Alcohol and Phenol

I don't think I could live without the necessities of living in a clean environment. I like to be able to clean and disinfect things when they are dirty. I like to take baths. I take one everyday. It is really interesting to think about how chemicals react to one another in order to get rid of germs and oils. I was just thinking about this not that long ago one day while washing my hair. I said to myself, "I wonder how this shampoo is getting my hair clean? Does it really work?" Now I have an idea of what that answer is after reading these past couple of chapters. There are somethings that are not healthy for our bodies. I don't use hand sanitizer and you can find it located in any location you visit. But if you come to my house there is none of that stuff here. We have to think about what we are putting on our bodies and what the consequences of it will be. It is really interesting to think about how sanitary things were in hospitals back in the day. Our chapter discussing this, and it was not that sanitary and they would reuse hospital beds which would cause more people to die from the spread of disease. I am thankful for how much more we care about how clean things are to prevent more people dying and spreading disease. Another form of alcohol other than for cleaning items, is what we drink. We can over consume alcohol and it can lead to an unhealthy life. But we use beer and other drinks in social events and parties, some people drink when they are stressed and upset. It can be abusive to drink for the wrong reasons. There is no need to drown your problems down with alcohol, it isn't going to do your future any good, but tell that to Homer Simpson.
The next chapter talked about Phenol and what things are made of it. The book talks about how so many things are made from Phenol because it is a lot cheaper than other kinds of plastics. It made me think about how many things I own that are made from Phenol. It made me sad to read about the elephants and how they used their husks for billiard balls. People really need to think about where their items come from and what sacrifices were given to make them. No animal should be killed in order to make things, there are other things that we can use to create the things we need.

Chlorocarbon Compounds and Pollution

This chapter starts out sounding like we have made a good discovery that would change our world for the better. We found a way to refrigerate things with the use of CFC's. CFC's were proven to freeze things without the use of other chemicals like ether, ammonia, methyl chloride, and sulfer dioxide that smell bad, are fire hazards, and are poisoness. We were able to preserve our food and that opened up a whole bunch of inventions such as premade food, household fridges, spray cans (hairspray, freon,etc.). What we didnt realize was that we were releasing pollutants into the world that were depleting the ozone layer. Eventually CFC's were banned due to the harmful effects the have. CFC's have made things like cancer, birth defects, and related deaths more accessable to people, things that are harmful to our bodies.

Eventually medicine was released into the world to help doctors and patients feel more comfortable during surgeries where there was less pain invloved. Ether was used as a anesthetic to help people sleep during surgeries until chloroform was used instead because it was less of a fire hazard and did smell better. But the use of chloroform wasn't as good as they thought, it did produce less deaths, but overall it was not healthy for people either. Morphine was used eventually.

Things that we use are not as healthy as we hoped that they would be for us. Everything we use has some kind of harmful aspect to it in our world. Nothing is as healthy as we thought they all wouldl be. Almost everyone drives a car and that is not environmental friendly. We try to make things healthier but will we ever have a pollutant free world? Who knows.

Salt

I am not much of a reader as I have probably mentioned before. I don't really like to read and to be honest the only reason why I was able to read this chapter was because I was able to relate it to my everyday life. I like to read about things that affect me in some way. This chapter relates to not only me but everyone because everyone needs salt in order to live. Salt is a neccesity that people need and without it people can get really sick and it can lead to death, but there should be a limit on how much salt people should intake. It may be needed but some people overuse salt to an extent where they can get high blood pressure. Salt is an electrolyte and it sends electrical charges in our bodies that helps control our heartbeats. People who play sports will get fatigued from sweating all of the electrolytes out of their bodies and drinks like Powerade and Gatorade to replenish those back into the body. I felt as though the chapter was understandable and I did gain a plethora of knowledge after reading it. I liked reading about how salt was extracted and how it is today. It is always interesting to read about how things were made and what the process was. The one I remember most was how they take salt from the ocean. It is one of the slowest processes but the most beneficial. Salt is used for things not only food, but salting icy roads to help keep roads safer to drive and walk on. There are several uses for salt and these are only some of them.