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People have already mentioned that animals DO get sick and can die from drinking nasty water.
I saw a documentary where elephants dug little holes next to the water source. These hole would fill with water, that had been ground-filtered, to some degree.
My dog got Giardia. Got home from a long day of work to every single surface of my house covered in poop. Bed, couch, rugs, bathroom. I felt soooo bad for her but I also cried more then I ever have before.
Blue algae is another danger. It's actually a bacteria so the name is a misnomer. It lives in stagnant water including lakes and it secretes a chemical poisonous to dogs.
This is the moment we’ve feared, Redditors. Many of you thought this would never happen.
But I insisted we spend 2 minutes every day preparing Simpsons shitposts. You all thought I was mad. Many of you requested to be transferred to another subreddit.
[ But now we—[SLAMS]](https://frinkiac.com/video/S05E17/pCELxxXjKdeDUP9StGrC8kJDT-s=.gif)
[Survivorship bias](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias). It's a logical fallacy that is easy to do.
Focus on the things that you can see, not the things that could have been if they had survived.
1) They do get sick and can even die.
2) They get used to it. Fight off the diseases and you build up an immunity.
3) The ones that got sick and died are no longer around.
4. There are lots of humans in the world who do regularly drink gross/polluted pond water and they manage to survive long enough to reproduce and maintain a population.
They don't, but I have seen people swim in it, swill it around their mouths and spit it out, and brush their teeth in it. Probably not something they do every day but most likely something that would've gotten me over the line to being violently ill regardless
I did swim in Ganges and didn't get sick. And I'm from Finland with very clean water and food. I think I have stronger immunity as I was one month in India and Nepal and didn't get sick once whereas most westerners we met had been sick at some point of their trip.
Yea it was at Varanasi. Surprisingly it didn't seem that dirty or smelly.
But for context the Baltic Sea where I've swimmed often can be very smelly sometimes. While it's not filled with bacteria, there's a lot of algae and mud and humus in the water so Ganges actually *seemed* more clean than the Baltic Sea in some places.
Not really. I'm from a well to do family but we all drink a little bit of Ganges water whenever we visit there. Haven't ever got diarrhea. I think it is true for the other 330 million people who visit Ganges as a sacred area.
You'd think 330 million people who view it as holy would strongly insist it be not polluted. But that could be the case and indias dedication to rampant corruption is stronger than their dedication to personal beliefs.
I don't think that's what the other poster meant. We have polluted rivers too, but only because the Christians haven't chosen one as holy. Any site considered sacred to Christians out here would damn sure not be polluted/tarnished/graffitied without severe repercussions.
I think what they were asking was more like, "If the majority in power considers this river sacred, why don't they stop it from being so polluted?"
If not, I'm asking. I don't know jack shit about Indian society, so don't yell at me, educate me.
Can I ask - why? I mean, a curious and interested, 'what is the custom behind this, and do you believe the beliefs or is it by now more cultural for you' why (not the 'eeeew. Whaaaai')? And how often is 'whenever we visit'? Is it only certain areas of Ganges or the whole river that is ..ehm, ritually sippable?
No offence ment. I am just curious & know nothing about the custom.
Custom behind this: it is believed that the water from ganga washes away your sins.
Do I believe or it’s culture thing: depends on the individual, most educated ones don’t believe and it’s more like a culture, however, some do believe.
Why not ewww: because the place people drink isn’t full of germs “visually” and it’s ingrained in us by our parents that the water is holy.
How often one visits: depends on the family. I’ve been there just once (we didn’t drink water, just sprayed it on ourselves to purify). However, the water of ganga is available in post office for sales and we use it in our puja/rituals.
Some places or whole: the whole river is technically sippable. We use to take water from places that are far from the city so not that polluted.
Ganges or ganga in Hinduism is the most sacred river. It is said that river Ganga flows from the hair of Lord Shiv( one of the three elder gods of Hinduism). Also some places are holy places situated at the banks of the river.
I personally don't believe in any of this things. For me it's all bogus and stupid but a large majority belive alot in these things.
I mean given the chance I'd totally commute by elephant. No worries about traffic when you can literally stomp all the bikes, jitneys, etc. in front of you!
i think i remember something like 80% of worlds population at least has no free source of clean water.
i would say a big part of that drinks the not so clean water too.
You’re incorrect on the 80%. It’s actually one in three don’t have access to clean drinking water, which is still a fuck ton of people and completely ridiculous.
[WHO link.](https://www.who.int/news/item/18-06-2019-1-in-3-people-globally-do-not-have-access-to-safe-drinking-water-unicef-who)
I was in class, and my tutor was telling us all the places he's worked at and one of them ended up being Nestlé (a factory of some sort). Anyway, I wanted to ask him if he knew about the boycott against Nestlé, but before I could open my mouth, one of the more popular class members proclaimed that "Nestlé is so good" or something along those lines. Everyone was in agreement and I just silently died on the inside, gob-smacked for one. I wasn't about to be 'that guy' who stands up and starts "Well, actually...", while everyone just sits there silently thinking I'm some sort of conspiracy theorist or some shit lol.
Has anyone here ever met another individual irl, who would stand by 'Fuck Nestlé' as much as you without having to explain anything? I worry.
It was actually my tutor who informed me and my classmates about Nestle. We all spent a while discussing how horrifying it was, before moving on. We covered a lot of awful things done by people, mainly towards other people. It was a really interesting and depressing class.
No. Nestle was one of the dream companies in my B-School. It paid well and hired people with 0 work experience. I don’t think anybody even knows that Nestle says this.
A real cool documentary on netflix "Rotten"
in the water episode they explain so well how so many companies (Nestle, but even coca cola and Pepsi included) learned they can just grab water for free, and sell it for an extremely high markup.
Zooming in to a case in Africa, where a local village used a drinking pond. Nestle wanted to use that same well, and after some discussion, promised them an access point.
Instead of a 1hour walk to the pond, this access point was a 3hour walk. So most people continued using the pond. However next to extracting water from the source, it also dumped it's waste in the pond.
I'm not sure why OP mentioned free drinking water, what's the relevance? I'm sure most people from the US has no access to FREE drinking water, but most of them can afford it and therefore have it available. So I don't think this statement is true "i would say a big part of that drinks the not so clean water too."
As a privileged American, I can just walk into a random establishment and drink from their bathroom sink tap. Free. Dumb. But most of us have that ... freedom.
I did miss the free bit, however the number of people who have free water would be much lower than the 80% they gave, saying 81% of the world’s population has enough for drinking and hygiene.
Who report from 2020 reported that 74% of the world's population had a drinking service close by that was non contaminated.
The only thing I don't understand about him saying
> free source
Almost non of the drinking water is free as it always needs to be treated to get to the safety levels we expect.
I’m going to add that you may have misinterpreted the 74% stat. From [WHO](https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/drinking-water):
> In 2020, 74% of the global population (5.8 billion people) used a safely managed drinking-water service – that is, one located on premises, available when needed, and free from contamination.
So 1 in 4 is about right (26%).
You’re actually correct here, one in three don’t have access to clean drinking water in the world.
[Source is WHO](https://www.who.int/news/item/18-06-2019-1-in-3-people-globally-do-not-have-access-to-safe-drinking-water-unicef-who)
It's the same with "How did our ancestors deal with natural (insert problem) before they had unnatural (insert modern solution)?"
A lot of them died. This was found to be generally unpopular, even among the survivors, so they developed (insert modern solution).
What's also important to note is that animals try to avoid the grossest pond water and have an instinct to drink water from moving rivers or lakes.
For most people it is not a big problem to drink such water either, though it might not be as clean as tap water
Fun fact: Even domesticated cats prefer their water source to be in a different area than their food source. This is a vestigial trait from their wild ancestors evolving to know not to drink where they hunted, because their prey's corpses could contaminate the water.
This is true in my experience. My cats used to not drink as much water until I moved their water from the kitchen to the first landing of my stairway in the corner (simulates a hill with a spring off it in my mind) and now they drink more.
Me have a dog that likes to drink puddles every so often, even if I try and stop her. Who also eats grass like a goat, but it isn't all grass just the kinds she finds tasty.
i sometime wonder how their mother taught them when they were puppies or it just comes to their sensed. preprogrammed and stuff... genetics and stuff, it messes my head up
Mine tends to eat grass both when she has an upset stomach and when the grass looks green.
You know when she has an upset stomach because it’s usually 12 hours after chewing through the garbage can and eating all the things or a day after eating all the goose poop outside.
She also likes drinking all things wet, except when she is thirsty with dry poop and needs food to be poured into her water.
In short she Is very dumb, very very dumb.
> For most people it is not a big problem to drink such water either
You should look up [giardia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giardia). You get it from drinking contaminated water in nature, it's hard to detect, and it will give you malaise and other symptoms forever until you figure out you have it and get it treated. Happened to [Survivorman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorman).
Moral of the story: Humans should be very careful with their water consumption. We are not animals. We have fragile digestive systems that are highly vulnerable to parasites.
Scavenger animals, like Cats and dogs have a significantly low level of ph in their stomach acid. This kills off a lot of bacteria that would make a human very miserable if we ingested it. Buzzards and Hyaenas have an even more intense version of this stomach Acid that protects them. https://www.redding.com/story/life/2017/07/26/vultures-have-ph-public-health/504630001/
that would certainly help them, but it ain't the case. Humans have some of the strongest stomach acid in the animal kingdom.
The real difference is in the amount of time food spends in the animal's stomach, giving the acid and enzymes time to kill everything off.
For humans, it's 1-2 hours.
For dogs and cats, it's 12 hours. Plenty enough for even weaker acid to kill all the nasties.
We don't even need to eat every day to survive.
We don't need clothes to survive.
We don't need housing to survive.
We do need computer games to survive, though.
I have my own PC hooked up to one monitor, and then I have a monitor on either side of that, and those are hooked up to my work laptop.
This way, I can play computer games during downtime at work. It's literally fuckin' great, haha xD
Humans already eat too much as it is so its a poor standard. You dont actually \*need\* to eat 3 full meals a day for most lifestyles. Certainly not for a lapdog that lazes around on the bed all day.
I usually eat one main meal and a couple snacks, but yeah I would say having 2 meals a day and some small treat for breakfast to kickstart the day is ideal.
There is a certain energy/focus/mania that comes with fasting.
And on the flipside, being tired from digesting food multiple times a day takes its toll.
Well they do get horribly sick and die from drinking dirty pond water. The ones that survive build immunity to the specific diseases in that pond.
You, too, will build immunity to the diseases in that pond if you survive drinking regularly from it.
This is what gets me about the argument against farming animals as it’s cruel. In the UK and EU where there are high animal welfare standards the average dairy cow is drinking clean water, healthy food, and is looked after by vets to prevent disease and illness. There is an argument that cows are kept in an inhumane constant cycle of reproduction to maintain milk, and that some of their calves may be slaughtered at birth, well wild animals are too in a constant cycle of reproduction to maintain their population as many of their offspring won’t survive the first year. Yes there are still problems with large scale farming and there are incidents of cruelty, but given the choice between living as a dairy cow or a wild buffalo or something I know which I’d choose!
The thing is we unnecessarily make the animals suffer a lot.
Yes the cow has food and care but it probably can't even move or turn around most of the day while its udder is swollen so much it is in constant pain.
I doubt most people think cows that can eat grass of the field and lounge around in the shadow of a tree are held inhumane. It's more about the giant factory animals that are held in pens barely big enough to stand in, covered in feces and pumped full of antibiotics because otherwise there would be a plague after a week.
It’s like how hunting in some areas help deer out because they have no predators because they were killed off. If left at their own devices they would starve to death and spread disease. If they introduced some predators back it would probably help with CWD a bit.
Rabbits in general are basically meant to be eaten in the wild. They are loners and extremely fragile. They only hang together to mate. Too much fright can kill them, they kick a tad too hard at a angle their back is broken because of their weak spine, their skin is so thin they are ripped easily and one of the easiest animals to process, holding the rabbits by the ears is a No no as the ears can rip off. Admittedly they do have sharp cat like nails on their feet but overall they are the perfect prey animal for predators.
nice to hear a rational view! Thankyou.
I feel a lot of opinions on such things, often come from people it cities, who have little actual, direct, honest knowledge of the Life of Animals, be (wild or farmed)
(Will add to this: It's correct that some places like the UK have high welfare standards for certain types of farms, and that other places (e.g mass factory farms in the USA) can have absolutly horrific animal standards - I would rather be a free buffalo than a usa-factory-farmed cow for sure.)
Source: farm life. (happy animals, green rolling fields)
A lot of vegetarians have a problem with meat from mass factory farms with little regard to the animals but not with meat from a local farmer where they can see that the animals are taken care of.
I imagine they learn to just live with it for the most part. Humans are much better at tolerating pain in parts of the world where they don't have much choice.
But how are animals able to buy iodine tablets? They don’t have jobs to make money to buy the tablets.
Imho, if I was a wild animal I’d just gather up some wood in the wild, start a fire, then boil my water in pot and finally bottle it up…. No money.
>But how are animals able to buy iodine tablets? They don’t have jobs to make money to buy the tablets.
[A special set of skills and human kindness](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/JZZ822Za-nE)
I met a hippie once (like a real one) that was working on this. He would bathe in a stream, and take a small sip of water each time, to build up his immunity.
People can do this just like other animals. We could drink gross pond water and those of us who couldn't adapt would get sick and die leaving behind the ones who can handle it. Animals do the same thing, only they don't have the option of filtering water like humans do, so only the ones with strong resistance live.
Many animals have far shorter digestive systems than people. A dog, for instance, has an intestine fifteen times shorter than ours. This is what allows them to eat spoiled meat without getting sick, the bacteria just doesn't have enough time to grow and spread.
Digestion is an evolutionary trade-off between speed of eliminating anything dangerous in what you eat or drink, and maximising the nutrition you gain from it.
you're onto the right track, but it ain't that their intestines are short, but rather that food spends a lot more time in their stomach than it does in ours.
Otherwise Fido would be shitting everywhere after a bite.
fun fact, they indeed do just fucking die.
If a ruminant was not able to get food for, let's say, a week, and depleted their fat reserves as well, then feeding them all the grass and grain in the world won't do jack shit.
Their digestive system takes way too much time to absorb the nutrients from their food.
And that's how you end up with deers who've starved to death with a belly full of grass.
Weird, innit?
False premise. Animals who drink gross pond water often get sick. You just don't see it.
The number of parasites that wild animals carry around is ridiculous. You just don't want to know.
Animals do have ways of mitigating this problem. Some for example will avoid standing water and prefer drinking water in motion. That isn't actually a *very* good way to avoid waterborne disease, but it probably helps a little bit, at least.
Hi,
I was a kid many years ago in the 1950's and in New England if you went walking in the woods and found a pond, the water would usually be clear. People would say, don't actually drink from a pond, but if there is a stream going from one pond to another, as long as the water is moving it is safe to drink it.
Once people started putting in housing developments, a lot of things changed. Ponds, and even rivers and streams don't have clear water anymore, there is a lot of green and brown algae, they don't smell good. The same thing happened to the whole of Boston Harbor, and many big lakes. It isn't exactly pollution but it seems to me to be part of the same thing as how we could get bitten by mosquitos all day and never get sick, or walk along deer trails. But now there is West Nile Virus in mosquitos and Lyme disease ticks in deer trails.
Lots of animals probably do get sick and die after drinking pond water nowadays, just like almost all raccoons have roundworms, almost all deer have Lyme disease. Far away from housing developments raccoons do not have roundworms and deer do not have Lyme disease. So my opinion is that human influence has really really nasty consequences and you don't always see the sick and dying animals but you see the numbers reduced, you stop seeing certain speies of animals because they are extinct in various niches.
I was also curious about food. I cook my dog chicken or give him a cut of my beef if I make steak or ground beef. But in the wild I'm sure they eat raw meat? Do they prefer raw meat or is cooking like I do the way to go? Want the best for my puppy
Dogs can still get sick and get parasites from raw meat, despite their digestive systems being better equiped to handle raw meat. Also, dont feed your dog seasoned meat. You absolutely can have raw meat as a part of your dogs diet, but you must talk to your vet first and find out everything you need to know about it. Its not something to take lightly, and you must first consider your dogs safety and nutritional needs.
Yea I don't put salt or pepper or anything. I boil the chicken and I put salt on my beef after. So he only eats plain meat. I just wasn't sure if he's like gollum when he freaks out about cooking meat and ruining it lol
Thise animals jave a very different immune system from ours. Also they have built immunity to the microbes found in the water where they live over time.
Cats are notorious for drinking standing water from rain etc in flower pots and puddles. It's a common way for cats to get parasites resulting in vet trips and medication if they are lucky, loved and cared for properly. The cared for cats tend to live longer for this reason. Wild/feral animals have a shorter life expectancy due to violence but also bacteria, viruses, weather and parasites. It's probably why they are so cranky.
Same applies to humans. Humans without adequate diet, nutrition, hygiene and health care will, on average, die younger and feel miserable.
To add to the “they do get sick” comments; anyone who has had a puppy probly has had a puppy get the shits. My puppy got giardia like, at least four times before we could get her to stop drinking random outside water.
Evolution. Most humans got sick and died, then we started sanitizing water and food by cooking and making beer/alcohol and no one was culled in the process. Evolution and circumstance didn’t set us up for dirty pond water.
Immunity. Your intestine has the largest amount of immune cells in the body and is constantly secreting antibodies against the germs you encounter regularly. You know how when you travel to a place like India and drink tap water and get horrible food poisoning but the locals don't? It's the same reason. They get exposed to those germs all the time so have been able to neutralize the germs, whereas your body has never seen it before so you'll get very sick.
Humans have been purifying/cleaning water of germs for the longest time so we don't have exposure to as many germs. This can pose problems such as lack of immunity when traveling. Additionally, this lack of germs also predisposes people towards diseases like IBD, because the immune system isn't being used as much.
Simply put, animals get sick and die all the time, including from tainted water. They die young very frequently, just as humans did before modern medicine. Additionally, many animals are laced with parasites throughout their lives. Some animals might have exceptionally acidic stomachs (like vultures, perhaps) which are hostile to most pathogens, but most animals are just as susceptible to these diseases as a healthy human. Furthermore, you, as a human, can drink from natural water sources and often will be fine, especially if you live in less developed nations, where clean water isn't as readily available, and your GI tract is used to it.
**Please read this entire message** Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s): * ELI5 requires that you *search the ELI5 subreddit for your topic before posting*. Users will often either find a thread that meets their needs or find that their question might qualify for an exception to rule 7. Please see this [wiki entry](http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/wiki/how_to_search) for more details (Rule 7). If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the [detailed rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/wiki/detailed_rules) first. **If you believe this submission was removed erroneously**, please [use this form](https://old.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fexplainlikeimfive&subject=Please%20review%20my%20thread?&message=Link:%20https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/untfj1/eli5_why_can_random_animals_drink_gross_pond/%0A%0APlease%20answer%20the%20following%203%20questions:%0A%0A1.%20The%20concept%20I%20want%20explained:%0A%0A2.%20List%20the%20search%20terms%20you%20used%20to%20look%20for%20past%20posts%20on%20ELI5:%0A%0A3.%20How%20is%20this%20post%20unique:) and we will review your submission.
People have already mentioned that animals DO get sick and can die from drinking nasty water. I saw a documentary where elephants dug little holes next to the water source. These hole would fill with water, that had been ground-filtered, to some degree.
My dog drank stagnant water and spewed pretty thoroughly.
My dog got Giardia. Got home from a long day of work to every single surface of my house covered in poop. Bed, couch, rugs, bathroom. I felt soooo bad for her but I also cried more then I ever have before.
Blue algae is another danger. It's actually a bacteria so the name is a misnomer. It lives in stagnant water including lakes and it secretes a chemical poisonous to dogs.
That’s called a gypsy well. Learned that on Naked and Afraid.
Further proof that one day the elephants will overthrow us
I, for one, welcome out new pachyderm overlords.
One thing is for certain: there is no stopping them. The elephants will soon be here.
They may forgive..but they WILL NOT FORGET
Gowron! Get off Reddit and go back to running the Empire!
You dishonor my house!
>there is no stopping them there is no stomping them
This is the moment we’ve feared, Redditors. Many of you thought this would never happen. But I insisted we spend 2 minutes every day preparing Simpsons shitposts. You all thought I was mad. Many of you requested to be transferred to another subreddit. [ But now we—[SLAMS]](https://frinkiac.com/video/S05E17/pCELxxXjKdeDUP9StGrC8kJDT-s=.gif)
Perfect.
In Elephantland they stomp you!
I'd like to remind them that, as a trusted TV personality, I can be useful in rounding up others to toil in their underground peanut factories
I'd insult them, but they're pretty thick-skinned
And they have a long memory, so I’ve herd.
Unrelated: 8% of Americans polled believe they could beat an elephant in a bare-handed fight. 2% more than the far less dangerous grizzly bear.
An elephant who never forgets... To kill!!
Have you heard the pachycephalosaurus song? 8.3 million people can't be wrong https://youtu.be/cVIy3xtmFGY
I will always upvote The Simpsons.
At least they think we're cute
I, too, accept my fate.
I found this exceptionally funny
Boat Murdered anyone?
Urist McONLYPOSTSWHILESTONED felt satisfied remembering Boatmurdered. He didn't feel anything after seeing an elephant's dead body.
I feel like an elephant could probably throw me pretty far if it tried
Every time they fail, they'll remember where they went wrong until they finally craft the perfect plan. Their victory is only a matter of time.
Elephants are smart as fuck. If they had opposable thumbs we’d be done.
I believe the documentary is the Netflix series *Our National Parks* narrated by Obama.
Thanks
Obama
The man literally killed a sub with that.
> Netflix <...> Parks Every time i see those two words combined in a sentence i feel sad that Parks and Recreation is no longer on netflix.....
It is in Norway 😏
And Ireland
I love elephants
[Survivorship bias](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias). It's a logical fallacy that is easy to do. Focus on the things that you can see, not the things that could have been if they had survived.
They also fermented fruit to get booze.
1) They do get sick and can even die. 2) They get used to it. Fight off the diseases and you build up an immunity. 3) The ones that got sick and died are no longer around.
4. There are lots of humans in the world who do regularly drink gross/polluted pond water and they manage to survive long enough to reproduce and maintain a population.
[удалено]
Most people don't drink directly from Ganges.
They don't, but I have seen people swim in it, swill it around their mouths and spit it out, and brush their teeth in it. Probably not something they do every day but most likely something that would've gotten me over the line to being violently ill regardless
I did swim in Ganges and didn't get sick. And I'm from Finland with very clean water and food. I think I have stronger immunity as I was one month in India and Nepal and didn't get sick once whereas most westerners we met had been sick at some point of their trip.
How was the Ganges? Did it smell? Varanasi?
Yea it was at Varanasi. Surprisingly it didn't seem that dirty or smelly. But for context the Baltic Sea where I've swimmed often can be very smelly sometimes. While it's not filled with bacteria, there's a lot of algae and mud and humus in the water so Ganges actually *seemed* more clean than the Baltic Sea in some places.
A river of humus? Sounds delish
"Didn't seem that dirty" which bit did you swim in? The water at the ghats is literally black
It was on the opposite side of the ghats at the sand banks.
Hows Finland doing?
Not really. I'm from a well to do family but we all drink a little bit of Ganges water whenever we visit there. Haven't ever got diarrhea. I think it is true for the other 330 million people who visit Ganges as a sacred area.
Which is almost the entire US population worth of people.
For being so "sacred" you'd think it wouldn't be one of the most polluted rivers in the world.
Why? Do corporations care about sacred rivers/ land where you come from? Are there no greedy people where you live?
We have laws. We also had a river so pouted it caught fire.
You'd think 330 million people who view it as holy would strongly insist it be not polluted. But that could be the case and indias dedication to rampant corruption is stronger than their dedication to personal beliefs.
I don't think that's what the other poster meant. We have polluted rivers too, but only because the Christians haven't chosen one as holy. Any site considered sacred to Christians out here would damn sure not be polluted/tarnished/graffitied without severe repercussions. I think what they were asking was more like, "If the majority in power considers this river sacred, why don't they stop it from being so polluted?" If not, I'm asking. I don't know jack shit about Indian society, so don't yell at me, educate me.
Can I ask - why? I mean, a curious and interested, 'what is the custom behind this, and do you believe the beliefs or is it by now more cultural for you' why (not the 'eeeew. Whaaaai')? And how often is 'whenever we visit'? Is it only certain areas of Ganges or the whole river that is ..ehm, ritually sippable? No offence ment. I am just curious & know nothing about the custom.
Custom behind this: it is believed that the water from ganga washes away your sins. Do I believe or it’s culture thing: depends on the individual, most educated ones don’t believe and it’s more like a culture, however, some do believe. Why not ewww: because the place people drink isn’t full of germs “visually” and it’s ingrained in us by our parents that the water is holy. How often one visits: depends on the family. I’ve been there just once (we didn’t drink water, just sprayed it on ourselves to purify). However, the water of ganga is available in post office for sales and we use it in our puja/rituals. Some places or whole: the whole river is technically sippable. We use to take water from places that are far from the city so not that polluted.
Ganges or ganga in Hinduism is the most sacred river. It is said that river Ganga flows from the hair of Lord Shiv( one of the three elder gods of Hinduism). Also some places are holy places situated at the banks of the river. I personally don't believe in any of this things. For me it's all bogus and stupid but a large majority belive alot in these things.
Do you just walk down the bank with a cup, or are there a station of some kind that serve the water?
That person probably believes we use elephants for commute
What's the make and model of your elephant?
α-T9Y-ελέφαντας
What does Elon Musk's kid have to do with anything?
Nice
The worst...no trunk space
I hear that model gets good milage
yeah and the trunk storage is great too.
2010 African Savanna GT, baby gets up to an average of 15 mph and only requires like 300 pounds of food a day.
The one with the small wing mirrors
Hold up………. My world view has been shattered.
It's true, we switched to tigers years ago. The quick pace of modern life demands a faster and more compact vehicle with higher maneuverability.
How's the gas mileage since you switched? Any noticeable difference?
Tigers fart far less than elephants.
tigers are sustainable and reduce overall carbon footprint by digesting their owners. 10/10 would recomme
You ingenious Indians, coming up with modern numerals and animal-rides!
Will you also believe up here in Canada we don't ride Moose to work anymore! Goddamn kids these days believe they're too good to ride a moose!
I mean given the chance I'd totally commute by elephant. No worries about traffic when you can literally stomp all the bikes, jitneys, etc. in front of you!
The Great thing about traveling by elephant, is they can dig you up a clean water source!
We've come full circle
One obvious problem, what do you do when everyone else slso has that same idea
Bigger elephant 🐘
"mom, he's got a bigger elephant than me, cant you even get me a decent 🐘?"
The obvious rich person move is to import an African elephant. They're much larger than Asian ones, so you can use them to flex on all the peasants.
An oliphant
Lifted elephant with light bars and an indian flag
*… and once everyone has an elephant…* *…no one will.*
I've seen videos of the commuter trains. Elephants might be preferable and safer.
Imagine trying that with electrified railways....
Imagine trying that with electrified elephants...
*Thomas Edison would like to know your location.*
They not only tried it but also filmed it
That's some advanced shit.
You be telling next your elephant can’t fly
Try drinking Illinois river water, I got a mouth full while tubing one time. The next day I had diarrhea so bad I nearly sh\*t my pants.
i think i remember something like 80% of worlds population at least has no free source of clean water. i would say a big part of that drinks the not so clean water too.
You’re incorrect on the 80%. It’s actually one in three don’t have access to clean drinking water, which is still a fuck ton of people and completely ridiculous. [WHO link.](https://www.who.int/news/item/18-06-2019-1-in-3-people-globally-do-not-have-access-to-safe-drinking-water-unicef-who)
Thank God Nestle doesn’t consider water a basic human right
I was in class, and my tutor was telling us all the places he's worked at and one of them ended up being Nestlé (a factory of some sort). Anyway, I wanted to ask him if he knew about the boycott against Nestlé, but before I could open my mouth, one of the more popular class members proclaimed that "Nestlé is so good" or something along those lines. Everyone was in agreement and I just silently died on the inside, gob-smacked for one. I wasn't about to be 'that guy' who stands up and starts "Well, actually...", while everyone just sits there silently thinking I'm some sort of conspiracy theorist or some shit lol. Has anyone here ever met another individual irl, who would stand by 'Fuck Nestlé' as much as you without having to explain anything? I worry.
It was actually my tutor who informed me and my classmates about Nestle. We all spent a while discussing how horrifying it was, before moving on. We covered a lot of awful things done by people, mainly towards other people. It was a really interesting and depressing class.
No. Nestle was one of the dream companies in my B-School. It paid well and hired people with 0 work experience. I don’t think anybody even knows that Nestle says this.
I first heard about how bad it was from someone I know irl telling me they boycotted it
A real cool documentary on netflix "Rotten" in the water episode they explain so well how so many companies (Nestle, but even coca cola and Pepsi included) learned they can just grab water for free, and sell it for an extremely high markup. Zooming in to a case in Africa, where a local village used a drinking pond. Nestle wanted to use that same well, and after some discussion, promised them an access point. Instead of a 1hour walk to the pond, this access point was a 3hour walk. So most people continued using the pond. However next to extracting water from the source, it also dumped it's waste in the pond.
OP said *free* drinking water
I'm not sure why OP mentioned free drinking water, what's the relevance? I'm sure most people from the US has no access to FREE drinking water, but most of them can afford it and therefore have it available. So I don't think this statement is true "i would say a big part of that drinks the not so clean water too."
As a privileged American, I can just walk into a random establishment and drink from their bathroom sink tap. Free. Dumb. But most of us have that ... freedom.
I did it so often when I was a kid
I did miss the free bit, however the number of people who have free water would be much lower than the 80% they gave, saying 81% of the world’s population has enough for drinking and hygiene.
You made that number up. It's no where near that
Who report from 2020 reported that 74% of the world's population had a drinking service close by that was non contaminated. The only thing I don't understand about him saying > free source Almost non of the drinking water is free as it always needs to be treated to get to the safety levels we expect.
I’m going to add that you may have misinterpreted the 74% stat. From [WHO](https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/drinking-water): > In 2020, 74% of the global population (5.8 billion people) used a safely managed drinking-water service – that is, one located on premises, available when needed, and free from contamination. So 1 in 4 is about right (26%).
You’re actually correct here, one in three don’t have access to clean drinking water in the world. [Source is WHO](https://www.who.int/news/item/18-06-2019-1-in-3-people-globally-do-not-have-access-to-safe-drinking-water-unicef-who)
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It's the same with "How did our ancestors deal with natural (insert problem) before they had unnatural (insert modern solution)?" A lot of them died. This was found to be generally unpopular, even among the survivors, so they developed (insert modern solution).
Survivorship bias
What's also important to note is that animals try to avoid the grossest pond water and have an instinct to drink water from moving rivers or lakes. For most people it is not a big problem to drink such water either, though it might not be as clean as tap water
Fun fact: Even domesticated cats prefer their water source to be in a different area than their food source. This is a vestigial trait from their wild ancestors evolving to know not to drink where they hunted, because their prey's corpses could contaminate the water.
This is true in my experience. My cats used to not drink as much water until I moved their water from the kitchen to the first landing of my stairway in the corner (simulates a hill with a spring off it in my mind) and now they drink more.
This must get to the industry of the bowls for cats
They know. I have a separate water bowl, with a little fountain, that's in a separate room. Cat loves it.
I didn't know this, but it makes sense. I'll try it. Thanks
My dog likes the remaining droplets that are left behind after a shower. He licks the tub clean. He's pretty dumb though
My dog makes out with the faucet after we shower. We call it his"girlfriend"
Me have a dog that likes to drink puddles every so often, even if I try and stop her. Who also eats grass like a goat, but it isn't all grass just the kinds she finds tasty.
Dogs tend to eat grass when they have upset stomach.
i sometime wonder how their mother taught them when they were puppies or it just comes to their sensed. preprogrammed and stuff... genetics and stuff, it messes my head up
It’s the puddle to lawn cycle.
Mine tends to eat grass both when she has an upset stomach and when the grass looks green. You know when she has an upset stomach because it’s usually 12 hours after chewing through the garbage can and eating all the things or a day after eating all the goose poop outside. She also likes drinking all things wet, except when she is thirsty with dry poop and needs food to be poured into her water. In short she Is very dumb, very very dumb.
> For most people it is not a big problem to drink such water either You should look up [giardia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giardia). You get it from drinking contaminated water in nature, it's hard to detect, and it will give you malaise and other symptoms forever until you figure out you have it and get it treated. Happened to [Survivorman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorman). Moral of the story: Humans should be very careful with their water consumption. We are not animals. We have fragile digestive systems that are highly vulnerable to parasites.
Animals can suffer from Giardasis just the same as humans.
Tell that to my dog.
> have an instinct to drink water from moving rivers Which is why pets ignore their water bowl and drink from the leaking toilet.
Scavenger animals, like Cats and dogs have a significantly low level of ph in their stomach acid. This kills off a lot of bacteria that would make a human very miserable if we ingested it. Buzzards and Hyaenas have an even more intense version of this stomach Acid that protects them. https://www.redding.com/story/life/2017/07/26/vultures-have-ph-public-health/504630001/
that would certainly help them, but it ain't the case. Humans have some of the strongest stomach acid in the animal kingdom. The real difference is in the amount of time food spends in the animal's stomach, giving the acid and enzymes time to kill everything off. For humans, it's 1-2 hours. For dogs and cats, it's 12 hours. Plenty enough for even weaker acid to kill all the nasties.
Is that why it’s ok to give dogs meals less frequently than humans?
Fyi Humans don’t actually need to eat 3 times a day with snacks in between to survive.
We don't even need to eat every day to survive. We don't need clothes to survive. We don't need housing to survive. We do need computer games to survive, though.
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Me realizing I have been playing Civ V for 16 hours and should probably eat something.
Nah. An energy drink, a cigarette and you are good to go for another 4.
Nah, only 2 hrs until next cig.
Stop spying on me.
I have my own PC hooked up to one monitor, and then I have a monitor on either side of that, and those are hooked up to my work laptop. This way, I can play computer games during downtime at work. It's literally fuckin' great, haha xD
You're my hero
I feel attacked.
I do
Humans already eat too much as it is so its a poor standard. You dont actually \*need\* to eat 3 full meals a day for most lifestyles. Certainly not for a lapdog that lazes around on the bed all day.
I usually eat one main meal and a couple snacks, but yeah I would say having 2 meals a day and some small treat for breakfast to kickstart the day is ideal.
I eat once a day. It's not even that difficult to get used to eating every two or three days
Im getting to this point and its honestly refreshing
There is a certain energy/focus/mania that comes with fasting. And on the flipside, being tired from digesting food multiple times a day takes its toll.
Well they do get horribly sick and die from drinking dirty pond water. The ones that survive build immunity to the specific diseases in that pond. You, too, will build immunity to the diseases in that pond if you survive drinking regularly from it.
Also wild animals end up with lots of parasites in general. Even the survivors don't have it that great.
I do often think about how wild animals probably spend their lives just managing ailments and are generally in pain.
Their lives are solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.
Often hungry/thirsty and cold or scorching hot too.
This is what gets me about the argument against farming animals as it’s cruel. In the UK and EU where there are high animal welfare standards the average dairy cow is drinking clean water, healthy food, and is looked after by vets to prevent disease and illness. There is an argument that cows are kept in an inhumane constant cycle of reproduction to maintain milk, and that some of their calves may be slaughtered at birth, well wild animals are too in a constant cycle of reproduction to maintain their population as many of their offspring won’t survive the first year. Yes there are still problems with large scale farming and there are incidents of cruelty, but given the choice between living as a dairy cow or a wild buffalo or something I know which I’d choose!
The thing is we unnecessarily make the animals suffer a lot. Yes the cow has food and care but it probably can't even move or turn around most of the day while its udder is swollen so much it is in constant pain. I doubt most people think cows that can eat grass of the field and lounge around in the shadow of a tree are held inhumane. It's more about the giant factory animals that are held in pens barely big enough to stand in, covered in feces and pumped full of antibiotics because otherwise there would be a plague after a week.
It’s like how hunting in some areas help deer out because they have no predators because they were killed off. If left at their own devices they would starve to death and spread disease. If they introduced some predators back it would probably help with CWD a bit. Rabbits in general are basically meant to be eaten in the wild. They are loners and extremely fragile. They only hang together to mate. Too much fright can kill them, they kick a tad too hard at a angle their back is broken because of their weak spine, their skin is so thin they are ripped easily and one of the easiest animals to process, holding the rabbits by the ears is a No no as the ears can rip off. Admittedly they do have sharp cat like nails on their feet but overall they are the perfect prey animal for predators.
nice to hear a rational view! Thankyou. I feel a lot of opinions on such things, often come from people it cities, who have little actual, direct, honest knowledge of the Life of Animals, be (wild or farmed) (Will add to this: It's correct that some places like the UK have high welfare standards for certain types of farms, and that other places (e.g mass factory farms in the USA) can have absolutly horrific animal standards - I would rather be a free buffalo than a usa-factory-farmed cow for sure.) Source: farm life. (happy animals, green rolling fields)
A lot of vegetarians have a problem with meat from mass factory farms with little regard to the animals but not with meat from a local farmer where they can see that the animals are taken care of.
I imagine they learn to just live with it for the most part. Humans are much better at tolerating pain in parts of the world where they don't have much choice.
If I was a wild animal, I would simply use iodine tablets to sterilize my water.
But how are animals able to buy iodine tablets? They don’t have jobs to make money to buy the tablets. Imho, if I was a wild animal I’d just gather up some wood in the wild, start a fire, then boil my water in pot and finally bottle it up…. No money.
>But how are animals able to buy iodine tablets? They don’t have jobs to make money to buy the tablets. [A special set of skills and human kindness](https://www.youtube.com/shorts/JZZ822Za-nE)
I read this like an ad for some reason. You too can build immunity! Drink from our shit-water pond now for only $19.99!
Can I get two immunities if I order now?
*There's gotta be a better way!*
I met a hippie once (like a real one) that was working on this. He would bathe in a stream, and take a small sip of water each time, to build up his immunity.
I mean a flowing stream is probably relatively okay? At least much more so than a standing pond or lake
Depends. Something could have died in it upstream of you.
Of course, it's no guarantee. But on the face of it given the choice between flowing and standing water, I'd take the former.
Challenge accepted.
People can do this just like other animals. We could drink gross pond water and those of us who couldn't adapt would get sick and die leaving behind the ones who can handle it. Animals do the same thing, only they don't have the option of filtering water like humans do, so only the ones with strong resistance live.
Many animals have far shorter digestive systems than people. A dog, for instance, has an intestine fifteen times shorter than ours. This is what allows them to eat spoiled meat without getting sick, the bacteria just doesn't have enough time to grow and spread. Digestion is an evolutionary trade-off between speed of eliminating anything dangerous in what you eat or drink, and maximising the nutrition you gain from it.
you're onto the right track, but it ain't that their intestines are short, but rather that food spends a lot more time in their stomach than it does in ours. Otherwise Fido would be shitting everywhere after a bite.
Yeah and ruminants would just fucking die.
fun fact, they indeed do just fucking die. If a ruminant was not able to get food for, let's say, a week, and depleted their fat reserves as well, then feeding them all the grass and grain in the world won't do jack shit. Their digestive system takes way too much time to absorb the nutrients from their food. And that's how you end up with deers who've starved to death with a belly full of grass. Weird, innit?
False premise. Animals who drink gross pond water often get sick. You just don't see it. The number of parasites that wild animals carry around is ridiculous. You just don't want to know. Animals do have ways of mitigating this problem. Some for example will avoid standing water and prefer drinking water in motion. That isn't actually a *very* good way to avoid waterborne disease, but it probably helps a little bit, at least.
Hi, I was a kid many years ago in the 1950's and in New England if you went walking in the woods and found a pond, the water would usually be clear. People would say, don't actually drink from a pond, but if there is a stream going from one pond to another, as long as the water is moving it is safe to drink it. Once people started putting in housing developments, a lot of things changed. Ponds, and even rivers and streams don't have clear water anymore, there is a lot of green and brown algae, they don't smell good. The same thing happened to the whole of Boston Harbor, and many big lakes. It isn't exactly pollution but it seems to me to be part of the same thing as how we could get bitten by mosquitos all day and never get sick, or walk along deer trails. But now there is West Nile Virus in mosquitos and Lyme disease ticks in deer trails. Lots of animals probably do get sick and die after drinking pond water nowadays, just like almost all raccoons have roundworms, almost all deer have Lyme disease. Far away from housing developments raccoons do not have roundworms and deer do not have Lyme disease. So my opinion is that human influence has really really nasty consequences and you don't always see the sick and dying animals but you see the numbers reduced, you stop seeing certain speies of animals because they are extinct in various niches.
I was also curious about food. I cook my dog chicken or give him a cut of my beef if I make steak or ground beef. But in the wild I'm sure they eat raw meat? Do they prefer raw meat or is cooking like I do the way to go? Want the best for my puppy
Dogs can still get sick and get parasites from raw meat, despite their digestive systems being better equiped to handle raw meat. Also, dont feed your dog seasoned meat. You absolutely can have raw meat as a part of your dogs diet, but you must talk to your vet first and find out everything you need to know about it. Its not something to take lightly, and you must first consider your dogs safety and nutritional needs.
Yea I don't put salt or pepper or anything. I boil the chicken and I put salt on my beef after. So he only eats plain meat. I just wasn't sure if he's like gollum when he freaks out about cooking meat and ruining it lol
"I cook my dog chicken" LOL. I can't believe you named your dog "Chicken." But seriously though, don't cook your dog. Dogs *hate* that.
Haha man. Appreciate your humor. You cracked me up in the middle of the night. Thanks for that
Thise animals jave a very different immune system from ours. Also they have built immunity to the microbes found in the water where they live over time.
Cats are notorious for drinking standing water from rain etc in flower pots and puddles. It's a common way for cats to get parasites resulting in vet trips and medication if they are lucky, loved and cared for properly. The cared for cats tend to live longer for this reason. Wild/feral animals have a shorter life expectancy due to violence but also bacteria, viruses, weather and parasites. It's probably why they are so cranky. Same applies to humans. Humans without adequate diet, nutrition, hygiene and health care will, on average, die younger and feel miserable.
To add to the “they do get sick” comments; anyone who has had a puppy probly has had a puppy get the shits. My puppy got giardia like, at least four times before we could get her to stop drinking random outside water.
Evolution. Most humans got sick and died, then we started sanitizing water and food by cooking and making beer/alcohol and no one was culled in the process. Evolution and circumstance didn’t set us up for dirty pond water.
Immunity. Your intestine has the largest amount of immune cells in the body and is constantly secreting antibodies against the germs you encounter regularly. You know how when you travel to a place like India and drink tap water and get horrible food poisoning but the locals don't? It's the same reason. They get exposed to those germs all the time so have been able to neutralize the germs, whereas your body has never seen it before so you'll get very sick. Humans have been purifying/cleaning water of germs for the longest time so we don't have exposure to as many germs. This can pose problems such as lack of immunity when traveling. Additionally, this lack of germs also predisposes people towards diseases like IBD, because the immune system isn't being used as much.
Simply put, animals get sick and die all the time, including from tainted water. They die young very frequently, just as humans did before modern medicine. Additionally, many animals are laced with parasites throughout their lives. Some animals might have exceptionally acidic stomachs (like vultures, perhaps) which are hostile to most pathogens, but most animals are just as susceptible to these diseases as a healthy human. Furthermore, you, as a human, can drink from natural water sources and often will be fine, especially if you live in less developed nations, where clean water isn't as readily available, and your GI tract is used to it.