Category: tautology

Of mostly natural origin

Is your shampoo of natural, unnatural, or supernatural origin?

Keith S. Taber

It seems that some of the ingredients of a well-known brand of hair care products are not of natural origin (Image by Stefan Keller from Pixabay)

A well know brand of hair products is being advertised on television with an explicit claim that the shampoo is 94% of natural origin. Clearly there is also an implicit claim here about the other 6%! This dubious claim does not seem to be a slip of the tongue, as similar references can be found in product details on line (including the examples below). The science teacher in me knew that it was this kind of nonsense which supports common misconceptions about 'natural' being inherently good, and there being a clear distinction between materials that are 'natural', and those that are not.

Shampoos from brands other than Herbal Essences are 100% of natural origin.

The other evening I was watching television, and there was a shampoo being advertised, and although I was not paying attention I thought I heard the claim that the shampoo contained products of 94% natural origin. Had I misheard – a quick 'rewind' suggested not.

My next assumption was that this was sloppy language being used by some advertising copywriter, and that the manufacturer who commissioned the commercial simply had not noticed the slip. So I had a look on line.1 It seems that the brand concerned, Herbal Essences, has a habit or topping up its products with material that is not of natural origin. The company claims it is using at least 90% materials of natural original in its latest products (see the examples below), and this is apparently seen as a positive point to stress in its marketing.

But this is just nonsense. If the shampoo was fabricated using 94% products of natural original, then 6% was not of natural origin. This leaves me to wonder where the rest originates. A shampoo, any shampoo, is 100% of natural origin.

Natural products chemistry

In chemistry there is a common term natural products which tends to be used for materials extracted from living organisms – one can extract vitamin C from oranges, and insulin for diabetics used to be extracted from pancreases from farm animals (although now it is produced by the activities of bacteria or yeast). In that sense salt (produced by evaporating sea water) and chalk (deriving from the shells debris from long dead sea organisms) are not natural products. But like everything else in the material world, salt and chalk are still of natural origin.

So what is a hair product which is not of natural origin, or which is only partially of natural origin? It seems there are two obvious contrasts to natural, which are 'unnatural' and 'supernatural'. Presumably the company was not suggesting it used ingredients of supernatural origin?

Do Herbal Essences employ a specialist formulation technologist to prepare the shampoo ingredients that are not of natural origin? (Image by pendleburyannette from Pixabay)

What makes something unnatural?

Assuming Herbal Essences products do not include material of supernatural origin, the other option would seem to be material of unnatural origin. But what makes a material unnatural.

At various times, in various cultural contexts, the divine right of kings, feudalism and slavery will have been seen as perfectly natural, as well the subservience of women to men. Certain sexual acts that are now widely (if not universally) considered part of the normal range of human behaviours have at various times in different societies been considered unnatural – indeed so unnatural that those found to have 'committed' them might be put to death.

Given that the question of 'what is human nature?' is not settled (didn't Immanuel Kant think this was the core task for philosophy?) the approach that is sometimes taken is to look instead to 'nature' herself (for nature is a 'she' as has long been established – in part justifying her domination and mistreatment by 'man'). If it happens in nature, then that's natural.

"The sun rises everyday but animals occasionally give birth to monsters. 'Natural is what occurs always or almost always', says Aristotle, generalizing from this experience."

Paul Feyerabend

So, by this criterion, saving lives with blood transfusions is not natural, and nor is hip replacement surgery, nor using an incubator to stop premature babies dying. However, cancer is natural. Pushing your siblings out of the nest, or pecking them to death, to get a greater share of the food your parents bring home is perfectly natural. Depositing your eggs in another creature, and paralysing it so that it acts as a defenseless (but alive, and so fresh) source of food when your offspring hatch out inside it, is natural.

"We can save you if you wish, but only by unnatural acts" (Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay)

The man-made is not 'natural'

This depends upon demarcating humans as somehow outside of nature. This is difficult for a natural scientist to accept as 'ever since Darwin' (to borrow a phrase) it has been difficult to see how humans can be considered inherently distinct from the rest of the natural world, even if contingency has led to some obvious differences in terms of the development of culture. This argument then distinguishes the natural from the synthetic, the man-made.

A space rocket is not natural (in this sense) as it only exists because humans built it. Whether this is qualitatively different from technology elsewhere in nature – a badger's dam, a termite's nest, a honeycomb – rather than just a matter of a (admittedly impressive) difference of degree is an interesting question.

There are no doubt times where it is useful to distinguish between materials and objects that can be collected or extracted form 'natural' sources, and those that only exist because they have been synthesised by people – even if we do need to be wary of reading too much into the distinction. The Saturn V rocket did not exist 'in nature', and nor does a lemon coated in a wax so that it will stay 'fresh' longer – but one is the product of considerably less processing than the other. 2

Fluorine compounds (fluorides) are added to drinking water in many places to help protect teeth, but in other places the water supply already (i.e., 'naturally') contains fluoride at much higher levels – indeed, sometimes high enough to be considered a medical risk. This both reminds us that what is natural is somewhat arbitrary, and that what is considered natural is not necessarily desirable.

Natural and natural origin

The Saturn V rocket was synthetic – it was not found 'as is', growing in a swamp or being ejected from a volcano ('You Only Live Twice' style). But the materials it was made from were all of natural origin, even if some of them may have been the result of considerable processing of naturally occurring materials.

Everything you see here is of natural origin (From 'You Only Live Twice', Eon Productions)

Any material thing in our world is of natural origin. Some materials are used much as found 'in nature', sometimes some cleaning or tidying is needed (think of natural diamonds being 'cut' to best reflect light), some purifying (separating compounds from crude oil fractions), some extracting (metal from ore), some synthesising (ammonia from hydrogen and nitrogen)… The amount of processing may vary considerably, but everything material that goes into a manufactured product is ultimately of natural origin.

So Herbal Essences products are 100% of natural origin, just as are the products of all their competitors.

A vague distinction

Webpages advertising specific Herbal Essences product lines often simply report that they are of 9n% natural origin, as in the examples below (95%, 96%, 97%). However, I found a page where it was clarified that the 90+% of natural origin included "purified water and ingredient materials derived from a natural source and subjected to limited processing".

So Herbal Essences do not use natural ditch water, or natural swamp water, or even natural sea water in their products, but rather purified water. I am pleased – as I have used Herbal Essences products, and will likely do so again, and I would rather not use dirty water when I am seeking to clean my hair.

Water – easily sourced from nature, and used in hair products (Image by mac231 from Pixabay)

So, it seems that for Herbal Essences, being of natural origin actually means, natural materials found in a suitable form to be used directly, or ("natural derived") only needing a "limited" amount of processing. Limited processing is a good thing in 'green chemistry' terms (less waste, less energy needed) but it is both a vague notion (who is to decide what makes the processing 'limited', and how does a consumer know what Herbal Essences count as limited?), and of course it is simply a quite different concept to being of natural origin.

I guess the company wanted a way of saying they were basing their products on natural products (such as plant extracts) without being misleading by implying that they could simply go and collect all the component materials and use them without needing any further processing. These materials may be pressed, steamed, or separated and purified in other ways, but are not generally the outcomes of complex synthetic processes. I can see both why that would be attractive to consumers, and why it is not easy to get across in a simple catchy term.

Yet the claim that 94% of your hair product is of natural origin, when a moment's thought should lead to the consumer realising that actually all products are of 100% natural origin, is a claim that (unlike the missing 6% of your Herbal Essences brand shampoo), does not have any substance.

a "limited" amount of processing

is both a vague notion and simply a quite different concept to

being of natural origin.

Appendix: Some examples of products that are not completely of natural origin

95% natural origin

The Herbal Essences Coconut Milk conditioner is, according to their website,

95% natural origin
73% purified water and 22% natural derived ingredients other 5% for a good usage experience & product stability.

https://herbalessences.co.uk/en-gb/products/coconut-milk/coconut-milk-shampoo/
96% natural origin

The Herbal Essences Coconut Milk conditioner is, according to their website

96% natural origin
88% purified water and 8% natural derived ingredients other 4% for a good usage experience & product stability.

https://herbalessences.co.uk/en-gb/products/coconut-milk/coconut-milk-conditioner/
96% natural origin

The Herbal Essences Bourbon & Manuka Honey shampoo, is,

96% natural origin
73% purified water and 23% natural derived ingredients other 4% for a good usage experience & product stability.

https://herbalessences.co.uk/en-gb/products/bourbon-manuka-honey/bourbon-manuka-honey-shampoo/
97% natural origin

Their Volumising White Strawberry & Sweet Mint shampoo, is

97% natural origin
84% purified water and 13% natural derived ingredients other 3% for a good usage experience & product stability.

https://herbalessences.co.uk/en-gb/products/white-strawberry-sweet-mint/white-strawberry-sweet-mint-shampoo/

At least 9/10ths natural origin

I learn from the company's website that

"All of our Herbal Essences bio:renew hair products have a 90% natural origin *"

https://herbalessences.co.uk/en-gb/whats-up-with-paraben-free-shampoo/

And they kindly explain that by natural origin they mean

"* includes purified water and ingredient materials derived from a natural source and subjected to limited processing"

Source cited:
  • Feyerabend, P. (2011) The Tyranny of Science. Cambridge: Polity Press

Footnote

1: All quotes are from the website pages cited as accessed on 22nd August 2021.

2. I note that Wikipedia suggests that

"Fruit waxing is the process of covering fruits (and, in some cases, vegetables) with artificial [sic] waxing material. Natural [sic] wax is removed first, usually by washing, followed by a coating of a biological or petroleum derived wax. Potentially allergenic proteins (peanut, soy, dairy, wheat) may be combined with shellac."

A chemical change is where two things just go together

Keith S. Taber

Morag was a participant in the Understanding Science project. In the first interview, in her first term in secondary school, Morag told me that that she was studying electricity having previously studied changing state and burning. When I asked her whether these science topics have anything in common, that made them science, we got into a conversation about chemical reactions, and chemical change:

Do they have anything in common do you think? is there anything similar about those topics?

Changing state and burning's got something in common, but I don't know about electricity.

Oh yeah? So what's, what have they got in common then?

Erm, in burning you have, you could have a chemical reaction, and in changing states you've got chemical reactions as well.

From the canonical scientific perspective, a change of state is not a chemical reaction (so this is an alternative conception), so I followed up on this.

Ah, so what's a chemical reaction?

(I had to learn this) it's when two things, erm, are mixed together and can't be made to the original things easy, easily.

Oh, can you give me an example of that?

{pause, c. 2 seconds}

Water mixing with sugar, but that's not a chemical reaction.

So, Morag offers a definition or at least a description of a chemical reaction, but then the example she gives of that of type of event is not something she considers to be a chemical reaction. (Dissolving is not usually considered a chemical change, although it usually involves the breaking and forming of bonds, sometimes strong bonds.)

Oh so that's something else is it, is that something different?

I don't know.

Don't know, so can you mix water with sugar?

Yeah, but you can't get the water and the sugar back together very easily.

You can't. Is there a way of doing that?

No.

No? So if I gave you a beaker with some sugar in, and a beaker with some water in, and you mixed them together, poured them all in one beaker, and stirred them up – you would find it then difficult to get the water out or the sugar out, would you?

Ye-ah.

Yeah, so is that a chemical reaction?

No.

No, okay. That's not a chemical reaction.

At this point Morag suggested we look in her book as "it's in my book", but I was more interested in what she could tell me without referring to her notes.

So, have you got any examples of chemical reactions – any you think are chemical reactions?

Fireworks,

I: Fireworks, okay.

when like the gunpowder explodes, erm in the inside, and you can't get it back to the original rocket once it's has exploded.

and is that what makes it a, er, a chemical reaction, that you can't get it back?

{pause, c. 3 s}

Yeah, I suppose so.

So, now Morag has presented an example of a chemical reaction, that would be considered canonical (as chemical change) by scientists. Yet her criterion is the same as she used for the dissolving example, that she did not think was a chemical reaction.

Yeah? And then the water and the sugar, you can't get them back very easily, but we don't think that is a chemical reaction?

Yeah – that's a chemical change – {adding quietly} I think.

It's what, sorry?

Well there's, a chemical reaction and a chemical change.

Oh I see. So what's the difference between a chemical reaction and a chemical change?

Erm nothing, it's just two different ways of saying it.

Oh so they're the same thing?

Yeah, just two different ways of saying it.

So, now Morag had introduced a differentiated terminology, initially suggesting that sugar mixing with water was a chemical change, whereas a firework exploding was a chemical reaction. However, this distinction did not seem to hold up, as she believed the terms were synonyms. However, as the conversation proceeded, she seemed to change her mind on this point.

So when a firework goes off, the gunpowder, er, explodes in a firework, that's a chemical reaction?

Yeah – yeah, cause something's mixing with the gunpowder to make it blow up.

…

And So that's a chemical reaction?

Yeah.

And is that a chemical change?

{pause, c. 2 s}

Yeah.

Yeah?

(I suppose.) Yeah.

And when you mix sugar and water, you get kind of sugary water?

Yeah.

Have you got a name for that, when you mix a liquid and solid like that?

{pause, c. 1 s}

Or is that just mixing sugar and water?

{pause, c. 1 s}

There is a name for it, but I don't know it.

Ah. Okay, so when we mix it we get this sugar-water, whatever, and then it's harder to, it's hard to separate it is it?

Yeah.

And get the sugar out and the water out?

Yeah.

So is that a chemical reaction?

{Pause, c. 3 s}

No.

No, is that a chemical change?

{Pause, c. 1 s}

Yes.

Ah, okay.

So, again, Morag was suggesting she could distinguish between a chemical reaction, and a chemical change.

So what's the difference between a chemical change and a chemical reaction?

A reaction is where two things react with each other, like the gunpowder and flame, and a change is where two things just go together. You know like water and sugar, they go together…

In effect we had reached a tautology: in a chemical reaction, unlike a chemical change, things react with each other. She also thought that a sugar/water and a salt/water mixtures (i.e., solutions) were different "because the sugar's so small it would evaporate with the water"*.

The idea that a chemical reactions has to involve two reactants is common, but is an alternative conception as chemists also recognise reactions where there is only one reactant which decomposes.

Morag seemed to be struggling with the distinction between a chemical and a physical change. However, that distinction is not an absolute one, and dissolving presents a problematic case. Certainly without a good appreciation of the submicroscopic models used in chemistry, it is not easy to appreciate why reactions produce a different substance, but physical changes do not. One of Morag's qualities as a learner, however, was a willingness to 'run with' ideas and try to talk her way into understanding. That did not work here, despite Morag being happy to engage in the conversation.

Morag was also here talking as though in the gunpowder example the flame was a reactant (i.e., the flame reacts to the gunpowder). Learners sometimes consider substances in a chemical reaction are reacting to heat or stirring rather than with another substance (e.g., Taber & García Franco, 2010).

Read about learners' alternative conceptions

Source cited:

Taber, K. S., & García Franco, A. (2010). Learning processes in chemistry: Drawing upon cognitive resources to learn about the particulate structure of matter. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 19(1), 99-142.