Another Year, More Chemophobia

Over the holiday break, a few people sent me pictures and links to demonstrate that we still have plenty to do to counter chemophobia in 2015. Here's a sampling:

1. U.S. FDA Cancer ad. Have you seen these pictures around airports, bus stations, and subways? This one - which I'm sure is equally supposed to simultaneously discourage youth smoking (while reminding them of Sauron from Lord of the Rings) appeared in my inbox a few days ago:

Nothing like some straight-up chemophobia from Big Government.

2. Health beans - now chemical-free!

Thank Goodness that 'omega fatty acids' or 'vital antioxidants' aren't chemicals!*

3. Microwaving'll kill ya. As a throwaway line in the Newsweek article interviewing famous futurists about whether or not Back to the Future Part II accurately predicted the future, Syd Mead, a "visual futurist" who designs sets for sci-fi movies, said this:

"No, I don’t remember [how the film depicted food]. I hope it wasn’t pills. [laughs] That was a fixture in future films. Popping steak or spinach or whatever in a pill. I hope it never comes to that."

"Microwave dinners are bad enough. Of course, microwave upsets the molecular structure of food, which isn’t too terribly healthy."

I've heard these arguments before, but neither one makes any sense. Healthy people routinely take all sorts of food supplements in "pill form" - vitamins, curcumin, antioxidants, essential oils - the list goes on and on. And as far as I'm aware, microwaves can't actually "upset" (change) the molecular structure of food.

Reminder: Syd consults for science fiction movies. We have a lot of work to do.
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*Yes they are.

WWWTP? Palmolive Edition

I happened upon this bottle in the store yesterday, and found the marketing statement quite curious:

Now wait just a minute...what does that even mean? Does a human contain "no unnecessary cells," or a delicious meal "no unnecessary ingredients?" Perhaps this is the Strunkian ideal* of chemophobic marketing:

"A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts."   - Strunk and White, The Elements of Style

So, what 'necessary' chemicals does Palmolive Free & Clear contain?

Source: Colgate-Palmolive 

So we have foaming agents, detergents, thickeners, stabilizers, fragrances, dyes, and water - a.k.a. every ingredient present in most dish soaps! 

This feels like Kraft Mac & Cheese redux. Please understand that I'm not against informed consumer choice, and I certainly support labeling transparency** and product safety. But this marketing slogan is at best meaningless, and at worst drags popular punching bag "chemicals" through the mud. Again.

At least it can wash off with Palmolive Pure + Clear - Contains Necessary Chemicals.

*Except, of course, that the authors of this dish soap piece seem to have omitted a verb.
**Next up: Chemplex (TM) brand butyllithium: Contains 95% random C-Li bonds (and fragrance!)