The Ethanol Papers - Paperturn manuscript - Flipbook - Page 371
America have used engine and fuel-system components that are resistant to
alcohol's solvent properties.)
However, the problem to me is that Jay didn't say "write to your legislators to
demand more freedom of fuel choice to give us old car owners easier access
to ethanol-free gasoline," he's instead calling for less freedom of fuel choice.
More importantly, as much as I hate to say it, Jay is using information to sway
the argument that is untrue and misleading. And so, since I think that Jay should
know, and does know better, that he is lying in the AutoWeek story.
For example, in the new AutoWeek story, Jay states that "ethanol will absorb
water from ambient air...causing corrosion and inhibiting combustion."
Ethanol doesn't absorb water from the ambient air. This lie is one of the oldest
and most malicious of the lies created by the oil industry to denigrate ethanol.
The only thing new in how Jay used this lie is that he used the word "ambient."
I've not seen that before. I've seen quotes that use the word "thin" to denote
ordinary air that we normally breathe, but not "ambient." Regardless, this is not
what occurs.
It seems many years ago that some clever oil industry person must have
learned that ethanol (alcohol) is a hygroscopic substance and that the general
dictionary definition for a hygroscopic substance is that it can attract moisture
from its environment. What the oil industry wag then did was to substitute the
word "attract" with "absorb," and "air" for “environment.” Thus, attracting moisture from its environment magically became absorbing water out of thin air.
To keep with a Jay Leno comedian metaphor, let me offer a classic Abbott &
Costello routine that presents a startlingly clear analogy at how silly Jay's hygroscopic statement is:
Costello tells Abbott that a loaf of bread is the mother of the airplane. Abbott
tells Costello that he's crazy. Costello asks Abbott if he agrees that necessity is
the mother of invention. Abbott replies yes. Costello then asks if bread is a necessity; Abbott says yes. Costello asks is the airplane is an invention; Abbott
says yes. Therefore, exclaims Costello, if bread is a necessity and the airplane
is an invention, then a loaf of bread is the mother of the airplane.
What I'm getting at is just because you can play semantic word games with the
definition of "hygroscopic" that doesn't mean that the result of the game is relevant and correct.
