On the Speakeasy Science blog, Debra Blum put down her paper today to rant against the term “chemical-free.”

I do understand that the phrase is just an advertising gimmick, implying a product’s freedom from mysterious but toxic industrial chemicals. I also understand that it’s basically ridiculous since everything, and I do mean everything including ourselves, is, in fact, composed of chemical compounds.

She uses a sign from a Cambridge, Mass. store called “Green Design” as an example.

One would think “chemical-free” bug spray couldn’t be written with a straight face, especially in a highly-educated community. But, this is after all a world, in which I get 44 million hits on Google when I type in the phrase, concerning everything from chemical-free mattresses to chemical free chicken. Not to mention the fact that one of our country’s leading newspapers just happily printed the rather hilarious phrase"chemical free minerals" in a straight-faced kind of manner.

…(U)nfortunately, our careless promotion of “chemical-free” contributes to public misunderstanding of the chemical-everything nature of our world. It plays to overwrought fears, making “chemical” synonymous with “evil.” And by doing so, it cheats people of a real appreciation of the wonderfully complex, beautiful and fundamental chemical design by which our universe exists.

See also Eva Amsen’s post, about two students in my undergrad department who challenged a brewery that claimed their beer contained no chemicals.