To be chemically clear, lots of stuff is made from petroleum because petroleum is made of strings of carbon atoms that we’ve learned to collect, purify and break up.
The exact same molecules could be made from other sources of carbon, like cellulose or other plant materials.
The molecules would be identical: pharmaceuticals, food dyes and flavorings, polyester, plastic toys, and your toothbrush. Carbon atoms can be configured in an infinite variety of shapes, into poisons or life-saving drugs. (hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and other atoms are added selectively)
So there are two basic issues:
1. The source of the carbon is important for the climate because petroleum sources add ancient carbon into the atmosphere while plants are recycling carbon that’s already there.
2. The molecules being made with the carbon can be good, bad, or innocuous.
The processing of petroleum is well developed (high T and pressure; high energy use, toxic solvents). But biology makes really complicated molecules at body temperature in water. We haven’t figured out how to do that very well, yet.
The field of “green chemistry” looks at the entire chain from source, manufacture, use, reuse, disposal to make safer, healthier processes for people and planet. (See talks by Paul Anastas and others.)
Well dent corn is the same way. We turn it into sugar, plastic, and lubricants. That said, my quick conclusion was we probably are better off not eating hydrocarbons in our food. It’s not acutely toxic, but it probably is chronically toxic.
Agreed, if it’s the exact same chemical formula, and it’s a pure ingredient, it shouldn’t matter if it’s petroleum based or plant based. The problem from a chemical standpoint comes from not meeting the purity requirements and then carrying other chemicals into what you are producing
I hear you Sarah, but in simple terms what does all that mean for what we should do about the food coloring in Skittles? Are you proposing we can create the same shelf stable dyes using a plant substance, we just haven’t bothered to do it? You clearly know much more than I do on the subject…I just don’t know what to do with the information. Thanks.
Canadians use blueberry juice and watermelon juice to add color. It Just costs more to do and it's less shelf stable. Products that are US made and shipped to the EU conform to EU food standards. Our food companies could easily switch but it would make products more expensive and less shelf stable.
My point is that you can make the exact same molecule synthetically (that is, in a lab) from petroleum or from another source of atoms. Whether it’s toxic or not doesn’t depend on the proximate origin of the atoms. (All of the atoms were originally formed in a star.)
Many colored molecules are made by a plants. For example Alizarin, a red dye extracted from madder roots has been used as a dye since 1500 BCE (per Wikipedia). The exact same molecule can be made in a lab from petroleum. The properties are identical wherever it comes from. It’s used in painting and useful in biochemistry. But I wouldn’t eat it from any source, plant or lab, because it’s carcinogenic.
Similarly, the molecule vanillin is made by the vanilla plant or can be made in the lab. Again, it’s the identical molecule; this one is nontoxic.
(I buy vanilla extracted from the plant because it includes a complex mixture of other molecules, not because it’s “natural”.)
For your health, it’s much more important to ask “is the molecule toxic?”, than where do the atoms come from. If it’s the “same dye” it has the same toxicity.
[For other reasons, like planetary health, a green chemistry approach is best because its goal is to minimize adverse effects at very step of making and using stuff.]
I honestly don’t know or care much about food dyes because the amount I consume is negligible. I expect we'd do fine with less garishly colored food, but I don’t obsess over that.
There are so many much more concerning problems. If you fill your car with gas you inhale benzene and other toxins. If you live near oil producing or refining facilities you’re inhaling tons of crap. If you live in a city you inhale ozone, NOx, and toxic particles. If you have a gas appliance in your house you are generating and inhaling NOx. We’re all eating micro and nanoplastics.
Excellent analysis. I eat very little junk food and no fast food and this is just more confirmation of what I already knew about the processed food industry. They have bought and paid for the FDA and obese and unhealthy Americans are the result.
The FDA also has regulatory capture on fillers that are put into medication (specifically lactose as a filler in tablets and inhalers). FDA says lactose is Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS). However, that only works for the 30% of the world’s population that can digest lactose as adults (most of whom are of Northern European descent). So FDA allows lactose to be used as a filler in prescription medications, which means that a) the tablet isn’t going to properly dissolve in the patient’s digestive tract and b) that the medicine will make a lactose intolerant patient sicker by upsetting their digestive system, which means c) even less likely to absorb the medication properly and d) patient quits taking the medication early because it’s making them sick from the lactose. And I don’t think that it’s a good idea for a lactose intolerant asthma patient to be shooting lactose powder into their lungs either.
If the US pharmaceutical companies want to sell medicine to 70% of the world’s population, they need to take the lactose out of their products.
On a personal note, I am one of those 70% of the world’s population who is lactose intolerant, which means that I have to take a liquid formulation of my anti cancer medication because the US FDA approved lactose as a filler for the tablet form, and there’s not a single pill form of it sold in the USA that doesn’t contain lactose in it.
This is an excellent case of moving so far right that they overlap with the left. That and creating talking points so that Democrats cannot attack Republicans in the future for poisoning us
Yep, Worm-Brain is a total whack job, but he'll be correct on a lot more. He's just the face of the movement if you don't know. Food Babe, Dr. Makary, Dr. Battacharya, Dr. Malone and a few others have been talking about this for years! Our food supply and medical/Rx establishments have been compromised for at least 50 years.
Hormones to make cows produce more milk and bigger cattle means that we ingest hormones causing disruption in our natural system.
Replacing real sugar (bad in large amounts) with High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCs). A byproduct of the production of HFCs is a form of Mercury that is allowed into our foods....in trace amounts. Most people consume numerous foods containing HFCs per day! And don't forget about the chemicals used as artificial sweeteners....which were only produced to be used by diabetics (yeah, right!). I'll have a BigMac/Lg fries and a Diet Coke, please!
The vaccine schedule has grown from 9 shots to, I believe 32? Many given as multiples and requiring boosters. The adjuvants allow the vial to remain viable for longer. A lot of the shots are to keep the proles working.......eg Chicken Pox.....Not many deaths but it requires a person (usually Mom) to be home from work 7-10 days with a sick child...so let's just vax it away. I'm NOT anti-vax and most other people aren't either, but it's NOT safe to vax away everything and to vax everybody for some minor/or rare illnesses.
Petroleum dyes in the food....could be replaced with blueberry/watermelon juice, but it costs more money!
Soda! OMG just don't drink it regularly. Anything that can be used to corrode the crud on battery terminals or clean your toilet should NOT be consumed in large amounts.
Sorry! The guy might be a whack job in a lot of ways, but I am overjoyed that he was appointed. I can't wait for that whole house of cards to come crumbling down so that it can be rebuilt from the ground up....with integrity!
Having chicken pox means that you have a chance of getting shingles, having measles takes your entire immune system down. I would have gladly taken a vaccine instead of being miserable with chicken pox as a child and running the risk of getting shingles, and I was glad to get my shingles vaccine and reduce my risk of getting shingles and dementia. The survival rate from vaccination is literally written in stone (headstones in graveyards, look at the numbers of dead children pre-vaccination and post-vaccination)
Guess you didn't read my post b/c I said I am NOT anti-vax! If someone wants to have their child vaxxed for Chicken Pox, they should have the choice (it is no longer a choice). Shingles was never a huge thing until recently. Yes, it has always been around. Maybe you should realize that Drug Companies manufacture a crisis to sell you a cure? And how do you really know that the Shingles vax reduces dementia? Show me ALL the studies....and not just the "one" that the Pharmaceutical company wants to provide to prove/show "efficacy". Pharmaceutical companies are the masters of marketing! Big Agra is next in line.
So you trust Big Supplements instead? They’re also capitalist to the core and more than happy to sell you sugar water, poison, and lies about their ingredients and their intentions.
Did I say that? I take a multivitamin a day along with my 1 Rx medication and OTC allergy medication (tis the season). I believe in Integrative medicine and I try to manage any issues with holistic type medicine/treatments before I go the Rx route. I believe in Acupuncture for certain issues and I have even seen a Chiropractor for back issues (after major back surgery!). Just STOP! It must really drive you crazy that the "trust" that you had in Government Agencies has now proven to be an illusion. It must be hard!
I agree with the Europeans. American chocolate is nasty. It has way too much sugar in it* and the milk chocolate does have a nasty odor and flavor to it. I was sold the first time I tasted the European ones.
To be chemically clear, lots of stuff is made from petroleum because petroleum is made of strings of carbon atoms that we’ve learned to collect, purify and break up.
The exact same molecules could be made from other sources of carbon, like cellulose or other plant materials.
The molecules would be identical: pharmaceuticals, food dyes and flavorings, polyester, plastic toys, and your toothbrush. Carbon atoms can be configured in an infinite variety of shapes, into poisons or life-saving drugs. (hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and other atoms are added selectively)
So there are two basic issues:
1. The source of the carbon is important for the climate because petroleum sources add ancient carbon into the atmosphere while plants are recycling carbon that’s already there.
2. The molecules being made with the carbon can be good, bad, or innocuous.
The processing of petroleum is well developed (high T and pressure; high energy use, toxic solvents). But biology makes really complicated molecules at body temperature in water. We haven’t figured out how to do that very well, yet.
The field of “green chemistry” looks at the entire chain from source, manufacture, use, reuse, disposal to make safer, healthier processes for people and planet. (See talks by Paul Anastas and others.)
Well dent corn is the same way. We turn it into sugar, plastic, and lubricants. That said, my quick conclusion was we probably are better off not eating hydrocarbons in our food. It’s not acutely toxic, but it probably is chronically toxic.
Agreed, if it’s the exact same chemical formula, and it’s a pure ingredient, it shouldn’t matter if it’s petroleum based or plant based. The problem from a chemical standpoint comes from not meeting the purity requirements and then carrying other chemicals into what you are producing
I hear you Sarah, but in simple terms what does all that mean for what we should do about the food coloring in Skittles? Are you proposing we can create the same shelf stable dyes using a plant substance, we just haven’t bothered to do it? You clearly know much more than I do on the subject…I just don’t know what to do with the information. Thanks.
Canadians use blueberry juice and watermelon juice to add color. It Just costs more to do and it's less shelf stable. Products that are US made and shipped to the EU conform to EU food standards. Our food companies could easily switch but it would make products more expensive and less shelf stable.
My point is that you can make the exact same molecule synthetically (that is, in a lab) from petroleum or from another source of atoms. Whether it’s toxic or not doesn’t depend on the proximate origin of the atoms. (All of the atoms were originally formed in a star.)
Many colored molecules are made by a plants. For example Alizarin, a red dye extracted from madder roots has been used as a dye since 1500 BCE (per Wikipedia). The exact same molecule can be made in a lab from petroleum. The properties are identical wherever it comes from. It’s used in painting and useful in biochemistry. But I wouldn’t eat it from any source, plant or lab, because it’s carcinogenic.
Similarly, the molecule vanillin is made by the vanilla plant or can be made in the lab. Again, it’s the identical molecule; this one is nontoxic.
(I buy vanilla extracted from the plant because it includes a complex mixture of other molecules, not because it’s “natural”.)
For your health, it’s much more important to ask “is the molecule toxic?”, than where do the atoms come from. If it’s the “same dye” it has the same toxicity.
[For other reasons, like planetary health, a green chemistry approach is best because its goal is to minimize adverse effects at very step of making and using stuff.]
I honestly don’t know or care much about food dyes because the amount I consume is negligible. I expect we'd do fine with less garishly colored food, but I don’t obsess over that.
There are so many much more concerning problems. If you fill your car with gas you inhale benzene and other toxins. If you live near oil producing or refining facilities you’re inhaling tons of crap. If you live in a city you inhale ozone, NOx, and toxic particles. If you have a gas appliance in your house you are generating and inhaling NOx. We’re all eating micro and nanoplastics.
If you consume supplements you're likely eating heavy metals and any number of other contaminants (https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/analysis-some-natural-supplements-can-be-dangerously-contaminated).
If the FDA goes away we might all be eating more arsenic, E. coli, and listeria. Not to mention PFAS.
Sorry, you asked for simple terms. My answer is the Micheal Pollan diet: eat real food, mostly plants, not too much.
Don’t obsess,
And don’t eat too many skittles.
Thank you VERY much. I get it. And I appreciate the references. I will read them!
Excellent analysis. I eat very little junk food and no fast food and this is just more confirmation of what I already knew about the processed food industry. They have bought and paid for the FDA and obese and unhealthy Americans are the result.
The FDA also has regulatory capture on fillers that are put into medication (specifically lactose as a filler in tablets and inhalers). FDA says lactose is Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS). However, that only works for the 30% of the world’s population that can digest lactose as adults (most of whom are of Northern European descent). So FDA allows lactose to be used as a filler in prescription medications, which means that a) the tablet isn’t going to properly dissolve in the patient’s digestive tract and b) that the medicine will make a lactose intolerant patient sicker by upsetting their digestive system, which means c) even less likely to absorb the medication properly and d) patient quits taking the medication early because it’s making them sick from the lactose. And I don’t think that it’s a good idea for a lactose intolerant asthma patient to be shooting lactose powder into their lungs either.
If the US pharmaceutical companies want to sell medicine to 70% of the world’s population, they need to take the lactose out of their products.
On a personal note, I am one of those 70% of the world’s population who is lactose intolerant, which means that I have to take a liquid formulation of my anti cancer medication because the US FDA approved lactose as a filler for the tablet form, and there’s not a single pill form of it sold in the USA that doesn’t contain lactose in it.
This is an excellent case of moving so far right that they overlap with the left. That and creating talking points so that Democrats cannot attack Republicans in the future for poisoning us
Yep, Worm-Brain is a total whack job, but he'll be correct on a lot more. He's just the face of the movement if you don't know. Food Babe, Dr. Makary, Dr. Battacharya, Dr. Malone and a few others have been talking about this for years! Our food supply and medical/Rx establishments have been compromised for at least 50 years.
Hormones to make cows produce more milk and bigger cattle means that we ingest hormones causing disruption in our natural system.
Replacing real sugar (bad in large amounts) with High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCs). A byproduct of the production of HFCs is a form of Mercury that is allowed into our foods....in trace amounts. Most people consume numerous foods containing HFCs per day! And don't forget about the chemicals used as artificial sweeteners....which were only produced to be used by diabetics (yeah, right!). I'll have a BigMac/Lg fries and a Diet Coke, please!
The vaccine schedule has grown from 9 shots to, I believe 32? Many given as multiples and requiring boosters. The adjuvants allow the vial to remain viable for longer. A lot of the shots are to keep the proles working.......eg Chicken Pox.....Not many deaths but it requires a person (usually Mom) to be home from work 7-10 days with a sick child...so let's just vax it away. I'm NOT anti-vax and most other people aren't either, but it's NOT safe to vax away everything and to vax everybody for some minor/or rare illnesses.
Petroleum dyes in the food....could be replaced with blueberry/watermelon juice, but it costs more money!
Soda! OMG just don't drink it regularly. Anything that can be used to corrode the crud on battery terminals or clean your toilet should NOT be consumed in large amounts.
Sorry! The guy might be a whack job in a lot of ways, but I am overjoyed that he was appointed. I can't wait for that whole house of cards to come crumbling down so that it can be rebuilt from the ground up....with integrity!
Having chicken pox means that you have a chance of getting shingles, having measles takes your entire immune system down. I would have gladly taken a vaccine instead of being miserable with chicken pox as a child and running the risk of getting shingles, and I was glad to get my shingles vaccine and reduce my risk of getting shingles and dementia. The survival rate from vaccination is literally written in stone (headstones in graveyards, look at the numbers of dead children pre-vaccination and post-vaccination)
Guess you didn't read my post b/c I said I am NOT anti-vax! If someone wants to have their child vaxxed for Chicken Pox, they should have the choice (it is no longer a choice). Shingles was never a huge thing until recently. Yes, it has always been around. Maybe you should realize that Drug Companies manufacture a crisis to sell you a cure? And how do you really know that the Shingles vax reduces dementia? Show me ALL the studies....and not just the "one" that the Pharmaceutical company wants to provide to prove/show "efficacy". Pharmaceutical companies are the masters of marketing! Big Agra is next in line.
If you talk and walk like an antivaxxer, you are on the side of the antivaxxers.
And this is WHY I am NO longer registered as a Dem! Take a look in the mirror to see why we have the Mango Menace in the WH.
So you trust Big Supplements instead? They’re also capitalist to the core and more than happy to sell you sugar water, poison, and lies about their ingredients and their intentions.
Did I say that? I take a multivitamin a day along with my 1 Rx medication and OTC allergy medication (tis the season). I believe in Integrative medicine and I try to manage any issues with holistic type medicine/treatments before I go the Rx route. I believe in Acupuncture for certain issues and I have even seen a Chiropractor for back issues (after major back surgery!). Just STOP! It must really drive you crazy that the "trust" that you had in Government Agencies has now proven to be an illusion. It must be hard!
i am and have been afraid of our food in America for a while. some of it seems like just downright poison. (i'm looking at you diet sodas)
I agree with the Europeans. American chocolate is nasty. It has way too much sugar in it* and the milk chocolate does have a nasty odor and flavor to it. I was sold the first time I tasted the European ones.
*Like much modern food.
Organic chemistry deals with carbon compounds in both food and fuels. There's a lot in common.
Also look at the difference in colour between Canadian and US Cheerios...