Sarang's Mostly Harmless

File this one under "things I don't fully understand."  Sarang has published a pamphlet, entitled Harmless Error, in which he argues forcefully that if beer is properly packaged, then non-pathogenic obligate anaerobes (bacteria that need oxygen to reproduce) should not be considered a "contaminant" or "impurity" in the beer.  He cites as his main example Acetobacter, the bacteria that converts alcohol to acetic acid (vinegar).  Because Acetobacter needs oxygen to do its work, it will have no effect on beer that is bottled or canned with minimal oxygen.  Acetobacter can cause problems in wine, which is often opened and then consumed over the next several days, during which it is difficult to prevent oxygen exposure.  Beer, though, is typically consumed soon after opening, long before oxygen exposure has any potential to spoil the beer.  (Acetic acid is actually considered an important part of some styles, such as Flanders red ale, and so those styles actually require Acetobacter to turn out right.  But Sarang does not make much of this, since the acetic acid "kick" that characterizes Flanders red ale would be completely out of place in most styles of beer.)

I found Sarang's argument highly persuasive, but I wonder whether most readers will find the issue interesting or even debatable.  I'm probably the ideal audience for this kind of thing, and even I found Harmless Error a bit dry at times.  And maybe that's Sarang's point.  Sarang has long argued that beauty, and more broadly aesthetic merit, is a moral value.  Maybe Harmless Error is an attempt to demonstrate ("show don't tell") that being right isn't enough, it's also important to be entertaining or at least engaging.  There is no flaw in the pamphlet, but no merit either, and so we can see with shattering clarity that "the truth is not enough."

Or maybe it's the opposite—maybe Sarang is satirizing our short-attention-span culture, our refusal to take ideas seriously unless they come with an emotional "hook."  Here is a serious, sober, well-written argument that will get no traction whatsoever in the broader culture, while we spend our hours poring over the latest ephemera on Twitter.  Maybe we are pissing away our lives while the truth about beer packaging stares us in the face.