What’s the straitght dope on filtered water? These companies are telling me that there are all of these poisons in tap water, but my hippy friend tells me that filtered water also filters out good things that my body needs. Will I be healthier drinking filtered or tap?
Filters out the good things in water like… what?
the hydrogen and oxygen?
the only other good things would be minerals, which you should get from your food too, and maybe the city adds flouride, which I would think your hippy friend (is it hippie or hippy?) would oppose.
So which is healthier?
Guess it depends on where you live maybe? In Paris people are told about how good the tap water is and that there is no need to filter it.
I don’t think it’s going to make too much of a difference in the long run.
Oh, and non-hippys drink filtered water too !
Play it safe. Just eat the Hippie.
IE won a googlefight against Y.
It depends on your water. There’s nothing to be filtered out except fluoride; it’s a good idea to drink fluoridated water, but it’s not essential. On the other hand, if your water doesn’t have something like lead or arsenic, why bother?
In my neck of the woods, it is purely a matter of taste.
Our tap water is perfectly safe, but tastes nasty. Run it through a filter and it tastes great.
For a somewhat more definitive answer, you might want to check with the NSF, which is the authoritative source on these matters, presumably even more so than your hippie friend. 
Check out www.nsf.org
The blanket statement that water filtration isn’t necessary is silly. Studies repeatedly show that about 50 percent of water wells in the US have contaminants above currently accepted safe levels. Moreover, a recent report–within the last 6 weeks–documents that the water in the nation’s cities is more contaminated than the EPA and local authorities report to the public.
Water can be contaminated in many ways: by excessive chlorine, perticides, fertilizers, bacteria, nitrates, radionucleids, industrial products, microorganisms, heavy metals and more. Most cities have relatively safe water, but prudence is wise. There are many types of filtration systems, each with its own advantages; most do not filter out flouride and flouride promotes good oral hygiene. Beware of Internet purveyors with screaming or alarmist sales pitches; hucksters abound.
GE, Whirlpool and PUR sells a complete line of filtration devices. The best first step is to have a reputable laboratory test your water, so you can assess what your next step should be.
A good many filtering systems remove calcium. Even with a balanced diet, many people are short of calcium, which is vital for bone and muscle health.
For example, water in many areas of Washington DC was recently found to have high levels of lead. Many inexpensive consumer filters are able to remove something like 95% of lead from drinking water, reducing lead back down to a save level. The EPA advises consumers in these affected areas to filter their water.
However, many have speculated that there was too much lead in the drinking water for some time before the EPA caught it. Therefore it may be a good idea to filter your water even if you don’t know it’s contaminated. Sending water to a lab for testing may be the best idea but honestly it’s probably cheaper just to buy the filters. Plus you may find that filtered water tastes better. Take a vitamin or drink more milk if you think you need more calcium.
Most home filters will not remove fluoride. Fluoride is removed by reverse osmosis and distillation* - not by charcoal or ceramic pitcher or faucet filters.
*and reverse osmosis and distillation remove many beneficial minerals. “Drinking water” has some of those minerals added back in, but the absorption rate of those minerals is debatable.
Hippie = new-age nature-loving grass-consuming bath-avoider
Hippy = too many Malomars
Just trying to help.
This strikes me as a very silly statement.
Clearly you don’t live in Milwaukee. I don’t think any water filter will remove fluoride, by the way; the fluoride compounds are much to fine to be filtered out. Filtration primarily removes bacteria, water-bourne parasites, and large nonorganic contaminants If you want to drink nonfluoridated water you need to drink distilled water or rainwater.
And I’m surprised, and a little disappointed perhaps, that the thread has made it this far without a Dr. Strangelove reference. “I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion, and the international Communist conspiracy continue to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.”
Stranger