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scovilles Is SHU scale logoritmic or linear? Experts, please....

Dr. Weird

Dr. Weird

No one has responded to me in the 'Pepper X' thread, so i thought i'd just make a thread....

In the recent Hot Ones video, Ed Currie claims that the SHU scale is logorithmic but i thought, and after googling, seem to see that the SHU scale is LINEAR....

He says that the Pepper X at ~2.65 million SHU is 3 times Hotter than the Carolina Reaper at ~1.65 million SHU, but this sound patently false to me.... but, IS IT?

Won't some actual experts chime in please?

(I had heard that Currie was full of sh*t, but had no opinion on him.... but after seeing that episode, it really had me thinking "Huh??"
 
from brittanica.com:
...Scoville Heat Units (SHU). Created by American pharmacist Wilbur Scoville in the early 1900s, the Scoville scale is a subjective assessment that relies on the capsaicinoid sensitivity of people experienced with eating hot peppers. The ratings work on A LINEAR SCALE, meaning that a 350,000-SHU habanero is 100 times hotter than a 3,500-SHU jalapeño. ... [ https://www.britannica.com/science/capsaicin#ref1304816 ]
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interestingly, on quora.com, this is being discussed, and the top answer says that in terms of a person's TOLERANCE for heat, that the scale does essentially work in a logarithmic way, but in the opposite direction than what ed claims.

that is to say, being able to tolerate habanero (after only eating low-heat peppers) is much more of a "learning curve" than going to ghost after mastering hab levels, and to go up to reaper etc. from ghost should be much easier than that.

i'm no expert, but everyone knows it's linear.
 
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Gas chromatography machines don't lie. It's a specific test and does not give one shit about how hot it is from one person to another. These machines are super expensive.
 
Voodoo 6 said:
Gas chromatography machines don't lie. It's a specific test and does not give one shit about how hot it is from one person to another. These machines are super expensive.
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Isn't it a little curious why no one corrected Ed on the 'Hot Ones' Pepper X world record video then?

I was certain that it wasn't logorithmic, but i don't consider myself a true pepperhead tbh, that's why i came here to ask.... if he's a genuiniely a fraud, or just an idiot who doesn't know what he's talking about, it's pretty easily proven.
 
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Voodoo 6 said:
Gas chromatography machines don't lie. It's a specific test and does not give one shit about how hot it is from one person to another. These machines are super expensive.
Click to expand...

Experimental data never lie :) Interpreters, on the other hand... In court proceedings, all sides involved may present specialists who interpret the same data in different, if not contrary, ways.

In relative (lab) terms, GC is not that expensive (anymore). For routine pepper testing, it makes more sense to use HPLC (although GC works fine).
 
I think Ed is a major hypester and probably not as knowledgeable as he likes to present himself. And frankly, in what video I've seen of him (mostly from Dirty Jobs) he comes across as quite an ass. He enjoys messing with people with the heat, and likes it when they have severe reactions. I don't think that's at all ok, and I suspect I wouldn't get along with him.

I don't know about Hot Ones, haven't seen any of their stuff, but I know there's a lot of BSers out there on social media (look closely at the videos of those who "eat" the super-hots), and a lot more who may be honest but just don't know much.

That said, I don't think Ed is a fraud. And without evidence to the contrary, I see no reason to doubt the lab results.
 
I do recall reading a study not long ago on the differences between capsaicin and other "spicy molecules", specifically referencing piperine. It talked about how the tissue response, directly correlating to how spicy something seems, for capsaicin is logarithmic but in the opposite direction as previously mentioned here. Basically the more capsaicin there is, the greater the diminishing return is on spiciness.

This contrasts with piperine (found in peppercorn) which has a linear response and essentially no ceiling on feeling spicier with greater concentrations outside of 100% piperine as the ceiling.

So all that to say TL;DR it is likely not 3x hotter. With that said, keep in mind the scale goes all the way up to ~16,000,000 SHU, so the rate of diminishing returns for capsaicin at concentrations leading to 1,000,000-3,000,000 SHU is lower than the large numbers would make it seem.
 
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Dr. Weird said:
No one has responded to me in the 'Pepper X' thread, so i thought i'd just make a thread....

In the recent Hot Ones video, Ed Currie claims that the SHU scale is logorithmic but i thought, and after googling, seem to see that the SHU scale is LINEAR....

He says that the Pepper X at ~2.65 million SHU is 3 times Hotter than the Carolina Reaper at ~1.65 million SHU, but this sound patently false to me.... but, IS IT?

Won't some actual experts chime in please?

(I had heard that Currie was full of sh*t, but had no opinion on him.... but after seeing that episode, it really had me thinking "Huh??"
Click to expand...
Sorry, I'm not an expert on logarithmic, nor linear scovile scale, but Ed Curry always contradicts himself and is.full of it. Like all salesmen. The fact that in one stream.he said that.he.had pepper x in reserve for the last ten years and now we finally see something. This says that he was stabilizing it all this time. We know that the the carolina reaper comes from the primo and now pepper x is a mustard pod and Troy primo is about to release his new zinging mustard pod. The timing couldn't be better and a nice big fat check to Guinness seals the deal.
BTW, some googlong says chemicay linear, but seems logeithmic. All subjective.
Best
Kevin
 
If pepper-X is 2.65 million SHU and the carolina reaper is 1.65 million SHU and the scale is indeed logarithmic (or should I say - the sensitivity of your mouth to heat is logarithmic?)

Shouldn't that be log10(2.65/1.65) = 0,2057... or 20% hotter in the mouth?

But then I might be completely wrong about this...
 
Dr. Weird said:
He says that the Pepper X at ~2.65 million SHU is 3 times Hotter than the Carolina Reaper at ~1.65 million SHU, but this sound patently false to me.... but, IS IT?

Won't some actual experts chime in please?

(I had heard that Currie was full of sh*t, but had no opinion on him.... but after seeing that episode, it really had me thinking "Huh??"
Click to expand...
I'm not an expert and don't know anything about this guy but I call sensationalistic BS all the way around. What happened to the individual Carolina Reaper record of 2.2 million SHU?
 
By definition the Scoville scale is linear. It's very simply the concentration of capsaicin in a dry sample in parts per million multiplied by 16. So 16 million SHU is 100% capsaicin and 2.65 million SHU is 16.6% capsaicin.

Note that the Scoville scale does not measure "hotness". Hotness is purely subjective and down to the individual, some feel less impact from capsaicin than others. Also your tolerance increases the more you eat so the perceived "hotness" of a pepper decreases the more of the you eat.
 
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Well, regrdless if the Pepper X is 2.65 million SHU, all i get from the whole thing is that Ed really is just full of sh*t.

Whether he's just an idiot or a liar, i don't care. *shrugs*
 
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Sounds like a shit salesman with a mouthful of samples in every video I have seen. All of the pepper darlings,sycophants and important folks in this hobby/industry are the same to be honest. Lie or turn a blind eye to profit,gain status or get seeds.

Guinness doesn't give one fraction of a shit that there is not any testing standard in place...they want to make a profit. It's equivalent to Tour de France cyclists testing themselves for drugs.In fairness to him--total liar and everything--most of his hate is jealousy because he found more success than anyone in this game. Just once I would love to have someone toss out the scripted questions and throw in some about biological inheritance in pepper breeding.
 
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Do any of you guys remember the threads going around when Ed was just bring the reaper out?
Lol, talk about a bunch bs in every direction about everything...
Origin, legitimacy, Scoville real numbers, f gen, it was priceless stuff.
Pretty entertaining at the time.
 
I think that 2.65M SHU is max heat. Not average heat. So Pepper X's average hotness would be approx 1.968M SHU. But I don't get it. Where did he get that three times hotter than Reaper? It's just only 20% higher than Carolina Reaper.
 
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