Smell of coffee awakened me from a coma! After a fall from height I was in ICU and in a coma for almost 7 days when a coffee cart came through one morning and that smell is the first thing I remember!
Interesting that they thought coffee was good for breathing issues, because it is! Caffeine is a weak bronchodilator which can improve breathing issues for 2-4 hours after drinking it. In a world without albuterol this was probably pretty significant.
Che Guevara had terrible asthma before inhalers existed and swore by yerba mate tea for it. As someone who also has asthma, I have used coffee and yerba mate to help my lungs for decades. It's not a weak effect for me, quite intense.
it is a diuretic. i always try to up my water intake at morning coffee because of that. when i was truck driving i hardly made it past the 1st two or three rest areas at the start of a day. also why i kept an empty sport drink bottle or two on hand. traffic jams happen at the most ... inconvenient ... times.
My Norwegian grandmother introduced me to coffee when I was 11 or 12 (I'm now nearly 68). I have many fond memories of having a cup of coffee with her, and sometimes my grandfather, with some sweet treats. I start my day with a big mug of coffee and later, a second one. Used to drink a lot more coffee, but over the years have reduced the amount, for no particular reason.
Coffee, tea and chocolate may have reduced certain infectious diseases because they required boiling water, and if the water was contaminated boiling would kill any germs.
@@Stettafire It used to. But, with certain things being put into out waterways and drinking water today - no longer true. I am a WWII baby and boiling used to be adequate whether at home or camping.
this is the weirdest paradigm at looking at the past, boiling making drinks safer was known, it has been known for waaaay longer than the discovery of America even, it' just that people are kinda lazy/don't think they'll get sick. The same as today, it's not that uncommon.
Boiling is enough to kill most pathogens, at least the ones typically capable of infecting people, as far as I understand. Sporulation of some pathogens might occur and be able to survive in boiling water, yes, but the spores produced usually need some time to transition back into viable pathogenic forms, this might be on the span of hours to days in some cases - this is called "the lag phase" of inoculation. To kill every germ (as well as spores), an autoclave is used. An autoclave is able to produce and withstand internal temperatures above the boiling point of water at pressures several times that of our atmosphere. I'm a biotechnology engineer and we routinely autoclave any and all waste that gets into contact with GMOs in order to make sure there's no risk of the GMO leaving the lab, so I have some knowledge of the inadequacy of simply boiling compared to complete sterilization techniques. No, this isn't something new that is added to the water, this has always been a thing, but we weren't aware and/or deemed it inconsequential to leave such spores unsterilized as the water would usually be used before the spores would become viable and able to multiply. Today it's still fine just to boil contaminated water in order to remove most pathogens in order to make water sources potable, most places. Anyways, to get back on topic, it definitely would have been more than enough to boil water (and still is, unless you need something clinically sterile for surgery or lab work) in order to significantly reduce the likelihood of being infected by various waterborne infectious diseases. In addition to aforementioned coffee, tea and chocolate, during beer brewing the wort is raised to a temperature that inactivates grain enzymes, which would also be sufficient to do the same to enzymes of microbes commonly found in water, thus rendering them functionally inert and unable to replicate, making beer among the selection of beverages mostly safe to drink. Cheers!
I was started on coffee when scarcely out of diapers as a mild bronchodilator. I'm not sure just how effective it was in reducing the incidence of asthmatic episodes but once I started a daily cup, there were no more visits to the emergency department of the city hospital. YMMV but I still enjoy it and have opportunity to occasionally roast some at the local coffee shop.
O thank you. My hubby had severe asthma and since he became a coffee lover the episodes slowly calmed down and with time faded away. ❤️❤️❤️❤️ Best wishes.
Coffee is definitely a bronchodilator and coffee drinkers have fewer asthmatic episodes. It' s supposedly the caffeine but then that would make Mountain Dew the ideal asthma drink.
@@susanohnhaus611 More like redbull. Mountain Dew gets a reputation for being high in caffeine but thats just compared to other sodas. Modern energy drinks are much stronger. But rarely stronger than coffee, coffee is quite caffeinated
Composer J.S. Bach wrote a mini-opera in the 1730's called "Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht" (Be still, stop chattering) about a young woman's love of coffee, and has since become known as the 'Coffee Cantata.'
@@BodywiseMustard LOL! You're probably right, I will try to update my personal "style guide." I had an English teacher in High School that taught that it's wrong to put a comma after the penultimate item prior to the word 'and' in a list of three or more items. Years later I learned about the Oxford comma and I now use it with a vengeance!
Verry interesting history John about coffee.I remember when I was a small child my Grandmother would grind coffee beans.You could smell it through the house.She would make it in a old purculator.That made me fall in Love coffee and I still Love it.David Back Menifee co KY.
There was a TED talk some years ago about the role of caffeine in sparking the Enlightenment. It was about how the switch from drinking beer all day to drinking caffeinated drinks "woke up," for lack of a better term, intellectual curiosity and discourse. Of course, the fact that coffee and tea houses were popular meeting places for scholars might have had something to do with it, too.😊
@@TomSeliman99 Was gonna say this - the sociopolitical environment was at least 90% of it. Europe was always a powerhouse just waiting to be unleashed if the shackles upon the population would ever be broken. There’s a TED talk for every theory out there. It seems like a platform that’s mostly used by people seeking a few minutes in the spotlight, although a few are really fascinating.
@@TomSeliman99 The Renaissance was more of a function of the movement of wealth and power to industry. The 'average' person had little to do with it other than increased employment and urbanization and increased access to education. The enlightenment piggybacked on that but was really a philosophical movement that was far more what we would call upper-middle class today. Working men, 'men of industry' were actively engaged and began social parties and regularly got together to discuss things like politics and philosophy which was only an 'Elite class' thing in the Renaissance as mentioned in this video.
You were one of the first UA-camrs to get me hooked! Genuinely love all your content and the work that goes into it #wholesome THANKYOU for still uploading!
Now that's funny timing, this very evening I was doing some filming in a powdered wig about life in an eighteenth century coffee house, and I read exactly those same two texts by Bacon and Willis myself!
I've been drinking coffee, since I was 2 years old. I'm now 56 and still drinking 2 cups a day. When I was a child, it was common in Italian families to give coffee to kids. My mom started drinking coffee about the same age as me. My day not only started with coffee, as a kid, we usually ended our night with coffee and something sweet to eat, like donuts or cake, right before bed, and the caffeine (and the sugar) didn't keep any of us from sleeping. And, as much as I like the taste of coffee, I like the smell of it even more. So, regardless of any negative views on coffee, I'm going to keep on drinking it.
Being a military veteran and coffee lover, as most vets are, I could say that 99% of the military folks drink lots of coffee. I would say overall, they are some of the most physically fit folks in the world.
Yup, as far back as I can remember my Nonna would serve us an espresso not long after dinner. Usually when we were talking in the living room or out on the porch on summer evenings. I still prefer a Moka pot espresso over the 'more cultured' steam machines.
I too have been drinking coffee since an early age. About 3, when I would sip coffee with my grandma & grandpa. I've been drinking coffee for about 60 years now. I do love the aroma of good strong coffee brewing every morning. 😁❤️❤️❤️
Thanks for sharing your story. I was given coffee in my bottle as a child lol. I was addicted to it at a very young age. I still love my coffee to this day and I'm 48 . Glad I'm not alone in being a coffee kid.
It was an expensive commodity back then, though. Remember that 1750 even was before the founding of America. Coffee was one of the commodities bought and sold by the British East India Trading Company back in the 1600's, but it was bought and sold in trade with the Islamic world initially, rather than in shipping it up to Britain or anywhere else in Europe; even after it eventually started making its way back home as an imported good, all imports came from the Middle East, and was not grown elsewhere. It wasn't until much later, around 1700, that it actually started to be spread to European colonies, taking until nearly 1800 to be transplanted to Mexico. Us calling coffee Java and Mocha actually derives from those ports being origins for the coffee trade, so they were marked with port-of-origin as a form of quality guarentee styling.
I think if you’re going multiple times per day every day, then sure, that could be an issue (especially in terms of environmental impact), but the idea that something that brings someone joy, or provides an escape, a social outing, or just plain provides a sense of fun or normalcy or enjoyment is evil because you CAN do it more cheaply at home is entirely missing the point. Everyone has things they spend money on and enjoy. For some people that thing is professionally made coffee in a “coffee house” and if that’s how someone chooses to spend their money then so what? Pundits and their “oh you’re latte-ing your retirement away” is just ludicrous; if you added up up what you spent on any one item over 35 YEARS of course it’s an outrageously high number. We really only “need” beans, spinach and water to live (for example) but that doesn’t make everything else luxury goods. Life is too short.
@@KainYusanagi yes I am aware of this: I have a master’s degree in History. I was making a joke based on what they explicitly said in the video. As they said, coffee houses were in the UK and Europe as early as the 18th century and, while a luxury, were not entirely out of reach of the middling and working classes.
So the East India TEA Company paid for studies to show that coffee was unhealthy & tea was healthy? Nothing has changed in 300 years. Nothing ever does.
I never clicked so fast! This was really interesting, how people reacted to these new things back then. I remember reading in a textbook about nutrition that any time a new study comes out about food toy should take it with a grain of salt. Sometimes something needs years and years of testing to really see the effects of it.
In my lifetime I've Been Told that bacon is bad for me probably 12 different studies said so and probably at least the same number of studies saying bacon has benefits. It used to be about every other year they either gave bacon back to you or took it away from you according to some study or another.
@@Jinjerella I've never seen a study that claimed bacon was good for you... its a processed meat and generally falls into the too much salt gives you hypertension school of medical advice.
I'm glad you said we still have this problem today, a lot of people think this is 'all in the past'. Nutritional epidemiology doesn't have any experiments with proper controls, duration and statistical power to underpin it (for obvious ethical and practical reasons), so it's still relying largely on naturalistic observation and mechanistic speculation, just as 300 years ago (albeit within a different paradigm). We make fun of 'bad humors' today, but they'll be making fun of 'bad cholesterol' in the future.
"Nutritional epidemiology doesn't have any experiments with proper controls, duration and statistical power to underpin it (for obvious ethical and practical reasons), so it's still relying largely on naturalistic observation and mechanistic speculation, just as 300 years ago (albeit within a different paradigm)." This statement sounds like the kind of typical statement said by one who is attempting to discredit, and delegitimize scientific studies, and science, in general. What studies/research about coffee/nutritional epidemiology aren't suitable enough for you? Please back up what you mean when you imply what you are implying? What you're saying about coffee tests and research are the same that misinformed conservatives say about vaccines. Modern society has benefited greatly from reasearch/studies about Nutritional epidemiology.
@@Ebani failing to see the connection between STEM and nutrition... I'm not going to go to a calculus professor, computer programmer, or mechanical engineer for nutrition advice. It's true that a lot of nutrition advice is not based on what is considered good science, but that doesn't mean STEM people know more than nutritionists do.
@@no_problem8023 nutritional epidemiology attempts to infer causation from correlation, without controlling for genetic, lifestyle and environmental confounders (and no, post-hoc multiple regression analysis is not 'control', it only further confounds the findings). Additionally the findings are rarely based on actual observations, but rather respondent data, which is provably unreliable and replete with both reporting and collection errors. The result is that in almost every epidemiological study the error bars alone will render the data irrelevant. Any signal is utterly swamped by noise (there are examples such as smoking and lung cancer where the signal is so strong and consistent it cuts through the noise, but that is the exception not the rule. and typically in such instances the association is so obvious no study is even required. smoking was an exception because of decades of propaganda and the consumer bias of addicted smokers)
About coffee helping you go to sleep. While, generally speaking, caffeine IS Stimulant for most people, people with Attention Deficit Disorder will experience the opposite effect. ADD is quite often treated with stimulants. I have ADD, to the point where there are days that I can not finish a sentence. For me, coffee is a lifesaver. It is well known among people who have ADD that coffee is helpful in increasing one's attention span. I know for me, a doubleshot latte puts me in a good mood and I can get stuff done. 4 doubleshot lattes will put me to sleep. I know I'm not the only one. While some people can not drink coffee past noon for fear of not sleeping, for me, a good night's sleep involves firing up the espresso maker.
the same but i find high caffeine from energy drinks and blonde coffee to not have this effect at amd eventually to be disruptive to sleep and agitating, so this opposite effect of stimulants i think may have been over generalized to caffeine and that coffee may have another compound causing this effect
Anecdotally, I've heard that part of the reason it helps is that the caffeine quiets down the ambient voices/thoughts that are constantly "buzzing" in an ADHD mind (at least, some have it. Maybe not all), making them less of a distraction and allowing one to focus more easily.
It's theorized the reason for that is because in people with ADHD, the problem is caused by a deficiency of certain neurotransmitters, which coffee stimulates the production of. So while in neurotypical people it causes an overproduction (causing the "buzz"), in people with ADHD it merely bumps them closer to normal. This also explains a lot of ADHD's symptoms as the brain desperately jumping from one novel stimulus to the next, because that stimulus also increases the production of the neurotransmitters that the brain is starved of (but only for a short period of time, hence the ADHD person's need to jump from one thing to the next rather than being able to focus on just the one.)
You know, it's always refreshing to see you discuss the things people got wrong, but also what they got right. There are some funny things here, but it's also correct that it can help breathing and headaches....but also cause trembling or nervousness for us 'hot brained' people, lol. Thanks for not just focusing on how 'dumb' people were back then
Xiaomanyc, a popular polygot of languages, he just put out a video a few days ago of making tea in a popular Chinese park in NYC. It's so fascinating how a cup of coffee or tea can be shared across cultures. We also tend to forget that these ingredients used to be exotic to Britain and America, but have been in use for thousands of years in others.
I literally got an ad in the middle of this video that was espousing the negative effects of coffee on a person's health. Also, I was a U.S. Navy Sailor, I can, and have, drank coffee to wake up, go to bed, stimulate my appetite, calm my stomach after eating very large meals, and to "hydrate" after a great night of drinking enough alcohol to float a Battleship. Coffee is at least one of the most important meals of the day.
@@catherineshaw1122 The diuretic effect seems to happen only for doses "significantly higher" than what the person is used to, though - it mostly goes away as tolerance increases.
Funny thing about coffee- the fact it's a stimulant specifically. Folks with ADHD have come forward multiple times- myself included- to report that drinking it actually helps! It's a form of self-medicating. It actually helps to *calm our brains*. Now, I'm not saying these folks 250 years ago who drank it before bed strictly had ADHD, b u t
It works for the same reason drugs like Ritalin or Adderall, which are also stimulants, work to treat ADHD! Stimulants actually calm our brains down, allowing us to slow down and actually focus.
I was told the same thing in the ‘90s. Every kid was drinking a ton of caffeinated soda and people thought that was okay, but somehow caffeine in coffee would stunt growth…
Love their enthusiasm- all thoughts which I've had, drinking coffee, two, three hundred odd years later!! Especially since my pot-a-day habit dropped by necessity to nearly none. Cruelty, I tell you.
The most memorable times of childhood were (There was a fireplace next to our wood stove) sitting around the fireplace with everybody on the farm drinking coffee as breakfast was being cooked. Even as a toddler with fresk milk. Now, I roast my own (The kitchen is La Cornue, but a Vogelzange Railroad flat top is on the covered patio).
I did a paper way back in my college days (circa 1985). It was determined by science that one could overdose on about 70 cups of coffee. So therefore, coffee can kill you. 🤓 Btw, it was also noted that nutmeg was a hallucinogen, which just happens to be the favorite spice of our most beloved host.
@@georgevieira6686 some people report the feeling to be like an unpleasant and overpowering hashish like sensation, which can include mild visual activity, but not classical hallucinations in the clinical sense. Otherwise yeah.
@coolguyhentaisenpai i think it takes less than half of that to cause potentially fatal water hypoxia. i think it's like 2 gallons in an hour without urinating but that's just a loose memory. I do know water poisoning is definitely a thing though.
Nutmeg effects the central nervous system in a way similar to mescaline but not as strong. I tried to smoke it once when I was younger and it gave me a terrible headache and dizziness with like a body numbness.
Coffee got me through some asthma reactions in the early 2000s, and I was very grateful for its usefulness in that regard and as an energy drink. I also like the flavor of it.
I'm not sure what the correct genre name would be but the music piece is from Manduetto by Jim's Red Pants jimsredpants.bandcamp.com/album/manduetto-mandolin-duets-from-the-18th-century. Hopefully this will help you find similar pieces.
@@marilynmitchell2712 Congratulations on going back to school! Coffee, tea or anything with caffeine helps when you're in school. Lol. Best of luck to you.
Coffee helps me with migraines as well, it is more than just the caffeine there is something else in it because I do not get nearly as good a result with cola which has a similar caffeine content.
We all know there's only one solution to too much caffeine: Bloodletting. Obvious enough in the 17th century, probably appropriate today. Thanks guys! Dave J
Coffee is like Guinness lol Guinness looks impressive when in a glass but many hate the taste - I used to hate the stuff but then one day I loved it 🤣🤣🤣.
He's right. It's pretty cool that the way people talk about what they believe something is, even before investigating it to see what it actually does, is the same way we do things today, all these years later.
I've heard of 'baptizing' red wine, but this was just the practice of adding a drop or two of water to the first glass poured (but not the subsequent glasses) to improve the taste.
Regarding breathing, coffee helps. Caffeine, actually. My son was born 3.5 months premature in March of 2020 and spent the forst 40 days of his life intubated. He received a daily dose of caffeine because it would help him remember to breathe. So they were certainly on to something with that claim.
How you prepare it makes all the difference as well. The only method my tummy allowed was in a Bialetti pot on the stove. Rich, smooth, low acid. I got that tip from a former Jesuit priest, lol.
In the 20th and 21st century, we have latte shops on almost every corner in the northwest. So not much has changed when it comes to coffee houses, just most have moved to drive in stands.
The 1855 treatise "Plant Intoxicants" by Baron Ernst Von Bibra, a German ethnobotanist, is quite an interesting read. This was right when isolating chemical alkaloids from plants was rapidly developing in science. Caffeine itself is an interesting topic throughout the book. It has an imperialistic tone at times which can be a bit offensive, but is generally a very sound and interesting resource, and piece of period specific science.
Forgot where I found this, but it is part of a documentary project on the back burner, Coffee & The Age of Reason
Sir Francis Bacon was knighted at the beginning of the Seventeenth Century. He began his professional life as a lawyer, but became best known a leader of the Scientific Revolution in Seventeenth Century Europe. This new philosophy established and popularized an inductive methodology for scientific inquiry, drawing knowledge from the natural world through experimentation, observation, and testing of hypotheses. Bacon led the denunciation of the influence of the Ancient Greek philosophers; he wanted to demolish the edifice of human knowledge, and rebuild it from the beginning on a new, more solid foundation in which everything was challenged and nothing was assumed. The religious wars of the Restoration had cleared the way for this revolution, in part by diminishing the authority of the Church, especially in Northern Europe. In England, a new nationalism flourished.The spread of this new nationalism throughout Europe was accompanied by the spread of a new drink, coffee. Coffee promoted sharpness and clarity of thought. It became the preferred drink of scientists, intellectuals, and businessmen. It helped them to better regulate their working day; first by waking them up in the morning, then by keeping them alert throughout the day, and if needed, by extending the work-day late into the evening. Coffee was served in calm, sober, and respectable establishments that promoted polite behavior and discussion. These establishments - the earliest coffee shops - provided forums for education, debate, and self-improvement. The impact of coffee was especially profound, since at that time, the common beverages were ale, beer, and wine. These were drunk even at breakfast, because they were far safer to drink than water, which was usually contaminated in most cities. Coffee was made using boiling water, and was therefore safe to drink. It provided a new alternative to alcoholic drinks. Those who drank coffee at breakfast (instead of beer) began their day alert and stimulated, rather than "relaxed" (if not a little inebriated), and the quality of their work and thinking improved dramatically. Coffee was heralded as: That Grave and Wholesome Liquor, That heals the stomach, makes the genius quicker, Relieves the Memory, revives the Sad, And cheers the Spirits, without making Mad. Western Europe began to emerge from an alcoholic torpor that had lasted for centuries. And the novelty of coffee further contributed to its appeal. It was a drink that had been unknown to the ancient Greeks and Romans. Drinking it was yet another way that Seventeenth Century thinkers could show that they had moved beyond the limits of the ancient world. Coffee was the great soberer. Coffee was a manifestation of modernity and progress. Coffee became a symbol of intellectualism, and indeed, the ideal beverage for the new Age of Reason.
Regarding the whole humours thing, it goes even farther back in time: Classical Antiquity. The 4 Elements are supposed to be sharing some properties, namely how cold or warm they are, and how moist or dry they are - each one having a primary property and a secondary property among those two, in a chain sort of way (e.g. primarily hot, secondarily dry). Funnily enough, because of the whole opposition thing, and as it clearly makes most sense for the "element" of fire to be primarily hot, the primary property of water is... being cold, not moist!
What's fascinating is that they did identify many of the effects of caffeine without knowing about it. All the discussion of stimulating the mind, coffee not being suitable for those with a nervous temper, causes trembling like the palsy, adds energy, etc. Then again, there was also much that was patently incorrect, like coffee before bed.
I'm watching this as I sip coffee. LOL. I find it interesting that they didn't know about caffeine, but they really did describe the effects accurately. It *is* a diuretic and can make you "produce urine." It has a mild laxative effect, so maybe that was the "aids in digestion" they saw. Caffeine does help with headaches. It's one of the active ingredients in Excedrin. It can make some people very jittery and shaky while not affecting others at all (me).
I think coffee is like wine. A little bit is probably beneficial as to the health benefits. However the benefits are quickly outweighed by the negatives when you drink too much of it. Where that line is is going to be different for each person. The problem is both substances are addictive. Some people have strong enough will to not be problem, but, most will become addicted to one degree or another. I believe we should be careful what ever we choose to put in ourselves. Evaluate yourself while your consuming. If you see signs of addiction pull back and reevaluate.
I remember once reading in Esther Forbes' novel "Johnny Tremain" a part in the book where Johnny receives payment from John Hancock then goes to a tavern to buy food. He spends part of the money on coffee and he ends up not caring too much for how it tastes.
Also read the book as a kid. He ordered a pitcher of chocolate and a pitcher of coffee. Loved the chocolate, but was disappointed in the taste of coffee after delighting in its smell.
@@trapperscout2046, well not exactly… it wasn’t required reading at my school. I was having trouble finding something I wanted to read, and was kind of off to the corner of the school library during the 1960s. Doubt I would have read it if I knew it was written in 1943. But it was a good story about apprenticeship, the guild system, classes in society, and the American Revolution. And the passage you picked out struck me as a kid about how someone’s economic station dictated he could only have known coffee & chocolate by smell rather than taste until his own good fortune. Thank goodness my doctors today & medical science tell me that both coffee & chocolate are good for my health.
LOL! 😆 You, Jon Townsend, adore the aroma of Coffee?!? I so remember a while back in your video about "The Perfect Campfire Coffee" you stated you weren't very fond of this wondrous concoction! Just toss a couple of whole Cloves into the pot when you add the grinds then you'll end up with the Nectar of the Gods on Mount Olympus to be enjoyed along with the Ambrosia that your precious daughter Ivy makes by folding Puff Paste over Fruit Preserves! ☕
Man... I can't get through the day without coffee and tea. Cup o' coffee on my way to work in the morning and then ice tea throughout the day to keep me going.
My grandparents gave us coffee and toast for breakfast on Sunday mornings before going to church. I was in 3rd grade my brother was in 6th grade at the time. They were both German, my grandpa would tell us it would stunt our growth but my grandma gave it to us anyway.
Honestly it makes me feel better to hear the commentary about coffee back then, specifically about it making you sleepy. I haven’t met a single person in my lifetime who can relate to coffee having an exhausting effect on me. I can drink a very small amount and be very sleepy. ☕️ I really don’t know why
Depends. I can drink coffee and go to sleep right away no problem BUT if i still stay up 2-3 hours after drinking it then i'm in trouble coz that means no night sleep for me. This is why i avoid drinking coffee at 6-8 pm.
In the late 1990's, a friend at work, brought me in an old, but unused filter coffee jug. It wasn't long before I was using it throughout the day at work - and was making some beautiful coffee with it - I spent a lot of money on the best coffee I could afford. I shared it with a lot of people, but I was still drinking an awful lot of coffee each day, to the point where I got kept awake at night - not by caffeine, which has no effect on my sleep at all, but by 'Jiggly Legs' (Medical terminology. Possibly). My Doctor asked me how much coffee I was drinking each day, and wasn't amused when I said: "About two litres." I drink coffee about twice a week now. 😆😆😆
Even today, some of us drink coffee to relax at night, while others can't sleep if they drink coffee in the afternoon. Neurology plays a role in this. My brain needs a stimulant to relax it, so I drink coffee in the evening. It really makes me sleepy.
Smell of coffee awakened me from a coma! After a fall from height I was in ICU and in a coma for almost 7 days when a coffee cart came through one morning and that smell is the first thing I remember!
Glad you made it bro ❤️
lol, your the ultimate coffee snob
The best part of waking up..!
That's how Starbucks was born! lol What a GREAT STORY! ☕
@@toucanrising7014 Lmfaoo, i shouldn't laugh but that made me wheeze
Interesting that they thought coffee was good for breathing issues, because it is! Caffeine is a weak bronchodilator which can improve breathing issues for 2-4 hours after drinking it. In a world without albuterol this was probably pretty significant.
Che Guevara had terrible asthma before inhalers existed and swore by yerba mate tea for it. As someone who also has asthma, I have used coffee and yerba mate to help my lungs for decades. It's not a weak effect for me, quite intense.
Can I just say that I LOVE your pfp and username.
It's also a mighty good diuretic as I learned after an all night study session while in college.
That's why coffe and cigarettes are so good together :D
Theophylline in Tea is also a bronchodilator. Making tea perhaps an even more ideal option for breathing issues.
"coffee promotes digestion" i see the morning coffee bathoom runs have been a thing for centuries lol
You beat me to it! First thing I thought of.
Ayurveda recommends coffee after a meal for kapha doshas.
It has the opposite effect on me, so I never drink it unless I have diarrhea, despite loving it
@@charsquatch600 that might be a side effect of it being very dehydrating.
it is a diuretic. i always try to up my water intake at morning coffee because of that. when i was truck driving i hardly made it past the 1st two or three rest areas at the start of a day. also why i kept an empty sport drink bottle or two on hand. traffic jams happen at the most ... inconvenient ... times.
My Norwegian grandmother introduced me to coffee when I was 11 or 12 (I'm now nearly 68). I have many fond memories of having a cup of coffee with her, and sometimes my grandfather, with some sweet treats. I start my day with a big mug of coffee and later, a second one. Used to drink a lot more coffee, but over the years have reduced the amount, for no particular reason.
I had a similar introduction to coffee with my Dutch grandparents. I still enjoy coffee today. 😁☕️
Coffee, tea and chocolate may have reduced certain infectious diseases because they required boiling water, and if the water was contaminated boiling would kill any germs.
You could say that about noodles too!
TBH boiling doesn't kill all germs but it does help
@@Stettafire It used to. But, with certain things being put into out waterways and drinking water today - no longer true. I am a WWII baby and boiling used to be adequate whether at home or camping.
this is the weirdest paradigm at looking at the past, boiling making drinks safer was known, it has been known for waaaay longer than the discovery of America even, it' just that people are kinda lazy/don't think they'll get sick.
The same as today, it's not that uncommon.
Boiling is enough to kill most pathogens, at least the ones typically capable of infecting people, as far as I understand. Sporulation of some pathogens might occur and be able to survive in boiling water, yes, but the spores produced usually need some time to transition back into viable pathogenic forms, this might be on the span of hours to days in some cases - this is called "the lag phase" of inoculation.
To kill every germ (as well as spores), an autoclave is used. An autoclave is able to produce and withstand internal temperatures above the boiling point of water at pressures several times that of our atmosphere. I'm a biotechnology engineer and we routinely autoclave any and all waste that gets into contact with GMOs in order to make sure there's no risk of the GMO leaving the lab, so I have some knowledge of the inadequacy of simply boiling compared to complete sterilization techniques.
No, this isn't something new that is added to the water, this has always been a thing, but we weren't aware and/or deemed it inconsequential to leave such spores unsterilized as the water would usually be used before the spores would become viable and able to multiply. Today it's still fine just to boil contaminated water in order to remove most pathogens in order to make water sources potable, most places.
Anyways, to get back on topic, it definitely would have been more than enough to boil water (and still is, unless you need something clinically sterile for surgery or lab work) in order to significantly reduce the likelihood of being infected by various waterborne infectious diseases. In addition to aforementioned coffee, tea and chocolate, during beer brewing the wort is raised to a temperature that inactivates grain enzymes, which would also be sufficient to do the same to enzymes of microbes commonly found in water, thus rendering them functionally inert and unable to replicate, making beer among the selection of beverages mostly safe to drink. Cheers!
I was started on coffee when scarcely out of diapers as a mild bronchodilator. I'm not sure just how effective it was in reducing the incidence of asthmatic episodes but once I started a daily cup, there were no more visits to the emergency department of the city hospital. YMMV but I still enjoy it and have opportunity to occasionally roast some at the local coffee shop.
I cant function without the stuff in the morning lol
O thank you. My hubby had severe asthma and since he became a coffee lover the episodes slowly calmed down and with time faded away. ❤️❤️❤️❤️ Best wishes.
Coffee is definitely a bronchodilator and coffee drinkers have fewer asthmatic episodes. It' s supposedly the caffeine but then that would make Mountain Dew the ideal asthma drink.
That is a treatment that was never tried on me. My asthma improved as I grew and by the time I was 5 I had stopped having attacks.
@@susanohnhaus611 More like redbull. Mountain Dew gets a reputation for being high in caffeine but thats just compared to other sodas. Modern energy drinks are much stronger. But rarely stronger than coffee, coffee is quite caffeinated
Composer J.S. Bach wrote a mini-opera in the 1730's called "Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht" (Be still, stop chattering) about a young woman's love of coffee, and has since become known as the 'Coffee Cantata.'
How cool! Thanks for this! ☕☕☕
Just shared it with a group on Facebook. Hope it is OK with you that I quoted you.
@@rosemcguinn5301 huge props for giving credit to him, most people would have just posted it like it was there
1730s **
You're probably thinking of the apostrophe in '30s.
Please learn and change :)
@@BodywiseMustard LOL! You're probably right, I will try to update my personal "style guide." I had an English teacher in High School that taught that it's wrong to put a comma after the penultimate item prior to the word 'and' in a list of three or more items. Years later I learned about the Oxford comma and I now use it with a vengeance!
Allegedly, Voltaire drank 64 cups of coffee each days. These probably would have been small cups but still quite lot!
70 modern day cups can kill you so I hope they were small!
Verry interesting history John about coffee.I remember when I was a small child my Grandmother would grind coffee beans.You could smell it through the house.She would make it in a old purculator.That made me fall in Love coffee and I still Love it.David Back Menifee co KY.
There was a TED talk some years ago about the role of caffeine in sparking the Enlightenment. It was about how the switch from drinking beer all day to drinking caffeinated drinks "woke up," for lack of a better term, intellectual curiosity and discourse. Of course, the fact that coffee and tea houses were popular meeting places for scholars might have had something to do with it, too.😊
Thank you for this. I was scanning comments to make sure this point was added to the discussion. So cool.
Doesn't make sense considering the Rennessaince is what sparked the enlightenment, long before coffee was discovered
@@TomSeliman99 Was gonna say this - the sociopolitical environment was at least 90% of it. Europe was always a powerhouse just waiting to be unleashed if the shackles upon the population would ever be broken. There’s a TED talk for every theory out there. It seems like a platform that’s mostly used by people seeking a few minutes in the spotlight, although a few are really fascinating.
@@TomSeliman99 The Renaissance was more of a function of the movement of wealth and power to industry. The 'average' person had little to do with it other than increased employment and urbanization and increased access to education. The enlightenment piggybacked on that but was really a philosophical movement that was far more what we would call upper-middle class today. Working men, 'men of industry' were actively engaged and began social parties and regularly got together to discuss things like politics and philosophy which was only an 'Elite class' thing in the Renaissance as mentioned in this video.
@@TomSeliman99 most TED talks are bs
Old school drinking from the saucer in the painting at 2:00.
You were one of the first UA-camrs to get me hooked! Genuinely love all your content and the work that goes into it #wholesome THANKYOU for still uploading!
Now that's funny timing, this very evening I was doing some filming in a powdered wig about life in an eighteenth century coffee house, and I read exactly those same two texts by Bacon and Willis myself!
I've been drinking coffee, since I was 2 years old. I'm now 56 and still drinking 2 cups a day. When I was a child, it was common in Italian families to give coffee to kids. My mom started drinking coffee about the same age as me. My day not only started with coffee, as a kid, we usually ended our night with coffee and something sweet to eat, like donuts or cake, right before bed, and the caffeine (and the sugar) didn't keep any of us from sleeping. And, as much as I like the taste of coffee, I like the smell of it even more. So, regardless of any negative views on coffee, I'm going to keep on drinking it.
Being a military veteran and coffee lover, as most vets are, I could say that 99% of the military folks drink lots of coffee. I would say overall, they are some of the most physically fit folks in the world.
Yup, as far back as I can remember my Nonna would serve us an espresso not long after dinner.
Usually when we were talking in the living room or out on the porch on summer evenings.
I still prefer a Moka pot espresso over the 'more cultured' steam machines.
I too have been drinking coffee since an early age. About 3, when I would sip coffee with my grandma & grandpa. I've been drinking coffee for about 60 years now. I do love the aroma of good strong coffee brewing every morning. 😁❤️❤️❤️
@@lindabarling7719 On a cold winter morning if I don't start off with that hot morning cup, well maybe 3 or 4. I'm going back to bed lol.
Thanks for sharing your story. I was given coffee in my bottle as a child lol. I was addicted to it at a very young age. I still love my coffee to this day and I'm 48 . Glad I'm not alone in being a coffee kid.
'Will drinking coffee kill me?'
'No, but trying switch my coffee out for decaf will get you killed'
- 18th century programmer
🤣🤣🤣
But Decaf is healthier.
😂
Hand carving all those wooden program tablets for the difference engines at the time was hard work. People say writing in fortran was bad.
The fact that ideologues were preaching about spending “too much” money on coffee as early as 1700 is too funny.
Hello Starbucks!!!! I'm a temp and really have to curb my urge to relax in a coffeehouse.
It was an expensive commodity back then, though. Remember that 1750 even was before the founding of America. Coffee was one of the commodities bought and sold by the British East India Trading Company back in the 1600's, but it was bought and sold in trade with the Islamic world initially, rather than in shipping it up to Britain or anywhere else in Europe; even after it eventually started making its way back home as an imported good, all imports came from the Middle East, and was not grown elsewhere. It wasn't until much later, around 1700, that it actually started to be spread to European colonies, taking until nearly 1800 to be transplanted to Mexico. Us calling coffee Java and Mocha actually derives from those ports being origins for the coffee trade, so they were marked with port-of-origin as a form of quality guarentee styling.
I think if you’re going multiple times per day every day, then sure, that could be an issue (especially in terms of environmental impact), but the idea that something that brings someone joy, or provides an escape, a social outing, or just plain provides a sense of fun or normalcy or enjoyment is evil because you CAN do it more cheaply at home is entirely missing the point. Everyone has things they spend money on and enjoy. For some people that thing is professionally made coffee in a “coffee house” and if that’s how someone chooses to spend their money then so what? Pundits and their “oh you’re latte-ing your retirement away” is just ludicrous; if you added up up what you spent on any one item over 35 YEARS of course it’s an outrageously high number. We really only “need” beans, spinach and water to live (for example) but that doesn’t make everything else luxury goods. Life is too short.
@@KainYusanagi yes I am aware of this: I have a master’s degree in History. I was making a joke based on what they explicitly said in the video. As they said, coffee houses were in the UK and Europe as early as the 18th century and, while a luxury, were not entirely out of reach of the middling and working classes.
@@Madiannereid masters degree, who cares. take the hit, move on, get your nose out of your crack
So the East India TEA Company paid for studies to show that coffee was unhealthy & tea was healthy? Nothing has changed in 300 years. Nothing ever does.
“Thou shalt not even talk unto me lest I hath partaken in mine coffee” -Shakespeare’s mug probably
I never clicked so fast! This was really interesting, how people reacted to these new things back then. I remember reading in a textbook about nutrition that any time a new study comes out about food toy should take it with a grain of salt. Sometimes something needs years and years of testing to really see the effects of it.
In my lifetime I've Been Told that bacon is bad for me probably 12 different studies said so and probably at least the same number of studies saying bacon has benefits. It used to be about every other year they either gave bacon back to you or took it away from you according to some study or another.
@@Jinjerella I've never seen a study that claimed bacon was good for you... its a processed meat and generally falls into the too much salt gives you hypertension school of medical advice.
Milk was pushed hard when I was a kid in the 90s. Now it’s not as good for you as was once thought.
I'm glad you said we still have this problem today, a lot of people think this is 'all in the past'. Nutritional epidemiology doesn't have any experiments with proper controls, duration and statistical power to underpin it (for obvious ethical and practical reasons), so it's still relying largely on naturalistic observation and mechanistic speculation, just as 300 years ago (albeit within a different paradigm).
We make fun of 'bad humors' today, but they'll be making fun of 'bad cholesterol' in the future.
I already do, sadly STEM ppl are few and far between
@@Ebani What? There are lots of STEM people. Several million of us?
"Nutritional epidemiology doesn't have any experiments with proper controls, duration and statistical power to underpin it (for obvious ethical and practical reasons), so it's still relying largely on naturalistic observation and mechanistic speculation, just as 300 years ago (albeit within a different paradigm)."
This statement sounds like the kind of typical statement said by one who is attempting to discredit, and delegitimize scientific studies, and science, in general. What studies/research about coffee/nutritional epidemiology aren't suitable enough for you? Please back up what you mean when you imply what you are implying? What you're saying about coffee tests and research are the same that misinformed conservatives say about vaccines. Modern society has benefited greatly from reasearch/studies about Nutritional epidemiology.
@@Ebani failing to see the connection between STEM and nutrition... I'm not going to go to a calculus professor, computer programmer, or mechanical engineer for nutrition advice. It's true that a lot of nutrition advice is not based on what is considered good science, but that doesn't mean STEM people know more than nutritionists do.
@@no_problem8023 nutritional epidemiology attempts to infer causation from correlation, without controlling for genetic, lifestyle and environmental confounders (and no, post-hoc multiple regression analysis is not 'control', it only further confounds the findings). Additionally the findings are rarely based on actual observations, but rather respondent data, which is provably unreliable and replete with both reporting and collection errors.
The result is that in almost every epidemiological study the error bars alone will render the data irrelevant. Any signal is utterly swamped by noise (there are examples such as smoking and lung cancer where the signal is so strong and consistent it cuts through the noise, but that is the exception not the rule. and typically in such instances the association is so obvious no study is even required. smoking was an exception because of decades of propaganda and the consumer bias of addicted smokers)
About coffee helping you go to sleep. While, generally speaking, caffeine IS Stimulant for most people, people with Attention Deficit Disorder will experience the opposite effect. ADD is quite often treated with stimulants. I have ADD, to the point where there are days that I can not finish a sentence. For me, coffee is a lifesaver. It is well known among people who have ADD that coffee is helpful in increasing one's attention span. I know for me, a doubleshot latte puts me in a good mood and I can get stuff done. 4 doubleshot lattes will put me to sleep. I know I'm not the only one. While some people can not drink coffee past noon for fear of not sleeping, for me, a good night's sleep involves firing up the espresso maker.
How fascinating! I can’t have caffeine after a certain time, or I won’t sleep. We’re all individuals and the differences made life interesting.
the same but i find high caffeine from energy drinks and blonde coffee to not have this effect at amd eventually to be disruptive to sleep and agitating, so this opposite effect of stimulants i think may have been over generalized to caffeine and that coffee may have another compound causing this effect
Anecdotally, I've heard that part of the reason it helps is that the caffeine quiets down the ambient voices/thoughts that are constantly "buzzing" in an ADHD mind (at least, some have it. Maybe not all), making them less of a distraction and allowing one to focus more easily.
100% yes!!
It's theorized the reason for that is because in people with ADHD, the problem is caused by a deficiency of certain neurotransmitters, which coffee stimulates the production of. So while in neurotypical people it causes an overproduction (causing the "buzz"), in people with ADHD it merely bumps them closer to normal. This also explains a lot of ADHD's symptoms as the brain desperately jumping from one novel stimulus to the next, because that stimulus also increases the production of the neurotransmitters that the brain is starved of (but only for a short period of time, hence the ADHD person's need to jump from one thing to the next rather than being able to focus on just the one.)
God be with ya, Townsends!
You know, it's always refreshing to see you discuss the things people got wrong, but also what they got right. There are some funny things here, but it's also correct that it can help breathing and headaches....but also cause trembling or nervousness for us 'hot brained' people, lol. Thanks for not just focusing on how 'dumb' people were back then
I remember being told coffee would stunt my growth. That hasn't stopped me!
My dad wouldn't let us drink coffee because he said it would stunt our growth. Turns out I don't like the taste anyway.
Vassilaro's Coffee. 100+ year old coffee company in NYC. Greek immigrant started it in 1919. BEST COFFEE IN NYC!!!!
Xiaomanyc, a popular polygot of languages, he just put out a video a few days ago of making tea in a popular Chinese park in NYC. It's so fascinating how a cup of coffee or tea can be shared across cultures. We also tend to forget that these ingredients used to be exotic to Britain and America, but have been in use for thousands of years in others.
I have that grinder! It's an awesome little thing. I didn't know the design was that old.
I literally got an ad in the middle of this video that was espousing the negative effects of coffee on a person's health.
Also, I was a U.S. Navy Sailor, I can, and have, drank coffee to wake up, go to bed, stimulate my appetite, calm my stomach after eating very large meals, and to "hydrate" after a great night of drinking enough alcohol to float a Battleship. Coffee is at least one of the most important meals of the day.
Coffee actually dehydrates, as it signals the bowels and kidneys to empty rapidly.
@@catherineshaw1122 yes, I'm aware. That might be the reason I placed quotation marks around the word "hydrate".
@@catherineshaw1122 The diuretic effect seems to happen only for doses "significantly higher" than what the person is used to, though - it mostly goes away as tolerance increases.
I just want to thank you for having a wholesome show of any kind on the internet. It’s so rare and I sincerely appreciate it
Funny thing about coffee- the fact it's a stimulant specifically. Folks with ADHD have come forward multiple times- myself included- to report that drinking it actually helps! It's a form of self-medicating. It actually helps to *calm our brains*. Now, I'm not saying these folks 250 years ago who drank it before bed strictly had ADHD, b u t
But what
@@MegaZsolti but there might be a connection there.
@@gabrielbruce1977 Oh, so this wasn't an ADHD joke. Sorry.
The problem is coffee makes me tired it does help my ADHD but Adderall does so without ever making me sleepy I need my Adderall
It works for the same reason drugs like Ritalin or Adderall, which are also stimulants, work to treat ADHD! Stimulants actually calm our brains down, allowing us to slow down and actually focus.
"opens up the body" well that's a fancy way of saying it helps you poop.
As someone with ADHD, coffee actually does a great job with getting me to sleep.
Heck, I drink espresso instead of taking ADD meds, and it seems to fix my brain.
Yes!!!!
A stimulant sometimes does relax me.
Shallows out the "spikes"
@@mikhailkalashnikov7886 And that's how you were able to create the AK platform. :D
My mother insisted in the '60s coffee stunted your growth. Some things just never go away.
I was told the same thing in the ‘90s. Every kid was drinking a ton of caffeinated soda and people thought that was okay, but somehow caffeine in coffee would stunt growth…
I was told the same in 2009
Yeah!! It’s still taboo for kids to have coffee! 😆
Love their enthusiasm- all thoughts which I've had, drinking coffee, two, three hundred odd years later!! Especially since my pot-a-day habit dropped by necessity to nearly none. Cruelty, I tell you.
Nearly none? Yeah, you're still an addict. Obviously not strong enough to quit properly.
The most memorable times of childhood were (There was a fireplace next to our wood stove) sitting around the fireplace with everybody on the farm drinking coffee as breakfast was being cooked. Even as a toddler with fresk milk. Now, I roast my own (The kitchen is La Cornue, but a Vogelzange Railroad flat top is on the covered patio).
I did a paper way back in my college days (circa 1985). It was determined by science that one could overdose on about 70 cups of coffee. So therefore, coffee can kill you. 🤓 Btw, it was also noted that nutmeg was a hallucinogen, which just happens to be the favorite spice of our most beloved host.
yeah about nutmeg, it is in fact so.
@@georgevieira6686 some people report the feeling to be like an unpleasant and overpowering hashish like sensation, which can include mild visual activity, but not classical hallucinations in the clinical sense. Otherwise yeah.
@coolguyhentaisenpai i think it takes less than half of that to cause potentially fatal water hypoxia. i think it's like 2 gallons in an hour without urinating but that's just a loose memory. I do know water poisoning is definitely a thing though.
Nutmeg effects the central nervous system in a way similar to mescaline but not as strong. I tried to smoke it once when I was younger and it gave me a terrible headache and dizziness with like a body numbness.
Sometimes coffee makes me sleepy. It as sometimes has a mellowing effect on some people with atypical neurology.
"the vital flame" That author really said I can't live without my coffee, eh?
Coffee got me through some asthma reactions in the early 2000s, and I was very grateful for its usefulness in that regard and as an energy drink. I also like the flavor of it.
The music on this channel is always sooo soothing! Can anyone tell me what style or genre of instrumental music this is? I want a playlist of it 🥲
I'm not sure what the correct genre name would be but the music piece is from Manduetto by Jim's Red Pants jimsredpants.bandcamp.com/album/manduetto-mandolin-duets-from-the-18th-century. Hopefully this will help you find similar pieces.
I'm surprised the Swedish royal experiment on tea vs coffee didn't come up! I think the subtext of it was related to the fears expressed in this...
If coffee would kill, I would have been dead a long time ago.
Thank You for interesting and detailed story!☕️ let’s take a cup😁
I didn't start drinking coffee until I was 50. Now I love it. It's helped tremendously with migraines.
Wow. I started coffee at age 52 when I went back to college.
@@marilynmitchell2712 Congratulations on going back to school! Coffee, tea or anything with caffeine helps when you're in school. Lol. Best of luck to you.
Coffee helps me with migraines as well, it is more than just the caffeine there is something else in it because I do not get nearly as good a result with cola which has a similar caffeine content.
@@marilynmitchell2712 how marvelous. I'm 52, what are you studying?
Have you dealt with migraines for a long time? I have had them here and there due to hormones and it's pure hell. I find that caffeine and sugar help.
Excellent episode! Cheers! ☕️☕️
I would say there is no good or bad when it comes to food, moderation in all things goes well.
That's the thing with me and food/coffee. I can't moderate
"Can coffee kill you?"
>Honoré de Balzac has entered the chat.
I worked in a couple of call centers and free coffee flowed from morning til night
We all know there's only one solution to too much caffeine: Bloodletting. Obvious enough in the 17th century, probably appropriate today. Thanks guys! Dave J
it actually does work, bloodlettings are a solution to many things, it's just really not worth it because there are less invasive procedures
I love the taste and smell of coffee, my better half absolutely hates the taste but loves the smell.
Coffee is like Guinness lol Guinness looks impressive when in a glass but many hate the taste - I used to hate the stuff but then one day I loved it 🤣🤣🤣.
Смотрю Ваши ролики , и всё больше начинаю понимать английский язык . Спасибо Вам за интересный контент !!!
C ув. с Украины ! Мир всем народам !
I can't believe Glade hasn't come up with a coffee-scented air freshener.
Hobby lobby has a candle that is spot on!
@@sarahcrews2544 thanks for that tip! I will check that out
Old spice makes coffee scented deodorant
Voltaire really knew how to go about life, fresh roasted coffee is the best coffee
He's right. It's pretty cool that the way people talk about what they believe something is, even before investigating it to see what it actually does, is the same way we do things today, all these years later.
'Coffee clears the mind.'
Well part of that is getting off of the mild hangover you've suffered since you were ten helps....
I've had coffee at bedtime on many occasions without any problems sleeping. Maybe it's because I consume so much of it all day long.
Yup,coffee makes me sleepy
Coffe being baptised is the most hilarious thing ever
I've heard of 'baptizing' red wine, but this was just the practice of adding a drop or two of water to the first glass poured (but not the subsequent glasses) to improve the taste.
3:52 it's a soup..from the perspective of an italian. Thank you for the fine youtube you all create.
Fascinating topic, well-presented! Roasting coffee has a fine aroma!
I shared this over on the "I Love Coffee" Facebook page, they're gonna love this...
I love that mug, unironically, I kind of want that as my morning mug now.
Regarding breathing, coffee helps. Caffeine, actually. My son was born 3.5 months premature in March of 2020 and spent the forst 40 days of his life intubated. He received a daily dose of caffeine because it would help him remember to breathe.
So they were certainly on to something with that claim.
Its funny how some of those very old superstitions still persist my parents used to tell me that coffee would stunt my growth.
A friend suggested I add a tiny pinch of baking soda to my coffee cup. It really does taste smoother and less acid.
How you prepare it makes all the difference as well. The only method my tummy allowed was in a Bialetti pot on the stove. Rich, smooth, low acid. I got that tip from a former Jesuit priest, lol.
Recommended serving is safe to say 1 cup a day... but they never mentioned the size of the cup!😁
6 ounces. I wrote a paper about coffee in Writing 101
Comically large cup
In the 20th and 21st century, we have latte shops on almost every corner in the northwest. So not much has changed when it comes to coffee houses, just most have moved to drive in stands.
2:08 "If you didn't buy fancy coffee, you could own a home" but 250 years ago...
The 1855 treatise "Plant Intoxicants" by Baron Ernst Von Bibra, a German ethnobotanist, is quite an interesting read. This was right when isolating chemical alkaloids from plants was rapidly developing in science. Caffeine itself is an interesting topic throughout the book. It has an imperialistic tone at times which can be a bit offensive, but is generally a very sound and interesting resource, and piece of period specific science.
The colors in this video are beautiful.
Forgot where I found this, but it is part of a documentary project on the back burner,
Coffee & The Age of Reason
Sir Francis Bacon was knighted at the beginning of the Seventeenth Century. He began his professional life as a lawyer, but became best known a leader of the Scientific Revolution in Seventeenth Century Europe. This new philosophy established and popularized an inductive methodology for scientific inquiry, drawing knowledge from the natural world through experimentation, observation, and testing of hypotheses.
Bacon led the denunciation of the influence of the Ancient Greek philosophers; he wanted to demolish the edifice of human knowledge, and rebuild it from the beginning on a new, more solid foundation in which everything was challenged and nothing was assumed. The religious wars of the Restoration had cleared the way for this revolution, in part by diminishing the authority of the Church, especially in Northern Europe. In England, a new nationalism flourished.The spread of this new nationalism throughout Europe was accompanied by the spread of a new drink, coffee. Coffee promoted sharpness and clarity of thought. It became the preferred drink of scientists, intellectuals, and businessmen. It helped them to better regulate their working day; first by waking them up in the morning, then by keeping them alert throughout the day, and if needed, by extending the work-day late into the evening.
Coffee was served in calm, sober, and respectable establishments that promoted polite behavior and discussion. These establishments - the earliest coffee shops - provided forums for education, debate, and self-improvement. The impact of coffee was especially profound, since at that time, the common beverages were ale, beer, and wine. These were drunk even at breakfast, because they were far safer to drink than water, which was usually contaminated in most cities.
Coffee was made using boiling water, and was therefore safe to drink. It provided a new alternative to alcoholic drinks. Those who drank coffee at breakfast (instead of beer) began their day alert and stimulated, rather than "relaxed" (if not a little inebriated), and the quality of their work and thinking improved dramatically. Coffee was heralded as:
That Grave and Wholesome Liquor,
That heals the stomach, makes the genius quicker,
Relieves the Memory, revives the Sad,
And cheers the Spirits, without making Mad.
Western Europe began to emerge from an alcoholic torpor that had lasted for centuries. And the novelty of coffee further contributed to its appeal. It was a drink that had been unknown to the ancient Greeks and Romans. Drinking it was yet another way that Seventeenth Century thinkers could show that they had moved beyond the limits of the ancient world.
Coffee was the great soberer. Coffee was a manifestation of modernity and progress. Coffee became a symbol of intellectualism, and indeed, the ideal beverage for the new Age of Reason.
Regarding the whole humours thing, it goes even farther back in time: Classical Antiquity. The 4 Elements are supposed to be sharing some properties, namely how cold or warm they are, and how moist or dry they are - each one having a primary property and a secondary property among those two, in a chain sort of way (e.g. primarily hot, secondarily dry). Funnily enough, because of the whole opposition thing, and as it clearly makes most sense for the "element" of fire to be primarily hot, the primary property of water is... being cold, not moist!
You should make those mugs for Townsend's online! I'd love a skull and crossbones mug!
Perhaps with something about nutmeg on the other side. HHHHHhhhhmmmmmm I wonder how well coffee and nutmeg would go together? Must try it soon.
What's fascinating is that they did identify many of the effects of caffeine without knowing about it. All the discussion of stimulating the mind, coffee not being suitable for those with a nervous temper, causes trembling like the palsy, adds energy, etc. Then again, there was also much that was patently incorrect, like coffee before bed.
Maybe not i sleep well after a cup of coffee.... everyones system behaves differently
I love the videos! Keep it up!!
250 yrs later and its still going strong!!
I'm watching this as I sip coffee. LOL.
I find it interesting that they didn't know about caffeine, but they really did describe the effects accurately. It *is* a diuretic and can make you "produce urine." It has a mild laxative effect, so maybe that was the "aids in digestion" they saw. Caffeine does help with headaches. It's one of the active ingredients in Excedrin. It can make some people very jittery and shaky while not affecting others at all (me).
I think coffee is like wine. A little bit is probably beneficial as to the health benefits. However the benefits are quickly outweighed by the negatives when you drink too much of it. Where that line is is going to be different for each person. The problem is both substances are addictive. Some people have strong enough will to not be problem, but, most will become addicted to one degree or another. I believe we should be careful what ever we choose to put in ourselves. Evaluate yourself while your consuming. If you see signs of addiction pull back and reevaluate.
Who else was drinking coffee while watching? I've been drinking different coffees from around the world and I keep coming back to Columbia.
On a Monday morning, secretly switch out the office coffee with decaf. Then Friday morning, switch it back to fully caffeinated.
I remember once reading in Esther Forbes' novel "Johnny Tremain" a part in the book where Johnny receives payment from John Hancock then goes to a tavern to buy food. He spends part of the money on coffee and he ends up not caring too much for how it tastes.
Also read the book as a kid. He ordered a pitcher of chocolate and a pitcher of coffee. Loved the chocolate, but was disappointed in the taste of coffee after delighting in its smell.
@@karinhart489 Let me guess. It was required reading in the fifth grade? It was for me at least.
@@trapperscout2046, well not exactly… it wasn’t required reading at my school. I was having trouble finding something I wanted to read, and was kind of off to the corner of the school library during the 1960s. Doubt I would have read it if I knew it was written in 1943. But it was a good story about apprenticeship, the guild system, classes in society, and the American Revolution. And the passage you picked out struck me as a kid about how someone’s economic station dictated he could only have known coffee & chocolate by smell rather than taste until his own good fortune. Thank goodness my doctors today & medical science tell me that both coffee & chocolate are good for my health.
I swear coffee and chocolate go great together ..have a little chocolate & coffee ..its really good
LOL! 😆
You, Jon Townsend, adore the aroma of Coffee?!? I so remember a while back in your video about "The Perfect Campfire Coffee" you stated you weren't very fond of this wondrous concoction! Just toss a couple of whole Cloves into the pot when you add the grinds then you'll end up with the Nectar of the Gods on Mount Olympus to be enjoyed along with the Ambrosia that your precious daughter Ivy makes by folding Puff Paste over Fruit Preserves! ☕
Man... I can't get through the day without coffee and tea.
Cup o' coffee on my way to work in the morning and then ice tea throughout the day to keep me going.
This is a cool episode! Even though I remember you saying you don't quite like coffee.
Did they drink coffee black when it was first introduced?
There was an advertisement on this video stating that coffee was bad for you with Jitters and anxiety and whatnot.
From my daughter-in-law:
First, I drinks the coffee,
Then I does the things!
My grandparents gave us coffee and toast for breakfast on Sunday mornings before going to church. I was in 3rd grade my brother was in 6th grade at the time. They were both German, my grandpa would tell us it would stunt our growth but my grandma gave it to us anyway.
Good morning Starbucks, I need something for my vital flame!
Coffee. That is all I needed to see in the title.
I'm happy that you like coffee so much, that just means more tea for me!
He actually doesn't care for coffee! He's mentioned it on a couple of episodes that feature it, like the coffee eggs
I'm glad you like tea, it leaves more coffee for me lol.
Too bad it’s all in the Boston harbor
I wonder why coffe can popular in that time
No sugar right?
Honestly it makes me feel better to hear the commentary about coffee back then, specifically about it making you sleepy. I haven’t met a single person in my lifetime who can relate to coffee having an exhausting effect on me. I can drink a very small amount and be very sleepy. ☕️ I really don’t know why
Depends. I can drink coffee and go to sleep right away no problem BUT if i still stay up 2-3 hours after drinking it then i'm in trouble coz that means no night sleep for me. This is why i avoid drinking coffee at 6-8 pm.
In the late 1990's, a friend at work, brought me in an old, but unused filter coffee jug. It wasn't long before I was using it throughout the day at work - and was making some beautiful coffee with it - I spent a lot of money on the best coffee I could afford. I shared it with a lot of people, but I was still drinking an awful lot of coffee each day, to the point where I got kept awake at night - not by caffeine, which has no effect on my sleep at all, but by 'Jiggly Legs' (Medical terminology. Possibly).
My Doctor asked me how much coffee I was drinking each day, and wasn't amused when I said:
"About two litres."
I drink coffee about twice a week now. 😆😆😆
I believe it was JS Bach who wrote a cantata on the dangers of coffee. It's fairly funny for material of the day.
Voltaire had lots of interesting problems associated with attention deficit disorder according the diaries of Marie de Chatelet, his mistress.
I have adhd, use coffee to “clear my mind”
@@Craig_Hilbig Hummmm and it's working ???
Even today, some of us drink coffee to relax at night, while others can't sleep if they drink coffee in the afternoon. Neurology plays a role in this. My brain needs a stimulant to relax it, so I drink coffee in the evening. It really makes me sleepy.
The coffee shops of London were only frequented by men (women stayed with tea). Lloyds of London began as a coffeeshop.
I'm British/English and I pretty much only drink coffee now. Maybe a cuppa now and then.
I like that mug. I showed it to my dad the other day during the livestream