After church last Sunday I noticed an unusual amount of dried blood on the pavement¹ out the front. Now this being Doonside which is in the western part of Blacktown Council which is already in Western Sydney, I supposed that the only way that you could get that much blood on the pavement would be if you had a pair of drunkards fighting or someone coming to sudden unpleasantness after falling off a bicycle or other some such. In Doonside though, I think that the former is more likely that the latter. The difference between drunkards fighting in Blacktown as opposed to drunkards fighting in Bondi, or Kings Cross, or Vaucluse, or Cremorne, is that drunkards fighting in Blacktown are just animals whereas drunkards fighting in Cremorne are genetlemen engaging in fisticuffs after celebratory feremented vegetable product imbibing - Hurrah!
Evaporated blood on the pavement left behind a residue² and this particular set of circumstances sent my mind spinning into examining the components. "What are you thinking about?" asked Mrs R. after lunch; as I was obviously wistfully lost in thought.
"I wonder what temperature human blood boils at."
Oh.
(Life Lesson: Never ask someone¹ what they are thinking about unless you are prepared to hear something completely hatstand bonkers.)
Human blood is a hideously complex substance which is made up of several component parts, of varying densities and varying volatility. The fact that there was dried blood on the pavement², is evidence that the atmosphere and the sun have been doing work on this patch, to drive off the more volatile components. Water and alcohol are likely the lighter and more volatile components and seeing as the sun is a relentless energy dumping machine, the energy to drive off those components was amply supplied. All that was left was the more solid residue, devoid of water.
To the issue at hand - Why would I wonder what temperature human blood boils at?
Human blood is mostly chemically made up of water. It turns out that most of the fluids in the human body with the exception of stomach acid are also mostly chemically made up of water. Human blood has a freezing point of about -3°C and a boiling point of about 104°C. This is keeping in line with most broadly salty liquids such as seawater. I have heard it said that as humans are about 60% water, then that means that we have a kind of sea within.
Given that the human body is roughly about 60% water, then it should be chemically possibly to liquify a human body to the point that it could then be boiled. For a 60kg human, you're going to need a particularly large boiling flask; which you might be able to order from either Krupps or Brand. Assuming that you could pulp and liquify a human body, this has some interesting results.
If we take our 60kg drunkard and assume that they are about 60% water, then that they are about 36kg of liquid. If you were to boil off all of the liquid at about 110°C, you could then re-condense the resultant gas into another flask. If you then take that resultant liquid and heat that to 90°C, then what will happen is that alcohol which boils at 78°C, will be driven off as a gas. You can then re-condense that resultant gas into another flask. Hopefully, the contents of that flask should be roughly similar to neat alcohol, because it is the most volatile of all of the liquids which might be present.
I should point out at this juncture that technically what we have are two stills; which are illegal in the state of NSW for the purposes of making alcohol unless under production licence. I should also point out at this juncture that boiling humans for the purposes of extracting alcohol is not only morally repugnant but also highly inefficient.
As it is, humans just like every living thing are mostly made of four elements; being Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen and Oxygen. Sugars and Alcohols are fancy longer chain combinations of mostly Carbon, Hydrogen, and Oxygen. This helps to explain why the chemicals within living things interact so well. On top this, it also helps to explain why we can drive off liquids from living things so easily. We actually perform this experiment without the equipment on regular basis when we cremate dead people. Cremation is an uncontrolled process of driving off all of the liquids and then oxidising the solid parts which remain. We have also actually perform this experiment twice in two uncrontrolled events in which some Japanese people were instantly vaporised and oxidised.
Now I have no idea how congruent Blood Alcohol Level is to the total amount of liquid in the human body but to make the maths simple, 0.1% which is double the legal BAC for driving, should give you approximately 36mL of neat alcohol. When you think about it, this seems about right as this amount is about 3 standard drinks. Thus, using the power of science and throwing morality and dignity to the kerb, it is possible to distill the chemical which may have likely helped cause this.
Looking at blood on the pavement not only made me wonder about the circumstances² which led to it being there, but also led me to wonder about my own mortality. At some point I will likely die and my useless corpse cremated. I too will leave behind a small pile of residue. Actually, when the skies begin to burn with a great noise and the elements melt with the heat of an insane nuclear fire, then the earth also and the everything contained that are therein will also be burned up and probably not even leave behind a small pile of residue.
What have we learned?
1 - blood on the pavement has a root cause.
2 - although you could extract alcohol from a dead human, it's not efficient or advisable to do so.
3 - never ever ask someone what they are thinking if they are lost in thought. The answer will invariably turn to a sense of mortality and the fact that everyone and everything will die.
Memento Mori.
¹I have it on somewhat decent authority that the likelihood of a woman thinking about absolute nonsense gibberish schnibity-nibity-schnik-nuck-neigh³ is far far far less as they possess brains which make connections from everything useful to everything useful. Men on the other hand are more likely to invent pointless schemes and systems which are as impractical as building Concorde out of cheese slices.
²passersby were amazed by the unusually large amounts of blood passersby were amazed by the unusually large amounts of blood passersby were amazed by the unusually large amounts of blood passersby were amazed by the unusually large amounts of blood
³Steady watch me navigate. Ah ha ha ha ha ha
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