Talk:Dihydrogen monoxide parody/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Not a hoax

Dihydrogen monoxide is just the name for water, and all the claims are real facts. Editor abcdef (talk) 08:12, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

That's right. The hoax was using these facts to convince people that there was a lurking danger that needed to be addressed. Mindmatrix 13:20, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Everything has its dangers, they all needed to be addressed. Editor abcdef (talk) 05:54, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

See the lengthy discussions on this very topic above. --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  13:29, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Where has this discussion gone? I also think that calling it a hoax is misleading and derogatory. It's actually a very useful educational tool and does not contain false information. Dreadpirate Roberts (talk) 06:13, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Check the archives - it has been discussed many times with no consensus to change it. This discussion, cut and pasted (I lost the user links) from last year, sums up the point of view that has prevailed:

"dihydrogen monoxide" is not a hoax. But the article is not about dihymonox, it is about a hoax involving dihymonox, hence the title. - Staszek Lem (talk) 18:56, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

No. It's not a hoax. It's deliberately one-sided in portrayal, but every word is true. That's the whole point of this exercise. - K7L (talk) 01:26, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

Every word is true, but the total effect may be false. This is a peculiarity of human language con men make good use of. - Staszek Lem (talk) 03:16, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

- DavidWBrooks (talk) 22:42, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Scientific names of water

Some time ago [this edit] removed explication of the nomenclature used to derive the term dihydrogen monoxide. I wonder if anyone else thinks there is value in restoring any or all of the explication of the scientific naming conventions which are the origin of the name DHMO. Numerous sources were cited, so calling it original research is not quite accurate, is it? --JimWae (talk) 07:30, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

Various names for water are commonly used within the scientific community. Some such names include hydrogen oxide, as well as an alkali name of hydrogen hydroxide, and several acid names such as hydric acid, hydroxic acid, hydroxyl acid, and hydroxilic acid. The term "hydroxyl acid" used in the original hoax is a non-standard name. An additional name, μ-oxido dihydrogen, has been developed for this compound.

Under the 2005 revisions of IUPAC nomenclature of inorganic chemistry, there is no single correct name for every compound. The primary function of chemical nomenclature is to ensure that each name refers, unambiguously, to a single substance. It is considered less important to ensure that each substance should have a single name, although the number of acceptable names is limited. Water is one acceptable name for this compound, even though it is neither a systematic nor an international name and is specific to just one phase of the compound. The other IUPAC recommendation is oxidane.

The use of numerical prefixes is typical nomenclature for compounds formed by covalent bonds, which are present in water. The prefix for the first named element is often dropped if the elements involved commonly form only one compound, or even if the number of atoms of the first-named element is the same in all the compounds of the two (or more) elements. Thus H₂S is often simply called hydrogen sulfide, and lithium oxide is a common name for Li₂O. However, the names dihydrogen sulfide, dilithium oxide, and dilithium monoxide are also commonly used both in industry and in universities, even though Li₂O is ionic.

The "mono-" prefix is often dropped for the second-named element if it is the only common compound the elements form. Thus for instance the IUPAC name of H₂S is hydrogen sulfide rather than hydrogen monosulfide. However, since carbon and oxygen can form several compounds (carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, tricarbon dioxide, and dicarbon monoxide), the mono- prefix is kept, as it is with silicon monoxide and silicon dioxide. Indeed, hydrogen and oxygen do form another common compound, H₂O₂ (hydrogen peroxide). Using prefix nomenclature, H₂O₂ would be called dihydrogen dioxide. Thus, keeping the "mono-" in dihydrogen monoxide could in principle serve to distinguish it from another compound.

References

I think this is interesting and useful stuff and would not object to its return. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 11:58, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

It's interesting, but seems like a WP:OR tangent to suggest that it's relevant. A "hydroxilic acid" hoax would have presumably had just as much impact. --McGeddon (talk) 21:10, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

"Scientific literacy"

QUOTE "It illustrates how the lack of scientific literacy". No it don't! The word is not in the mainstream of thought. Water is called water, Aqua and its scientific term is H2O. That word, Dihydrogen monoxide is not used so you can't call people illiterate not to know a highly technical term. --24.177.0.156 (talk) 20:58, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

The point is not that people don't know what "dihydrogen monoxide" is. The point is that it is easy to fool the naive, even when correctly (though misleadingly) describing the properties of the compound. Compare the Food Babe treatment of "yoga mat compound"; whether it is harmless or not, it is an emotional, not a scientific, argument to mention that it is used both in bread dough and in yoga mats. --Macrakis (talk) 21:24, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

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How do I link the term "diprotium monoxide" to this page?

I don't really want a redirect to this page, obviously -- I want a redirect to the main article.

I can easily edit articles, but from what I can gather from the rather abstruse "help" pages (some help!), what I actually need to do is to create a new article page with a redirect in it. How do I do that? How do I invoke an editor to create a new page??? Help! (But not from any of the "help pages," thank you very much)... The Grand Rascal (talk) 08:57, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

You didn't find the create an article wizard link on this page to work? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Article_creation - DavidWBrooks (talk) 11:21, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

I neither KNEW about the "create an article wizard," nor did any of my searches find it.

I've bookmarked the "Article_creation" page, so this difficulty should not afflict me again. THANK YOU MUCJLY for your prompt assistance!

16:13, 19 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheGrandRascal (talk • contribs)

(Re-)added "diprotium monoxide"...

I've (re-)added the term "diprotium monoxide" to the list of "other" chemical names for water. This term IS occasionally encountered on the web at large, e.g., http://ftp.xecu.net/bobsharp/nicholas/nuclearchemistry.htm , and so merits at least a brief mention. The Grand Rascal (talk) 16:39, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

This is not an article about alternative names of water - it's an article about the parody or hoax, and I cannot find an example that uses this name as part of a parody. Can you? (In fact, I can't find examples of parodies using any of the other names we have listed.) - DavidWBrooks (talk) 16:45, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

---

David, the very first sentence of the article says, "The dihydrogen monoxide parody involves calling water by an unfamiliar chemical name." Read that again: chemical name. Do you imagine there are special chemical names used only as part of a parody? Any name for water used in a parody will by definition be a chemical name!

As for sources of the parody using the actual names... Hmmm. Well, let's see now: the article itself says:

(1) "A 1983 April Fools' Day edition of the Durand Express, a weekly newspaper in Durand, Michigan, reported that "dihydrogen oxide" had been found in the city's water pipes";

(2) "The first appearance of the parody on the Internet was attributed by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to the 'Coalition to Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide'";

(3) "Nathan Zohner, a 14-year-old student, gathered petitions to ban "DHMO" as the basis of his science project, titled 'How Gullible Are We?'";

(4) The entire section of the article titled, "Public efforts involving the DHMO parody," seems to be pretty fruitful;

(5) The DHMO.Org site is still up.

Is this not sufficient? Or are all of the sources bad?

And, indeed, were it not for these things, what basis would there be for this article in the first place?!? TheGrandRascal 17:48, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it says "The dihydrogen monoxide parody involves ..." - it's not enough that a name was used by somebody in some context. It has to be used as part of the hoax / parody effort to be listed.

You're right, I went overboard getting rid of the other alternatives and will replace some. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 17:50, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

"Draft:Diprotium monoxide" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Draft:Diprotium monoxide. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 September 10#Draft:Diprotium monoxide until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Hog Farm _Bacon 20:32, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

Water contains high levels of hydrogen

This is not a good joke actually, because there are legitimate reasons why the water might contain high levels of hydrogen gas (e.g. current passing through causing electrolysis). As already pointed out at metafilter. Not sure if any RS actually made this point though. Double sharp (talk) 06:03, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Not sure what your point is, as hydrogen gas has nothing whatsoever to do with the parody. GenQuest ^"scribble" 18:51, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

Um... If water has more than two hydrogen atoms, wouldn't it stop being water? It would then be a different molecule, H₃O, not H₂O. Anyways, even if it is a bad joke, I don't think that would be a reason for deleting any reference to that here in Wikipedia. After all, Wikipedia has no censorship. --The typos fixer (talk) 19:02, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia is also not an indiscriminate collection of information. The statement that Wikipedia is not censored means that the fact that someone is, or might be, offended by a statement is not a valid reason to keep that statement out of Wikipedia. There are, however, plenty of other valid reasons to remove or keep statements out of Wikipedia. - Donald Albury 22:26, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Not accurate

This describes neither a hoax (as the article previously described), nor a parody. At best, would be described as a practical joke to confuse naive people in a world full of paranoid people who are terrified of everything. 2605:B100:349:8C6D:390E:166:1E5A:A627 (talk) 18:17, 7 September 2022 (UTC)

Check the note on the top of this page, the one starting "Ahem". - DavidWBrooks (talk) 18:29, 7 September 2022 (UTC)