Lvni...A Quest

[entropyembrace]

Yes, all minerals are chemicals.

Natural doesn´t mean safe either....there are very toxic compounds that are naturally occurring.

Also I don´t think most clay is usable as it is mined out of the ground...it needs some processing first and it´s common practice to mix mined material to make a clay formulation.

So the question you should be asking is...."is this clay formulation food safe at the temperature it was fired?"

Well $#*^. Now I have another category of teapot I want to buy and try. This hobby is expensive!

The high-fire makes sense. I should have connected that. Thanks.

Entropy,wouldn't all minerals be chemicals then? So perhaps the question should be, natural chemicals (found as is without human intervention/with minimal modification to make it workable) or human constructed chemicals?

So then how do we know which chemicals are harmful and which are beneficial, other than trying and seeing how you feel (hopefully not dead!)? I am no chemist, and I don't expect my tea studies to take me too far in that direction (briefly flirting with chemical biology while learning about the leaves and especially fermentation taught me to just ask people who know more ).

[needaTEAcher]

That makes sense. So then how can we figure out which formulas are safe? As much alarmism as there is in the world, and as many people as will lie to make a sale, it's difficult to know who to trust, in both directions!

Any thoughts?

[AdamMY]

Granted I am not an experienced potter, but I have talked with quite a few of them ( though none of them yixing potters). Basically all potters want their pieces to be used. That includes if they are going to be advertised for food use, that means they want the pieces to be food safe. while I am not doubting that it could be possible that certain oxides and mineral combo's could be added to clay if they want the clay to appear green ( or basically any other color), but they still want it to be used, so they wouldn't do anything that they know would be toxic to users.

Granted I am also a bit of a skeptic in the sense that large factories are basically large corporations whose end goal is to sell pieces and operate more for the bottom line, and if green pots sell for a premium price, then they may want to try and find the cheapest way possible to create pots that look green. But a few people have in the past suggested that people added things like lead and such to pots, which I find absurd as I can not think of why anyone would add a semi precious metal to a yixing pot, especially when it apparently has no added benefit to the pot. So while I do not believe it is out of the question that someone is adding "chemicals", which I assume means chemicals that are not naturally occurring in the clay itself, and possibly never found in any clay ( at least in significant amounts) but my real question is even if they were harmful would the added price of production be justified?

[entropyembrace]

That makes sense. So then how can we figure out which formulas are safe? As much alarmism as there is in the world, and as many people as will lie to make a sale, it's difficult to know who to trust, in both directions!

Any thoughts?

If you have access to the potter you can ask if a piece is intended as decorative only or if it was functional...this is probably the best way.

If you know what´s in the clay you can check ceramics websites yourself...but knowing what´s in the clay usually means some contact with the potter so the first method is better.

Also as a general rule of thumb...the higher fired a piece is the more materials are safe.

[MarshalN]

I'm quite sure that few, if any, yixing potter can tell you exactly what's in a specific clay they're working with. They might have general ideas, but if you ask what chemical compounds are in there, I'm fairly certain they can't tell you.

Nor will it matter. Even if you can analyze what elements are in the clay (easy to do these days) you do not know what forms they come in, necessarily, so you don't really know whether such elements are, for example, water soluble. Unless and until you can do these analyses without damaging the item in question, worrying about poison is probably just a waste of time.

[SilentChaos]

So while I do not believe it is out of the question that someone is adding "chemicals", which I assume means chemicals that are not naturally occurring in the clay itself, and possibly never found in any clay ( at least in significant amounts) but my real question is even if they were harmful would the added price of production be justified?

Sorry to sidetrack a bit, but this got me thinking.

Whoever made this must be a bit cuckoo in the head then? And if its supposed to be a 'display pot', ball filter makes no sense...

[entropyembrace]

I'm quite sure that few, if any, yixing potter can tell you exactly what's in a specific clay they're working with. They might have general ideas, but if you ask what chemical compounds are in there, I'm fairly certain they can't tell you.

Nor will it matter. Even if you can analyze what elements are in the clay (easy to do these days) you do not know what forms they come in, necessarily, so you don't really know whether such elements are, for example, water soluble. Unless and until you can do these analyses without damaging the item in question, worrying about poison is probably just a waste of time.

Really it doesn´t matter what´s in the pot as long as it doesn´t leach...so you would just need to test the water that comes out of it, not the pot material itself.

If you look at ceramics websites of colour additives that are fairly common and dangerous in high fired wares there´s really not much besides lead and cadmium that you have to worry about.

So overall...it´s not really that common that any stoneware piece is actually going to be leaching toxins.

[bagua7]

All clay is made of chemicals

All tea is made of chemicals

All water is made of chemicals (mostly one chemical)

Almost anything you can imagine is made of chemicals

But when you go against the Tao, human manipulation of the chemicals you are talking about, then they become unnatural and therefore bad Qi.

[TIM]

All clay is made of chemicals

All tea is made of chemicals

All water is made of chemicals (mostly one chemical)

Almost anything you can imagine is made of chemicals

But when you go against the Tao, human manipulation of the chemicals you are talking about, then they become unnatural and therefore bad Qi.

How can we fix this unnatural bad qi Bro?

[ImmortaliTEA]

All clay is made of chemicals

All tea is made of chemicals

All water is made of chemicals (mostly one chemical)

Almost anything you can imagine is made of chemicals

But when you go against the Tao, human manipulation of the chemicals you are talking about, then they become unnatural and therefore bad Qi.

I would love to hear the answer to this as well!

How can we fix this unnatural bad qi Bro?