[2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Blame Quintushalls for this.

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Astrogirl
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[2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Astrogirl »

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Gradivus »

I'm kind of a smartass like that. When I'm eating something and someone asks, "Is that organic?" I'm likely to answer, "All my food is organic. Otherwise I'd have to subsist on ball bearings, iron filings, and carbon fibers."

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Guest »

carbon fibres would be organic

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Quentin »

i have literally never seen a drink labelled as 'chemical free'

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Epoch Four »

Quentin, literally meet Coconut Groove. It's "totally chemical free". So's literally this beer, apparently literally:

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by DonRetrasado »

Waterloo's got some record for "most subpar local breweries" or something by now.
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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Michele-Michel »

I thought the whole point of beer was that it chemically alters your brain.

Are they saying their beer is no fun?

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Epoch Four »

I can only presume that they are indeed saying they have crafted the world's most pointless beer.

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Kaharz »

A 'chemical substance' generally means a pure chemical compound with a definite composition. If you are being technical, that is the technical definition. It has also come to be used commonly as something that is artificially produced, since most pure substances require some kind of processing to create or extract. Saying a product was made with 'no chemicals' is not all that far off unless they used purified additives of some sort.

So if the beer was just made with grains, yeast, and tap water, it doesn't really contain any chemical substances. None of those things are pure substances with definite compositions. Of course, they are using it as a marketing ploy and playing on the natural fallacy. Which is wrong. But they probably aren't actually using the term 'chemical' wrong even if they are exploiting people's generally misguided belief that artificially created compounds are bad and natural things are good.
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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by wbeaty »

Michele-Michel wrote:I thought the whole point of beer was that it chemically alters your brain.
Perhaps only alters inorganic brain? TREE ASMIOFANIAN LAWS! HA HAHA HAHAHA HAHAHAHA!
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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by jake »

Kaharz wrote:A 'chemical substance' generally means a pure chemical compound with a definite composition. If you are being technical, that is the technical definition. It has also come to be used commonly as something that is artificially produced, since most pure substances require some kind of processing to create or extract. Saying a product was made with 'no chemicals' is not all that far off unless they used purified additives of some sort.

So if the beer was just made with grains, yeast, and tap water, it doesn't really contain any chemical substances. None of those things are pure substances with definite compositions. Of course, they are using it as a marketing ploy and playing on the natural fallacy. Which is wrong. But they probably aren't actually using the term 'chemical' wrong even if they are exploiting people's generally misguided belief that artificially created compounds are bad and natural things are good.
Hey, tap water is purified and prepared. Just cause it's a compound and not an element doesn't disqualify it from chemical substance. Also the process of yeast extruding ethanol is a chemical reaction that creates a chemical substance. Just because humans aren't directly adding it in doesn't disqualify it from being purified and prepared. Possibly the only thing that might be considered non-artificial here is the grain and even that has been genetically engineered up the wazoo and is really more of a freak mutant designed for human purposes over a few hundred years than anything like "natural" hops.

What it's really exploiting is people's weird and arbitrary notions of artificiality.

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Kaharz »

jake wrote:Hey, tap water is purified and prepared. Just cause it's a compound and not an element doesn't disqualify it from chemical substance.
Tap water is actually a mixture, mostly in the form of a solution. That is what disqualifies it as a chemical substance, not the fact that is not an element. If it was completely pure water, then yes, it would be a chemical substance. Pure compounds are chemical substances because they have a constant chemical composition. The chemical substance 'water' is always H2O. However, tap water is H2O mixed with a varying amount of other chemical substances and a few other things as well. Since the composition of that mixture is not fixed, it is not a chemical compound by the technical definition. I know this all rather nit-picky, but since everyone was being all "hur hur, everything is chemicals dumbass" about the no chemicals added, I felt I'd be all "hur hur, not if you want to use the technical definition." Yes, advertising as 'no chemicals added' and 'all natural' is still asinine, but can be technically correct. Which is part of the problem. If a lot more people understood this stuff, then they might not be as impressed by such weak marketing ploys. Saying something is 'all natural' is basically saying, "We know mostly what is in here, but we aren't exactly sure in what amounts and there is probably some shit* mixed in that we don't know about at all."
What it's really exploiting is people's weird and arbitrary notions of artificiality.
I believe I said almost exactly that in the second half of my last sentence.

To review, they are not technically lying because they did not add any chemical substances by the technical definition unless they used some amazingly distilled water. The end product certainly contains loads of chemical substances. It is in fact comprised completely of chemical substances, which was everyone else's overly reductionist joke. But as mixtures or other substance without a fixed composition, the ingredients and total product are not chemical substances.

*Literal shit could be one of those things they don't know is in there.
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Alx3m

Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by Alx3m »

Tap water is actually a mixture, mostly in the form of a solution. That is what disqualifies it as a chemical substance, not the fact that is not an element. If it was completely pure water, then yes, it would be a chemical substance. Pure compounds are chemical substances because they have a constant chemical composition.
I don't understand? Just because something is not a chemical substance doesn't mean it isn't made out of chemicals.

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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by GUTCHUCKER »

Alx3m wrote:
Tap water is actually a mixture, mostly in the form of a solution. That is what disqualifies it as a chemical substance, not the fact that is not an element. If it was completely pure water, then yes, it would be a chemical substance. Pure compounds are chemical substances because they have a constant chemical composition.
I don't understand? Just because something is not a chemical substance doesn't mean it isn't made out of chemicals.
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Re: [2013-04-11] Everything is chemicals!

Post by gopher65 »

Kaharz wrote:Tap water is actually a mixture, mostly in the form of a solution. That is what disqualifies it as a chemical substance, not the fact that is not an element. If it was completely pure water, then yes, it would be a chemical substance.
A fair number of "No Chemicals Added!" products (products that are attempting to exploit the naturalistic fallacy) claim to use evaporated, and therefore "purer", water. While not strictly speaking only water, water that has been evaporated and then condensed is close enough to "pure" that by your cherry-picked - though not technically incorrect - definition of the word "chemical" it could be considered a chemical.

So I'd submit that by any definition of the word "chemical" they're engaging in false advertising. I think they'd be better off from both a legal and marketing perspective to claim that their products only contain "natural ingredients". Of course, if you're creating a healthfood beverage made from artificially purified water, asparagus, tomatoes, and spinach (all three of which underwent extensive longterm artificial breeding programs before they were forced into their modern edible form), you might have a hard time claiming that any of those four ingredients can truly be called natural.

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