Comment on Apart from water and salt, are there any inorganic foods?
xkforce@lemmy.world 10 months ago
It depends on what you mean by “eat.” Does being able to survive them traveling through your digestive tract count as “eating” something? Does it have to have nutritional value? If the former, any inorganic substance with a low enough LD50 in a low enough dose would count. If it actually has to have nutritional value, youre limited to minerals like Calcium Carbonate (chalk and this isnt organic despite Carbon being in its composition), Potassium Chloride (no salt), Magnesium Oxide (milk of magnesia), Iron Sulfate etc. and any inorganic derivative that has relatively low toxicity.
Radio_717@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Calcium bicarbonate is inorganic because it doesn’t contain hydrogen. Organic compound must have both carbon and hydrogen atoms.
Beardliest@lemmy.world 10 months ago
That’s a false statement. It needs to have carbon-hydrogen non-ionic bonds for it to be organic. Think carbonic acid vs a ketone of some sort.
Radio_717@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Not really completely false just missing a piece of information- ie I should have mentioned they be bonded but carbonic acid and ketones are both organic compounds so I’m not sure what you’re trying to say there.
xkforce@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Carbonic acid IS NOT organic.
pjhenry1216@kbin.social 10 months ago
Organic compounds don't have a strict consensus based definition today. So any matter of fact statement isn't widely held any longer. It's just one school of thought so to speak.
Radio_717@lemmy.world 10 months ago
You’re right- primarily because science changes as new things are discovered and therefore the definition changes.
I still think the definition I learned with C-H covalent bonds indicating organic has fewer exceptions than other definitions.
Eheran@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Calcium carbonate is inorganic because it is a simple salt. Containing hydrogen has nothing to do with it. Ca(HCO3)2 is just as inorganic.
If you think a molecule needs to contain both H and C to be organic, then fully halogenated propane is inorganic, but as soon as one of the 8 halogen atoms is not substituted it suddenly is organic again. This gets even more absurd with larger molecules like oleic acid C18H34O2. 34 chlorine replacing all H? Inorganic. 33? Organic.
Radio_717@lemmy.world 10 months ago
None of those compounds would be stable. Theoretically you’re making a good point for an exception to C-H bonds defining organic chemistry but I bet all of your fully halogenated compounds would degrade and break apart until some number of hygrogens replace the halogens to make it stable.
Point taken tho.
Eheran@lemmy.world 10 months ago
What do you mean would not be stable…? They are more stable than then hydrogenated versions. PTFE is essentially only C and F in endless chain of [CF2].