7 ms·

Meet “raw” water – ludicrously priced unfiltered water with random bacteria

88 points by pjl 9y ago

ghostman12 9y ago
It's from the same guy who made Juicero. surprise surprise
justusw 9y ago
I suppose this is meant as a counter-piece to the article that recently was on the HN front page: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfiltered.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfilter...
- Quanttek 9y ago
  I think the NYT article is already critical of the movement without becoming snarky likes the Ars article: > (There is no scientific evidence that fluoride is a mind-control drug, but plenty to show that it aids dental health.) > Talk like Mr. Singh’s disturbs Dr. Donald Hensrud, the director of the Healthy Living Program at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. What the raw-water partisans see as dangers, he says, are important safety measures. > “Without water treatment, there’s acute and then chronic risks,” Dr. Hensrud said, including E. coli bacteria, viruses, parasites and carcinogenic compounds that can be present in untreated water. “There’s evidence all over the world of this, and the reason we don’t have those conditions is because of our very efficient water treatment.” Admittetly it wouldve been nice if more counter-voices would've been heard even though the purpose of the reader is to acquaint the reader with the movement (assuming - I guess - a certain reasonableness of the reader)
overcast 9y ago
This is the dude that started that Juicero nonsense. Now he's circumventing all of the progress we've made in the last few hundred years with making water potable. This should end well.
- rhizome 9y ago
  Someone take away this guy's license to conduct business, please. Snake oil is played out.
  - geodel 9y ago
    Are you also against 100% natural organic snake oil?
    - jfoutz 9y ago
      I’m a little sad you got downvotes. Although a slightly better approach might have been, it’s a raw business license. 100% natural and regulation free. It’s easy to attack snake oil. The meta reference is a bit more amusing, because it has a recursive flavor. It also directly attacks the ethics of the business itself.
    - KaiserPro 9y ago
      is it vegan?
  - AnimalMuppet 9y ago
    The FDA can jail people. Unfortunately, it takes ignoring their orders. By the time that happens in this case, it is reasonably likely that a few people will have died from this.
  - jcoffland 9y ago
    Unlikely, when after decades, homoeopathic "remedies" are still regularly sold at Whole Foods [1]. The FDA seems to take the stance that if it's not obviously toxic, conmen can sell anything they can get enough people to believe in. [1] If you don't already know why homeopathic remedies are complete BS, look up "homeopathic dilution" and the meaning of the markings such as "30X" or "10C" found on these products.
    - MBCook 9y ago
      https://twitter.com/BigZaphod/status/948215762438803457 https://twitter.com/BigZaphod/status/948215762438803457
iaw 9y ago
From the makers of Juicero comes Cholera water! This aligns pretty well with the ideas of the anti-vaccine movement though.
- aaroninsf 9y ago
  My thought as well. Well that and, _surely this is a hoax._ The results are predictably going to be national news of the if it bleeds it leads variety... <shakes head>
- pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
  #CholeraDetox2018.
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  >This aligns pretty well with the ideas of the anti-vaccine movement though. // Can you expand on that at all, what particular ideas do they have that this aligns with. Seems a long way from "vaccines contain stuff that is deleterious to health" [which is sometimes true, though key is that provably carriers in infant vaccines weren't causing Autism] to "we should drink water with unknown pathogens in". Surely the refusal to put unknown pathogens in your body would align better with the refusal to put unknown vaccine constituents in to your/your child's body?
  - iaw 9y ago
    In the article they talk about how this water appeals to those who are worried about prescription drug residues and fluoride in their drinking water. It seems like the anti-vacc movement makes poor health decisions based on a flawed or limited understanding of science and a strong faith in pseudo-science. Science says vaccines are good, pseudo-science says that scientists are wrong and vaccines cause autism. Science says fluoridated water is okay, the jury is on on prescription residue, and we have a pretty clear idea of what happens with contaminated water consumption, pseudo-science "look what sort of nasty things science put in your water! Lets go with natural water from dirty sources!" Edit: It's not about keeping unknown things out of their body, it's about a small group of non-scientists making unfounded allegations that can undermine the efforts society has made to improve the health of humanity (small pox, cholera, etc.)
draw_down 9y ago
This is such a goofy non-story.
olivermarks 9y ago
If you are interested in 'raw' water live somewhere on a well rather than on mains water and do your own filtration...buying water in containers isn't cost effective, unless you are Nestle selling it... http://www.desertsun.com/story/news/environment/2017/12/21/california-regulators-tell-bottled-water-maker-nestle-halt-unauthorized-water-diversions-national-fo/928071001/ http://www.desertsun.com/story/news/environment/2017/12/21/c...
abakker 9y ago
Matt Levine had a pretty funny take on this: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-02/citi-told-some-customers-to-buy-the-sells https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-02/citi-told... But really, can this even be sold? What does the FDA do, exactly?
- pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
  Are there laws against selling untreated well water? I mean, you're allowed to drink out of your well, shouldn't you be able to sell it if you state its origins and testing results truthfully?
  - abakker 9y ago
    Well, yes, you should be able to if all the tests are done. But, If I report 6/10 tests, then what?
davidw 9y ago
Hey great, now the high and mighty of SV can barf all over one another at their orgies.
0xfeba 9y ago
I'm guessing a HN commenter posted this comment on the article's page: > Let's call it Live Blockchain Water and watch the cash roll in! I nearly spit my drink out.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
deno 9y ago
It’s easy to dismiss the claim that fluoride is a mind control drug, if taken literally. When I’ve probed just a little the actual claim I’ve heard is that it somehow affects personality, making for easier to control masses. I don’t know whether that’s true but at least that’s a claim that can be falsified. The other thing is: “Tap water? You’re drinking toilet water with birth control drugs in them,” There’s plenty of evidence for trace amount of estrogen and estrogen-like substances in the water. Maybe that’s not an issue, but it’s also true that testosterone levels in men are declining worldwide. However there can be a number of causes for this, and the two are not necessarily linked. Not mentioned in this article, but on HN frontpage earlier, there’s tons of micro particles of plastic in oceans, and subsequently wild fish. I don’t know those subjects enough to make any kind of informed observation… But dismissing all of it as conspiracy theory doesn’t really sound convincing anymore.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- cmiles74 9y ago
  Microparticles of plastic in fish, in most cases, come from the water exiting a water treatment plant that is entering the environment. Some of these microparticles are manufactured, often in beauty or cleanser products, others are the result of plastics breaking down. While tap water may contain these microparticles of plastic, there's no reason to believe that water out in the wild will be free of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics
- WerstPerson 9y ago
  TLDR: Bullshit bullshit, talking out of asshole bullshit.
- jjeaff 9y ago
  Many wells have higher fluoride content than municipal supplies. So if we are wanting to create a complacent society, would have been better to leave people on well water.
- KaiserPro 9y ago
pwthornton 9y ago
Some of us grew up on well water. It's generally fine, although you need to inspect and treat it regularly, and if one of your neighbors really messes up his well, it can affect the whole water table around him too. My digestive track always gets a little messed up when I visit my parents back home (although this could also be from the water being treated for hardness). If you were really interested in non-municipal water, the best route to go would be some sort of filtered reverse osmosis setup or something similar, of which you most certainly do not need a Silicon Valley snake oil salesman for. You can also get a home system to make distilled water just for drinking that won't cost that much. Honestly, the biggest issue that the average person could have with municipal water is it being overly hard. I might get a filtration system in our new place to deal with that. I might also be tempted to get some kind of filtration system for water just for my coffee and tea, simply for taste reasons.
- nkrisc 9y ago
  Yes, well water is generally fine but as you mentioned, there's quite a bit that can be done to make it even safer, which this company apparently neglects, as a selling point. >My digestive track always gets a little messed up when I visit my parents back home Not necessarily dangerous, but also not an experience I'd pay $6/gallon for.
- schiffern 9y ago
  >Some of us grew up on well water. It's generally fine, although you need to inspect and treat it regularly You need to inspect it (the CDC recommends annually sending away for a water test[1]), but I'm aware of no EPA or CDC recommendation that calls for unconditionally treating the water. You treat well water only if the tests find a problem. [1] http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/testing.html http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/testi... https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/treatment.html https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/trea...
  - pwthornton 9y ago
    This is true. It's just that you usually find some issues every few years that you at least need to throw some chlorine in the well.
saintPirelli 9y ago
I guess this is good news for Wendy Northcutt.
Karliss 9y ago
Don't know about about other countries but where I live obtaining and selling spring and mineral water is nothing unusual. There are laws that regulate it to ensure it's safe for consumption.(link with english translation on the right side) https://likumi.lv/ta/id/278817-noteikumi-par-dabigo-mineraludeni-un-avota-udeni https://likumi.lv/ta/id/278817-noteikumi-par-dabigo-mineralu... Pay attention to point 16: > 16. Any disinfection treatment by whatever means and the addition of bacteriostatic elements or any other treatment likely to change the viable colony count of the natural mineral water is prohibited for natural mineral water and spring water.
- cesarb 9y ago
  In my country (Brazil) buying bottled mineral water is also common. But I don't know whether it comes directly from the spring, or is passed through a filter first. We learn from childhood that one must only drink filtered or boiled water, so I won't be surprised if there's a filter involved.
  - Karliss 9y ago
    Tap water is fine in most cities here but many people just prefer the taste. Not many buy it for drinking at home but it is very common in water coolers at offices.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
cs702 9y ago
> raw_water == snake_oil True
KaiserPro 9y ago
I love dysentery. All it takes is someone/thing defecating in the well and you'll get cholera. Epidemiology literally came about because of "raw water" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outb...
monocasa 9y ago
FWIW, I absolutely love my in-law's unfiltered well water. It's ridiculously hard water (tons of calcium etc.), and tastes very sweet as a consequence. I haven't ever had water that tastes as good, and we always fill up a couple jugs to take back with us. If I were somehow lose access to that water I'd probably try this at least once just to see if it's close.
- jimmaswell 9y ago
  I've had well water with a lot of sulfur in it a few times. Not sure if I'd say I like it but it's an interesting experience.
  - monocasa 9y ago
    Yeah, the sulfur heavy ones are pretty terrible, but that's not all Wells.
    - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
      People will buy sulphurous water, "tastes vile enough that it seems like it could be a medicine" I think is the rationale. Eg at Bath in the UK, not sure if you can take it away but you can buy a glass in the tea-rooms.
- pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
  Your well water was coming from property people you know own, not what some random snake-oil salesman is bottling and selling. Personally, I'd rather not risk it.
maxxxxx 9y ago
This is ludicrous but these guys still manage to change people's purchasing behavior. At work I see a lot of people drinking $2 "Honest Tea" which is just tea with a lot of sugar. On the face of it this is ridiculous but people buy that stuff. In the age of $2 tea and $4+ coffee I can see a big market for overpriced water.
vanattab 9y ago
The best water I have ever tasted comes from a spring in the Red River Gorge area of Kentucky. If anyone is rock climbing in the RRG and wants to give it a try look for pipe sticking out of a hill side about a half mile before the Nada tunnel when entering the gorge. Edit: Just looked up the exact location, 37.815495, -83.692356
indubitable 9y ago
This seems pretty funny at a glance, but on the other hand there's a really really big elephant in the room today - and that is the state of the American population. Our overall healthfulness has decreased dramatically in just a few decades. The US life expectancy is even in decline. This all correlates with things like the rise of the internet, but the rise of the internet has occurred worldwide whereas the degree of unhealthfulness of the US is something unique in its degree - and that's in a large population. It's easy to blame things look unhealthy food, yet I don't think we have 70% of the population downing Big Macs while treating soda like water in a desert oasis. In either case gluttony is hardly an American exclusive. I'm not suggesting that it's the water, but I am suggesting that it is not unreasonable to think that something we probably believe is perfectly reasonable or even healthful may be having unforeseen consequences that have yet to be precisely singled out. And so experiments that sound stupid may not be such an awful idea. Penicillin was only accepted long after its discovery. A big part of the reason for that is using a byproduct of blue-green mold to treat vulnerable bacterial infections is something most people intuitively dismissed as idiotic - even after the discoverer presented and published his findings. If there's a market for folks that want to down 'natural' water at a premium, then I think this is a good thing. They get to act as guinea pigs for the whole of society, the guy makes a few bucks, and in the end everybody learns a bit more.
- KaiserPro 9y ago
  I take your point, but, we have a long case history of what happens when we don't have clean water, starting here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outb... (well it started before that, but this is when epidemiology became a thing.) safe water doesn't need to be sterile. In the UK, you are allowed a certain level of "harmless" bacteria. However there are strong laws that are _enforced_ to make sure that people don't get harmed. Now, there _might_ be a case that "raw" water provides/boosts/promotes certain gut flora in people that is beneficial. However gut flora is a new and little understood science. Applying occam's razor to declining health in the US, and I'd point to two things: 1) increasingly sedentary lifestyle 2) Terrible health system that denies basic care for >60 million people and pumps the rest full of narcotics. Unlike the gut flora theory, there is a mountain of evidence to back it up, not some bearded weirdo with little connection to the real world.
sjg007 9y ago
Are you supposed to boil it?
Theodores 9y ago
The thing is that there will be people wanting to defend this product. It will become just another thing like 'natural salt' that has no added iodine but has lots of impurities in it. This is then packaged as 'non GMO' and 'Gluten Free' amongst other organic things. As a regular user of a bread making machine I do wonder if my bread would be improved by the use of this posh salt rather than the table salt I normally use. Would I live longer by not having the anti-caking ingredient added to the teaspoon of salt I use with my bread? So, after a push of a button and a couple of minutes exactly measuring flour, water, salt, sugar, butter and yeast I get perfect fresh bread. Meanwhile, the mystery individual 'ms Ancedote' goes the whole hog on using overly-good ingredients to make some 'even better bread'. This will be using wholemeal organic spelt flour instead of regular strong wholemeal flour, this will also be measured in 'cups', not weighed. So all the other ingredients are fancy, e.g. the salt, the oven will need to be on for hours and lots of noises and mess will be made. Net result is essentially unrisen bread, the science not understood, the interior still sticky dough, the outer with a thicker and dryer crust than one might want. To my science mind this is madness, a lot of work with ingredients coming from all four corners of the globe, just for some bread that is wrong. All kinds of exciting herbs and what-not could also be added, such 'rustic' fun is the desired thing, it does not taste like store bought bread and that is what matters. The fact it takes five hours to make is part of it. None of it makes sense until you learn the word 'orthorexia': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthorexia_nervosa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthorexia_nervosa So my mystery friend that makes awful bread and does not want to be making normal bread like I do, why is this? It is just one symptom of a bigger thing going on, orthorexia. I would say there is a whole industry going on around orthorexia and that these guys are tapping into that market.
giomasce 9y ago
This "toilet water" part really reminds me of the movie Idiocracy...
spapas82 9y ago
This reminds me of a quote of General Ripper from Dr Strangelove: "Mandrake, do you realize that in addition to fluoridating water, why, there are studies underway to fluoridate salt, flour, fruit juices, soup, sugar, milk... ice cream. Ice cream, Mandrake, children's ice cream."

88 points by pjl 9y ago

It's from the same guy who made Juicero. surprise surprise

I suppose this is meant as a counter-piece to the article that recently was on the HN front page: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfiltered.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfilter...

Quanttek 9y ago
I think the NYT article is already critical of the movement without becoming snarky likes the Ars article: > (There is no scientific evidence that fluoride is a mind-control drug, but plenty to show that it aids dental health.) > Talk like Mr. Singh’s disturbs Dr. Donald Hensrud, the director of the Healthy Living Program at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. What the raw-water partisans see as dangers, he says, are important safety measures. > “Without water treatment, there’s acute and then chronic risks,” Dr. Hensrud said, including E. coli bacteria, viruses, parasites and carcinogenic compounds that can be present in untreated water. “There’s evidence all over the world of this, and the reason we don’t have those conditions is because of our very efficient water treatment.” Admittetly it wouldve been nice if more counter-voices would've been heard even though the purpose of the reader is to acquaint the reader with the movement (assuming - I guess - a certain reasonableness of the reader)

overcast 9y ago

This is the dude that started that Juicero nonsense. Now he's circumventing all of the progress we've made in the last few hundred years with making water potable. This should end well.

rhizome 9y ago
Someone take away this guy's license to conduct business, please. Snake oil is played out.
- geodel 9y ago
  Are you also against 100% natural organic snake oil?
  - jfoutz 9y ago
    I’m a little sad you got downvotes. Although a slightly better approach might have been, it’s a raw business license. 100% natural and regulation free. It’s easy to attack snake oil. The meta reference is a bit more amusing, because it has a recursive flavor. It also directly attacks the ethics of the business itself.
  - KaiserPro 9y ago
    is it vegan?
- AnimalMuppet 9y ago
  The FDA can jail people. Unfortunately, it takes ignoring their orders. By the time that happens in this case, it is reasonably likely that a few people will have died from this.
- jcoffland 9y ago
  Unlikely, when after decades, homoeopathic "remedies" are still regularly sold at Whole Foods [1]. The FDA seems to take the stance that if it's not obviously toxic, conmen can sell anything they can get enough people to believe in. [1] If you don't already know why homeopathic remedies are complete BS, look up "homeopathic dilution" and the meaning of the markings such as "30X" or "10C" found on these products.
  - MBCook 9y ago
    https://twitter.com/BigZaphod/status/948215762438803457 https://twitter.com/BigZaphod/status/948215762438803457

iaw 9y ago

From the makers of Juicero comes Cholera water! This aligns pretty well with the ideas of the anti-vaccine movement though.

aaroninsf 9y ago
My thought as well. Well that and, _surely this is a hoax._ The results are predictably going to be national news of the if it bleeds it leads variety... <shakes head>
pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
#CholeraDetox2018.
pbhjpbhj 9y ago
>This aligns pretty well with the ideas of the anti-vaccine movement though. // Can you expand on that at all, what particular ideas do they have that this aligns with. Seems a long way from "vaccines contain stuff that is deleterious to health" [which is sometimes true, though key is that provably carriers in infant vaccines weren't causing Autism] to "we should drink water with unknown pathogens in". Surely the refusal to put unknown pathogens in your body would align better with the refusal to put unknown vaccine constituents in to your/your child's body?
- iaw 9y ago
  In the article they talk about how this water appeals to those who are worried about prescription drug residues and fluoride in their drinking water. It seems like the anti-vacc movement makes poor health decisions based on a flawed or limited understanding of science and a strong faith in pseudo-science. Science says vaccines are good, pseudo-science says that scientists are wrong and vaccines cause autism. Science says fluoridated water is okay, the jury is on on prescription residue, and we have a pretty clear idea of what happens with contaminated water consumption, pseudo-science "look what sort of nasty things science put in your water! Lets go with natural water from dirty sources!" Edit: It's not about keeping unknown things out of their body, it's about a small group of non-scientists making unfounded allegations that can undermine the efforts society has made to improve the health of humanity (small pox, cholera, etc.)

draw_down 9y ago

This is such a goofy non-story.

olivermarks 9y ago

If you are interested in 'raw' water live somewhere on a well rather than on mains water and do your own filtration...buying water in containers isn't cost effective, unless you are Nestle selling it... http://www.desertsun.com/story/news/environment/2017/12/21/california-regulators-tell-bottled-water-maker-nestle-halt-unauthorized-water-diversions-national-fo/928071001/ http://www.desertsun.com/story/news/environment/2017/12/21/c...

abakker 9y ago

Matt Levine had a pretty funny take on this: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-02/citi-told-some-customers-to-buy-the-sells https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-02/citi-told... But really, can this even be sold? What does the FDA do, exactly?

pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
Are there laws against selling untreated well water? I mean, you're allowed to drink out of your well, shouldn't you be able to sell it if you state its origins and testing results truthfully?
- abakker 9y ago
  Well, yes, you should be able to if all the tests are done. But, If I report 6/10 tests, then what?

davidw 9y ago

Hey great, now the high and mighty of SV can barf all over one another at their orgies.

0xfeba 9y ago

I'm guessing a HN commenter posted this comment on the article's page: > Let's call it Live Blockchain Water and watch the cash roll in! I nearly spit my drink out.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

deno 9y ago

It’s easy to dismiss the claim that fluoride is a mind control drug, if taken literally. When I’ve probed just a little the actual claim I’ve heard is that it somehow affects personality, making for easier to control masses. I don’t know whether that’s true but at least that’s a claim that can be falsified. The other thing is: “Tap water? You’re drinking toilet water with birth control drugs in them,” There’s plenty of evidence for trace amount of estrogen and estrogen-like substances in the water. Maybe that’s not an issue, but it’s also true that testosterone levels in men are declining worldwide. However there can be a number of causes for this, and the two are not necessarily linked. Not mentioned in this article, but on HN frontpage earlier, there’s tons of micro particles of plastic in oceans, and subsequently wild fish. I don’t know those subjects enough to make any kind of informed observation… But dismissing all of it as conspiracy theory doesn’t really sound convincing anymore.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
cmiles74 9y ago
Microparticles of plastic in fish, in most cases, come from the water exiting a water treatment plant that is entering the environment. Some of these microparticles are manufactured, often in beauty or cleanser products, others are the result of plastics breaking down. While tap water may contain these microparticles of plastic, there's no reason to believe that water out in the wild will be free of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics
WerstPerson 9y ago
TLDR: Bullshit bullshit, talking out of asshole bullshit.
jjeaff 9y ago
Many wells have higher fluoride content than municipal supplies. So if we are wanting to create a complacent society, would have been better to leave people on well water.
KaiserPro 9y ago

pwthornton 9y ago

Some of us grew up on well water. It's generally fine, although you need to inspect and treat it regularly, and if one of your neighbors really messes up his well, it can affect the whole water table around him too. My digestive track always gets a little messed up when I visit my parents back home (although this could also be from the water being treated for hardness). If you were really interested in non-municipal water, the best route to go would be some sort of filtered reverse osmosis setup or something similar, of which you most certainly do not need a Silicon Valley snake oil salesman for. You can also get a home system to make distilled water just for drinking that won't cost that much. Honestly, the biggest issue that the average person could have with municipal water is it being overly hard. I might get a filtration system in our new place to deal with that. I might also be tempted to get some kind of filtration system for water just for my coffee and tea, simply for taste reasons.

nkrisc 9y ago
Yes, well water is generally fine but as you mentioned, there's quite a bit that can be done to make it even safer, which this company apparently neglects, as a selling point. >My digestive track always gets a little messed up when I visit my parents back home Not necessarily dangerous, but also not an experience I'd pay $6/gallon for.
schiffern 9y ago
>Some of us grew up on well water. It's generally fine, although you need to inspect and treat it regularly You need to inspect it (the CDC recommends annually sending away for a water test[1]), but I'm aware of no EPA or CDC recommendation that calls for unconditionally treating the water. You treat well water only if the tests find a problem. [1] http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/testing.html http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/testi... https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/treatment.html https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/private/wells/trea...
- pwthornton 9y ago
  This is true. It's just that you usually find some issues every few years that you at least need to throw some chlorine in the well.

saintPirelli 9y ago

I guess this is good news for Wendy Northcutt.

Karliss 9y ago

Don't know about about other countries but where I live obtaining and selling spring and mineral water is nothing unusual. There are laws that regulate it to ensure it's safe for consumption.(link with english translation on the right side) https://likumi.lv/ta/id/278817-noteikumi-par-dabigo-mineraludeni-un-avota-udeni https://likumi.lv/ta/id/278817-noteikumi-par-dabigo-mineralu... Pay attention to point 16: > 16. Any disinfection treatment by whatever means and the addition of bacteriostatic elements or any other treatment likely to change the viable colony count of the natural mineral water is prohibited for natural mineral water and spring water.

cesarb 9y ago
In my country (Brazil) buying bottled mineral water is also common. But I don't know whether it comes directly from the spring, or is passed through a filter first. We learn from childhood that one must only drink filtered or boiled water, so I won't be surprised if there's a filter involved.
- Karliss 9y ago
  Tap water is fine in most cities here but many people just prefer the taste. Not many buy it for drinking at home but it is very common in water coolers at offices.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

cs702 9y ago

> raw_water == snake_oil True

KaiserPro 9y ago

I love dysentery. All it takes is someone/thing defecating in the well and you'll get cholera. Epidemiology literally came about because of "raw water" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outb...

monocasa 9y ago

FWIW, I absolutely love my in-law's unfiltered well water. It's ridiculously hard water (tons of calcium etc.), and tastes very sweet as a consequence. I haven't ever had water that tastes as good, and we always fill up a couple jugs to take back with us. If I were somehow lose access to that water I'd probably try this at least once just to see if it's close.

jimmaswell 9y ago
I've had well water with a lot of sulfur in it a few times. Not sure if I'd say I like it but it's an interesting experience.
- monocasa 9y ago
  Yeah, the sulfur heavy ones are pretty terrible, but that's not all Wells.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    People will buy sulphurous water, "tastes vile enough that it seems like it could be a medicine" I think is the rationale. Eg at Bath in the UK, not sure if you can take it away but you can buy a glass in the tea-rooms.
pttrpttrwttr 9y ago
Your well water was coming from property people you know own, not what some random snake-oil salesman is bottling and selling. Personally, I'd rather not risk it.

maxxxxx 9y ago

This is ludicrous but these guys still manage to change people's purchasing behavior. At work I see a lot of people drinking $2 "Honest Tea" which is just tea with a lot of sugar. On the face of it this is ridiculous but people buy that stuff. In the age of $2 tea and $4+ coffee I can see a big market for overpriced water.

vanattab 9y ago

The best water I have ever tasted comes from a spring in the Red River Gorge area of Kentucky. If anyone is rock climbing in the RRG and wants to give it a try look for pipe sticking out of a hill side about a half mile before the Nada tunnel when entering the gorge. Edit: Just looked up the exact location, 37.815495, -83.692356

indubitable 9y ago

This seems pretty funny at a glance, but on the other hand there's a really really big elephant in the room today - and that is the state of the American population. Our overall healthfulness has decreased dramatically in just a few decades. The US life expectancy is even in decline. This all correlates with things like the rise of the internet, but the rise of the internet has occurred worldwide whereas the degree of unhealthfulness of the US is something unique in its degree - and that's in a large population. It's easy to blame things look unhealthy food, yet I don't think we have 70% of the population downing Big Macs while treating soda like water in a desert oasis. In either case gluttony is hardly an American exclusive. I'm not suggesting that it's the water, but I am suggesting that it is not unreasonable to think that something we probably believe is perfectly reasonable or even healthful may be having unforeseen consequences that have yet to be precisely singled out. And so experiments that sound stupid may not be such an awful idea. Penicillin was only accepted long after its discovery. A big part of the reason for that is using a byproduct of blue-green mold to treat vulnerable bacterial infections is something most people intuitively dismissed as idiotic - even after the discoverer presented and published his findings. If there's a market for folks that want to down 'natural' water at a premium, then I think this is a good thing. They get to act as guinea pigs for the whole of society, the guy makes a few bucks, and in the end everybody learns a bit more.

KaiserPro 9y ago
I take your point, but, we have a long case history of what happens when we don't have clean water, starting here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1854_Broad_Street_cholera_outb... (well it started before that, but this is when epidemiology became a thing.) safe water doesn't need to be sterile. In the UK, you are allowed a certain level of "harmless" bacteria. However there are strong laws that are _enforced_ to make sure that people don't get harmed. Now, there _might_ be a case that "raw" water provides/boosts/promotes certain gut flora in people that is beneficial. However gut flora is a new and little understood science. Applying occam's razor to declining health in the US, and I'd point to two things: 1) increasingly sedentary lifestyle 2) Terrible health system that denies basic care for >60 million people and pumps the rest full of narcotics. Unlike the gut flora theory, there is a mountain of evidence to back it up, not some bearded weirdo with little connection to the real world.

sjg007 9y ago

Are you supposed to boil it?

Theodores 9y ago

The thing is that there will be people wanting to defend this product. It will become just another thing like 'natural salt' that has no added iodine but has lots of impurities in it. This is then packaged as 'non GMO' and 'Gluten Free' amongst other organic things. As a regular user of a bread making machine I do wonder if my bread would be improved by the use of this posh salt rather than the table salt I normally use. Would I live longer by not having the anti-caking ingredient added to the teaspoon of salt I use with my bread? So, after a push of a button and a couple of minutes exactly measuring flour, water, salt, sugar, butter and yeast I get perfect fresh bread. Meanwhile, the mystery individual 'ms Ancedote' goes the whole hog on using overly-good ingredients to make some 'even better bread'. This will be using wholemeal organic spelt flour instead of regular strong wholemeal flour, this will also be measured in 'cups', not weighed. So all the other ingredients are fancy, e.g. the salt, the oven will need to be on for hours and lots of noises and mess will be made. Net result is essentially unrisen bread, the science not understood, the interior still sticky dough, the outer with a thicker and dryer crust than one might want. To my science mind this is madness, a lot of work with ingredients coming from all four corners of the globe, just for some bread that is wrong. All kinds of exciting herbs and what-not could also be added, such 'rustic' fun is the desired thing, it does not taste like store bought bread and that is what matters. The fact it takes five hours to make is part of it. None of it makes sense until you learn the word 'orthorexia': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthorexia_nervosa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthorexia_nervosa So my mystery friend that makes awful bread and does not want to be making normal bread like I do, why is this? It is just one symptom of a bigger thing going on, orthorexia. I would say there is a whole industry going on around orthorexia and that these guys are tapping into that market.

giomasce 9y ago

This "toilet water" part really reminds me of the movie Idiocracy...

spapas82 9y ago

This reminds me of a quote of General Ripper from Dr Strangelove: "Mandrake, do you realize that in addition to fluoridating water, why, there are studies underway to fluoridate salt, flour, fruit juices, soup, sugar, milk... ice cream. Ice cream, Mandrake, children's ice cream."