem t1_iu72c5u wrote

Probably all the electronics that are rushed to shelves and burn peoples houses down.

Or wrapping most of our food in petroleum biproduct

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ClitClipper t1_iu95ilx wrote

Heating food in plastic packaging in microwaves has always weirded me out. I won’t be shocked if that’s someday looked at as foolish in hindsight.

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mhyquel t1_iu7g6sl wrote

I've said this a few times; at some point we'll look back at surgery as barbaric. People from the future will find it abhorrent and astonishing that we used to cut people open to make them heal.

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wolfie379 t1_iu7hppm wrote

I saw a documentary about that - doctor travelled back in time to give a kidney dialysis patient a pill to get her kidneys working again.

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mpking828 t1_iu8xi2v wrote

We do this now.

  • Trepanation (drilling or scraping a hole in the skull) to release the demons out. (Seriously, but sometimes worked because of cranial pressure from severe head trauma, they just didn't know that)
  • Lobotomy, severing connections in the brain’s prefrontal lobe with an implement resembling an icepick, done up till the 1970's
  • Bloodletting ie draining your blood to restore the balance of humors. Just tap an artery and let some blood out till your better.
  • Malaria therapy. You got syphilis? We'll give you malaria, cause the fever is so hot and prolonged, it will kill the syphilis.
  • Cough syrup used to be made from morphine
  • Mercury drops was a common medical tonic.
  • Heroin was also a cough syrup as well.
  • Leeches anyone? Common up till the 1800's, people used leeches, usually in reference to bloodletting.
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alex8339 t1_iu96c1q wrote

>Leeches anyone? Common up till the 1800's, people used leeches, usually in reference to bloodletting.

And maggots!

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whoamist t1_iu9e379 wrote

Leeches and maggots are still used in medicine

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RollinThundaga t1_iu8m7d9 wrote

Resetting complex bone fractures will probably always require it. You can't migitech a femur to heal properly when its in three pieces, each an inch apart and stabbed into the surrounding muscle.

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donspyd t1_iubov1c wrote

I mean I heard the same thing in Star Trek, but its better than the alternative. Would it really be humane to just let everyone suffer and die until we invent lasers and magic drugs? So I don't think its barbaric really. You work with what you have.

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SableShrike t1_iu7vnqr wrote

Fossil fuels! If we manage to survive and outgrow them, they’ll eventually be as alien to us as murdering sperm whales for lamp oil is to us now.

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bane5454 t1_iu8g8n1 wrote

Not quite today, but… lead in gasoline up til 1995. Also an honorable mention is modern vehicle safety, as the crumple zone in vehicles used to be whatever poor souls happen to be in the car at the time. Head on collision? Hope the passenger doesn’t mind having an engine ejected onto their lap. :/

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ArkyBeagle t1_iue1po5 wrote

I always liked the driver having a spear ( the central bar in the steering column ) pointed at their thorax.

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MJBrune t1_iu80c7x wrote

Honestly, we have exploding phones and manually controlled cars. Those are the two biggest things people will look back at and go... But why?

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uski t1_iu8rli3 wrote

PFAS and neonicotinoids

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