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India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

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Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#191

Post by mschuster91 »

ralfd wrote: post #107
newsat13 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It showed a Indians in a tiny village who were falling ill because they were literally taking a shit in the same river that they were getting their drinking water from, just a few meters away. Many things that are obvious to now are not obvious unless we are rightly educated. You might like to read http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/01/12/37566392... which believe it or not is not even 150 years old.

Sure, but non-obvious things often manifest in culture nonetheless. For example the romans with their mighty aqueducts, cleanliness rules in religion, drinking tea (needs boiled water) or beer/wine (alcohol desinfects), or being obsessed that evil witches dont poison your wells etc.

> drinking tea beer/wine (alcohol desinfects)

Also, beer provides large amounts of calories, so it also feeds the consumer with low risk of the "food" getting stale. There's a reason why in Bavaria a fat belly is called a "Bierbauch" ;)

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#192

Post by lacampbell »

clock_tower wrote: post #65
Cyph0n wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, this is quite baffling. The only answer I can think of is that India hasn't been prioritizing education in rural communities. Population is not a valid excuse: do people still shit where they drink in China? I'm more understanding when it comes to the lack of basic sanitation facilities, but lack of education is inexcusable in this day and age!

China used night soil as fertilizer historically; they don't anymore (when was the practice abandoned, I wonder? And is there any Chinese interest in terra preta?), but it got them into great habits. The same is true for at least Korea and Japan; I don't know as much about Southeast Asia. Only drinking hot drinks also helped China's health. Fernand Braudel, in The Structures of Everyday Life , discusses this in passi…

The hot water thing was nothing more than a method to kill bacteria AFAIK. In much of Europe the preferred way of doing that was to produce beer.

Many East Asians to this day still believe that hot water is better for your health, even when filtered water is cheap and plentiful. If you ask for water at a restaurant it will inevitably be warm. I've had people express concern when drinking cold water during the winter, or when I'm sick.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#193

Post by lacampbell »

Laforet wrote: post #180
Banthum wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's far beyond "toddlers in rural China commonly poop in the street". In downtown Shanghai I got to watch a mother walk out of her business holding her child, have the child crap on the sidewalk (while being held in the mothers' arms), and then brought back inside. This was not a baby. The kid looked about 3-4 years old. This goes on in subway stations as well. The parent has the kid sit on the edge of a garbage can…

This arises from a mixture of two things: A strong agrarian tradition where no piece of human waste is going to be left festering in the sun - somebody is going to pick it up and make good use of it. In all seriousness this has been the case until chemical fertilisers became cheap enough, before then every town had organised dung-gatherer guilds who organised daily cleanup of faeces in the street and sold the product…

I'm not sure I buy the first two explanations. Taiwan is culturally Chinese, but if someone takes a crap on the street it'd be a small news story. Usually it's blamed on mainland tourists.

I'd say it's more to do with development than anything else.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#194

Post by JabavuAdams »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #144
Pica_soO wrote: post #113

The thing that strikes me as the most odd - is that until ww1 (thats right the recent Battlefieldified one)- soldiers would carry talismans into the battle, that where supposed to make them bulletproof and immortal. Thats right, something that sounds oh, so exotic, right in the midst of the west. Also, it helps if you look at the Congo and Europe during WW2. The same chaos, the same refugee rows, the same anarchy and…

If someone's shooting at you, you're going to make damn sure you take every measure possible to not get shot. There are no atheists in foxholes.

> There are no atheists in foxholes.

This is just a thing that people say that doesn't stand up to even cursory scrutiny.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#195

Post by Declanomous »

mschuster91 wrote: post #191
ralfd wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but non-obvious things often manifest in culture nonetheless. For example the romans with their mighty aqueducts, cleanliness rules in religion, drinking tea (needs boiled water) or beer/wine (alcohol desinfects), or being obsessed that evil witches dont poison your wells etc.

> drinking tea beer/wine (alcohol desinfects) Also, beer provides large amounts of calories, so it also feeds the consumer with low risk of the "food" getting stale. There's a reason why in Bavaria a fat belly is called a "Bierbauch" ;)

A fat belly is literally called a beer gut or a beer belly in English as well.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#196

Post by indogooner »

agustamir wrote: post #15

I hope that all these toilets being built are actually being used, serviced and maintained by the people of the community. I have seen TV reports where these toilets were being built to achieve targets and end up being either filthy because no one maintained them, or used as storage(?). This, along with a massive awareness drive(the govt has some ads running on tv) to push people towards using these toilets. Many cha…

Unfortunately your fears are not unfounded. I have been to a village which is supposed to be model village for the constituency (adopted by the ruling party legislator). Open defecation has not reduced significantly. The toilets built are in a deplorable state and if people are not using them it is understandable. I think the public is also to be blamed for this but if the legislator can't introduce/inculcate mindset change in just one model village in their constituency it is not encouraging.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#197

Post by ilyagr »

delecti wrote: post #58
nojvek wrote: post #4

Two of the most forward thinking folks I believe are Bill Gates and Elon Musk. While Elon wants to carve way into science fiction, Bill wants to ensure no one gets left behind. Exciting time to be alive. In this case big kudos goes to Narendra Modi and the Indian govt to ensure this happens. I believe such fundamental things are the most effective when govt pushes for it rather than individuals.

Two internet celebrities I follow (John and Hank Green) call those two approaches to making the world better "decreasing worldsuck" and "increasing awesome", and I really like that model of thinking. Obviously there are a lot of awesome things we can be doing in the world, but we can't let society leave people behind either.

Did you just translate the grandparent comment into silicon-valley-speak? It means the same thing, but sounds so much more marketable :)

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#198

Post by CydeWeys »

4684499 wrote: post #174
kirrent wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Literally in the linked Wikipedia article: "Although cast-iron cookware is known to transmit iron to food during cooking, the cost to obtain it is prohibitive for most of the individuals living in poverty in rural Cambodia, who earn less than $1 per day." In what world would a cast iron pan be cheaper than a small ingot?

What world? I don't know. I searched and find this website before commenting: http://www.luckyironfish.com/shop , which says It costs $25 each, while you can find $22 iron pan on Amazon. Sure it might be cheaper in Cambodia, then the price of iron pans would be lower as well. They didn't just use an ingot, they shaped the ingot into a lucky fish, which also costs money.

The ingots were distributed for free, and likely cost under a dollar each to manufacture in bulk.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#199

Post by fellellor »

4684499 wrote: post #174
kirrent wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Literally in the linked Wikipedia article: "Although cast-iron cookware is known to transmit iron to food during cooking, the cost to obtain it is prohibitive for most of the individuals living in poverty in rural Cambodia, who earn less than $1 per day." In what world would a cast iron pan be cheaper than a small ingot?

What world? I don't know. I searched and find this website before commenting: http://www.luckyironfish.com/shop , which says It costs $25 each, while you can find $22 iron pan on Amazon. Sure it might be cheaper in Cambodia, then the price of iron pans would be lower as well. They didn't just use an ingot, they shaped the ingot into a lucky fish, which also costs money.

Buying new pans is such a stupidly colossal waste of money for low income families. They already have pots and pans, and definitely don't need more. An ingot is something they can easily accommodate. And it probably costs a whole lot lesser than 20 USD.

Re: India Is Winning Its War on Human Waste

#200

Post by sbierwagen »

graycat wrote: post #100
avar wrote: post #16

> Unfortunately, in many places, it’s not > feasible to lay down sewer pipes or build > treatment facilities. [...] But giving > people access to toilets isn’t enough. You > also have to persuade them to use the > toilets. I can't find it now, but there was a news video making the rounds a year or two ago that showed that this problem is much more fundamental than that. It showed a Indians in a tiny village who were…

Don't need much in the way of sewer pipes. I live in the US, in NY, 70 miles north of Wall Street, in a house with two bathtubs, four sinks, three toilets, one washing machine, and one dish washer, with nearly no use of "sewer pipes". Right, no city sewer. Instead there is some PVC pipe, cheap, super simple to work with, darned rugged, and, presto, bingo, a big concrete box in the ground just behind the main piece of…

Why are you putting every other word in italics?
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