I'm muddling the headline a bit because there's quite a lot of unpack. Michael Siegrist and Angela Bearth, professors at a university in Switzerland, polled people in eight European countries and asked them if they would like to live in a world without chemical substances. Ilya Somin writes at Reason:
A recent study published in Nature Chemistry finds that 39 percent of respondents in eight European countries say they "agree" with the statement that "I would like to live in a world where chemical substances don't exist." Another 39 percent say the "slightly agree" or "slightly disagree" with this statement. Similarly, 40% say "they do everything I can to avoid contact with chemical substances in my daily life."
As the study's authors—Swiss academics Michael Siegrist and Angela Bearth—point out, such "chemophobia reflects stunning scientific ignorance, because human life would be virtually impossible without chemicals. Indeed, pretty much everything we use or touch is a chemical or combination of chemicals.
So it's even worse than we thought! The chemicals are everywhere!
For several years, when I've conducted one-shot information literacy classes at my library, I've done a cold open in which I pull up the hilarious DHMO.org website and launch into a fast-paced and hopefully terrifying rant about the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide.
That's water.
Increasingly, though, I find that I can't lead with this shtick because the students already know what dihydrogen monoxide is or have already seen the website. That's an unscientific sample without even casual methodological rigor, but it's encouraging.
-via Instapundit | Image: A Cure for Stupid People t-shirt now on sale at the NeatoShop!