My wife gets a lot of emails from her cousins about the latest big bad corporate attack on the little guy, how they are poisoning us with some chemical that is “one atom [or molecule]” away from some highly toxic substance.
As has already been mentioned, it is extemely relevant to note whether the ion behaves the same as the atom. Chlorine gas (Cl[sub]2[/sub]) is highly toxic, Sodium metal (Na) is extremely reactive, and sodium chloride (NaCl) is table salt. More than three-fouths of our atmosphere (78%) is Nitrogen Gas (N[sub]2[/sub]). Nitrogen is used in a variety of situations where an inert gas is required, because under most conditions, it does not react. But many high explosives derive their power from their Nitrogen content (**TNT—**2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, is a chemical compound with the formula C[sub]6[/sub]H[sub]2/sub[sub]3[/sub]CH[sub]3[/sub]; **Hydrazine, **N[sub]2[/sub]H[sub]4[/sub], is a rocket fuel, among other uses; Nitroglycerine, C[sub]3[/sub]H[sub]5[/sub]N[sub]3[/sub]O[sub]9[/sub] is the active ingredient in Dynamite.)
Coal, which is mostly pure Carbon, burns, but is not usually unstable. Diamond and graphite are other forms of nearly pure Carbon, which are not considered particularly dangerous. But take one atom of Carbon and one atom of Nitrogen, and you get Cyanide (CN).
If people are going to get their panties in a twist with “OMG!!!11!!! It’s only a few atoms different from [some highly gross substance]!!11!!:eek:” it would behoove them to have at least a rudimentary understanding of what the Hell they are talking about.
Careful, I burned myself on gaseous DHMO the other day - oddly, though, the best treatment I had at the time was the liquid form. Have to be careful though, that stuff’s bad shit if it gets into your lungs.
What you should beware of, of course, is alcohol, C[sub]2[/sub]H[sub]5[/sub]OH. It’s not even one atom away from dimethyl ether, CH[sub]3[/sub].O.CH[sub]3[/sub]. No-one around here’s crazy enough to drink ether, are they, even mixed with water? :eek:
Chocolate is a deadly poison. As little as a quarter pound can kill a dog! (True.)
But seriously, you cannot prove to me that if I use Splenda instead of sugar in my morning pot of tea and make no other change in my diet it won’t help weight loss (as well as help with my mild diabetes). You can’t tell me that if, on a hot summer afternoon, after I’ve spent an hour working in the garden I drink a glass of diet root beer (the only diet soda I like) and make no other change in my diet it won’t help with weight loss. Not a lot obviously, since a couple spoons full of sugar are under 50 calories, but every bit helps.
That it does - a 12oz can of sugary soda typically contains ~140 Cals of sugar. Cut out three of those a day and it’s getting near to a pound of fat in a week. It all adds up.
DHMO can certainly be tricky stuff. I used to actually SUBMERGE myself in it for two hours a day in high school, and I ingested it at regular intervals during the submerging. Luckily, I avoided serious side effects, and I did have the benefits…I lost weight and had nothing but lean muscle mass growth. Powerful stuff. And, though I’m ashamed, I’ve begun the submergings again, on a slightly more limited basis, as I attempt to lose weight again. Whew. Glad I got that off my chest.
As to artificial sweeteners not aiding in weight loss: Anecdotally…I drink a lot of diet pop (soda/soft drink, whatever), and I have noticed if I sprinkle in regular glasses of water between cans of Diet Coke, I have FAR less of a sweet tooth during the day. When I drink Diet Coke basically all day (I used to drink about 5-6 cans a day…I’ve now cut back to about 3), I crave sweets and fat like nothing else.
AIUI, the relative lack of toxicity to humans is partly why it was so desirable for insect control. It’s fatal to bugs, relatively safe for humans, and its usage was only stopped when it turned out that DDT wouldn’t degrade (at least, not all that quickly), and indeed, caused some serious environmental problems.
Also, it was getting so it wasn’t all that harmful to mosquitoes, either. Places where DDT had seen heavy use were breeding crops of DDT-resistant mosquitoes, reducing its effectiveness compared to other chemicals and control methods, which is a major reason we stopped using it.
I believe it’s safe to generalise that any article claiming that substance X is this many atoms/molecules away from substance Y, where substance Y is scary or poisonous, they’re talking bollocks.
Does the term ‘one molecule/atom away from…’ ever turn up in serious scientific or respectable journalistic contexts?
Well, if you count isotope studies and isotope effects, then maybe. Or maybe the substitution of a different element in the same period, such as a switch to selenium in this paper (discussed in this blog post.) And there are a number of drugs where the only difference is small changes in a functional group, such as codeine and morphine, where the only difference is a methyl group present in codeine.
But I agree, for your formulation above, it’ll always be non-scientific scaremongering.
My argument is, if Splenda is so harmful, why does the FDA let us have it? Or is that naive?
It’s illogical to believe that the same agency that drags its heels on approving potentially life-saving drugs based on the argument “we can’t prove that it’s harmless” would then turn around and approve a sweetener and justify it by saying “we can’t prove that it’s harmful.”
Though I am confused about why these entities want to kill off most of the world’s people, when there is so much more profit and fun to be had controlling and deceiving a maximal number of humans.
It’s not quite so illogical as that. Foods & drugs are regulated very differently. And the burden of proof can, in many cases run the other way.
But overall, the FDA seems generally capable. If Splenda was going to be producing chrnic health problems in thousands of people I think we’d have seen it by now.
What I don’t understand is why anyone would want an artificial sweetener in the first place. Just don’t eat sweet stuff and you’ll be both healthier & happier.
Well, sure. But the point of the studies that do say they don’t seem to help with weight loss is, people who drink diet sodas tend to take in more calories elsewhere. So they ARE making changes in their diet, just not conscious ones.
As a sugar substitute for people who are diabetic, they’re clearly invaluable. If you’re on a weight loss diet that you’re being highly conscientious about, they’re probably a good way to have a treat without getting extra calories. But if you’re casually hoping to drop weight just by switching from regular to diet soda it might not work because you may end up taking in the extra calories anyway if you’re not paying attention to what you snack on otherwise.
Oh, you can go a lot further than that. The very air we breathe is zero atoms away from being a highly corrosive, unstable oxidizer.
Quoth DHMO himself:
Indeed, these are actually the same fact. To put it simply, nitrogen really, really likes to be in its elemental, N[sub]2[/sub] form. If it is in that form, it’s really hard to get it into some other form, so it’s fairly inert. If it’s in some other form, then it’ll really easily (and energetically) revert to the elemental form. It’s like a big heavy rock held high up in the air, versus a big heavy rock sitting on the ground.
I say let the idiots who don’t know enough about chemistry and biology to realize that 3D structure trumps 2D chemical formulae, scare themselves to death by any and all available means - hopefully before they can breed.
