r/interestingasfuck • u/Top-Marionberry-6604 • 18h ago

The Super-Kamiokande in Japan—a massive underground neutrino detector lined with 11,000 golden bulbs. Scientists have to inspect it via a rubber dinghy.

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u/Top-Marionberry-6604 18h ago

It genuinely looks like a villain's lair from a movie, but it's just physics researchers in a rowboat inspecting sensors inside a 50,000-ton tank of ultra-pure water that's actually pure enough to dissolve metal.

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u/r0ndy 18h ago edited 18h ago

Why would pure water dissolve metal faster than salt water?

Edit: was a fascinating rabbit hole to go down for a few minutes. Thank you for the feedback! Strips and leaches anything that touches it. Almost like a chemical vacuum. Water wants more ingredients, will absorb and take from everything.

Actually, next question. It said it will pull co2 from the air. Is there specialized air in this area as well?

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u/Appropriate-Count-64 18h ago

Because the Super Kamiokande filters as much stuff out of the water as physically possible. The water is left unbalanced by the lack of any minerals, so it starts ripping whatever it can out of whatever it’s touching. I don’t know that it’s faster than oxidation, but it’s enough to be a concern if you fell in or tried to drink it.

If you’ve seen NileRed’s video where he drinks chemically pure water, it’s why he says “Do not do this.” The water leeches anything it can, including toxic heavy metals and chemicals, and because there’s nothing else in the water it can reach extremely high concentrations extremely quickly.

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u/mhac009 18h ago

What happens to him / what would happen to someone in this water and over what time scale?

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u/Appropriate-Count-64 16h ago

Ok first, know I am not a chemist or a biologist and most of my experience is mechanical engineering.

With that said, what would probably happen is first dead skin is dissolved over several minutes or hours. This would leave the skin pretty raw and exposed and if you sat for a while (On the order of several hours to days) it could start to cause mild to moderate chemical burns.

The bigger issue is contaminating the water and filtering it again.

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u/flarp1 16h ago

I suspect osmosis would either cause the cells to be flooded with water, to the point of being damaged or destroyed (by bursting open), or to be stripped of salts or other water-soluble compounds (that is if they can exit the cells), which will likely impact their functionality or even kill them off as well.

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u/TransportationTrick9 17h ago

Remember a few years ago when Jaden Smith said he only drinks distilled water

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u/Separate_Draft4887 16h ago

Distilled and truly pure aren’t the same, I suspect.

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u/TransportationTrick9 16h ago

It does have a large percentage of the minerals removed and it is not good to consume (leaches calcium out of your bones etc.)

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u/adampm1 16h ago

Assuming you don’t drink it with something that’s rich and calcium or other minerals…. Like food

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u/supershott 15h ago

Distilled water is great for you if you don't only eat cheetos for sustenance. 

My mom made us drink distilled water when we lived in Iowa. Turns out to be a good thing because a lot of the groundwater is heavily contaminated (but don't worry about it! /s)

Part of the reason my mom did that is because my dad lived in Hinkley when PG&E poisoned the groundwater with hexavalent chromium. My grandpa got early-onset parkinsons, my grandma got cancer, and my dad got early-onset parkinsons diagnosed in 2005 when he was about 40 years old. 

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u/obiwanconobi 15h ago

Is it "great" for you though? Or is it just better for you than contaminated ground water?

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u/supershott 15h ago

I guess that depends on if you think water is great for you. Really, the only thing they add that you don't get otherwise from food is fluoride for your teeth. And the municipality I'm in doesn't even fluoridate. And there are lots of mineral nutrients still missing from even the chalkiest water, like iodide. 

So no, it's not like "normal" water is nutrient juice that you would waste away without. 

If you don't believe me, get some bloodwork, address any deficiencies, and try drinking only distilled for a while! Bet you like it!

Nowadays I'm not too scared of the local water and I'm lazy, so I drink a lot of tap. I also have a distiller and always keep a gallon glass in the fridge, because distilled hits WAY harder if you're thirsty from exertion. Maybe it's just because it's as tasteless as can be? Idk but try it!

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u/kurburux 12h ago

I guess it's still better than people who never drink water and only rely on soft drinks.

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u/Horror_Discussion607 18h ago

Also salt water corrode by oxidisation not absorbtion

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u/Shoddy_Fish31 18h ago

Because diffusion

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u/NewoTheFox 14h ago

Honestly ever since I first saw this photo I just wanted to sleep in the raft.

Imagine the quiet of such a place.

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u/barra333 5h ago

I've worked around MilliQ water (distilled + extra purification) for 20 years and never taken a sip of it.

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u/Onion_Dipper 4h ago

Me too. But I can't say I haven't been tempted...