Organic and Inorganic - How They Relate to Chemistry and Food

[LePatron7]

Hi everyone. This is a post explaining the difference between the terms organic and inorganic when it comes to food production, and chemistry. The term organic is used very loosely to describe a variety of things in an inaccurate way. For example, it's common in raw food circles to say that cooking makes something inorganic, or that something is bad because it doesn't come in an organic form. These are inappropriate ways of using the terms organic and inorganic, and I'll clarify in this post.

Organic in grocery terms simply means without the use of pesticides, GMO's, or with pesticides that are allowed in organic food. When it's not organic it can contain pesticides and GMO's.

Organic in chemistry simply means that it contains carbon. Inorganic means it doesn't contain carbon. The body makes and uses both organic and inorganic compounds. For example the body uses protein, fat, and carbohydrates which are organic compounds. It also uses chloride to make hydrochloric acid, both of which are inorganic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_chemistry - "The range of chemicals studied in organic chemistry include hydrocarbons, compounds containing only carbon and hydrogen, as well as myriad compositions based always on carbon, but also containing other elements,"

The way organic is used to describe how cooking denatures nutrients and makes things inorganic is a completely inaccurate use of the term organic and inorganic/non-organic.

For example, cooking produces heterocyclic amines. Some would consider it to therefore be "inorganic," however by the actual definition of organic heterocyclic amines are often times organic compounds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterocyclic_compound - "Although heterocyclic compounds may be inorganic, most contain at least one carbon."

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-heterocyclic-amines.htm - "A cyclic chemical compound is composed of elemental atoms bonded together in the form of a ring. Most cyclic compounds are organic, containing carbon."

This is just an FYI for those who throw around the term organic and inorganic so loosely as if to describe some magical quality. The body needs, uses, and produces both organic and inorganic compounds.

[LePatron7]

Just a couple inorganic compounds the body can't do without - oxygen and water - neither contain carbon.

[LePatron7]

A few websites using the terms organic and inorganic incorrectly

http://www.truelivinghealth.com/raw-food-vs-cooked.html

"• The basic fact is that cooking denatures food.  It alters it chemically and causes food to change into an inorganic form providing us with fragmented food. Size, Color, Texture, Thickness, Loss of water are all visible changes that happen to food when cooked"

http://www.living-foods.com/articles/eatonlyraw.html

""Heating any food, destroys much of its vitamin, mineral, and protein content and poisonous inorganic acids are formed. The all uncooked diet is most healthful.""

http://www.living-foods.com/articles/rawfreshproduce.html

"cooking causes inorganic mineral elements to enter the blood and circulate through the system, which settle in the arteries and veins, causing arteries to lose their pliability, ï‚· the body prematurely ages as this inorganic matter is deposited in various joints or accumulates within internal organs, including the heart valves. "

Interview with Aajonous Vonderplanitz - http://drbass.com/aajonus.html

"Clay is like a food, especially when moist, and therefore the minerals are not inorganic. The body can utilize the minerals fairly well. However, as I state in my book, fresh raw vegetable juices provide the best, although in some cases incomplete, mineral concentrations. Cheese is also a concentrated source of organic minerals. My conclusions are always based on consistent good results and research."

Members at the RPD forum misusing inorganic and organic - http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/infonews-items/why-drinking-water-is-bad/msg31521/#msg31521

"Because the "minerals" in mineral water are all INORGANIC, eventually loading up your kidneys in your old age.  "

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/general-discussion/raw-eggs-whites-and-yolks/msg14846/#msg14846

"or chicken feed is usually cracked, old, rancid, inorganic, highly void of minerals and omega threes like insects and green plants are, "

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/journals/goodsamaritan%27s-experiments/msg85180/#msg85180

"cooking makes those organic iodine nutrients inorganic and less usable by the body.  We can do better than even those 4% of americans who are not iodine deficient."

[van]

I'll take ownership of the quoted line about chicken feed.   The inorganic reference their was relating to the fact that nine out ten times the feed was grown inorganically or with the use of toxins. 
   
     I'm still not convinced by references here regarding the inorganic vs. organic nature of cooked food,,  eating rock based minerals, and eating minerals that have been converted into either plant or animal.    For example,   for many years I have tried taking mineral supplements  ( well actually I gave up many years ago).   Each time I developed small little pea sized lumps within the tissues of my limb.  I am a below knee amputee.  We load our limbs for support, thus create constant pressure on tissues not normally loaded.   I strongly suspect that those mineral, rock based, simply entered my blood stream and  fell out of suspension in areas of limited blood flow.   This may seem strange or bad science, but the number of times it happened convinced me that ingesting rock based minerals  was not the same as getting them from plants and animals. 

[eveheart]

I have a little problem with this topic because the word organic has different meanings within different contexts. There are lots of English words with multiple meanings, so no biggie. This was brought out in the days when the term organic food was coined. Everybody was up in arms in the 1980s because organic means one thing in chemistry and another thing in food production.

There really is no problem once you know what the term means in each context. As you point out, DaBoss, organic [chemistry] refers to carbon-containing matter. In the context of food production, organic food means food produced according to conventions of organic farming, which governs use of certain pesticides and fertilizers and currently prohibits GMO in food.

I think "we" decided to use organic in two completely different contexts 30+ years ago. Doing this is appropriate in the English language. I don't think many food shoppers suppose that organic food contains no carbon*; neither do many chemists think that carbon-containing compounds need to certify methods of tilth.

*Okay, okay, most US food shoppers have no idea about organic compounds.

[LePatron7]

I understand everyone has different things that do and don't work for them. For me unrefined salt is great, and a lot of things that don't work with others work well with me.

This post is simply to clarify the two accurate ways in which organic and inorganic are used properly - organic and inorganic chemistry, and organic and non organic agricultural practices. The terms organic and inorganic have no place when it comes to mentioning cooking. Like I showed in this post there are organic heat created toxins.

This information isn't an attack, it's for clarification on the accurate way to use those terms. Raw animal foods provide higher quality protein, fat, fat based compounds (cholesterol, etc.), and less toxins - but being raw or cooked doesn't have anything to do with being inorganic or organic.

Organic and inorganic compounds are both essential to life.