In 2017, New Zealand’s Whanganui River was designated as having the same rights as a human person. The decision drew upon Maori belief in the animate status of nonhuman beings and depended on the legal power of a Western state. This article examines those two factors in relation to the history of drinking water as an essential part of human diet, focusing on early modern England/Britain. In the early modern period, water was stripped of a life-giving force with which earlier European authorities (not unlike the Maori) had endowed it, even as water was becoming a generic component of a recommended diet—recommended, not least, by state authorities. Medical interpreters who published their works in English distanced themselves from definitions of matter that had considered water as itself vital, and instead defined the material components of a healthy diet, including water, in terms that avoided any hint of vitalism. Encounter with the dietetic advice of other cultures did not revive belief in water’s vitalist properties; rather, that advice was assimilated to new expectations that beverages, especially water, should maintain a cool body and temperament. These transformations took place in an imperial context. It was the Royal Navy that declared the minimum units of drinking water necessary for humans (meaning its sailors), which was a historically novel development. To uncover these trends is to explore how change occurs, and therefore how it might occur in the future, as state power may more frequently need to align with beliefs in animate nature that today are mostly non-Western beliefs, in order to protect natural features and resources, not least for human health.

中文翻译：

---

为什么要喝水？

2017 年，新西兰的旺格努伊河被指定为与人类享有同等权利。该决定借鉴了毛利人对非人类有生命状态的信仰，并取决于西方国家的法律权力。本文研究了这两个与饮用水作为人类饮食重要组成部分的历史相关的因素，重点关注现代早期的英格兰/英国。在近代早期，水被剥夺了早期欧洲当局（与毛利人不同）赋予它的生命力，即使水正在成为推荐饮食的通用组成部分——尤其是国家推荐的当局。用英语发表作品的医学口译员与认为水本身至关重要的物质定义保持距离，取而代之的是定义健康饮食的物质成分，包括水，避免任何活力主义的暗示。遇到其他文化的饮食建议并没有恢复人们对水的活力特性的信念；相反，该建议被吸收到新的期望中，即饮料，尤其是水，应该保持凉爽的身体和气质。这些转变发生在帝国背景下。是皇家海军宣布了人类（即其水手）所需的最低饮用水单位，这是一个历史性的创新发展。揭示这些趋势就是探索变化是如何发生的，以及未来可能如何发生，因为国家权力可能更频繁地需要与当今大多是非西方信仰的有生命力的信仰保持一致，