Ecolog:
When I was a boy I was oft told that you weren't a MAN if you hadn't drunk
out of a cow-track. We thought then that water was rendered "pure" by being
"filtered" through the soil, that bacteria was killed by exposure to the
sun, and further purified by rapids and waterfalls. All these things, taken
literally, could be said to be true, but without context, might not be true
enough. I've drunk a lot of bad water in my time, and a lot of "good" water;
when I counted trees for the USFS in the Northern Sierra Nevada, and hiked,
hunted, and fished in many other places, including Eastern Turkey, where one
defecates and washes up at the water's edge. I rarely, if ever, carried a
canteen. I also "caught" some mysterious "bug" that plagued me for years and
who knows how much damage it did to my innards, perhaps accounting for some
of my laziness, even to this day.
Years before plastic-encased water was available, I took up drinking
distilled water because I liked the taste better than the sodium-loaded
municipal water that was available until my water utilities engineer buddy
pointed out the risks inherent in that practice. My municipal water source
has lots of minerals, especially sodium, which gives the water an inferior
"flavor." My charcoal filter will take care of the chlorine (I guess), but
not the sodium, so I drink bottled water (I know the source and where the
plant is) at home and gamble when I'm out. I drink filtered tap water at
home sometimes and use it for coffee, tea, and cooking.
I have no idea what the pros and cons of this history have produced. Did I
acquire any odd antibodies? Did I acquire any fatal poisons or organisms?
What role does dosage play in water intake? How much myth surrounds this
topic? How much do "experts" really know?
WT
I never actually drank out of a cow-track, but have drunk out of a
West-Texas stock-tank, which is like a giant cow track, full of urine,
feces, mud, and pollywogs, not to mention whatever else fell in .
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bill Silvert" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, September 12, 2010 11:56 PM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Spontaneous fermentation
While it is certainly true that this quote is wrong, the underlying
ecological principle is correct. During Franklin's time water was considered
an unsafe drink, and in general it was. Sanitation was poor and beverages
like beer and cider were safer and thus considered preferable. According to
some sources Franklin actually was more of a water drinker than most people
of his time, but the erroneous quote accurately reflects the ecological
views of the time.
These attitudes persist to the present time and account for the popularity
of bottled water.
Bill Silvert
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Matt Chew" <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, September 12, 2010 9:40 PM
To: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Spontaneous fermentation
It has been politely suggested that the Franklin "bacteria" quotation is
dubious. It is worse than that, in two ways.
First, the salient facts are readily available but were apparently never
checked or even questioned before they were posted. Such naive and
incurious assertions should not be emanating from ESA email addresses – no
matter how useful they seem for promotional purposes.
Second, as the instructor for an upper-division undergraduate (BIO-)
course
in the History of Biology, I regret to report that ecology students (and
the
professionals they become) share today's generally profound historical
illiteracy–and apathy. This is a pity in a field whose motivations,
hypotheses and conclusions are so deeply affected and occasionally even
determined by cultural and intellectual fashions.
If you don't know the history of ecology, you don't know ecology.
Matthew K Chew
