Jekyll and Hyde Nanoparticles?

Yes, Yes, and Yes.

The ignoramuses should be worried, and keep their fingers out of that they wholly do not understand.

What else is new?!?

Pick up any 10 advertisements that speak of their "nano-worthiness", read the ad, and ask yourself, "what is there about this (item, material, application, etc.) that could have ANYTHING to do with nano anything?"

Then start the answer to your "ignoramus" interlocutor with "do you know what NANO really refers to?". By the time the ignoramus understands what the term means, you'll have gone a long way toward helping him/her to understand from whence any nanoparticle dangers may arise.

Way too much is said about nano-particles that still don't exist for us to be getting so afraid of them, YET. I say an advertisement less than a week ago which referred to a micro-fiber cloth (the real thing) as "nano-enabled". Would ANYONE like to explain what that could possibly mean, besides that the advertiser thinks "nano" is a money-maker selling point?

My take on the matter is entirely different.

First of all, I consider the real nano field entirely new in it physics, chemistry and biochemistry. That simply means gazillion new surprises, both good and bad. All that needs to be handled in a fortright and systematic way. The talent is there. The discipline? And there is the rub.

There was once recombinant genetics in the same situation, creating fear and loathing in many of us. Then the leading lights of the field came together, and made a public pact and declaration, to conduct only certain research, blocking off alarming avenues. And they enforced it. Fear dissipated rapidly, and overall it is a model of success.

Counter example is Roundup. This excellent product blocks an enzyme in the chlorophyll, choking the targeted plant. Precisely targeted, entirely nontoxic. Then, the developers, full of hubris, developed Roundup resistant plants. What for? The b.s. floated is thicker than moskitoes on a hot summer night. The royal F***p was predictable. First they promised, it will stay in the experimental field. No, it did not. Then they swore on a stack of bibles and their children birthrights, that it will not spread to other species. It did, promptly.

They believed their own marketing bs, and had no adult supervision in the form of their well informed colleauges in the field. This ego driven flop was so obvious in the coming, even I could spot it and take bets. And win every one, to my displeasure.

----------------------------------------------------

there is a way and method to get sound results. Cutting corners and marketing is none of them.

Good points all, and I would not disagree that there is a need, NOW, for some internal regulation of the field of nano research, which I agree, again, is a ripe research field. But my response was to the question about what you'd say to the ignoramus, and my intent was the make him no longer an ignoramus. And the industries that misuse the term for supposed commercial gain (I'm not sure anyone really buys a "nano-enabled fabric" and that is a real quote from a real ad) only serve to make an ignoramus a bigger ignoramus.

So my response, while accurate, I believe, was too narrow to suit your purpose, I think. My apologies for that, and my agreement with your (re)stated points, which I was apparently too obtuse to recognize on the first go-round.