Our minus ion water 42,000 ions per cc air
As our water produces twice larger number of negative ions than ordinary city water, we call it "minus ion water". As for most of Japanese people, English word "minus" is much more familiar than English word "negative", so we have named our water "minus ion water".
Our minus ion water is made from city water itself, by making it pass through strong magnetic field (not only magnet but there is a patented small special device in it) as shown on the figure below. Four blocks in the left figure are magnets.(Sorry, in Japanese only)
Fig. Principle of minus ion water equipment
As our equipment doesn't touch the water, the composition of "minus ion water" remains as same as the original city water. So, we guess that the difference of the production of negative ions is not because of the changement of the composition, but because of the structural changement, which is mechanical or electrical or whatever, of the water itself.
Prof. Libbrecht's cirtics against Mr. Masaru Emoto's work
http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/myths/myths.htm
The Hidden Messages in Water
What do you think of the work of Masaru Emoto?
My opinion, you ask? The short answer is that I think Mr. Emoto's work is nothing more than the usual New-Age nonsense -- popular gibberish.If you haven't heard of Mr. Emoto, he has published several books claiming that ice crystals grow differently when water is first exposed to different thoughts and feelings. For example, he may start by playing assorted varieties of music -- jazz, classical, rock-and-roll, etc. -- to different containers of water. The "treated" water is then used to grow snow crystals under otherwise identical conditions. He claims that the different musical treatments yield different types of snow crystals, and shows us pictures to prove it. If you think it defies common sense that water does this, you are right. In fact water does not respond to thoughts and feelings; it's just water.
How then does one explain Mr. Emoto's experiments?
My best guess is that Mr. Emoto grows hundreds of crystals and then selects
different shapes to demonstrate whatever point he wishes to make.
For example, when the water was exposed to classical music he picks out
some beautiful crystals to show us. For rock-and-roll, he selects
some ugly crystals and shows us those. His conclusion -- classical
music makes beautiful crystals while rock-and-roll makes ugly ones.
What he does not show us is that both musical treatments actually made
the same numbers of beautiful and ugly crystals. In scientific circles
this is called picking your data to fit your hypothesis, and of course
it is considered fraud when it appears.
Do I know Mr. Emoto
does this? No, which is why I called it a guess. Mr. Emoto has never published
his work in a reputable scientific forum, where it would be scrutinized. He
only presents it in self-published books, where he is free to say whatever he
wants. Basic physics says the work cannot be correct, and Mr. Emoto has not
convinced the scientific community that his experiments have any merit
whatsoever.
I know one thing for sure, however. If Mr. Emoto's
work were correct, it would immediately be worthy of a Nobel Prize.
(And I should point out that not only is a Nobel Prize a great honor, it
includes a cash prize of several million dollars!) But the work is
not correct, and to date it has not attracted even the slightest scientific
attention. It's simply another example (there are so many out there!)
of New-Age nonsense trying to disguise itself as science.
Additional information about Mr. Emoto's work
I would like to show you a recent article issued in Japan.
"Aera", one of the quality weekly magazines in Japan, issued
an article about Mr. Emoto's work in December, last year as shown below.
Ms. Ariyoshi, a press lady of Aera, was allowed by Mr. Emoto to attend
his convention meeting and wrote the article which blamed him one-sidely,
introducing comments of 4 scientists who had been ciriticizing his work
since years ago.
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Aera 2005.12.05
In the article, there was also an interview of Mr. Emoto as below. In it,
he said clearly that his work was not a science but a kind of "poem"
or "fantasy".
He is selecting crystals
Also, when I had once a chance to attend his lecture meeting held in Osaka
for about 3 years ago, I remember that Mr. Emoto said without any hesitation
that he was selecting the best favorite crystals among several crystals
when he published a book.
For example, when he shows a picture of a crystal of a certain beautiful
spring water, he selects a crystal which is well representing his idea
about the spring among several crystals made from the spring water.
Why not?
I think it is a natural way for an ordinary person to do so.
Should one select ugly one? Or should one show all the pictures in the
limited pages of one's book?
Similarly, when he creates a fantasy of a water crystal which "listened
to" Mozart, of course he selects the best crystal for it among the
crystals which appear in the water which "listened to" Mozart.
If we consider his work as a kind of science, it must be unfair to select crystals. But if it is just a fantasy as he said, it may be rather natural for the author to select crystals.
Your guess
You blame him as follows.
For example, when the water was exposed to classical music he picks out some beautiful crystals to show us. For rock-and-roll, he selects some ugly crystals and shows us those. His conclusion -- classical music makes beautiful crystals while rock-and-roll makes ugly ones.
Yes, you are right so far. You don't need to guess. Mr. Emoto admitted
the fact by himself that he selected crystals.
But the next sentence is not necesarrily to be correct.
What he does not show us is that both musical treatments actually made the same numbers of beautiful and ugly crystals.
It is your guess.
I understand that you judged from your experience as an expert that there
should be no difference in the way of forming crystals whether the water
was exposed to classical music or rock music or whatever.
But if we consider those musics as the vibration of air, there might be
any slight difference or tendency in the way of shaping crystals among
waters which were exposed to different vibrations.
Probably, Mr. Emoto is feeling in his fantastic mind that there are differences in the numbers of beautiful crystals and ugly crystals depending on which music they are exposed to.
Though I don't have so much interest in the relation between the air vibration and the forming of crystals, at least we have to say that it is not sure whether the numbers of beautiful crystals and ugly crystals in Mr. Emoto's observation are the same or not, until he opens his data.
Is it fraud?
And finally you blame his activity as fraud.
In scientific circles this is called picking your data to fit your hypothesis,
and of course it is considered fraud when it appears.
If Mr. Emoto selects crystals of the water which was exposed to a music
other than Mozart and connects it to Mozart, then such a behavior must
be blamed as fraud, I agree, even if he is making a fantasy.
But what he did is to select the best favorite crystal among the crystals
of the waters which were once exposed to Mozart and connect it to Mozart
and make his fantasy of Mozart. Actually, all the pictures in his books
are selected by him in this manner. When he says that this is a crystal
of California water, then it is really the crystal selected form crystals
of California water, not of Arizona water nor Colorado water nor anything
esle. There seems to be no reason for Mr. Emoto to cheat people in this
point, because there are anyway many crystals.
I understand that Mr. Emoto doesn't think it a fake at all. He takes a
Mozart crystal among Mozart crystals and creates a fantasy of Mozart. His
story is completed in his brain without any conflict for him. It is just
his way of thinking.
Then, should we blame him as a fraud?
It is a kind of religion
Then Mr. Emoto steps a further step.
He says that water reacts to human being's consciousness and/or words,
even reacts to written letters.
In this case also he is selecting crystals along with his own feeling or
sense. So, it is impossible for any scientist to trace or prove whether
his report is true or not. There is no objectivity nor repeatability from
the first.
I think it is "out of science". Then it must be out of the scope
of scientific criticism.
It may be a kind of religion.
If you blame his thought as a new-age-nonsense, we may remember another
famous story that a dead man revived three days later.
Do people believe the revival story as a scientific truth? No, they don't.
Then , do people blame it as an old age nonsense? No they don't.
People understand scientifically that a dead man would never revive, because
it is out of the definition of death.
But they believe the story. It is out of science. It is a religion. People
believe what they want to believe, even if it is scientifically wrong.
It's a human society, isn't it?
Then, do people beleive Mr. Emoto's work as a science? Or do people expect
that modern scientists may happen to admit or approve the phenomenon that
water recognizes human being's words or thoughts?
Never.
Sound and common sensed people don't believe Mr. Emoto's work in the sense
of science. People know that science may explain half of the world, but
not the other half. There must be another world which modern science cannot
explain. People accept Mr. Emoto's story just as a fantasy of another world,
or I may say as a "religion".
In Japan, there are a few scientists who are blaming Mr. Emoto's thought
itself. They think that many Japanese people have already believed Mr.
Emoto's work as a science. And they think that many other people will come
to fall into the trap if they don't give any warnings to the society.
But it is only their misunderstanding. The real situation is not so. Not
so many people believe Mr. Emoto's work as a science.
In Japan, several hundreds of elementary school teachers are trying to
teach the kids the importance of the mind to thank others, showing Mr.
Emoto's fantasy. They say, " Even life-less water reacts to your good
mind, why not your family, your friends and your neighbors?" First
half of the lesson may be only a fantasy, but the last half of the lesson
is the truth. If you thank people, then the people will thank you. If you
hate people, then the people will hate you. This is the truth of the human
society which kids should learn at a certain stage. So the lesson is not
useless. But the class is "moral", not "science" of
course.
Mr. Emoto doesn't force nor lead the teachers to do so. Teachers have read
Mr. Emoto's book by themselves and have taken his idea to their educational
contents. Then, though those Japanese scientists can argue the matter with
those school teachers, they are not allowed to promote a social movement
or an internet chorus to force Mr. Emoto to give his fantasy up. Japanese
constitution doesn't allow such a crude behavior.
By the way, being contrary to the hope of teachers, kids are only halfly
listen to teachers' voices, but halfly want to escape from such a boring
class and play baseball. It is difficult to bring up religious kids in
the modernized countries, isn't it?
Scientific possibilities
Then, isn't there any room in Mr. Emoto's work to be reconsidered scientifically?
I think there is one point which should be studied further scientifically, which is that Mr. Emoto reported that the probability of the appearance of crystals is different by samples and there is seen some tendency depending on samples.
He divides a sample water into 50 containers and freezes them. In the case
of city water of big city like Tokyo, it is hard to see any crystals in
the 50 containers, but in a certain famous spring water, for example, there
comes out a crystal in 5 or 6 containers, which is around 10%. Then Mr.
Emoto evaluates that it is good, powerful water.
But our result was much more remarkable.
We brought our "minus ion water" which is made from Tokyo city
water to Mr. Emoto's reseach facility.
It was also divided into 50 containers in the usual way, and as a result they reported to us that they found each one beautiful crystal in 47 containers, which is 94% probability.
our result is 47/50 = 94%
Fig. Water crystal of our minus ion water
As I mentioned before, our "minus ion water" could produce much
more negative ions in the atmosphere than ordinary city water. As there
is no difference in the composition of the waters, we guess that it can
be a result of a slight electrical or mechanical unknown changement of
the structure of water itself.
Here we find the difference of the probability of the appearance of crystals
depending on water samples. It may also indicate the unknown slight changement
of the structure of water itself.
Mr. Emoto's method of observing crystals
Mr. Emoto's way of observing crystals is, at first to drop about 1 cc water
in a container and keep it in the freezing room at the temperature of minus
25 degrees centigrade for 2 or 3 hours. Then the water freezes and makes
a shape like a kiss-me chocolate.
Then they take it out to the other room of around minus 5 degrees centigrade
temperature and observe the ice with the microscope under a bright light.
The expansion ratio of the microscope is 200, they say.
Then at the timing when the ice starts to melt, there comes out a crystal
at the top of the kiss-me chocolate shape. The dimension of the completed
crystals is around 0.2 mm diameter, they say.
They observe only the top of the kiss-me cholate shape. They don't see
any other part. They say that the branches of the crystal grow horizontally
and at the same time the thickness of the crystal grows vertically upwards.
How the crystal is formed?
I guess that the ice starts to melt by the heat of the light, and vaporization starts at the surface of the ice.
Then there are generated vapor flows along with the surface of the ice
towards the top of the kiss-me chocolate shape as shown on the drawing
left.
When the vapor flows go away from the top of the ice, there may happen
an effect of a kind of "heat-less expansion" and the temperature
of the top of the ice or the vapor around the top becomes lower again.
The temperature will be low enough to freeze the water around the top again
or crystalize the water or vapor around the top.
It is only my guess.
But if it is right, the amount of vapor, the speed of the flow, shape and
incline of kiss-me chocolate and so on should be critical for Mr. Emoto's
crystalizing method.
Then the temperature of freezing water, namely minus 25 degrees centigrade, which Mr. Emoto has chosen, might happen to be appropriate to get an ideal kiss-me chocolate shape. Or if the quantity of the heat supplied from the lighting is critical, then the lighting equipment which Mr. Emoto bought at an electric appliance shop happened to be a good one.
Mr. Emoto's observation is being blamed severely by Japanese scientists
because the conditions of the observation are not accurate, not stable
and not professional. After all they deny and exclude "all" of
Mr. Emoto's work without too much careful considerations.
But I think the probability of the appearance of the crystals in Mr. Emoto's
observation should be treated more carefully. As a matter of fact, Mr.
Emoto says that the probability of the appearance of the crystals is different
by samples. For example, he suggests the tendency that underground water
has much higher probability of forming crystals than surface water.
I think the beautifulness or the perfectness of the crystal which Mr. Emoto
mentions eagerly and repeatedly is related to the probability of its appearance.
Because, if the probability is high, then there seems to be much chance
for the crystals to make their shape beautiful or perfect. As beautifulness
and/or perfectness are to be evaluated by human sense, it is difficult
to treat them in the sense of science. But on the other hand, the probability
of the appearance of the crystals can be an objective, repeatable and scientific
index which may suggest a possibility of the changement of the structure
of water itself.
Both the number of negative ions and the probability of crystalization
can be scientific indicators to indicate the changement of the water strucutre
at the level of molecule.
Another experiment
There is another experimental result. We made two circulation systems as
shown below.
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Left figure is the diagram of it.
They are very simple. The water circulates from the tank to the pump, then
to the steel pipe (material is ss, which is rather easy to rust) of 10m
long (the spiral line) and comes back to the tank.
These two sysytems are made exactly similar. Only one difference between
two sysytems is that the left sysytem has our "minus ion water equipment"
in the line(red one). In the picture, you can see it on the top of the
tank, the bright silver one. The equipment doesn't touch the water inside
the pipe directly.
We filled the same city water in the two tanks and started to operate the
pumps at the same time. After 72 hours operation, we took water samples
out of the tanks.
Left side is the water from the left sysytem.There is no rust.
Right side is the water from the right system.There is much rust.
The experiment was done in a small private laboratory which was supplying
hand-made academic-use measureing equipment of very small magnetization,
where Prof. Joseph Kirshvink had been visiting sometimes.
What do you think the result suggests?
We believe that there must be any changement in the structure of the water itself.
The taste of wine changes
There is another interesting performance. Our minus ion water can change
the taste of wine in the bottle. We show this performance every month to
the people here. Almost all of the people can feel the change of the taste,
even in the blind condition.
Several months ago, we had a chance to show the performance to the professors
of Kobe national university. We visited the university and there came 4
professors to the guest room. One is a doctor of agriculture, one is a
doctor of physics, one is a doctor of mechanics and the other is a doctor
of medicine. It had to be one of the best intelligent parties in Japan,
we thought then.
We had bought 2 bottles of mineral water and 2 bottles of cheap red wine
which had a bit stimulus taste, and brought them there. (It is important
to choose cheap wine to find the difference of the taste clearly). We filled
up 2 buckets with the mineral water, in front of the audience. One bucket
was filled with ordinary mineral water. The other was filled with the mineral
water passed through our equipment. We used a funnel to make it sure that
our equipment didn't touch the water. As it was easy for us to use bottled
water in such a guest room which had no water facilities, we used mineral
water. And it was more doubtless for the audience to see the sealed bottles
opened in front of them.
Then we put the bottles of wine, which were just bought at a shop into
the buckets. The seal was not opened, of course.There was no direct contact
between the wine and the water.
Then we started to explain about our equipment and had discussion with
the audience for about 1 hour.
Then we opened the bottles and enjoyed wine party . All the doctors could
feel the difference of the taste even in the blind condition.
Though the water didn't touch the wine at all, the taste of the wine in
"minus ion water" became mild.
This miraculous performance is repeatable. It happens anytime, anywhere
and almost all people can feel the difference. It may be a miracle, but
not a magic nor a deception. There must be scientific reason behind it,
I believe.
We have experienced hundreds of other good results in the application field
of agriculture, food industries, restaurants, fish business, animals, health
of people and so on which must indicate not the changement of the composition
but athe changement of the structure of water itself.
Also, we have data which show that the vaporization of our minus ion water
is faster than ordinary water, which may explain the high probability of
forming crystals at the top of the kiss-me chocolate.
We are now proceeding further research in several ways.
We are trying to see inside the water itself directly.
Further research is required
You say that your equipment for observing crystals is just like a simple
vapor chamber. Then your crystals are definitely made from the vapor.
On the other hand, Mr. Emoto's crystals are made from liquid water and
are seemed to be made in the water.
Also, I understand that you are observing the crystals in various conditions,
such as temperature, humidity, voltage and so on, which are not the conditions
of water itself. You may not expect or investigate any difference by the
difference of water samples.
But Mr. Emoto is observing the difference of crystals depending on the
difference of water samples, keeping the other conditions as same as he
can. He takes samples from all over the world, which are surface water,
spring water, city water and so on. He even shakes the samples with different
vibrations and gives them different histerisis.
I think these two experiments are observing different phenomena.
Even though Mr. Emoto is not the expert of science, even though what he
says is strange for all the scientists, I believe that there should be
a room for proceeding his study further in scientific manner, hopefully
by expert scientists of water crystals.
Of course those scientsits should be kept away from Mr. Emoto's fantasy.
October 18th, 2006
Yours sincerely,
Eisuke Yoshioka
Reprsentative Yoshioka Office