[ Post a Response | The Sublime Desire of Cigarette Smoking ]
Posted by M G F on March 29, 2008, 3:24 pm, in reply to "Youtube video - tar in cigarettes"
Vesperae is correct. The tar produced by that experiment is very, very different than what is deposited in a smoker's lungs. I agree that productions like this video have, if anything, the opposite effect when watched by a smoker. For me, it was interesting to watch because of what it tells me about the perception of smoking by its creator.
Years ago as an undergraduate, I took a public health awareness class as part of my pre-nursing program. Pairs of students were assigned a health issue and over the course of the semester had to develop PSA materials, including a static display, to persuade people to avoid or cease the particular behavior. My partner and I, both smokers, chose smoking as our issue. I was fortunate to have a partner with the technical background and access to equipment necessary to carry out my our ideas. We built a pair of "lungs" using pink-dyed foam rubber encased in clear plastic. The "lungs" were operated by placing them between a couple of clipboards and squeezing the air out. When the clipboards were pulled apart, air was drawn into the "lungs". Over the course of the remaining 13 weeks of the semester, we had the "lungs" "smoke" five cigarettes a day, taking a drag whenever whoever wasn't operating the "lungs" took a drag. The smoke wasn't expelled until the real smoker exhaled. We took a picture of the lungs every four days when a pack of cigarettes had been consumed. By the end of the semester, the "lungs" had "smoked" two cartons of the cheapest full flavored generic brand available. By the end of the semester the "lungs" were a dark yellowish brown.
When it came time to present our project, we displayed the "lungs" in front of three panels. One panel explained the experiment and methodology and had assorted raw facts about the health risks of smoking. The other two panels had the photographs documenting the project.
The project didn't come close to accurately duplicating what would happen to a pair of virgin lungs if their owner smoked two cartons of cigarettes over the course of 13 weeks. Speaking as a smoker, though, it was far more thought provoking than watching 300 cigarettes artificially smoked and the tar distiled out. Interestingly, even though we watched the "lungs" change, the project did not prompt me to consider giving up smoking. If anything, it heightened my awareness of the Risk and fascination with smoking. I am still in touch with my classmate and, yes, she is still smoking. She also kept the "lungs" and mentioned in an email a while ago that she had stumbled across them and they are now hard as rocks. I guess they have emphysema. 
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