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It and wine also killed bacteria in water so allowed larger communities to form.

by walshemj 5y ago

datameta 5y ago
In the middle ages beer watered down to .5-1% alcohol was had when water supplies could not be guaranteed to be fresh
- perl4ever 5y ago
  You know, this is something people mention a lot on the internet since forever, and it reminds me of the assumption that mouthwash which is 20-25% alcohol must be for the purpose of killing germs. However, I recently read something that claimed to debunk this, saying that even 50 proof is not effective at all at sterilizing things and it is merely a solvent for the active ingredients. The reason I stumbled on it was because I'd been worrying about whether the alcohol free variants are effective, vs. alcohol potentially being a carcinogen. So I think it's less obvious what effect 1% alcohol has than at first glance.
  - dylan604 5y ago
    I always thought they were watering the beer down so you could drink it in place of water so you wouldn't be inebriated after breakfast.
  - datameta 5y ago
    I did consider not posting that factoid. I had been a while since I double checked it. You're right, now that I think about it more. I'm inclined to no longer believe that statement to be true but I wonder if a single digit percentage of alcohol could be enough to stave off more advanced stages of exponential growth of bacteria for a meaningful amount of time like, say, a day. Nevertheless: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_beer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_beer
- gambiting 5y ago
  It was debunked time and time again. People in ancient times drank water, it's just that reading ancient texts gave some historians the idea that people only drank beer, since that was the only drink they wrote about(well, along with wine). No one wrote about drinking water because there was no reason to write about it. But modern historians are very much certain that the "they only drank beer because it was safer" thing is a myth, we don't have any proof for that.

It and wine also killed bacteria in water so allowed larger communities to form.

datameta 5y ago

In the middle ages beer watered down to .5-1% alcohol was had when water supplies could not be guaranteed to be fresh

perl4ever 5y ago
You know, this is something people mention a lot on the internet since forever, and it reminds me of the assumption that mouthwash which is 20-25% alcohol must be for the purpose of killing germs. However, I recently read something that claimed to debunk this, saying that even 50 proof is not effective at all at sterilizing things and it is merely a solvent for the active ingredients. The reason I stumbled on it was because I'd been worrying about whether the alcohol free variants are effective, vs. alcohol potentially being a carcinogen. So I think it's less obvious what effect 1% alcohol has than at first glance.
- dylan604 5y ago
  I always thought they were watering the beer down so you could drink it in place of water so you wouldn't be inebriated after breakfast.
- datameta 5y ago
  I did consider not posting that factoid. I had been a while since I double checked it. You're right, now that I think about it more. I'm inclined to no longer believe that statement to be true but I wonder if a single digit percentage of alcohol could be enough to stave off more advanced stages of exponential growth of bacteria for a meaningful amount of time like, say, a day. Nevertheless: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_beer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_beer
gambiting 5y ago
It was debunked time and time again. People in ancient times drank water, it's just that reading ancient texts gave some historians the idea that people only drank beer, since that was the only drink they wrote about(well, along with wine). No one wrote about drinking water because there was no reason to write about it. But modern historians are very much certain that the "they only drank beer because it was safer" thing is a myth, we don't have any proof for that.