You are what you eat — but if you want to get literal about it, you are mostly what you drink. So, how much of that should be water? Cr...
You are what you eat — but if you want to get literal about it, you are mostly what you drink. So, how much of that should be water?
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About 60 percent of the average adult human body is made of water, according to a National Institutes of Health report. This includes most of your brain, heart, lungs, muscles and skin, and even about 30 percent of your bones. Besides being one of the main ingredients in the recipe for humankind, water helps us regulate our internal temperature, transports nutrients throughout our bodies, flushes waste, forms saliva, lubricates joints and even serves as a protective shock absorber for vital organs and growing fetuses.
There's no dispute that water is crucial to a healthy life (or any life at all, for that matter). And yet, there's little scientific consensus about the exact amount of the stuff an individual should consume each day. So how much water do you actually need to drink to be healthy?
You may have heard that you should drink eight 8-ounce (237 milliliters) glasses of water a day (totaling 64 ounces, or about 1.9 liters). That's the wrong answer. Despite the pervasiveness of this easily remembered rule, there is no scientific evidence to back it up, according to a 2002 review of studies. In fact, numerous studies suggest that this is far more actual drinking water than is necessary for most healthy adults.
The problem with this rule, researchers say, is that drinking water by the glass is not the only way that humans hydrate. Yes, it's true that guzzling H2O is an inexpensive and calorie-free way to whet your whistle, but the "8 x 8" rule crucially overlooks two big sources of daily water consumption.
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