Here are some very basic reasons why I would rather not drink natural spring water.
Cryptosporidium, Giardia, Clostridium, Legionella, Salmonella and Hepatitus A.
I think they’re good reasons.
These genera of microorganisms (the last one is a virus) are just a very tiny sampling of some lovely little critters that are found in pretty normal water. Listen up “natural food movement”. These are not chemicals, they are not “man made additives”, or results of “processing”. They are exactly the opposite. These microorganisms are about as “natural” as it gets. Single celled, hundreds of millions of years in the making, and enough of them will kill the crap out of you. That’s not just a figure of speech, a lot of waterborne pathogens keep you from holding anything in your intestines.
Recent events (actually, they’re daily events, but some get on the news more than others), have got me thinking about water. The recent Cholera outbreak in Haiti will tell you the tragedy of what happens when you can’t process your water. The lack of water treatment literally plagues all of civilization that doesn’t have it, and it’s not a “modern” problem. Untreated water, depending on where it comes from, usually won’t harm every person, but it is enough of a challenge for the bodies of the young, the old, and the ill to keep populations small and stagnant. The increase in human population that came with the development of cities and civilizations was directly correlated to water technology.
Wastewater treatment could be the single most important everyday technology that has allowed developed countries to become well, developed (along with the plough). A large part of what allowed the Roman empire to become so successful was the construction of huge waterways that carried clean water from the mountains to the cities. Why the mountains? When water condenses and then rains or falls as snow to these high altitudes, it doesn’t carry very many pathogens with it. Storing water in the form of ice or cold water on top of mountains is also pretty beneficial, because it’s too cold for most of these things to live. Then, it trickled down in fast moving streams and straight to the cities via enormous aquaducts. The Romans understood this (though not in those terms), and this is why even in cities that were on lakes and rivers, the Romans built ways to get water from higher ground. After being used by the cities, the water washed away the wastes to fester in the sea, where the salt content actually keeps the water pretty “clean”. Most bacteria, like people, can’t drink salt water.
Modern infrastructure to clean water is phenomenal. It could be the most ingenious mix of using plants, bacteria, manmade chemicals and filters to provide what we get on tap. Processes range from chemical scrubbing of pipes, massive filtering and oxygenation of water, to my favorite “activated sludge”, only because it sounds like something a supervillian would create. Look it up, it’s gross, but it probably has saved your life once a week or so during your lifetime.
Where you don’t have water, you don’t have anything. While there are a lot of pesky little suckers that like to live in water, it’s not the case that they “shouldn’t” be there, you just shouldn’t drink a lot of them. What lets us live in urban cities, arid climates, and have the enormous flexibility we do in the developed world relies largely on the fact that we can turn on a tap and get processed, unnatural, modified, additive filled, water. This is the healthiest water can be, even if you compared it to what you could suck from the clouds.
Next time you think about the arguments against resource processing, processed or modified foods, or any argument that “natural” is better. Think of water.
How often have you heard that natural foods are better for you? Children should be excused for their behavior because it’s only natural for kids to be that way. Childbirth should at least be attempted naturally. You should try to cure your flu using natural home remedies.
All of these claims that permeate our society hold one belief in common; that nature manifests itself in a way that is best left undisturbed. This includes plants, other animals and of course, the human body. This concept is so ingrained into our society that at first glance it is difficult to see how irrational it is.
Logically, whether something is natural has nothing to do with whether it is good. The fallacy of assuming that the “naturalness” of something increases its “goodness” or “value” is what is termed the naturalistic fallacy.
The naturalistic fallacy is largely due to a misunderstanding of evolution and the natural world. Organisms don’t happen to survive because they have constantly evolved to be “better” and now they are the “best” and are therefore surviving.
Organisms in existence are maintaining a very delicate balance that involves not only their physical adaptations, but also behavior that varies immensely with individuals and populations. Furthermore, interactions with other species and environmental conditions are most of what is responsible for whether or not an organism will survive. NO MATTER how impractical or imperfect the species, if there is ample habitat and consumable resources, and if there are no overwhelming predators or competing species, the species will continue to propagate.
Here is an example. The giant panda is one of the most ill equipped animals on the planet. Its digestive system is so ineffective at retrieving nutrients from food that pandas have to eat constantly. In order to preserve energy (given it is so hard to consume), pandas are very sedentary. Pandas have terrible physical adaptations for defense, including the one of the worst camouflaging systems in the animal kingdom. Pandas are also one of the most ineffective species on the planet when it comes to reproduction. Female pandas are fertile for two to three days a year. That is all. Furthermore, she births two cubs per litter, and then immediately abandons one of them and raises only one.
Pandas have no immediate predators. Their terrible physical adaptations and inability to reproduce effectively are causing them to slowly but surely drive themselves into extinction. Naturally.
You may be thinking; “But those are pandas – the human body is much better equipped”. Not exactly.
Consider your teeth. You brush your teeth twice a day with a plastic and very “unnatural” toothbrush. You have to shove a piece of string between each of them every day. There is fluoride in our drinking water. You have to see a special doctor every year to get them cleaned – because brushing them twice a day and flossing STILL isn’t enough to keep them from rotting out of your mouth. Up until the twentieth century – it was common practice to pull all of the teeth out of the mouth as soon as they were formed and use dentures – because it prevented the eventual agony of losing them one by one.
Over sixty percent of the adult American population wears glasses. Those of you that think that natural things are better – how about going to the department of transport and telling them that you think it would be much better if the law was reversed – and that nobody should wear corrective lenses behind the wheel. Drivers would be better off with their natural vision, right?
I have heard the argument that “technically, people don’t need clothes”. I live in Canada, and I beg to differ. Not only has clothing made it possible for me to live where I do and not lose every limb slowly to frostbite and die from subsequent infection, it is also crucial in disease prevention. By covering some of the more infection-prone parts of our bodies, and adding a barrier that protects the integrity of the skin, our clothed body is much more likely to survive than our unclothed body.
For women that promote natural childbirth at all costs, consider this. Until the 19th century childbirth was one of the most dangerous activities a woman could engage in. Even today, in countries without modern healthcare systems, 1 in 16 women die from childbirth. In developed nations, the number is closer to 1 in 2800. Infant death rates are astronomically higher in both places. Given the long gestation time and large fetal size, humans are simply not very well adapted for childbirth. Gazelles can run away from lions just minutes after they are born.
I’m not advocating that we not have any trust in our bodies to keep us alive. Our immune system, for instance is incredibly capable of protecting us from millions of things in our environment that would otherwise kill us incredibly quickly. However, where our bodies are lacking, it’s not “bad” to use implements that we have invented that don’t exist that way in nature. In fact, those implements are the very things that have allowed us to be so successful as a species.
Accept it, we are not perfect. Our bodies are hideous, hairless, slow, nearly deaf and nearly blind. Luckily, the one thing that human evolution ultimately selected for was a decent brain. They’re not perfect, but they’re pretty damn good. Don’t be afraid to use yours!
