h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This is the only thing that I can think of that was:
(a) Worse then the thing it replaced.
(b) A huge success.
Clearly its inventor was a genius.

(a) It replaces cows.
(b) of course, cows don't fit in the fridge.
Just another one of Gods cock-ups

Milk cartons have replaced cows? That's going to have a serious effect
on the environment. I guess, if you see the cow as the original container of milk, at one end of a long chain of different types of milk containers through history (such as the churn or the bottle), and you assume some kind of teleological explanation which sees the milk carton as the inevitable extension of the cow's purpose, well then you might be able to claim that milk cartons replaced cows. But in this case, you would be veering into a Marxist Theory of the Cow, which is dangerous territory for anyone, as Marx actually claimed, in a hastily scribbled footnote to the Labour Theory of Capital.
I was thinking more of the humble milk bottle- which always struck me as being an all-round simpler and better container then the carton, which is perversly difficult to open.
I agree with you, though, that it is damn tough getting a cow in the fridge. Tried it once, wasted a whole afternoon.

'course they're BOTH good at spreading milk round the room. Just that if you're using a bottle you drop it and get lots of shards of glass too. And if you're using them like this then neither option is re-usable.
Cartons are however inferior because clever starlings can't drink from them on doorsteps, and hence remain thirsty.

I agree that both milk bottles and cartons are good from spreading milk around rooms. But this attractive feature is only possible because of their primary function, which is to keep milk confined in a space. And we need to ask ourselves, how scared, really, are we of the glass of a milk bottle? Is this fear real or imaginary? And is it worth the sacrifice of actually being able to get at the milk without finding a knife or scissors, risking slicing our thumbs open with said knife, or finding oneself with milk all over one's shirt and a piece of cardboard that looks like it was torn open by a desperate milk-crazed Neanderthal? I am honestly mystified as to the popularity of the milk carton. I would love for someone to convince me otherwise, so I can lead a normal life again. Please.
And, by my reckoning, the clever starlings are the ones that could open milk cartons, which would mean, I suppose that they contribute, indirectly, to the possible evolution of Starling intelligence- but that means that the clever starlings would bother trying..

i think the attraction in milk cartons is that they don't have to be washed and reused, cutting production costs.

What about the recyclable plastic one-gallon milk jugs? Those seem fairly practical. Oops, that isn't the point of this entry.

Cut in production costs.. I had never thought of that. A good social benefit, requiring a small personal sacrifice in ease of access to milk. Well, that does put my mind at rest somewhat.
But I am not sure if a cut in production costs is always a good thing in and of itself. It would only be so if there were other consequential benefits, such as improvements to the environment and/or the working conditions of those in the milk industry. I suspect, however, that the cut in production costs merely off-sets an increase in the corporate profits. In short, my pain and discomfort in getting at my milk is only helping to pay for a swimming pool somewhere in L.A. (Don't know why I chose L.A.- its hard to think of anywhere as the milk capital of the world) And if that were the case, I would be even more annoyed about it then I was before.
I can't be certain of this, though, as:
(1) My suspicion is predicated on a somewhat negative view of human nature as always greedy and profit driven, and I am not sure if this is a view that I even hold.
(2) I think you might be getting at the point that there is some environmental benefit to the milk carton over the bottle- i.e., cheaper to re-cycle, which would be worth my sacrifice- and this holds true whether it is actually put in practice or not. And, consequently the milk carton is indeed a (potentially) useful technology. Well, I think, without wanting to get too deeply into recycling techiques, that this is probably right. So now, I can go to sleep.

glad that put your mind at ease...

I doubt the carton is more enviromental that the bottle. But even so why don´t we just keep milk in juice cartons? They are so much easier to open, and it´s pretty much the same concept. And I think the guy who invented them became a billionaire on that too.

The starlings could open the silver foil lid they had back then. But what is the problem with simply putting on a lid like coke bottles have? That would require starlings with thumbs, which would really be a jump in starling-evolution.

I aggree with sea's washed and re used theroy, except that I think they were meant to reduce disease rather than costs.

that too.

I`t only natural for the milk inside one of these cartons to "relocate" to the floor and that is simply because Homogenised Milkinius(the evolved form of the cow juice we all know and love as"Milk"),is awfully curious,like ourselves,about it`s natural surroundings
I say "Let the milk loose,freedom to milk in all prisons we narrow minded humans call conatiners!!"

Milk bottles are easier to recycle than cartons - You wash them and fill them up again.

However someone has to lug the things around and pick them up. Outside of the UK the world has been devoid of electric milk floats and the delivery of bottles to feed starlings. Take for example the N. Americn milk run - Hormone fed factory cattle squirt milk into some machine that heats it up, purifies it and extracts all the remaining milk qualities. This milk is further separated and classified and sent out in plastic lined boxes and distributed to supermarkets. Sedentary consumers can then stop ruminating, get off their couches, get in their cars drive around polluting the air and burning energy and getting stuck in traffic to enter some sterile air conditioned mall burning lots of energy and taking up some huge eyesore of a piece of property.

The consumer then lugs it home. Uses it before the expiry date, then as a token gesture to the environment tosses it into a recycling box to be picked up by the municipal recycling (bin men) crew. The box material can then be sorted cleaned and processed and made into new boxes - all which take energy that has to come from somewhere like burning oil or reacting uranium.

Even as a fan of the milk bottle, I am bound to say that it is not an easy thing to wash. In fact, they seem to have been contrived without cleanliness in mind at all. On the domestic level, you need a special brush (actually, didn't there used to be such things once? Little wirey things with long handles. Now no longer with us. Or am I merely displaying a worrying psychological trend towards some kind of milk-obsessed madness here?). Once you have the brush (Yes, they did exist, I'm sure of it, I'm not talking nonesense here- lets plow on..), it was never going to properly clean the entire bottle. You would, without fail, end up with a thin circle of decaying milk in the base. (So the milk-bottle cleaning brush becomes another useless invention- maybe even one I just made up! Ha ha... Perhaps it is in the nature of milk that it attracts such things- it is, after all, a powerful substance and force of magic in a dark and bewildering world..)
Anyway, that's just the domestic level. On an industrial level, you need big factories, filled with bottle cleaning machines, powered by the usual dwindling/dangerous resources etc.. etc.. You see, it is a sad fact today, that because of our consumer structure, almost every product you can think of is tarnished with all of the apathy and waste that adheres to our system.. On this level, I reckon, milk cartons and milk bottles come out pretty much equal. As do Christmas Trees, Cat Collars, Joy Sticks, Aircraft etc... So, remove the common demoninator, and you are left with an inquiry into the relative costs and benefits of bottle versus carton re-cycling as it could be in every possible world. And only by going through that could you decide- from this angle- whether the carton is ultimatley the more beneficial technology. And, since, I couldn't really bring myself to do this, I relied on the following thought:

"Hmmm, well, glass is hard but cardboard would probably just end up turning into fertiliser..."

Admittedly thin, but, heck- why not rely on poetry once in a while to feel better about the world.

Anyway, back to the starlings. People seem mightily concerned about the evolution of their intelligence. Ultimately, I reckon, they'll pull through somehow- but that shouldn't stop us from helping them. And a thin piece of foil just doesn't cut it- They saw through that one mighty fast. I reckon the carton might be just about right for the next level. So, at least, its got that going for it.

We (us technophobes in Kent that is) get milk bottles every day! And when that isn't enough, we go down the road to the Post Office and pick up one or two plastic cartons of the stuff.

The only time we ever drink that bloody awful milk you get in cardboard cartons is when we can't be bothered to go to 24hr Tesco and/or our tastebuds have completely deteriorated to the point of accepting this whitened water as milk. And why are they so hard to pour? I know that it's something to do with that effect that makes things stick to their containers - I believe jet engines are also subject to it - but it isn't hard to make them NOT that shape!

Oh and round our way we get them in juice containers...they are bad enough, I pity all you out there who are stil coping with the ones you have to rip open with your bare teeth...

I fail to see why we need milk cartons at all - it would be much simpler and economical to have fresh milked pumped straight into the home much in the same way as water is. This would have the benefical effect of allowing milkmen to find alternative employment with more sociable hours. Those not wanting the new convenient delivery method, for reasons associated with cost and/or infrequently cleaned kitchen and/or dining areas would be free to own their own cows and obtain their own milk, and thus also be free from VAT payments on piped milk.

the milk would go bad! and spoil all the other milk!

Are you in NZ? Here, we are stuck with plastic bottles or cardboard cartons (a Tory govt gave in to big business, and allowed plastic and cardboard, changing the law to help business, it's a NZ thing, honest, NZ pols love $$$$$$$ and business even more than Americans do!) As the person who does the shopping, I avoid cardboard cartons, cos they're fiendishly hard to open, and impossible for a kid. But plastic bottles are horrible, spill everywhere, and if you drop them they break! My son found that out, bringing one home from the shop. They were recently 're-designed' and have even worse problems now.Bring back glass bottles! Now, please!

who, me?