Amiga.org
Coffee House => Coffee House Boards => CH / General => Topic started by: bloodline on July 11, 2006, 10:15:53 PM
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Quite possibly the greatest drink I've ever had the pleasure of pouring over my taste-buds...
Unlike "Coke Zero" which is so disgusting I actually felt sick after drinking it. I have to know that others have felt similarly after befouling their mouths with this, the most vile of all soft drinks.
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Geez, over a few decades they can sell nuclear waste as a soda.
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I've been waiting on diet cherry coke for a long time my pleasure at its arrival is only lessened by its poor availability in local shops.
Not tried coke zero myself but a friend claims it tastes just like diet coke, im not sure i believe him since he doesnt tend to drink diet coke.
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Diet?! YUCK
I can't stand diet anything, it's revolting. I can't even get that crap to rinse off my tounge! It's like it has some kind of wetting agent in it, or WD-40.
Coca Cola man. :-)
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Turambar wrote:
I've been waiting on diet cherry coke for a long time my pleasure at its arrival is only lessened by its poor availability in local shops.
Yeah, It's been a bit hard to find here in London... as soon as a shop gets a delivery of Diet Cherry Coke, it sells out within a couple of days.
Not tried coke zero myself but a friend claims it tastes just like diet coke, im not sure i believe him since he doesn't tend to drink diet coke.
Imagine you get some fizzy water, flavour it with vanilla and mint, then add some vinegar... Viola! Coke Zero... All the shops are stocked to the celling with this stuff... no one seems to like it.
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These days, I'm partial to a Diet Lime Coke, which is nice and refreshing. Personally, I am the exact opposite of T-bone: I can't stand the sweetness of regular soft drinks; if anything they make me more thirsty. For my regular intake of fluids, I use mostly water: cheap, just plain H2O without additives, and quenches the thirst fastest because of the osmotic pressure difference between it and my body fluids :-P.
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Having seen first hand the effects of a coca-cola concentrate spillage at the docks of my home town as a child, I have not felt inclined to drink coca cola in any way shape or form.
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You know what's refreshing?
(http://www.washjeff.edu/CAPL/images/m/6.jpg) (http://www.washjeff.edu/CAPL/images/l/6.jpg)
(http://www.amiga.org/images/subject/icon19.gif)
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aye, indeed, but sadly Beer and work are often (though not always :-D ) mutually exclusive... just Diet Cherry Coke is required.
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Karlos wrote:
Having seen first hand the effects of a coca-cola concentrate spillage at the docks of my home town as a child, I have not felt inclined to drink coca cola in any way shape or form.
What happened?
(And while I'm at it, is that rotated black \tau on the right of your hand a fracture? What did you do?)
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bloodline wrote:
aye, indeed, but sadly Beer and work are often (though not always :-D ) mutually exclusive... just Diet Cherry Coke is required.
Yeah I know, but then I drink water or coffee.
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Karlos wrote:
Having seen first hand the effects of a coca-cola concentrate spillage at the docks of my home town as a child, I have not felt inclined to drink coca cola in any way shape or form.
Ignorance is bliss.
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Karlos wrote:
Having seen first hand the effects of a coca-cola concentrate spillage at the docks of my home town as a child, I have not felt inclined to drink coca cola in any way shape or form.
Yes, yes... I too would have been scared by such a traumatic event... To experience the loss of the precious liquid may well have pushed me to the... er... dark side... pepsi :cry:
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Cymric wrote:
Karlos wrote:
Having seen first hand the effects of a coca-cola concentrate spillage at the docks of my home town as a child, I have not felt inclined to drink coca cola in any way shape or form.
What happened?
(And while I'm at it, is that rotated black \tau on the right of your hand a fracture? What did you do?)
Myself and several other kids from my junior school saw this unfold one saturday morning when basically playing not so far away.
A fairly large shipment of concentrate (later announced to be coca cola concentrate) was dropped in a crane accident, rupturing several large drums of the stuff.
The concentrate, which is basically neat phosphoric acid (which is very different to the same stuff dissolved in water) and all the other stuff except sugar and carbonated water eroded away 6 inches of reinforced concrete in an extremely exothermic reaction that, like neat sulphuric acid, is not best dealt with by applying water. Which is exactly what several dock workers attempted before the professionals got there. Several of them were hit by the backsplash getting burned, both thermally and chemically. I found out later that one was permanently blinded.
An entire hazmat team had to come in to clean the spill and the whole area was evacuated. The extent of the damage was evident the following week when the badly corroded steel rods that reinforced the concrete were visible for all to see in the 5 metre wide sunken depression the stuff had made.
Seeing that when your'e seven years old really made you wonder what the stuff does to your insides.
And yes, that was my broken wrist (specifically the scaphoid) before it was realigned and cast. Look in the scaphoid fractures thread to see how I skilfully managed that.
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bloodline wrote:
Quite possibly the greatest drink I've ever had the pleasure of pouring over my taste-buds...
I just tried some seeing as it got such a glowing review here.
IMHO, I wouldn't say it's the greatest drink ever, but certainly the best diet coke they've made.
But it suffers from the same things that all the diet cokes (and supermarket own brands) have, it's just too thin and watery compared to normal coke, and still has that horrible artificial sweetner aftertaste to it.
Unlike "Coke Zero" which is so disgusting I actually felt sick after drinking it.
Luckily it didn't make me sick, to me it just didn't taste of anything..I guess that's why they call it Zero
Anyway, if you happen to have some spare diet coke laying around (approx 200 litres will do) you can always try this (http://youtube.com/watch?v=QC0bhZeDU30&search=diet%20coke%20mint)
Next up on Amiga.org, Lilt or 7-Up..
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@KArlos:
Reminds me of a friend of mine, who likes to point out that orange juice concentrate is handled as a hazardous and toxic chemical, and is shipped in specifically designed ships and containers. The stuff has a pH of about 0.5.
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Cymric wrote:
@KArlos:
Reminds me of a friend of mine, who likes to point out that orange juice concentrate is handled as a hazardous and toxic chemical, and is shipped in specifically designed ships and containers. The stuff has a pH of about 0.5.
Nothing compared to Pineapple juice concentrate (Unpasturised)!!!
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I've had to handle stuff with a negative pH in the past. Ordinary bronstead style protonatinc acids pale into insignificance next to superacids ;-)
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Okay, okay, superacids rock (has anyone beaten the power of a HSO3F / SbF5 mixture yet?) but that wasn't my point. My point was that a concentrate of purely natural ingredients can be made to have a pH resembling that of battery acid :). Normally you tend to think of 'natural' acids in terms of weak buffers, diluted, not fully ionised, and the like.
Bloodline, what is the pH of pineapple juice concentrate, then? Pineapple on its own doesn't taste all that sour to me.
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Cymric wrote:
Bloodline, what is the pH of pineapple juice concentrate, then? Pineapple on its own doesn't taste all that sour to me.
It gets to be about as acidic as as orange juice, but it also conatins bromelain (various proteases) which makes it pretty lethal stuff...
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Cymric wrote:
Okay, okay, superacids rock (has anyone beaten the power of a HSO3F / SbF5 mixture yet?) but that wasn't my point. My point was that a concentrate of purely natural ingredients can be made to have a pH resembling that of battery acid :). Normally you tend to think of 'natural' acids in terms of weak buffers, diluted, not fully ionised, and the like.
HF + SbF5 is a considerably stronger protonating acid than SbF5 activated fluosulfonic acid (which will already dissovle wax!). This is down to the fact that SbF5 sequesters F- on dissociation of HF and point blank refuses to give it back. The resulting SbF6- ion is an extremely weak base and very poor nucleophile. You end up, quite literally with free protons kicking around - it's about 2×10^19 times stronger than 100% sulfuric acid ;-)
Depending on the ratio of HF to SbF5 it retains the ability to dissolve glass and other silicates as well as alkanes and other materials...
Almost as bad as coca cola concentrate ;-)
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Slightly more worrying is that Lucozade contains Vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid) and preservative (Sodium Benzoate). When combined they have a habit of fermenting to brew Benzine (a cancer causing chemical).
It was on the BBC 6 'O Clock News - Lilt was withdrawn and now appears with a different preservative, yet GlaxoSmithKline still see fit to keep Puke-o-Zade on our shelves under the guise of a 'health' drink.
And remember citizens: Guiness is good for you + smoking is a throat tonic.
:inquisitive:
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Don't overreact---benzene formation isn't that important unless you keep foddstuffs outside of the fridge in full sunlight. Of course, journalists and consumer agencies are quick to remind us that benzene is a carcinogenic substance, should be forbidden, yaddayaddayadda.
Apparently the problems begin with ascorbic acid being able to react with certain metal ions; the resulting species are able to reduce just one electron away from oxygen; these ions then go on to form OH*-radicals which decarboxylise the benzoate ion to benzene. (This page (http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/jafcau/1993/41/i05/f-pdf/f_jf00029a001.pdf?sessid=6006l3) shows the mechanism.) Problem is: benzoic acid is a natural fungicide, present in a number of berries (cranberries, cloud berries) and other fruits.
So now we have the curious situation that we have two ingredients naturally occurring in a lot of plants which are not allowed to be mixed because it produces a chemical which causes cancer on the long term. I daresay the solution is likely going to come from the fact that we shouldn't eat nor drink anything at all. :roll: Oh, by the way, be careful with feeding your pet cat anything containing benzoic acid or it derivatives: cats have a much lower tolerance towards this chemical than humans.
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Karlos wrote:
You end up, quite literally with free protons kicking around - it's about 2×10^19 times stronger than 100% sulfuric acid ;-)
Sounds like the blood of a certain type of alien being killed and resurrected on the white screen for about 4 times...
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Cymric wrote:
Karlos wrote:
You end up, quite literally with free protons kicking around - it's about 2×10^19 times stronger than 100% sulfuric acid ;-)
Sounds like the blood of a certain type of alien being killed and resurrected on the white screen for about 4 times...
Unless it's blood vessels were nickel lined (IIRC HF passifies nickel by making a tough surface fluoride) I don't think that particular stuff would be. It's a _lot_ stronger than SbF5 activated triflic acid (FSO3H). Like the latter, it will protonate raw alkanes.
Incidentally, according to something I read recently, modern varieties of carborane based superacids (not actually stronger than the stuff above in dissociation terms but a better source of 'clean' H+ only - ie no dodgy fluorides or other species) might be able to protonate xenon :lol:
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Cymric wrote:
Of course, journalists and consumer agencies are quick to remind us that benzene is a carcinogenic substance, should be forbidden, yaddayaddayadda.
So now we have the curious situation that we have two ingredients naturally occurring in a lot of plants which are not allowed to be mixed because it produces a chemical which causes cancer on the long term.
I daresay the solution is likely going to come from the fact that we shouldn't eat nor drink anything at all. :roll:
That certainly prevents death caused from cancer!
The average life expectancy in Malawi is 37 years. One quarter of children do not live to see their fifth birthday; 48% of those under five are malnourished.
Malawi's Starve (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/1817258.stm)
It's a fact, few people in Malawi die of cancer.
@hyperspeed
Move to Malawi and your benzene worries are over! :P
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by Cymric:
Don't overreact---benzene formation isn't that important unless you keep foddstuffs outside of the fridge in full sunlight.
The BBC report didn't mention light as being a significant catalyst - the reaction was taking place in storage. And isn't it precisely when there is bright sunshine that people are going to want to drink Lucozade for refreshment?
... that bottle you leave on the beach in the afternoon sun... a ticking cancer timebomb!
(Not to mention new research that suggests the plastics used in the bottle can leak chemicals simular to oestrogen).
When you say benzoic acid is present in fruits, does this mean Sodium Benzoate?
Anyway, the food standards people weren't asking for the Sodium Benzoate to be removed from Lucozade, they wanted the Vitamin C removed for some odd reason. They suggested that there were other opportunities to get this anti-oxidant other than in soft drinks.
In fact, it's either Norway or Sweden has banned Cornflakes as the Vitamin content is deemed a risk to the liver.
But it's Coca Cola's ability to clean tarnished spoons, patios etc. that should pose the greatest warning. Have you noticed too that everyone who drinks Diet Coke is a fat ass?
(Aspartame has been linked to brain cell death as well!)
A good all rounder I've discovered lately is 'Five Alive'. It may be bottled by Coca Cola Enterprises under license but it features none of the crap associated with that American brand.
A good, still and refreshing fruit juice drink in a can with no artificial colours, preservatives or flavourings. It comes in Forest Fruits and Citrus flavours.
:-D
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But it's Coca Cola's ability to clean tarnished spoons, patios etc. that should pose the greatest warning.
As can brown sauce, toothpaste etc.
Have you noticed too that everyone who drinks Diet Coke is a fat ass?
Perhaps they are on a diet? I know thats a bit of a leap but still....
A good, still and refreshing fruit juice drink in a can with no artificial colours, preservatives or flavourings.
No its just got a crapload of sugar in it.
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Hyperspeed wrote:
by Cymric:
Don't overreact---benzene formation isn't that important unless you keep foddstuffs outside of the fridge in full sunlight.
[quote[The BBC report didn't mention light as being a significant catalyst - the reaction was taking place in storage. And isn't it precisely when there is bright sunshine that people are going to want to drink Lucozade for refreshment?
It does take place in storage, but much more slowly. Sunlight really provides the 'oompf' for the reaction. Lowering the temperature by 10 degrees cuts the reaction rate in half (old chemist's rule of thumb). But still: it requires a significant amount of sunlight (I recall about a day) before really elevated concentrations of benzene are reached. We're still talking low amounts on an absolute scale, though, and drinking such a bottle of 'spiked' Lucozade won't harm you. Now if you were to ingest gallons upon gallons, yes, then, perhaps.
By the way: I didn't know people stored their drinks in open sunlight... They usually keep them in a bag underneath lots of material so the drink stays cool :p
... that bottle you leave on the beach in the afternoon sun... a ticking cancer timebomb!
I think it is about as carcinogenic as walking around in a large city on a hot, sunny afternoon. Phrases like 'ticking cancer timebomb' are nothing but sensational flourish to scare the population.
(Not to mention new research that suggests the plastics used in the bottle can leak chemicals simular to oestrogen).
Not the phthalate-scare again... This is getting old. The true source of scary phthalates---to make plastic pliable and soft---has been banned from most toys and to my knowledge platics used to store food in. No more source of leaky oestrogenes from that. The second source would be PET, but you need to use really old and really worn bottles (high temperatures, lots of sunlight, lots of agressive liquids, lots of physical stress) in order to coax a little of the material out into the liquid it's containing. It is far likelier that you have a beautiful lining of algae in the bottle long before that happens.
When you say benzoic acid is present in fruits, does this mean Sodium Benzoate?
Yes. Or another salt, say with potassium or calcium.
Anyway, the food standards people weren't asking for the Sodium Benzoate to be removed from Lucozade, they wanted the Vitamin C removed for some odd reason. They suggested that there were other opportunities to get this anti-oxidant other than in soft drinks.
That would be a worthwhile suggestion. One of the two chemicals (ascorbic acid or benzoic acid) has to go if you don't want the benzene reaction to occur. It is a bit silly to remove naturally occurring ascorbic acid from fruit juice, but you don't have to exacerbate the problem by adding more.
In fact, it's either Norway or Sweden has banned Cornflakes as the Vitamin content is deemed a risk to the liver.
Sounds like too much vitamin A or pro-vitamin A, not C. A is known to be a bit of a problem in too high doses: especially pregnant women need to be careful not to overdo it, as it can harm their child. Vitamin C is relatively safe in that regard---at least, I've never heard of any other problem save the benzoic acid one.
But it's Coca Cola's ability to clean tarnished spoons, patios etc. that should pose the greatest warning. Have you noticed too that everyone who drinks Diet Coke is a fat ass?
I kindly request you not refer to me as a 'fat ass'. According to my girlfriend, my ass is just right: perfect for little slaps and nibbles. I also happen to like my diet Coke quite a lot, thank you very much: it doesn't taste as sweet as regular Coke, and quenches my thirst better because of that.
(Aspartame has been linked to brain cell death as well!)
What hasn't?
Lately, I've begun switching to water: simple, costs almost nothing, and no health-issues whatsoever.
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Lately, I've begun switching to water: simple, costs almost nothing, and no health-issues whatsoever.
Couldn't agree more.
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I recommend green tea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green-tea) for anyone with cancer phobia. tastes like {bleep} at first try, but you get used to it in time. other variants like oolong tea and mugicha (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mugicha)(barley tea) are easier to drink, though probably difficult to find in the west.
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Cymric, I'm glad you ended your post with a reccommendation of water. Your knowledge of chemicals seems vast so I was surprised you even considered Diet Coke to be a thirst quencher (didn't they add loads of sugar to it in Theme Park so you'd drink more?).
:-D
I once made a Diet Coke lollipop in the freezer but couldn't get the spoon out when it froze rock solid. I put it on defrost for a while but I totally melted the lolly and evaporated the water. What was left behind was basically a thick tar, similar to black enamel paint.
I don't think the 'Cola' in Coca Cola is the same thirst quenching 'Cola Bean' that Africans/Arabs traded for long haul journneys. The recipe with it's caramel colourings, carbon dioxide bubbles and the rest certainly doesn't lubricate as quickly as a glass of ice cold H²O.
As for the plastic issue it is a real, July 2006 issue right now as German scientists have recently published findings in either Nature or New Scientist regarding oestrogen-linked chemicals in (plastic) bottled water.
And why is it that mashed baby food from Cow & Gate, Heinz et al comes in little glass jars. Even purified water and baby juice in little palm sized glass jars. Could silicone be a more lawsuit-proof material when it comes to contamination?
Another consideration is pasteurisation - when the liquid is heated to 80°C+ to kill the bacteria, is it pumped into the bottle hot or cold - hot might react with packaging.
There is also the issue of aluminium in cans - aluminium has been linked to dimentia and Parkinsons disease and I have noticed labels on ladies anti-perspirents recently saying `Aluminium Free Formula'.
And why does anyone think carbonated drinks are more refreshing? The bubbles make your eyes water and you can't drink too much or you'll belch it back up.
Heat Wave advice from the Met Office suggests a cool drink of water (uncarbonated fruit drinks are a reasonable alternative) that be sipped rather than gulped. 8 glasses a day be drunk for full hydration of the brain.
And I might add that you should sip a little even when you're not thirsty as by the time you ARE thirsty you will be mildly dehydrated. If your pee is yellow you need to drink a lot more. Clear pee is good pee!
Don't eat sugarpuffs in hot weather either.
:lol:
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Benzene... Mmmmm, Aromatic! :-D
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Mmmm cyclobutadiene, antiaromatic...
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cyclobutadiene... tasty... hey, where'd it go?? :-o ;-)
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bloodline wrote:
cyclobutadiene... tasty... hey, where'd it go?? :-o ;-)
Mmmm, too much ring stress and no delocalisation....
Read into that what you will *snigger*
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What's cyclobutadiene?
:inquisitive:
Anyone seen those MagiCool sprays in shops right now? They mysteriously cool you down somehow, the ingredients list is rather worrying though.
Would this stuff be classified as endothermic? Isn't liquid nitrogen in that category?
Another interesting thing I was thinking earlier... if the tannins in black grape juice and wine can block absorbtion of iron (Vitamin C aides absorbtion) and iron is an essential for a healthy brain... then is it reasonable to suggest that people that drink red wine are gradually becoming stupid?
:pint:
Also, ice cream - delicious though it is, is a dairy product and thus contains artery lining cholesterol. I have recently discovered 'vegan ice cream' in Holland & Barrett health shops and it tastes exactly the same but is made with soya-bean milk (thus contains Omega 3 & 6). A little off topic but it gets my thumbs up.
:laughing:
Oh, they were giving away free miniature cans of Coke Zero in town today, nothing ground breaking. They'll try lime, cherry, vanilla, diet but it won't stop the inertia of people now realising that plain water is the best.
I had to laugh yesterday when an advert for the Dairy Council was showing these glamour models strutting about and it insinuated that eating cheese would make you beautiful. My fat arse... the growth hormones, cholesterol, anti-biotics and culture produced toxins are only going to give you nightmares and make you look like a fresian.
On the subject of anti-biotics, if a horse is given them then it's manure will kill all nearby plants and render the soil useless. Gardeners and eaters of horse beware!
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T_Bone wrote:
Diet?! YUCK
I can't stand diet anything, it's revolting. I can't even get that crap to rinse off my tounge! It's like it has some kind of wetting agent in it, or WD-40.
Coca Cola man. :-)
WD40 isnt a wetting agent: WD means Water Dispersal.
however, I'd agree that diet coke must have something like it in as a flavouring agent! (wheres that dem bleurgh emotie when you need it ?!)
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Cyclobutadiene (more strictly cyclobuta-1,3-diene)
is 4 carbons in a cyclic (I hesitate to use ring more like square !) configuration with double bonds between two sets of carbon atoms.
or two ethene molecules linked by single bonds between the two carbons.
words are useless, piccies are better:
C=C
| |
C=C
the other valences in the carbon are of course hydrogen.
benzene is similar, but 6 carbons in a ring with three double bonds every other bond.
I'm not gonna try that one in Ascii art !!
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@AgaFaster
... except it is nothing like benzene chemically - no delocalisation of any kind, it is basically an extremely reactive diene (enchanced by the considerable bond angle strain) and tends to undergo an automatic diels adler reaction with itself.
Benzene, on the other hand does not have this alternating single/double bond structure, the electron density is spread evenly around the ring in a fully delocalised configuration. See Huckel rule for predicting ring "aromaticity".
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Hyperspeed wrote:
:inquisitive:
Anyone seen those MagiCool sprays in shops right now? They mysteriously cool you down somehow, the ingredients list is rather worrying though.
Yes, I had some last summer and made full use of it :-) Unfortunately I couldn't find it in the shop recently. It's just water with a bit of dimethyl ether and presumbly some sort of emulsifier.
Would this stuff be classified as endothermic? Isn't liquid nitrogen in that category?
Substances are not classified as endo/exothermic, only reactions (more specifically processes).
Magicool works simply because when you spray it on yourself, the ether evaporates out of the spray very quickly, rapidly cooling the water droplets before they hit you, in the process. There's no mystery to it ;-)
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by Karlos:
Magicool works simply because when you spray it on yourself, the ether evaporates out of the spray very quickly, rapidly cooling the water droplets before they hit you, in the process. There's no mystery to it
I wonder how many innocent rabbits, guinea pigs and monkeys had to endure hours of spraying into the eyes, ears, wounds and mouth to test the safety of that!
If people want to magically cool themselves they should wear a hat and buy an ice-cream.
On the subject of atoms and all that: why, with particle accelerators and all this, is it still beyond science to turn lead into gold?
We've already grown diamonds, built steam engines a few molecules across and set off multi-megaton nuclear bombs...
And back to soft drinks - what is an emulsifier, what is acesulfame, how does a 'widget' work in beer cans and just who sells/regulates the E numbers?
Answers on a postcard!
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Cymric wrote:
(Aspartame has been linked to brain cell death as well!)
What hasn't?
Lately, I've begun switching to water: simple, costs almost nothing, and no health-issues whatsoever.
CAUTION!
Large amounts of water hazardous! :P
water intoxication (http://www.webmd.com/content/article/42/1671_51282.htm )
chug down about three quarts of water or more all at once to come down with a case of true water intoxication. These people become drowsy, lightheaded, and weak. They have trouble coordinating bodily movements and thinking straight, looking and feeling as if they just stumbled out of the local bar. But the water-intoxicated can't just go home and sleep it off. They must get treatment or risk going into convulsions, a coma, or even death.
AND Water can interfere with breathing!
Drowning Fact Sheet (http://www.poseidon-tech.com/us/statistics.html)
Fanning the flames of paranoia :-D ;-)
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Hyperspeed wrote:
by Karlos:
Magicool works simply because when you spray it on yourself, the ether evaporates out of the spray very quickly, rapidly cooling the water droplets before they hit you, in the process. There's no mystery to it
I wonder how many innocent rabbits, guinea pigs and monkeys had to endure hours of spraying into the eyes, ears, wounds and mouth to test the safety of that!
The toxicity of the substances contained in the product are likely to have been long known before it was formulated. They're not exactly new. It's mostly water.
If people want to magically cool themselves they should wear a hat and buy an ice-cream.
If you think that virtually anything you eat, ice cream included, has not had every additive exhaustively tested on animals then you are frankly a bit gullable. Even when a product says it has not been tested on animals, it does not imply that the components that went into making it have never been tested.
On the subject of atoms and all that: why, with particle accelerators and all this, is it still beyond science to turn lead into gold?
It isn't. In theory, you could carefully build up gold atoms from lighter ones by heavy particle bombardment, or by carefully chipping down heavier ones.
In practise it's not possible simply because of the energy required, the fact that you are probably more likely to shatter your target nuclei than get it to fuse with the incoming one, that it would take interim stages of likely highly unstable nuclei that would just decay again faster than you can get from one metastable stage to another and that the end product would likely contain an infinesimal amount of gold relative to the now probably highly radioactive side products.
We've already grown diamonds, built steam engines a few molecules across and set off multi-megaton nuclear bombs...
Growing crystals isn't that difficult, although getting them pure is another matter. Conceptually, nuclear devices aren't that complex either. Nanotechnology on the other hand...
And back to soft drinks - what is an emulsifier, what is acesulfame, how does a 'widget' work in beer cans and just who sells/regulates the E numbers?
Answers on a postcard!
Well, an emulsifier is simply any substance that allows you to mix two normally immiscable liquids, eg hydrophillic and hydrophobic. You'll find them in all sorts of things from ice cream to moisturising cream...
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Karlos wrote:
Hyperspeed wrote:
And back to soft drinks - what is an emulsifier, what is acesulfame, how does a 'widget' work in beer cans and just who sells/regulates the E numbers?
Answers on a postcard!
Well, an emulsifier is simply any substance that allows you to mix two normally immiscable liquids, eg hydrophillic and hydrophobic. You'll find them in all sorts of things from ice cream to moisturising cream...
Acesulfame-K is a sweetner. The "Widget" is a small presurised liquid nitrogen canister, with a strees point at the top which breaks when the pressure outside gets too low (ie you open the can). The nitrogen then sprays through a tiny hole in the top releasing millions of tiny bubbles into the beer.
E numbers are regulated by the Codex Alimentarius Commission. http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web/index_en.jsp
You really do ask very basic questions... :-(
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So if you collected enough widgets you could theoretically make a very unpleasant potion that freezes everything on contact?
:inquisitive:
by bloodline:
You really do ask very basic questions...
Doesn't someone's signature say "The only stupid question is a question not asked?"
:-D
metalman: That drowning link appears to contradict the theory in the film 'The Abyss' that if you let someone drown you can resusciate them some time later. According to the stats most people get brain damaged and the best chances of recovery are resuscitation within two minutes!
On that subject, scientists were reported to have been working on a breathable liquid similar to that portrayed in The Abyss... is this what the illusionist David Blaine was breathing in that 'bubble' or did he have a pipe in his gob all the time?
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Hyperspeed wrote:
On that subject, scientists were reported to have been working on a breathable liquid similar to that portrayed in The Abyss... is this what the illusionist David Blaine was breathing in that 'bubble' or did he have a pipe in his gob all the time?
Nope. The Abyss borrowed an already developed idea. Heavy flurocarbons are used as breathing fluids already as they have excellent oxygen / carbon dioxide solvation/transport properties.
The liquids include derivatives of perflurocyclohexane (often anchored with a nice heavy bromine atom). These have densities greater than water and are quite difficult to breathe. A lot of research into these compounds was carried out at Durham Universitiy. Contrary to the movie's suggestion, most rodent subjects died afterwards due to the stress on their resparatory system when trying to evacuate the fluid.
Their main use, AFAIK is to assist people that have severe breathing difficulties from lung trauma where the substance is dripped into the lungs, inflating the aerioli with oxygen rich fluid.
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Hyperspeed wrote:
So if you collected enough widgets you could theoretically make a very unpleasant potion that freezes everything on contact?
:inquisitive:
by bloodline:
You really do ask very basic questions...
Doesn't someone's signature say "The only stupid question is a question not asked?"
The quote is wrong... "The only stupid question is one asked by an idiot." :-D
I never said your questions were stupid. And, statements don't need question marks ;-)
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Slightly off-topic I know but haven't scientists worked out how a fish's gills extract oxygen from water and applied it to a device similar to that used by Qui Gon and Obi Wan in the Phantom Menace?
Is the level of oxygen in water sufficient to sustain a human without other heavy equipment?
Another thought would be that if humans exhale carbon-dioxide then isn't there a way to constantly recycle the oxygen atoms by filtering out the carbon? I saw some program where it said the Apollo 13 crew had to build a makeshift carbon dioxide filter using lime or calcium or something... a small, portable air recycler would prove very handy for a Mars mission or the construction of a lunar base.
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Hyperspeed wrote:
Slightly off-topic I know but haven't scientists worked out how a fish's gills extract oxygen from water and applied it to a device similar to that used by Qui Gon and Obi Wan in the Phantom Menace?
Is the level of oxygen in water sufficient to sustain a human without other heavy equipment?
No, not if you want to breathe air. Lungs and gills perform similar functions but you cant use some artificial gill to extract gaseous oxygen from water suitable for a human to breathe directly. Oxygen solubility in water is actually pretty low.
Another thought would be that if humans exhale carbon-dioxide then isn't there a way to constantly recycle the oxygen atoms by filtering out the carbon? I saw some program where it said the Apollo 13 crew had to build a makeshift carbon dioxide filter using lime or calcium or something... a small, portable air recycler would prove very handy for a Mars mission or the construction of a lunar base.
That was a CO2 scrubber - the whole purpose was to filter carbon dioxide out of the air, rather than liberate oxygen from it. In an enclosed space, CO2 build up from breathing becomes toxic long before you run out of sufficient oxygen to breathe.
As for "filtering" out the carbon and liberating oxygen from CO2, see: plants/photosynthesis ;-)
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But if Carbon Dioxide has 2x oxygen atoms for every 1x carbon then some kind of splitting of this would be really cool for air recycling. Pure oxygen though is probably a little dangerous for space missions.
(http://www.windows.ucar.edu/physical_science/chemistry/co2_molecule_sm.gif)
And with water, if you had a small hydrogen fuel cell to propel you through the ocean a future technology could potentially split the H²O into 2x parts fuel, 1x part breathing.
(http://www.vrmedialab.dk/pr/img/projekter/stud/chemistry1.jpg)
I wonder if anyone will actually crack the problems of perpetual energy, or at least increase energy recycling. If the sun is a chain reaction lasting billions of years then who knows what could be done.
There's some guy already trying to create a black hole (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/03/0318_050318_pin_blackhole.html) in a laboratory!
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Check out those double bonds on each of the Oxygens... that's one stable little molecule, photosynthesis is a complex process that requires a lot of enery... best leave it to the plants.
BTW, you do realise that the big orange thing under the space shuttle is basicly a big tank full of pure liquid oxygen (and hydrogen...).
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Hyperspeed wrote:
But if Carbon Dioxide has 2x oxygen atoms for every 1x carbon then some kind of splitting of this would be really cool for air recycling.
It costs exactly as much energy to break the bonds as making them freed. And since burning carbon gives off a lot of energy (look at your ordinary stove), you need quite a lot of energy to reverse the process. There's no shortcut, nor shall one ever be found.
I wonder if anyone will actually crack the problems of perpetual energy, or at least increase energy recycling. If the sun is a chain reaction lasting billions of years then who knows what could be done.
There is no perpetual energy---not even the Sun is perpetual. Besides, what the Sun is doing is nuclear fusion, and that is a completely different (and much more difficult) game. If ITER works as envisaged, then we are (literally) one step away from creating a commercial prototype of a device which at least is capable of sustaining a fusion reaction on its own. Then it's 'just' a matter of extracting that energy. I hope I live long enough to see ITER's successor in operation. Such a device would rank near the top in the Seven World Wonders of modern engineering.
As for more mundane energy conversion processes, tremendous advances have been made in the area of fuel cells. These turn chemical energy directly into electrical energy, instead of going through the wasteful bypass of burning fuel first, and using heat to generate the electrical currents. Unfortunately, in order to use normal fuel to extract the energy out of you require some fancy catalysts which do not tolerate sulphur very well; and if anything is a prerequisite, it is tolerance towards sulphur.
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There's some guy already trying to create a black hole in a laboratory!
Black hole's don't exist (http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/28/0543250) ;-)
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nicholas wrote:
There's some guy already trying to create a black hole in a laboratory!
Black hole's don't exist (http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/28/0543250) ;-)
if it turns out that black holes DO exist, somebody quickly throw a bunch of politians down it and save us from their folly.
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cecilia wrote:
nicholas wrote:
There's some guy already trying to create a black hole in a laboratory!
Black hole's don't exist (http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/28/0543250) ;-)
if it turns out that black holes DO exist, somebody quickly throw a bunch of politians down it and save us from their folly.
Surely we'd have to do the same to anyone genetically related to them, and also anyone who has aspirations to be a politician and their relations too? Just to be on the safe side. ;-)
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Five Alive Berry Flavour quenched my thirst thrice yesterday.
Citric Acid, I salute you!
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Well, almost on topic..
The Diet Coke and Mentos experiment with a new twist... a human container (http://youtube.com/watch?v=lFf-kW1E0Tc)
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i'm hooked on the stuff since my girlfriend bought me a bottle by mistake.
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Ian-uk wrote:
i'm hooked on the stuff since my girlfriend bought me a bottle by mistake.
Yup... I think they must have put some good stuff in there...
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MSG!
:-D
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Hyperspeed wrote:
Not to mention new research that suggests the plastics used in the bottle can leak chemicals simular to oestrogen).
Actually, the research is not all that new, though presumably ongoing. I saw a documentary on that years ago. The chemicals contain chains similar to oestrogens. They lock into oestrogen receptors in humans. They were considered to have a tendancy to androgenise people. However, it's not only plastic bottles which were thought to do this. Many substances were thought to act in that way, the most common of which was reported to be household detergent. We all know how much of that there is floating through our water systems. So, rince your dishes, specially if you are pregnant.
At the time I saw the documentary, I think some of the research had still not been thoroughly verified, though it was a long time ago now, and the details are becomming hazy.
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Holy sh¡t... that would explain why the women in Britain are so fugly!
:lol:
I didn't realise that the oestrogen type chemicals could lock into the receptors for these hormones.
Can anybody explain how hormones work and how long it would take the body to flush out these plastic compounds from "receptors"?
Lately I've noticed a sign on a brand of bottled water stating "Do not re-use this container"... so I've started filling up a glass fruit-juice bottle each day... and as I've mentioned earlier - a lot of baby food comes in glass as opposed to plastic (even though glass would seem potentially more harmful were it chipped).
Did I also mention an article I read by chance in a library about children's school wear? It said about man-made fabrics from oil being used (polyester?) and that they were leaking chemicals into kids' skin, not letting the pores breathe etc. It reccomended natural materials like silk and cotton (wool is a bit itchy).
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Alright... noone's responding... time for a song!
The Additive Song - MP3 - 586K (http://www.digital-audio.net/_aude/animan/additive.mp3)
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