That pinged my BS detector as well. I see later on in this thread they show a reference. I still think it's BS. Consider the volume of air versus the volume of buildings. Consider that hot smoke goes up. Consider how well smoke must diffuse for you to smell it from a chimney down the block. I doubt that you could purposefully design buildings to be such wonder air filters.

But like others here, and unlike Sam's general presumption, I find the premise that smoke is bad for you quite believable. I have some reservations about whether the actual risk I'd receive from recreational burning is worth worrying about. Sam would have made a more convincing case if he had included such facts.

The article is actually more telling about Sam, his friends, and maybe us as well, than fireplace smoke.

Sam makes an uncompelling case that doesn't include the hard facts needed to make a clear determination of costs associated with a wood burning fireplace, and when people don't automatically accept it, he treats their resistance to his received word as evidence for faith based irrationality on their part. The objections he anticipates and chooses to respond to are not fact based questions about dosage, but historical anecdotes, basically straw men.

The most interesting thing I took away was the apparent disparity between the reaction of LW'ers and the reaction Sam reports from his friends. Almost everyone here seems open to the possibility, and even consider it plausible, while by my reading of Sam's reports about his friends, they are completely dismissive of the possibility.