Imagine You Are An Aluminum Atom: Discussions With Mr. Aluminum: I have written a book on aluminium. It is my first book and it will almost certainly be my last.
Pre-publication, the most common question I receive about the book is why I wrote it. I think it began as a reference guide to living in the aluminium age (The Aluminium Age post). An attempt at something akin to frequently answered questions on aluminium and life. Writing the book, putting words on paper, so to speak, changed this. I immediately understood that I could not remove myself from the book. My long affair with aluminium meant that the story had to be personal. I think, I hope, that the reasons for this will become obvious when the book is read.
The book is a warning. When Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring it was not as a reference guide to pollution of the environment by pesticides. It was a warning. As I wrote my book, I unravelled forty years of research and revealed, at least to myself, that human exposure to aluminium is the, yet unrecognised, unprecedented threat to the future of mankind. Of course, the rallying cry of all scientists remains in that more research is needed. However, the peer reviewed published science is unequivocal in demonstrating the toxicity of aluminium in all living things including humans. The latter most worryingly exemplified by the concentrations of aluminium found in human brain tissue in Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis and autism to-date (Aluminium in human brain tissue). We have now reached a point where the association of the body burden of aluminium with chronic human disease is unequivocal. We are on a slippery slope and we will continue to slip and slide towards our demise as long as the role, only now, played by biologically reactive aluminium in biochemical evolution remains unchecked. There are solutions and I have written about these in my book. Only the politics of power and high finance prevents ameliorative actions from being taken right now.
I frustrated the publishers of my book by insisting upon a quirky title, ‘Imagine You Are An Aluminium Atom’, they wanted something more digestible (less words) to the book-buying public. I insisted because even though the underlying message of the book is both dark and foreboding, perhaps I should have called it Silent Aluminium, I wanted a title that was peculiar to me (find out why in the book). Books have become integrated into our convenient, throwaway society, the expectation being that, like buses, another will come along in a moment. This book will stand-alone whether it is read or not. It is the story of my life
Christopher Exley PhD FRSB: Imagine You Are An Aluminum Atom: Discussions With Mr. Aluminum