DHMO

Forget Carbon Dioxide, fight Dihydrogen Monoxide

ECOstrive – Eighteen states filed suite against the EPA on Wednesday to force them to regulate Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emissions. But the real danger could be Dihydrogen Monoxide (DHMO). According to the United States Environmental Assessment Center, thousands die each year after inhaling dihydrogen monoxide. It is also a major component in acid rain.

According to DHMO.org, DHMO is a colorless and odorless chemical that kills or maims thousands each year, primarily through accidental inhalation. It has also been revealed to be a causative agent in many environmental exposure incidents, industrial contaminations, automobile accidents, and property damage. The dollar amount losses caused, and the lives impacted, by the DHMO threat are virtually innumerable. Perhaps we should be pressuring the EPA to regulate DHMO as it is very prolific throughout the environment. Maybe not…

Sounds serious, right? Well, for those of you who don’t know, DHMO is the scientific name for the substance more commonly known as water or H2O. This story illustrates how easy it is to be fooled by junk science. DHMO is such a good example, because everything said is true. Without the context of knowing that it is water, it is easy to see the dangers that DHMO can cause. It causes property damage, will kill when inhaled and is a part of so many things that it is easy to truthfully state that DHMO plays a part in many dangers. It is so convincing that in 2004 Aliso Viejo, California nearly banned foam cups because they found that DHMO was used in thier manufacture. In fact, many reputable people have fallen for just the DHMO spoofs.

In 2006, in Louisville, Kentucky, David Karem, executive director of the Waterfront Development Corporation, a public body that operates Waterfront Park, which features a large, accessible public fountain, wished to deter bathers from using the fountain. “Counting on a lack of understanding about water’s chemical makeup,” he arranged for signs reading: “DANGER WATER – CONTAINS HIGH LEVELS OF HYDROGEN – KEEP OUT” to be posted on the fountain at public expense. There are other myths that get attention, again due to lack of context and the gullible public. Perhaps you heard of the sodium lauryl sulfate cancer scare. It is also due to misinformation and distorting the context. Here is a link to that story.

In 1997, Nathan Zohner, a 14-year-old junior high student at Eagle Rock Junior High School in Idaho Falls, Idaho, gathered 43 votes to ban the chemical dihydrogen monoxide, out of 50 people surveyed among his classmates. Zohner received the first prize at Greater Idaho Falls Science Fair for analysis of the results of his survey. In recognition of his experiment, journalist James K. Glassman coined the term “Zohnerism” to refer to “the use of a true fact to lead a scientifically and mathematically ignorant public to a false conclusion.”

Check out Wikipedia on the subject of dihydrogen monoxide. You will be surprised at all of the activity it has caused. Now you can see why there are so many skeptics on Global Warming. The facts given by the alarmist have no context associated with them. Because there is no context, we cannot make accurate or reliable decisions based on the information we are given.

So, lets look at things a little more closely before we jump to conclusions or we could find ourselves banning water.

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