"Lignin-free" boxes

Regardless of the validity or lack thereof of the chemist's claims, the
whole exchange is still disturbing because what the vendor and
manufacturer are trying to do is to is second guess the customer and
tell us, in essence, not to worry our pretty little heads about such
things.  Clearly, it is not their place to decide on our behalf what is
and isn't acceptable; if we specify lig-free, and pay for lig-free and
don't get lig-free than we have not been treated properly and I find it
deeply offensive.  On a more concrete level, the vendor is extremely
presumptuous; he has no way of predicting our individual applications.
For example, even if what he said about "the earliest reactions of the
lignin [having] therefore already occurred" is true (and I too fail to
be comforted by this assurance), that would not answer our concerns
about specific effects with materials other than paper such as
photo-emulsion. Given the extremely primitive state of knowledge in
lignin chemistry generally, the entire assertion becomes not only
self-serving, but ludicrous. I plan to be including Ralph Roessler of
PTI in the distribution of the DistList (we talk together via modem
several times a week), and he may have something to add to this
discussion. It would be interesting to get the opinions of someone in
the business.

                                  ***
                   Conservation DistList Instance 2:8
                 Distributed: Sunday, December 11, 1988
                        Message Id: cdl-2-8-007
                                  ***