Food

[RuneDragoon]

So I watched something cool yesterday, but it also has made me think a little bit about wondering and worrying about some of the things we eat as food these days...

Mythbusters: Imitating a youtube video with a sand and propane cannon and finding it works, they scaled it up and found something even more flammable than propane: Non dairy coffee creamer. When they lit it up, the fireball made the team run a short distance away because they honestly were very scared of its size.

After seeing this, again, makes me think... we really eat stuff that is so flammable that it makes a white glowing fire when it ignites?

Another example of somewhat alarming food: Twinkies. They don't decompose and half the ingredients if I remember right are a chemistry project.

*scratches head* Hope people get what I am saying but one has to wonder why we eat this stuff.

[Raptress]

Actually, I've heard that Twinkies really only have a shelf-like of either two weeks or two months.
That, and, sometimes science is weird. If I remember right, pure potassium ignites in contact with water. You know, that stuff in bananas.

[RuneDragoon]

Actually, I've heard that Twinkies really only have a shelf-like of either two weeks or two months.
That, and, sometimes science is weird. If I remember right, pure potassium ignites in contact with water. You know, that stuff in bananas.

Indeed it does, which is why pure potassium doesn't normally exist in nature, because it is too reactive... some chemistry is fun.

[Sigi]

Things like flour can explode and almost all food is deadly if you eat/drink too much of it. (google "killed by drinking too much water" )

[Steelclaw]

Just about any organic (containing carbon compounds) material will burn if it's finely dispersed and heated enough. Consider flour, sawdust, powdered sugar, and oil.

It's really no surprise to me that since most of the stuff we eat is organic (not the "expensive food" kind of organic), that it is also flammable. In case you're wondering, your body is flammable too -- once that pesky water evaporates.

As for eating "chemicals", that's what everything is. Consider the primary source of energy used in your body: glucose. It's a specific arrangement of 6 Carbon atoms, 12 Hydrogen atoms, and 6 Oxygen atoms (which, I assure you, are very bland in their elemental states and pretty unusable). Whether they got in that arrangement through some man-made process or through a biological one doesn't change the fact that it's glucose and your body will "run" off of either. Also, consider table salt, a combination of Sodium and Chlorine, held together pretty weakly. Consuming either of the two in their elemental form would be fatal. However, combined, they make food yummy. So, just because what you're eating doesn't exist in nature doesn't mean it's bad for you, or that you shouldn't eat it.

As an aside, the bananas you're probably accustomed to eating (the yellow-ish ones at the supermarket) have been bred by humans and actually don't occur in nature since the plant that produces them is sterile. One could argue that they're man-made; and they're certainly not bad for you.

So, fear not and eat up! Worry about how the stuff you're eating affects your body, not whether it's naturally occurring. *wanders off for some steak*

[Romirez]

Things like flour can explode and almost all food is deadly if you eat/drink too much of it. (google "killed by drinking too much water" )

that is very very possible. overhydration has almost the EXACT same symptoms as heat exhaustion. if treated as heat exhaustion/stroke...bad things can happen.