the harm from leaded gasoline at the dosage used wasn't obvious at the time
He was famously warned of leaded gasoline's dangers, had to take a vacation to Miami to recover from lead poisoning. And also was famously a co-inventor of CFCs.
His only saving grace is that his name is also on the list of "inventors killed by their own inventions."
Humans have eat potatoes for about 8000 years. So that seems to be a pretty large scale experiment.
While deciding to put a safe amount of a dangerous material on a product used in large scale is not a good decision.
Not sure how to explain (as I have little time now) but here is a simple way: - both potatoes and led have safe and dangerous levels - one - potato - was used since at least 8000 years ago - the other was not used on such large scale
It seems to me that we need to define safe levels in other way:
- safe levels on small scale and uses rarely
- safe levels on large scale or used constantly
Small amounts of lead don't kill you immediately, they just make you a little dumber, a little more aggressive...
With leaded gas, the problem was also these small, long term effects that had never been established despite lead being used for thousands of years.
Today it's widely known that large doses of solanine (a compound in potatoes and tomatoes) are toxic, but the amount commonly in food is thought to be safe. So we haven't banned potatoes.
But even if some insane or evil scientist invents a harmful compound that becomes widely used, I'd be mainly angry at the US Public Health Services, or the equivalent public health agency in other countries. It's their responsibility to only allow safe products. They conducted a study on leaded gasoline and decided not to ban it. And every other country allowed it as well.
So we have to conclude every country's public health agency was either corrupt or incompetent, or that the harm from leaded gasoline at the dosage used wasn't obvious at the time. (Or both.)