Detergents Make Water Wetter
To get things clean, water must penetrate deeply into the fabric. A glance at the water beads on your umbrella shows that water isn’t particularly good at wetting things. The problem is it has a high surface tension, which makes water behave as if it had a thin skin on it. That’s why insects can walk on water.
Washing powders and detergents work to make water wetter by lowering its surface tension. This enables the water to carry detergent molecules deep into the fibres, where they can come into close contact with the dirt.
Detergent molecules are like little tadpoles. The heads are attracted to the water molecules by a small electric charge, while the tails, which are chemically very similar to grease, are repelled by water molecules. So the tail of the detergent molecule attaches itself to the grease. With their heads attracted to water, and their tails embedded in the grease, the detergent molecules hold the water and dirt together, until they float away as the clothes are agitated.
Washing powders may involve other things besides detergent. These include bleach, enzymes to break down protein stains like blood and perspiration, and blueing agents, which make the laundry appear whiter. Blueish dyes absorb some of the reflected yellow light. This brings it more into balance with the blue light, so that the material appears whiter to the eye.
So next time you wear a white top, spare a thought for the hard working molecules that drag out the dirt.
Getting things clean occupies a significant amount of time and energy. Food preparation and eating utensils, the clothes we wear, the buildings we use, and our bodies all have the tendency to accumulate “dirt.” This seems to be a significant aspect of the law of entropy by which systems move toward a state of inert uniformity.
Unless we actively put energy into the systems we depend on, they deteriorate to the point of uselessness. Actually, some systems become worse than useless. They can become hazardous as they deteriorate. The proliferation of dangerous bacteria in health-care facilities is a good example. Constant vigilance must be maintained by infection control staff to keep hospitals and clinics places that promote health and healing rather than infection and illness.
Maintaining acceptable levels of hygiene is one of those things that is best done regularly in reasonable amounts rather than occasionally in bursts. Whether we’re talking about stains in clothing or the concentration of unhealthy bacteria or parasites in an environment, keeping an acceptable level of cleanliness is easier if we don’t let “the enemy” establish itself.
Keeping the various aspects of our personal environment clean is not the only cleaning challenge we have to deal with. The moral universe presents a whole series of obstacles of its own. There seem to be a few behaviours (like pedophilia) which are generally seen to be reprehensible, even criminal. However, it doesn’t take very many steps down the moral trail to find considerable divergence in opinion regarding standards.
When it comes to setting the mark for human moral behaviour, we will always be in trouble if we use our own shifting, self-interested frame of reference to establish the rule. We live in an orderly physical universe. Modern science got a huge boost from scientists working to discover the laws of nature embedded by God in creation.
Our own personal morality will be distinctly enhanced if we work to discover God’s moral laws revealed in the Bible.
David Humphreys and Ron Hughes
