[Stoves] Millions and millions saved - the Golden Arches of FakeDonalds (Re: Andrew)

[Traveller]

Andrew:

I have no basis to form an opinion whether cleaner stoves "can have an
effect on decreasing those premature deaths."

For one, the term "cleaner stoves" begs definition, since "cleanliness" is
about fuels, combustion practices, cooking habits. I also happen to think
"cleanliness" is a CONTEXTUAL, subjective determination, not some
lab-produced, WBT-sanctioned, ISO-blessed farce with critical acclaim in
NYT.

Also, "premature deaths" is loose use of the concept of "premature
mortality", which has little to do with specific individual deaths.
"Premature mortality" is a matter of definition. Statistics of actual
deaths are imprecise, and IHME super-humans assign or re-assign "causes of
death" by fiat (otherwise claimed to be "expert consensus" once the doors
are closed). Statistics of "disability" are even more questionable, as also
those of incidence and co-incidence of disease. God knows how much
information we really have on individual health conditions, nutrition,
exposure to disease vectors, genetic stock, and their age/sex/ethnic
variations including those over time.

In short, "decreasing" premature deaths means nothing. Nothing specific, at
any rate.

There will ALWAYS be premature deaths and DALYs, estimation anywhich way
(so far, what I call "killing by assumptions"; who knows what magic will
happen with Big Data?)

What will change is attribution of premature deaths and DALYs. Something
has to be blamed. A few years ago, climate change was blamed, even for
cohorts past, and Tony McMichael even prepared regional age/sex forecasts
of premature deaths due to climate change by 2020. Then the IHME folks
wised up and dropped climate change from their 2008 update of GBD and then
on.

I will spare GACC, NIH and Gates Foundation a few hundred million dollars
and can declare "cleaner stoves will lower premature mortality attributable
to cooking fuel emissions by x million per year by 20aa and y million per
year by 22bb." I can make up baselines and deltas to fill up a, b, x and y.

I just need my 20% cut. It will even buy me a chair at IHME and Gates
Foundation advisory board.

Until then, I won't make up my mind.

A mind shouldn't be made up anyway. Perpetual skepticism is the price
science extracts.

Rest is up to theologians. They can walk down the mountaintops and try to
understand the contexts, as Cecil would recommend. ISO/IWA, GACC/NIH,
IHME/WHO are cults.

Nikhil



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> ------------------------------
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> Message: 13
> Date: Thu, 08 Dec 2016 10:35:10 +0000
> From: ajheggie at gmail.com
> To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves
>         <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>
> Subject: Re: [Stoves] report with dissapointing results from cleaner
>         cookstoves (Crispin)
> Message-ID: <18di4c5goch45ba9cejce2blkr89rr92j9 at 4ax.com>
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>
> [Default] On Thu, 8 Dec 2016 02:42:51 -0500,Traveller
> <miata98 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> > enjoyed the luxuries of stove science while some 400 million poor people
> have died prematurely in the last 30 years.
>
> traveler make up your mind, either cleaner stoves, arrived at
> by application of science, can have an effect on decreasing those premature
> deaths (and for the most part we are considering infant mortality so life
> expectation might otherwise be many years) or the
> wood smoke those 400 million poor endured was not a
> significant contribution to their early demise.
>
> Given that I believe sooty particulates [1] from incomplete combustion are
> a danger to health I wanted views on why this study did not conclude a
> cleaner stove had no effect.
>
> So far Roger Samson has made some observations , though I never did see
> his original post.
>
> [1]Frans has pointed out that it is the PICs adsorbed onto the sooty bits
> that do the damage, carbon bucky balls being basically inert in the body.
>
> AJH
>
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