so the other day i was concerned about aluminium in my diet and where i might be absorbing aluminium. i had heard something a while back about alziemers patients having aluminium deposits in their brains. so i looked up on wikipedia (the source of all knowledge) about aluminium and found that it is indeed a neurotoxin that alters the function of the blood-brain barrier. thats sounds pretty bad to me. i was wondering all this because i realized that one of our cooking pots is made of aluminum (both spellings appear to be correct). i was comforted by wikipedia that "The use of aluminium cookware, popular because of its corrosion resistance and good heat conduction, has not been shown to lead to aluminium toxicity in general." so i am hoping that they are right and will not throw out our nice pot. However i have decided that i will no longer use my precious old spice underarm deodorant/antiperspirant because apearantly it is made almost purely out of aluminum salts. i was interested to find out if my trusted (been using it about 15 years) deoderant had aluminum in it because wikipedia said this " Excessive consumption of antacids containing aluminium compounds and excessive use of aluminium-containing antiperspirants are more likely causes of toxicity." it turns out that nearly all deoderants/antiprespirants on the market are made with aluminum salt because they are very effective at managing smells and sweat. sweet (not). so i went straight to the store and bought some specifically "non- aluminum" pit stick. the adidas 24 hour seems to be working just fine. i dont really use alot of the stuff in the first place but i still wanted to err on the safe side. altho i havent bothered to check if "tums" or "rolaids" have aluminum in them (i think it might only be maalox and Amphojel). all these pre-cautions may just be me being silly because i also learned that aluminum is the most commonly found metal in nature (tho never in a pure state). they say that it makes up about 8% or the earths crust. so you would have to lock yourself indoors if you wanted to completely avoid aluminum all together. WP says "aluminium accumulation may be a consequence of the Alzheimer's damage, not the cause. In any event, if there is any toxicity of aluminium it must be via a very specific mechanism, since total human exposure to the element in the form of naturally occurring clay in soil and dust is enormously large over a lifetime."
now having learned all this i was reminded of silver. it occured to me that i had heard the very opposite things about silver. that silver kills germs and bacteria and warewolves and whatnots. i thought that this was odd because in my mind silver and aluminum are very similar, except for this; aluminum-bad, silver-good. so naturally i continued on wikipedia over to learn about silver. i thought it was cool that silver has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal. even higher than copper. and it was true that Silver is antimicrobial, and dilute solutions of silver nitrate and other silver compounds are used as disinfectants. "Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, wrote that silver had beneficial healing and anti-disease properties, and the Phoenicians used to store water, wine, and vinegar in silver bottles to prevent spoiling. In the early 1900s people would put silver dollars in milk bottles to prolong the milk's freshness. Silver compounds were used successfully to prevent infection in World War I before the advent of antibiotics". so these silly people descide that it might be a good idea to eat alot of silver "Today, various kinds of silver compounds, or devices to make solutions or colloids containing silver, are sold as remedies for a wide variety of diseases. Although most are harmless, some people using these home-made solutions use far too much and develop argyria over a period of months or years, and several cases have been documented in the last few years in the medical literature, including one possible case of coma associated with a high intake of silver (see medical references). It is strongly advised to notify a doctor when taking silver as a form of self-medication." i thought this was all hokey. i thought these silly people didnt really exist... until i got up this morning and heard about a real live PAPA smurf!
because apearantly it is made almost purely out of aluminum salts. i was interested to find out if my trusted (been using it about 15 years) deoderant had aluminum in it because wikipedia said this " Excessive consumption of antacids containing aluminium compounds and excessive use of aluminium-containing antiperspirants are more likely causes of toxicity." it turns out that nearly all deoderants/antiprespirants on the market are made with aluminum salt because they are very effective at managing smells and sweat. sweet (not). so i went straight to the store and bought some specifically "non- aluminum" pit stick. the adidas 24 hour seems to be working just fine. i dont really use alot of the stuff in the first place but i still wanted to err on the safe side. altho i havent bothered to check if "tums" or "rolaids" have aluminum in them (i think it might only be maalox and Amphojel). all these pre-cautions may just be me being silly because i also learned that aluminum is the most commonly found metal in nature (tho never in a pure state). they say that it makes up about 8% or the earths crust. so you would have to lock yourself indoors if you wanted to completely avoid aluminum all together. WP says "aluminium accumulation may be a consequence of the Alzheimer's damage, not the cause. In any event, if there is any toxicity of aluminium it must be via a very specific mechanism, since total human exposure to the element in the form of naturally occurring clay in soil and dust is enormously large over a lifetime."
