Oddbean new post about login | logout Jury awards $229M to victims of “Real Water” tainted with rocket fuel chemical An expert witness testified hydrazine was likely formed during an electrolysis process. https://arstechnica.com/health/2023/10/jury-awards-229m-to-victims-of-real-water-tainted-with-rocket-fuel-chemical/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/190/499/770/817/934/original/8aed015e6718869f.jpeg
@872ab8e1 Seems a good time for a reminder that "alkaline water" has absolutely zero health benefits. It's just a matter of a certain sort of taste and texture. Otherwise there are exactly zero benefits. People get lead into ideas like that it can somehow balance their blood pH or something. It doesn't. If it could affect your blood pH at all you'd end up in the hospital. Your body keeps blood pH in a very very tightly controlled range. Alkaline water will not change this.
@872ab8e1 And this is why we need well funded regulatory agencies. These snake oil sellers should've been required to have the product tested *before* being allowed to take it to market. The fine is some pale consolation to people whose kids ended up in the hospital with liver failure.
@872ab8e1 I've read Ignition! and yo, hydrazine isn't just a rocket fuel chemical, it's a freaking monopropellant! It's like the main one because all the other monoprops tend to freaking explode if you look at them wrong, or produce clouds of fun stuff like heavy metals! At least it wasn't a bimethyl mercury derivative?
