Ask a chinaman. A chinese chef once told me that the reason to put salt in the water to cook pasta is because Marco Polo stole noodles from China and cooked them in sea water on the boat. So I asked why then u put salt in water to cook Chinese noodles? He told me that a lot of stuff that we have come from China. I agreed, like the plague, and various strains of influenza. There was some disconnect between us but he was proud of his heritage and knew a lot about noodles.