Thanks to Dave for bringing up a subject that happens to be one I use in my Advanced Expository Writing class--DHMO--dihydrogen monoxide.
We like to think that we are sophisticated thinkers, people who can read, observe and synthesize the massive amounts of information we are presented with on a daily basis, particularly in the scientific arena. We place faith in science and scientists and the facts and figures they give us. We tend to believe that a lie would not be published and be believed because of all the access we have to media information. We tend to believe in our own infallability and our ability to tell the real from the fake, the truth from a hoax. Oh that that were 100% true.
Well, Professor Tom Way, building on the prior work of others, decided to put our abilities to the test. He began an organization and put up a website for that organization, a website that meets the highest standards for what a website should be and do. It's masterfully created and organized.
Please go to the website at http://www.dhmo.org/ And after you've gone there, please do come back and tell me all about how infallible we are as information gatherers and synthesizers.
12 comments:
Excellent. Good chuckle. I've never been one to believe everything I read (or everything on talk radio or FOX), but this is a terrific reminder.
Awesome site and a new one for me. Going to send a couple of people there who are still trying to make me believe that if its on an official website it has to be true.
Actually, I think everything on that website is pretty much true. The chemical does cause many hundreds of thousands of deaths each year, is a major component of acid rain, is used as an industrial solvent and industries discharge it into rivers and other waterways, and most governments are doing little about this chemical.
AHHHHH!!!! We're all gonna die!!!!
Yes, everything on the site is true. It's even funnier if you have a scientific background. The "ad" for a klein bottle at the bottom is just classic.
Yes Anonymous, it's all true. And yet, there are areas of the US that would kill to get more DHMO into their areas. They fight territorial bureaucratic wars with neighboring states over who has the right to the DHMO that is available. When a technological approach fails them, they've even been known to consult with Native American Shamans to stage esoteric public rituals in hopes that more DHMO will materialize.
Humans are strange creatures, lusting after those things that they know can harm them, but they want them anyway.
Awesome.
I think we should ship all our DHMO to Israel and spay it from airplanes all over the country. They'd LOVE it!!!
Thanks for the laugh. (as well as the deeper message)
Just knew it couldn't be all the yummy flavorings and corn syrup and other goodies in sodas that are doing us harm--it has to be the DHMO, the largest ingredient in the sodas.
So tell me. Do you think I have a law suit in the making against my doctors who pushed DHMO on me all these years?
So its the DHMO that's causing sea levels to rise and not global warming?
Global warming is releasing increasing amounts of liquid DHMO into our Oceans.
very funny...
Hilarious! I'm so tempted to send some of my students to that site and see how long it takes for them to catch on -- or not!?! Thanks for the laughs.
This has been around for years, but they have redesigned this since the last time I looked at it.
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