The general term "second hand" implies a prior usage as in "second hand" or "previously owned" car. Applying this definition to smoke, I would assume second hand smoke had already passed through some other medium, someone else's lungs. But I believe what is meant is any smoke generated by a smoker whether or not portions of it had been removed by his lungs. Actually, you would expect that smoke which had passed through someones lungs would be, more or less, "purified smoke".
When considering second hand smoke and harm it may cause, I would suspect that the closer to the source a bystander is, the more concentrated the smoke would be and, therefore, the further from the source the less danger the smoke would present. But then there is the factor of accumulation in a closed area and how many smokers are smoking. The effects from second hand smoke could probably be calculated from a formula which considered the number of smokers smoking and volume of smoke generated the saturation effect in which as each distance becomes saturated, more bad stuff would be passed further away, the proximity to the source of the smoke and the volume of the enclosure, if any, and the respiration rate of an individual in the space. You could probably get a government grant to develop such a formula.
This is not intended as a defense of smoking itself but the right of the smoker to smoke and the right of non-smokers to get as far away from smokers as possible. If we banned every bad or dangerous habit individuals have, there would be nothing left to do. People who are willing to pay the price in poor health and treatment costs because of bad or risky behavior should be allowed to, freely. Athletes of all kinds, race car drivers, swimmers, jay-walkers and the over-eaters do stupid things too. The right of someone to not smoke is no more right than for the smoker to smoke. I can imagine that some of the winter illnesses smokers are prone to comes, not from smoking, but from smoking in the freezing temperatures and blizzards.
We all, almost all, do stupid things. If someone tried to stop you from being stupid, I know you would object, Obama does.
When considering second hand smoke and harm it may cause, I would suspect that the closer to the source a bystander is, the more concentrated the smoke would be and, therefore, the further from the source the less danger the smoke would present. But then there is the factor of accumulation in a closed area and how many smokers are smoking. The effects from second hand smoke could probably be calculated from a formula which considered the number of smokers smoking and volume of smoke generated the saturation effect in which as each distance becomes saturated, more bad stuff would be passed further away, the proximity to the source of the smoke and the volume of the enclosure, if any, and the respiration rate of an individual in the space. You could probably get a government grant to develop such a formula.
This is not intended as a defense of smoking itself but the right of the smoker to smoke and the right of non-smokers to get as far away from smokers as possible. If we banned every bad or dangerous habit individuals have, there would be nothing left to do. People who are willing to pay the price in poor health and treatment costs because of bad or risky behavior should be allowed to, freely. Athletes of all kinds, race car drivers, swimmers, jay-walkers and the over-eaters do stupid things too. The right of someone to not smoke is no more right than for the smoker to smoke. I can imagine that some of the winter illnesses smokers are prone to comes, not from smoking, but from smoking in the freezing temperatures and blizzards.
We all, almost all, do stupid things. If someone tried to stop you from being stupid, I know you would object, Obama does.
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