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Comment by derpiederpie | Hacker News Reader

Its time to prosecute the Scientists & Business people who privately gain from the public harm they do.

It's insane to me that such actors are let off the hook regarding the millions or billions of damages they are liable for.

Frankly, I understand why China executes white collar criminals--

I wish more scientists responsible for developing toxic chemicals, and the businesspeople who pay them-- were prosecuted and handed capital sentences for their crimes against wildlife & humanity.

Perhaps then-- by holding them responsible and making examples of them-- their future ilk would be responsible actors.

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If "Scientists & Business" develop solutions that unknowingly do harm amd were approved by the FDA, who should be held responsible?

We've seen example after example of "Scientists & Business" knowing full well that their products are harmful and doing everything they can to cover that fact up and prevent the public from learning the truth, and even examples where the FDA itself knew full well that the products are harmful and yet the products are allowed to continue to be sold.

The entire system is broken and part of what is missing, perhaps the most important part, is accountability and meaningful consequences.

Obviously, companies who were genuinely unaware that their products were harmful and who immediately recalled and ceased production of those products after finding out aren't the biggest problem, but they still show that the product safety testing practices of both the company and the FDA are inadequate.

It frustrates me when privacy prevents anyone discovering about a companies bad product.

If a company has a list of buyers of their product, they should be able to hand that to healthcare providers and have those healthcare providers check medical records to see if, for example, everyone who uses this brand of toilet cleaner ends up getting arthritis 10 years later.

If it’s really unknowingly they shouldn’t be held responsible. But we have plenty of examples where companies knew exactly what’s going on and they covered it up for decades. See lead gas or tobacco. Or the food industry who pours sugar into everything. They know exactly that they are generating millions of diabetics.

The thing is, it seems they usually do know. And we don’t prosecute and handle that case yet. So the “unknowingly” seems to be the least of our worries.

Do they usually know or are there just a handful of very high profile cases where they did?

It seems like everyone's go to example of this is the oil industry and global warming and tobacco and cancer.

That only scratches the surface. In every high stakes business, they have prepared the ground for themselves through lobbying and regulatory capture to minimize the level of necessary care while maximizing protection against liability.

Both. Unknowingly usually means uncaringly. And the FDA clearly has duty to thoroughly test products.

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