Maggie's Farm

They are forced to do this by a core requirement of environmental law called the Precautionary Principle, first enunciated in the "Mono Lake" case in California. In essence, the courts must presume something is harmful unless it can be proven it is not harmful. Since logically it is not possible to prove a negative, you routinely get absurd results like this.

In Logic, the Precautionary Principle is known as an "Appeal to Ignorance."

In one case I was dealing with, the issue was harm to something known as the "cave amphipod" which were presumed to be eaten by the "blind cave spider." Since this is all occurring deep underground, no one has ever seen a "cave amphipod," but since the blind cave spiders must be eating something, it was presumed that this creature must exist. It was inherent on the landowner to prove that its activities would not harm this cave amphipod. As you can imagine, that was a rather difficult task.

National Audobon Society v. Superior Court, 33 Cal. 3d 419 (1983)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Audubon_Society_v._Superior_Court

It is first in a line of cases judicially creating the doctrine that natural resources are subject to the "public trust," which essentially makes environmental regulation a judicial matter by saying all decisions are subject to final review by the courts. Those seeking to engage in actions must demonstrate to the courts' satisfaction that their actions will not harm public trust resources under the precautionary principle.

The public trust / precautionary principle was initially argued for by Professor Sax at Boalt Hall (U.C. Berkeley Law School). Here's an article: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/571d109b04426270152febe0/t/57ae14bf1b631b641df835d4/1471026385237/2012_Blumm_Internationalizing-PTD.pdf

The precautionary principle has now spread throughout environmental regulation and law. Google "precautionary principle," you will find tons of articles talking about its application throughout environmental and health regulations. Since logically it cannot be overcome, it is a primary arrow in the quiver of environmental organizations seeking to stop action. It is also the core argument supporting the "climate change" fallacy, where actual evidence does not support that climate change is occurring but those in disagreement must "prove" it doesn't, while those who fear it is occurring just point to computer models supporting their position, even though those models have repeatedly been shown to be flawed.

I have been doing this kind of law for 30 years, including just briefing a large appeal on the public trust and the precautionary principle and being involved in some of the cases in the previously linked article. I think I understand it.

Here's the precautionary principle test set forth in the coffee decision:

http://cdn.cnn.com/cnn/2018/images/03/29/coffee.proposed.stmt.of.decision.after.trial.pdf

You really don't get it, do you? Intentionally. You don't bother to read anything I called your attention to that shows you're wrong.

One more try, right from the horse's mouth, the group that files these lawsuits. California cancer warnings and the precautionary principle:

http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-pro-con2-2009nov02-story.html