@PointZero: Don't go for a distiller. -All- of the minerals are removed from the water. You'll end up having to take a Multi-Vitamin. Buy a reverse-osmosis filter. You're better off. Look here: https://www.propurusa.com/ I bought this one: https://www.propurusa.com/Propur-Traveler-System-Gravity-Filter.html It's a little expensive, but well worth it. Plus, take a look at the stuff the filters remove. https://www.propurusa.com/assets/images/Lab Report 15-134.pdf https://www.propurusa.com/assets/images/14-286-P-231_test.pdf https://www.propurusa.com/assets/images/14-227 (Pro-One-G2-Microcystin).pdf https://www.propurusa.com/assets/images/POGMineralReport.pdf I am -NOT- a sales person for them: I've had one for about 8 months now and am quite pleased with it.
read the label on a box of shredded wheat next time your in the grocery store, you'll be surprised by what it does not have
@MS_User: A High or low PH does mean that there's something wrong with the water. And the best way to get vitamins is to eat a balanced meal, complete with vegetables. Sometimes, you have to take a multi-vitamin. But you shouldn't unless you speak to your doctor. Especially if you're on any meds.
MJ: Thanks for the info. The house we've moved into fairly recently has a triple carbon-filter, reverse-osmosis system built in under the kitchen sink. But I've never used it since I don't know what condition it's in. I plan to check it out after other higher priority projects are finished. I figure it's safer right now to just buy drinking water from the water store since they're constantly changing filters. But it's a hassle lugging several 5 gallon jugs around regularly. After checking my zip code in that link that R29k posted a few pages back, I see my city's water is listed with "6 contaminants detected above health guidelines" (including arsenic) and "17 other detected contaminants". I'm not sure I would even trust the under-sink system to clean the water. I probably should just relax about water since most people probably drink only straight tap water daily with no problems. I'll check out those links you posted though. Thanks again for the info. Joe C: Yes, Shredded Wheat is a good/healthy choice, as are several others.
Just saw this news article and thought of the talk of cereal here: a local place has drinks made with breakfast cereals and alcohol. Can get a drink with Fruity Pebbles and vodka or rum. http://www.abc15.com/entertainment/events/arizona-restaurant-swirling-cereal-infused-cocktails
Joe C: and they're charging $10 for that crap, lol. But hey, those crazy drinks got them coverage on the news so I guess it worked out ok for them. MJ: just reading that list of ingredients for the drink made me queasy. Barf bag needed indeed.
Another update on alkaline water: I posted earlier that the water store owner and I tested a sample of his water dispensed from his machine that was set for a pH level of 9. And that it did indeed test to that level by both us. Yesterday, while filling the large bottles with regular water, I bought another gallon of pH 9 water to bring home. I tested the "alkaline" water at home and it was 7 (neutral). I think the owner may have pulled a sleight of hand on me earlier when we both tested it at 9: when he filled a small cup with sample water, he purposely stood in front of me blocking my view for a moment. There are pH calibration solutions available that can raise or lower pH to specified levels. I think he must've used a solution to raise the level since I've now tested it twice at 7 myself. So I'm back to thinking that water dispensed from this machine is snake oil (a fraud) and just a way for them to charge a much higher price. I'm not going to buy any more of it (until the digital pH tester arrives ).
To make a proper opinion about a process one needs to know in detail what exactly a special 'device' does and to conclude effects on health one needs the corresponding scientific background to put the relations right. Besides of that there are different 'approaches' to achieve a wanted, personal goal. In relation to drinking water there are 2 basic approaches. - one can remove anything from the water and find a substitute somewhere else at food to make sure there will be no deficiency at any other essentials but water. This approach would determine 'water' as water only essential. - one can remove anything from the water that is considered as non-healthy and STILL use drinking water as source of other additional essentials such as essential minerals. I'll try to illustrate the relations here in this thread as soon as I get the time for it. I'll try to find wordings for the interested people here which are comprehensible. It should be possible since I do teach that every year. I don’t know if the editor here allows me to post formulas either mathematical or Chemical..I'd have to try. Goal would be to offer material that anybody who is interested can make own conclusions, goal is not to follow my own personal idea. (Which I can post anyway). (There are many terms used in this thread, so we have here an already complex situation and it's hard to get them structured here at a thread. We have acid/base, pH value, electrolysis, adsorption, Ion exchange, reverse osmosis, distillation. These all would require many different chapters of Physics and Chemistry already, not to speak of physiological / pharmacological action in human body.) In advance one consideration for now. It is related to water devices which are using electrolysis. I want to show up 2 major issues in this regard. The first: Pure water doesn’t contain much of charged particles, called Ions. The Ion product of water describes that. It illustrates the relation (balance) of water and its Ions H+ and OH- (I'll post more about this at future posts). The very most part of pure water is H20 and only a very little amount of it dissociates to H+ and OH- ions. When both are exactly the same amount we speak of neutral water. Commonly people speak of neutral water = pH7, that isn't right, strictly seen. H2O is non-conductive!!! To have electrical conduction through water you need particles which are charged (Ions). Compared to metal as conductor there are free electrons. This means pure water is a very bad conductor! To apply electrolyses one needs conductors, though. The more Ions (minerals) you have got in the water the more conductive it becomes. In this aspect it is senseless to use pure water for electrolyses. The second: What happens at electrolyses at all? The Ions, the ions only are moving to the electrode with opposed electrical charge and become discharged (following a special order called electrochemical series or potential). Always 2 H+ ions are moving to the electrode which has an excess of electrons, take up one electron each and become discharged. 2 of the Hydrogen atoms form H2 molecular hydrogen. 2 H+ + 2 electrons --->H2 It is a flammable gas that is leaving the water. At the other electrode there is lack of electrons. Always 2 OH- Ions are moving to it and each of it loses its electron. 2OH- ----> O + H2O +2electrons. 2 Oxygen atoms then form molecular O2. It is also a gas and leaves the water. Since the electrical balance has to be neutral we get 2H20---> 2H2 + O2. This might be known as detonating gas, lol. The amount of dissociated water remains the same very low amount, because 'new' water molecules are dissociating, but always corresponding to their Ion product which is very low! This means: The electrolysis of pure water is very slow due to its bad conductivity! AND since H+ (which is representing "acid" according to Arrhenius) 'vanishes' exactly the same amount as OH- (which is representing "base" according to Arrhenius) there is never a change of pH value. In other words: Electrolysis of pure water doesn't work very well and never changes the pH value! If electrolysis should change the pH value (regardless of any sense) then there must be minerals present. They strongly increase conductivity due to their Ions AND as second condition -to make a pH change possible- the H+ / OH- balance must be disturbed. This can happen by discharging Chloride to Chlorine or Nitrate to NOx! Very simply spoken. If electrolysis leads to any change of pH there can be questionable products formed also. Water with a higher amount of actually harmless Chloride becomes even more dangerous due to the formed Chlorine during electrolyses. (To make it scientifically complete: Chlorine then can do further chemical reactions with the alkaline water and form even more questionable products.)
Thank you Yen for providing us another detailed and useful explanation. Apparently, the machine runs water over electrically charged plates to separate higher pH water from the lower pH. The lower pH water is then discarded down the drain. It doesn't charge the ions, as I posted earlier. Here's a video that demonstrates how it works: Code: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN6nhOOaTrk And here's a video that shows the actual internal portion of the machine: Code: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Opqwg-Eyvl8 The water being used as a source at the water store has been run through several processes beforehand to lower contamination but is still not 100% pure water (as I mistakenly said in an earlier post). It has been cleaned but there are still very small amounts of minerals left in it. They are very low levels though and mineral supplements are suggested to be taken if this water is the only water consumed. I'm no expert in this stuff and this whole alkaline water thing may be completely bogus. I'm learning more about it as I go along. The only reason I'm even aware of it is that a couple people I know have talked about the many benefits they felt after consuming alkaline water. They weren't trying to sell me anything- they were just passing along what they felt was useful information. I thought I would try getting the alkaline water from my local store since they have one of the machines. I haven't noticed any benefits from it during the short time I tried it, but they say a person needs to use it regularly to really feel benefits.
@PointZero: Don't waste you time or money with that machine. The most useful part of it is the water filter. The rest is hogwash.
We have just watched the videos in the lab. Lots of colleagues joined. Besides of 'ROFL' there has been also a huge outrage how consumers get fooled. It is unbelievable how those dilettantes are trying to bend science. I can only say to all people: Keep off your hands from such a crap! The filter is just calcium sulfate (cheap gesso)/charcoal combination. It doesn't do very much, too. Let me put it right.... Ions are charged particles per definition, they get DISCHARGED by electrolysis. It gets alkaline because H+ gets discharged before any other metal ion (except noble metals which are usually not present in water). When H+ is leaving the balance of the ion product of water the OH- concentration must increase since the ion product is constant at given temperature. The OH- ions do survive IF another anion is present which is discharged BEFORE it (electrochemical series). This results to an increment of pH per definition. At the other electrode there happens what I have already posted. They in fact can/do add common salt to get even more alkaline water. You get there chlorine which reacts further with the water itself. Short: You get on the 'drinking side' water with a drop of drain cleaner (sodium hydroxide) On the 'discard side' water with toilet cleaner 'active chlorine/hypochlorite/hypochlorous acid'... If you want such alkaline water add a little tip of a spatula of sodium hydroxide and you get the same. If you want to kill yourself you can reach pH 14 by adding even more, lol. It is still hard to me to believe how people are fooling others. I post something about the ion product of water later to have it more completed.
The ion product of water. (There is no formula editor available I try my best.) Kw = c(H+)*c(OH-) This is obtained from reaction equilibrium or better said LMA, the law of mass action. In words: Kw is a constant at given temperature, it's important to treat it as a constant. Its unit is square mol divided by square liter c(H+) is the concentration of hydrogen Ions or protons. The unit is mol divided by liter another wording of concentration is molarity. This is 'acid' by Arrhenius c(OH-) is the concentration of hydroxide ions. The unit is mol divided by liter another wording of concentration is molarity. This is 'base' by Arrhenius, we say it acts alkaline. The pH value. pH = -log [c(H+)] In words. The pH value is equal to the negative decadic logarithm of the H+ ion concentration. pH comes from pondus Hydrogenii (like weight of Hydrogen). Strictly seen it is activity not concentration, but that doesn't matter here. OK what can we do with them now? Kw is a given constant and can be found everywhere where scientific constants are noted. Kw is constant at given temperature at any place on earth. Kw is 10^-14 square mol / square liter at 25 degrees Celsius. Lets insert it and calculate the pH value of pure water at 25 degrees Celsius 10^-14 = c(H+)*c(OH-) we of course solve the equation for c(H+), we know that there are always one H+ and one OH- from one H2O This means c(H+) = c(OH-) in pure water. 10^-14 = c(H+)*c(H+) We get c(H+) by the square root of Kw=10^-14, the square root is easily calculable we just have to divide the exponent by 2. The result for c(H+) is 10^-7 mol/liter. Now we can insert this into the pH equation pH = -log [c(H+)] pH = -log [10^-7] pH =7 (easy here since it already has got the base of 10). When we now take the Kw of water which is 70 degree of Celsius we get from literature Kw=10^-12.79915 square mol / square liter. This Kw value is greater than 10^-14! This results to c(H+) = 10^-6.399575 mol/liter and that to a pH of around 6.40. This means the acidic activity/concentration has increased and hence the pH value has decreased. ANYWAY since the amount of H+ and OH- ions are still the same it is always NEUTRAL. The pH value is decreased because it is only related to the H+ (acid) concentration. So now we have resolved the pH7= neutral myth. One last important consideration. Let's treat it like a balance and like a equilibrium! Kw = c(H+)*c(OH-) What happens if I remove H+ ions by electrolysis for example? The balance is encountering a disturbance, removing H+ ions means lowering its concentration/activity. Disturbance Kw > c(H+)*c(OH-) Enforcing constant: c(OH-) has to increase to overcome the disturbance!!! Kw = c(H+)*c(OH-) That means to achieve a pH change one has to disturb this equilibrium in that way that c(H+) ≠ c(OH-) BUT Kw = c(H+)*c(OH-) This reasons why electrolysis of pure water never changes any pH. It reasons very bad conductivity / low amount of ions (0.1008 microgram H+ and 1.70073 microgram OH- in one liter of pure water at 25 degrees). I guess I stop here, feel free to ask for details if interested. Too bad I cannot illustrate the formulas correctly there is no exponent and no index... You can play with the formulas / pH values and compare concentration relations to get a better understanding. To solve the equation for c(H+) from given pH use logarithmic 'rules'... like c(H+) = 10^(-pH) You can play with the ion product and always remain Kw constant usually 10^-14 (25 degrees) Enjoy.
For those who don’t like the chemical stuff and like it more visually. Watch this around the 11th minute ONLY. The experimental setup of her has much more scientific background, but only there. Later then she fails badly, though. Not knowing that the pH scale is logarithmic and that human body has an intelligent buffer system which can get support by isotonic beverages. She condemns the beverages not considering that the stomach acid is far far more acidic and that is the reason why acidic beverages don't have a real impact on human body!!!! What's evil at them is their sugar!!!! It illustrates impressively the very low capacity of that Kangen water when it encounters beverages which are isotonic (minerals). There are two reasons. The logarithmic pH scale and no buffer capacity compared to buffer capacity of such beverages. There would be another experiment she has missed and stopped too early!!! To have it very authentic it might be a disgusting idea since you would have to obtain some real stomach acid... Alternatively get hydrochloric acid with a concentration of c(H+) = 0.1 mol / liter which scientifically represents stomach acid. Get a glass of Kanken water and add some drops of universal indicator solution. It should change its colour to blue to represent alkaline water. Then add drop-wise some of the "stomach" acid and do that until it changes its colour to represent the character of an acid. I bet you don't need more than 20 drops to be added to 100 millilitre of Kangen water until the myth is destroyed. That's the effect of a logarithmic scale and no buffer capacity. It puts both aside, Kangen water and acidic beverages. Another very bad thing: She glorifies alkaline water as healthy. BUT to kill pathogens and to digest them human body needs acid and enzymes first!!!!
Here's my contribution. http://www.chemguide.co.uk/physical/acidbaseeqia/kw.html @Yen, et. al.: LOL Yup. That's why our stomachs manufacture hydrochloric acid. And grade school chemistry teaches us that Acid + Base = some Salt + water. KOH + HCl = KCl + H2O (IIRC) NaOH + HCl = NaCl + H2O So, whatever alkali they're creating will get reduced to some salt and water in your stomach, effectively standing in the way of proper digestion. Salt (KCl or NaCl) NaCl (Table Salt) will raise your blood pressure,and can contribute to hypertension and possible stroke. KCl (A salt substitute) can cause problems for cardiac patients, because of the body's sensitivity to Potassium levels. It is also one of the three chemicals used in execution by lethal injection. Read here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidk...f-execution-by-lethal-injection/#7d68a9271038 That's why lemon and / or lime juice in filtered water (no sugar) is the best beverage you can possibly drink.
Doh, I could have linked to that as well and saved a lot of time, lol. Nah, I like to be an own author only relying on what I have studied. I have to say it's a quite good link! The only difference is (and that's explainable) that some are using different symbols at variables (EU and US), different units, different models as reference. You can notice when there is a ‘p’ for pondus in front of we frequently have a logarithmic function of it. And the squaring of liter is square liter (exponent of two). If you use cubic decimeter you get an exponent of 6!!! It’s absolutely the same. Arrhenius said: We speak of acid if the compound releases H+ (protons) in aqueous solution and we speak of base if the compound releases hydroxyde ions in aqueous solution. Arrhenius is actually ‘enough’ here. There is a golden rule I always take care of: Use the model that is sufficient to explain the phenomenon/relation you want explain. There is a general mechanism in science. A (limited) model can explain a special phenomenon / attribute / behavior and the like… UNTIL there is something discovered that behaves either the same way without the typical attribute (model) or different with it. The conclusion is always to extend the model / conception. Examples: Atomic Models There is Niels Bohr and there is the orbital model. Would I use the orbital model if Bohr is sufficient? Rather not. Concerning “acid” we have Arrhenius, Brønsted and Lewis (used in organic Chemistry). What’s also interesting here one can clearly notice that Chemistry also went from absolute views to relative! While Arrhenius determined ‘total’ attributes, Brønsted said there can be only an acid when there is a compound (at the same place and time) which behaves as base!!! He said an acid is a proton donator and a base is a proton acceptor. One molecule of H2O donates a proton (H+) to the other water molecule which does accept it. It has left back its hydroxide ion and there is formed a H3O+ (oxonium ion or hydroxonium ion) 2H2O----> H3O+ + OH- A short remark to the mentioned sodium and potassium and chloride ions: They (and some others such as calcium and yes protons) are very important when it comes to eukaryotes ….. for communication/transmission, as event trigger and as transport process of the cells. Everyone who is familiar with Biology knows the terms resting potential, sodium-potassium pump… They are important. Without them nothing ‘eukaryotic’ would work. BTW: Human daily need of potassium is around 2 grams and human body consists of around 130 grams of potassium! Paracelsus applies here also and yes it is a used component to kill people. AFAIK reversal of cell-membrane potential.... Well an exercise: If you mix a solution that is pH1 like stomach acid with the same volume of a solution that is pH 9.5 what pH would you get? (Should represent a situation where one drinks the same volume of Kangen water like his volume of stomach acid) We do not care about that little volume contraction/change that always happens if you mix 2 different solutions….mark the next line for the result... Result: The pH value increases only a little bit to pH 1.30 Oh and another one. People say human body produces 2-3 liters of stomach acid per day. Let's say they are only 2 liters. How many liters of Kanken water (pH 9.5) you'd have to drink every day until your stomach would reach the glorified alkaline range of pH >7?? lol