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Just checked: There are NO valid medical uses for nicotine. Now, you were saying?

Nicotine is a POISON. There is NO REASON why anyone should be voluntarily taking it into their bodies.

Are you a smoker, defending your nicotine addiction? I think it likely, and if so then I can't take your arguments seriously anyway. So how about you stop poisoning yourself, then we'll talk mkay?

Sorry, I have only smoked a total of 4 cigarettes in my life. I kinda liked the last one, and so said to myself "This is your decision point". And never smoked again.

But my comments were not really in defense of any one substance; just pointing out that there are lots of "poisons" that have "legitimate" uses as well.

In fact, you must not have "checked" very well. This was the third Google entry on the first results page:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

Only about 3%-4% of upper management test as psychopaths (vs about 1% for the general population). How do you account for the other 96%?

The off-cited 1 in 5 Australian study was badly misreported by the press. It found 5.76% could be classified as psychopaths, 10.42% were dysfunctional with psychopathic characteristics, and overall 21% showed some psychopathic traits. Crucially, they did not give a comparison for these metrics to the general population. The press added up all these numbers and misreported that 21% were psychopaths. (For comparison, 16% of prisoners are classified as psychopaths.

The vast majority of people highly successful in business are completely normal.

female gametes are 100% present at birth

That's recently been found to be untrue.

Not quite. It depends greatly upon the health of the female in the years just prior to puberty. A more concise explanation of ovogenesisis here. This is indeed news for most nerds of the computer kind but then again we do understand the concept of having soldered in ram that cannot be increased. With male nerds the problem lies in the waste of excess male gametes while thinking about the physical aspects of a females reproductive organs. Thus reducing the quantity of male gametes available when the occasion actually occurs. So we do not reproduce as frequently as males who do the real thing, a situation which in theory could reduce the population of nerds in the long run.

Another former smoker. 20 a day.

I now vape with nicotine.

I believe vaping to be worse than "nothing at all". We're ingesting chemicals in ways that aren't exactly natural. But I also believe it's orders of magnitude "better" than smoking. I hope there's more research done into nicotine, as I believe it's also been linked with neurological benefits; there's clearly a great deal we still don't know about the drug. I expect some of it to be good, and some of it to be bad, simply because nicotine has been used for a relatively long time now - and while we've established issues with the way people consume the drug (producing tar), the drug itself seems to have been harder to nail down.

Personally, as a complete layman, I do believe there's a link between inflammation and nicotine. There is some kind of link between my psoriasis (inflammation), nicotine, obesity and cardiovascular disease. Some of it we know; some of it we're still piecing together. Psoriasis has been linked with inflammatory heart disease https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news... , obesity is obviously linked with heart disease - there's talk about smoking (or nicotine, the research seems to be a WIP here) impacting psoriasis https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As for the cause and effect; who knows? That's why this research is important, imho. But as others have warned - it needs cool heads. There 'are' sections determined to treat nicotine as a holy war. I can understand that; I've lost two family members to smoking related illnesses, with a third at the chronic stage of her illness.

But if vaping helps smokers, and improves their health (relative to smoking) - great. It expect it has its own complications - but I remain confident, at this point, that there are less complications than from smoking.

Another former smoker. 20 a day.

I now vape with nicotine.

I believe vaping to be worse than "nothing at all". We're ingesting chemicals in ways that aren't exactly natural. But I also believe it's orders of magnitude "better" than smoking. I hope there's more research done into nicotine, as I believe it's also been linked with neurological benefits; there's clearly a great deal we still don't know about the drug. I expect some of it to be good, and some of it to be bad, simply because nicotine has been used for a relatively long time now - and while we've established issues with the way people consume the drug (producing tar), the drug itself seems to have been harder to nail down.

Personally, as a complete layman, I do believe there's a link between inflammation and nicotine. There is some kind of link between my psoriasis (inflammation), nicotine, obesity and cardiovascular disease. Some of it we know; some of it we're still piecing together. Psoriasis has been linked with inflammatory heart disease https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news... , obesity is obviously linked with heart disease - there's talk about smoking (or nicotine, the research seems to be a WIP here) impacting psoriasis https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As for the cause and effect; who knows? That's why this research is important, imho. But as others have warned - it needs cool heads. There 'are' sections determined to treat nicotine as a holy war. I can understand that; I've lost two family members to smoking related illnesses, with a third at the chronic stage of her illness.

But if vaping helps smokers, and improves their health (relative to smoking) - great. It expect it has its own complications - but I remain confident, at this point, that there are less complications than from smoking.

Some who would start smoking will use ecigs instead. That's bad how?

As for helping you quit, ecigs helped me quit. After a number of years vaping, I found that I just wasn't interested in the nicotine anymore. No drama, no nail biting, no eating the entire refrigerator, nothing. Just no more interest in nicotine.

While you are one of the (rare) "success stories" of people being able to quit using e-cigs, there are much larger issues at stake. E-cigs are being promoted as a safe alternative to tobacco (quoted from article true link here) and were not designed to help people quit, just channel their addiction/dependence onto a new (probably) more profitable platform, that may be slightly more socially acceptable:

"As tobacco usage declined over time in the United States, industries introduced an alternative known as electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) claiming they were a healthier alternative to tobacco smoking.3

Since then, the number of e-cigarette users has increased significantly because of the perception that they serve as a healthy substitute to tobacco consumption with minimal or no harm, a lack of usage regulations (although that has now changed), and the appealing nature of these devices, among other reasons."

And it goes on to state that the these products are increasingly used by teenagers:

"Consequently, e-cigarettes became the most commonly used smoking products, especially among youth, with more than a 9-fold increase in usage from 2011 to 2015.5"

The purposed of this article was to illustrate that these products are not benign as most users believe.

That's the part that really hacks them off, I sinned by smoking and they want to see some serious suffering as penance.

No, they are not out to punish anyone, rather they are trying to dispel incorrect claims from a formerly unregulated industry. Please be happy that someone is actually studying the effects so that we can make informed decisions instead of relying on industry propaganda.

Link for the second article referenced here

The following tooth treatments discourage cavity-causing bacteria and encourage remineralisation of teeth:

* Arginine-containing toothpaste -- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
* CPP-ACP-containing treatment -- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As far as I know, the number of current manufacturers of these treatments are limited, with Colgate Pro-Argin for arginine-containing toothpaste, and GC Tooth Mousse for CPP-ACP.

The following tooth treatments discourage cavity-causing bacteria and encourage remineralisation of teeth:

* Arginine-containing toothpaste -- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
* CPP-ACP-containing treatment -- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As far as I know, the number of current manufacturers of these treatments are limited, with Colgate Pro-Argin for arginine-containing toothpaste, and GC Tooth Mousse for CPP-ACP.

American AC in Paris noted:

This is *really* cool science, but "paradigm shifting" may be a touch over the top--this isn't the first paper or study to come to the conclusion that Toxo plays a role in neurological disorders, and there are labs around the globe that have been working on this topic for years.

Yep:

• Bermoy, Webster, and Macdonald from 2000.
• Webster, from 2001.
• Webster again, from 2007.

and those are just the top three scholarly articles for a google search for "toxplasmosis rat behavior". The parent page for each of those articles links to other, related studies, as well - but the Bermoy, Webster, and Macdonald study from 2000 appears to be the first. So, no, not exactly ground-breaking, and definitely not a paradigm changer, either.

Anybody remember Stanley Prusiner (hint: he won pretty much every award there is to win in medicine - including the Nobel - for his work establishing the existence, transmissibility, and neurodegenerative impact of prions)? Remember how respected authorities in medicine laughed at him ... ?

Your misinformed, or lying.
Every system has constraints, but near universal coverage with low out of pocket costs is something we should strive for.

"Approximately 74% of the population is compelled to join a sickness fund. Another 14% are members who join voluntarily even though their income exceeds the statutory cutoff. Of the remaining portion, 10% is covered by private insurance and 2% by police officers insurance, student insurance and public assistance. One of every 10 Germans covered by sickness fund insurance also purchases private supplementary insurance to cover co-payments and other amenities."

It may not be single payer, but a single payment negotation is also something Americans should not only dream about, but should demand.

"Perhaps the biggest difference between our two approaches is the extent to which Germany has managed to rein in the cost of healthcare for consumers. Prices for procedures there are lower and more uniform because doctors’ associations negotiate their fees directly with all of the sickness funds in each state. That's part of the reason why an appendectomy costs $3,093 in Germany, but $13,000 in the U.S."

The tittle had me excited because I thought they'd been studying the suicide risk of depressed people on anti-depressants vs. depressed people not on anti-depressants. There have been studies done, such as this one (open access, published in the journal of the Royal Society of Medicine) found that when selective serotonin and serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors are given to adult healthy volunteers with no signs of a mental disorder, the suicide risk is doubled. Whether this doubling also occurs in depressed individuals is the real question, but this is hard to study ethically.

Anti-depressants are far more controversial than most people seem to think, and the medical field has slowly begun to admit it. Note that I'm not saying the study I mentioned or this study prove that their usage should be stopped, but at the very least they're clear indicators that more research is needed into their efficacy and potential alternatives.

Indeed you are right! Antidepressants are far more controversial than most people seem to think. The reasons some doctors in the medical community are beginning to admit it (embarrassingly after 20+ years) is that the data for their effectiveness is really thin. Essentially, they don't work outside of patients with (maybe) really severe depression, and even in those cases the effect is largely minimal.

What's worse, like all good/new things once the first bits of data started to show they "helped" (mood in many people is a fluctuating thing, you could argue they would have felt better in a few weeks anyway), the prescriptions started flowing, and it is now hard to reverse the expectations that one of the prior commenters note - pill to cure or treat depression. According to a 2015 study, more than two-thirds (69%) of those prescribed an antidepressant do not actually meet the criteria for the diagnosis of major depressive disorder.

It also shows the business of medicine - showing "statistically significant" results that may or may not contribute to clinical significance. Here's what I mean. For trials that examined depression that was mild to moderate in severity, the benefit was just 1.29 points on the 53-point Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS). The difference for trials that studied severe depression was 2.69 points on the HDRS. Previous researchers suggested/used a 3-point difference which corresponded to “no clinical change”—that is, neither a doctor nor a patient would notice that change. Other researchers showed that at least a 7-point difference was necessary for “minimal improvement.” As you see, many studies don't come close.Then there is publication bias. If you look closely you find that 49% of the total studies had negative results,

It is a mess. It is a problem. People who are clinically depressed and suffer depression need treatment, and they need effective medications that afford them a clinically significant improvement in their condition, not just statistically. This is true for all branches of medicine - I'm looking at you cardiology and oncology.

Is there evidence that any of these residual plastic bits that get through the water filters are actually harmful?

Given that you were already connected to the Internet, not looking this up is just plain lazy.

Here is your evidence. I chose it out of 254,000 Google results for "Plastic mimics estrogen" because it is hosted by the U.S. National Institutes of Health as opposed to a partisan site.

My suspicion is they're benign and that this is a well-known phenomena, or rare, but it upsets people concerned about the idea of "un-natural" or "synthetic" things making their way in their food source.

Actually it seems this has been an area of study for a few years now:

http://system.suny.edu/system-...
Microplastics affect different aspects of the environment. They can affect fish, birds and other wildlife who may ingest the plastics, causing internal blockage, dehydration and death in these species.

Microplastics can also transport other pollutants. They absorb pollutants already in the water, such as DDT, polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). When ingested by wildlife or humans (either directly or indirectly), these plastics contain high concentrations of these dangerous toxins which can become even more concentrated and dangerous as they bioaccumulate in the food chain.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
Public health impact of plastics: An overview
2011 Sep-Dec

I guess microplastic fibers are different than microplastic beads, and maybe definitive, specific studies haven't been published yet. But, logic would say they probably have the same ill effects. I do agree I'd wait for the studies before passing laws. But nothing wrong with have a product ready to solve the problem.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

I'm all for science, but peer review is broken. This is one of many articles on the problem if you care to google.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

> Real men drink their water with as much contaminants as humanly possible, because real men are not pussies!

But they might *become* pussies because of that ;-)

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
- http://agsci.psu.edu/aec/resea...
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
- https://www.naturodoc.com/libr...

I know, I know: real men don't "do" science. Science is for pussies!

Thank you for your post and for its fine double irony. Now tell me: Did you see this second level? Then I must bow in awe before you!

Things changed a lot since 2006 (and that pamphlet is based on even older data from the turn of the century). Here's something from this decade. Estrogen reduces inflammatory response. As for blood suger, you've got it backwards:

In addition, recent research has shown that post-menopausal females exhibit increased incidence of type 2 diabetes, reduced insulin sensitivity, increased fat mass and increased systemic inflammatory markers [48]. These same features are seen in ovarictomized rodents, suggesting that estrogen may play a role in reducing the incidence of type 2 diabetes, insulin insensitivity and weight gain in aging females [48]. Human studies have suggested that HRT may protect against obesity-induced insulin resistance in older women in part by inducing increases in heat shock proteins (HSPs) [49–51]. These data suggest that estrogen and HRT could help limit the onset of type 2 diabetes in aging females [24, 49].

Who doesn't want a reduced risk of type 2 diabetes, and less weight gain.

Estrogen has been shown to provide damage protection in a range of other tissues, beyond muscle and bone, including cardiac, neural, hepatic and vascular tissues

Who doesn't want better protection for their bones, heart, brain, liver and circulatory systems?

Also, the benefits are now main-stream knowledge, including the big prize - a longer, healthier life.

Women using hormone replacement therapy were found to be 30 per cent less likely to die than those not on hormone therapy, the study found.

Women who use hormone replacement therapy to relieve the symptoms of menopause significantly improve their chances at a longer life due to a decreased risk of heart attack or stroke, according to new research.

A study conducted at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles looked at the health records of more than 4,200 women who received coronary calcium scans between 1998 and 2012. The scans measure the amount of calcium in the heart’s arteries. Higher calcium levels indicate plaque build-up, which increases the risk of having a heart attack or stroke.

Heart disease and stroke are the second and third most common causes of death in Canada, behind cancer, according to Statistics Canada.

Hormone replacement therapy users were also found to be 20 per cent more likely to have a coronary calcium score of zero, the lowest possible score. And 36 per cent were less likely to score above 399, indicating a high risk for heart attack and severe atherosclerosis -- a hardening and narrowing of the arteries. Estrogen is believed to have a beneficial effect on heart health and cholesterol levels because it increases the flexibility of blood vessels and arteries, allowing for better blood flow.

“Hormone replacement therapy resulted in lower atherosclerosis and improved survival for all age groups and for all levels of coronary calcium,” he said.

What's not t like. Helps explain why my cholesterol levels are crazy good (HDL more than twice the target value, LDL less than half the target value), and why my red and white blood cells last much longer than average (less wear and tear from being forced through plaque-filled blood vessels). It also reduces the risk of strokes because it counter-acts hardening of the arteries.

Ad the liver damage? That was a concern when people were using horse estrogen. Human estrogen doesn't have the same effect. And electrolyte balance (hyperkalemia) is a risk factor when using ethinyl estradiol (also linked to diabetes) and spironolactin, not when using estradiol and cyproterone acetate. Too bad that the US doesn't allow the use cyproterone acetate, unlike most of the rest of the world.

So that leaves just

Stop with the bullshit. Suicide rates are just above the general population for post-op transsexuals.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

In England, 48% of the transgender young people had attempted suicide at least once in their lives.[13] The prevalence of suicide remains high among transgender persons irrespective of disclosing their transgender status to others and undergoing sex reassignment surgery.[8]

I'll just leave a few references here:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As children with GID only rarely go on to have permanent transsexualism, irreversible physical interventions are clearly not indicated until after the individual’s psychosexual development is complete. The identity-creating experiences of this phase of development should not be restricted by the use of LHRH analogues that prevent puberty.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

At the assessment in childhood, 60% of the girls met the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria for GID, and 40% were subthreshold for the diagnosis. At follow-up, 3 participants (12%) were judged to have GID or gender dysphoria.

I'll just leave a few references here:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

As children with GID only rarely go on to have permanent transsexualism, irreversible physical interventions are clearly not indicated until after the individual’s psychosexual development is complete. The identity-creating experiences of this phase of development should not be restricted by the use of LHRH analogues that prevent puberty.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

At the assessment in childhood, 60% of the girls met the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria for GID, and 40% were subthreshold for the diagnosis. At follow-up, 3 participants (12%) were judged to have GID or gender dysphoria.

In case you haven't noticed, the number of in-home video game consoles totally swamps the number of video game arcade machines. Stop living in the past. Your mode of thinking is obsolete, same as you.

In case you haven't noticed, this doesn't contradict anything I've stated.

As for high blood pressure, take some estrogen.

That would cause a ton of other problems, so no thanks. My blood pressure is actually quite well controlled with exercise and prescription sleep medication, in addition to 6 grams daily of taurine supplement.

As for high blood pressure, take some estrogen. Contrary to previous findings, it's now known to be beneficial to both the circulatory system and the brain, by making the blood vessels more flexible and reducing the risk of stroke. It's also a powerful antidepressant. Oh wait - you can't/won't do that. I can (and do) which means I'm likely to live far longer than you. Sux 2 B U.

You're sadly mistaken:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

CONCLUSIONS: The increased mortality in hormone-treated MtF transsexuals was mainly due to non-hormone-related causes, but ethinyl estradiol may increase the risk of cardiovascular death. In the FtM transsexuals, use of testosterone in doses used for hypogonadal men seemed safe.

(Or if it was you stating this to me, you'd refer to it as a lie.)

And the reason the life expectancy is higher for real women is widely recognized as being owed to social factors (for example, men having a tendency of taking on jobs that are more hazardous to their health.) This is reinforced by the fact that the extra longevity that women have varies a lot from country to country, even among first world countries.

The different incarceration rates based on gender correlate to testosterone. Higher testosterone results in more violent behavior in both men and women, and the more violent the crime, the more likely to get harsher sentences instead of, say, community service or posting a peace bond. And given that men have much higher levels of testosterone, this would explain the higher male prison population. It's pretty obvious. There's even an expression that sums it up - men think with their dicks. Don't see the currency of expressions of women thinking with our vaginas, which highlights the disparity of testosterone influencing decisions and actions between men and women.

Higher testosterone levels are related to criminal violence and aggressive dominance among women in prison, says a Georgia State University study released Sept. 23.

The study, published in the September-October issue of Psychosomatic Medicine, measured testosterone in 87 female inmates at a maximum security prison. Their criminal behavior was scored from court records, and their prison behavior was assessed from prison records and staff interviews.

Testosterone was found related both to the violence of the women's crimes and to the aggressive dominance of their behavior in prison. This finding was further supported by assessing how an inmate's age corresponded to her behavior and testosterone levels.

As the amount of the hormone measured decreased in older prisoners -- testosterone declines with age -- so did the aggressive dominance. But the study concluded that testosterone, not age alone, was the significant factor; older inmates who had high hormone levels were not less aggressive or dominant.

"The key to this study is it shows testosterone is linked to dominance in both criminal behavior and behavior in prison," says Dr. James Dabbs, a professor of psychology at Georgia State University and lead researcher on the project.

The findings, by Dabbs and Marian Hargrove, are similar to those in studies of male prisoners. This indicates testosterone's effects on behavior are the same in women as in men, says Dabbs. Testosterone levels were highest among male inmates convicted of violent crimes such as rape, homicide and assault. These men also violated more prison rules.

Consider that both chemical and surgical castration reduce the rate of repeat pedophile offenders from 50% to between 2% and 5%. Testosterone clearly plays a role.

I hope you don't work for google, making gender generalizations like that.

In this case, it's accurate - men do have more colour-blindness - 16x as much.

As many as 8 percent of men and 0.5 percent of women with Northern European ancestry have the common form of red-green color blindness.

Men are much more likely to be colorblind than women because the genes responsible for the most common, inherited color blindness are on the X chromosome. Males only have one X chromosome, while females have two X chromosomes. In females, a functional gene on only one of the X chromosomes is enough to compensate for the loss on the other. This kind of inheritance pattern is called X-linked, and primarily affects males. Inherited color blindness can be present at birth, begin in childhood, or not appear until the adult years.

[citation needed]

Citation: Fruit Juice Intake Predicts Increased Adiposity Gain in Children

Citation: Reducing childhood obesity by eliminating 100% fruit juice

Citation: Fruit consumption and risk of type 2 diabetes

Citation: Intake of Fruit, Vegetables, and Fruit Juices and Risk of Diabetes in Women

Citation: Soft drink and juice consumption and risk of physician-diagnosed incident type 2 diabetes

[citation needed]

Citation: Fruit Juice Intake Predicts Increased Adiposity Gain in Children

Citation: Reducing childhood obesity by eliminating 100% fruit juice

Citation: Fruit consumption and risk of type 2 diabetes

Citation: Intake of Fruit, Vegetables, and Fruit Juices and Risk of Diabetes in Women

Citation: Soft drink and juice consumption and risk of physician-diagnosed incident type 2 diabetes

[citation needed]

Citation: Fruit Juice Intake Predicts Increased Adiposity Gain in Children

Citation: Reducing childhood obesity by eliminating 100% fruit juice

Citation: Fruit consumption and risk of type 2 diabetes

Citation: Intake of Fruit, Vegetables, and Fruit Juices and Risk of Diabetes in Women

Citation: Soft drink and juice consumption and risk of physician-diagnosed incident type 2 diabetes

In his defense, he was vaccinated as a child and as such his mental facilities were damaged. It's totally true, there's a paper on it and everything.

So, we know, categorically, that less calories and more exercise creates increased hunger.

We "know, categorically" nothing of the sort. Research on the relationship between exercise and appetite suggests it's at least dependent on the type of exercise, and that some exercise actually decreases appetite. See, for example, here and here.

Though this may not have been your intent, your "advice for fat people" comes across as though they should avoid exercise and focus on carb management. That's not sound advice. Though I don't disagree that cutting carbs within reason is a piece of the puzzle, there are many benefits beyond weight management to rational levels of exercise. And THAT is something we "know, categorically."

So, we know, categorically, that less calories and more exercise creates increased hunger.

We "know, categorically" nothing of the sort. Research on the relationship between exercise and appetite suggests it's at least dependent on the type of exercise, and that some exercise actually decreases appetite. See, for example, here and here.

Though this may not have been your intent, your "advice for fat people" comes across as though they should avoid exercise and focus on carb management. That's not sound advice. Though I don't disagree that cutting carbs within reason is a piece of the puzzle, there are many benefits beyond weight management to rational levels of exercise. And THAT is something we "know, categorically."

Oh, quit with the "poison" nonsense. Sugar is our primary cellular fuel. The issue is the quantity, the level of refinement, and the relative difficulty in obtaining food not saturated in it.

That turns out not to be the case. It is well known, and has repeatedly been demonstrated, that the body's cells run equally well on fat. See, for example, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... For further copious details, including case studies, see Gary Taubes' excellent summary "Good Calories, Bad Calories" (published in the UK as "The Diet Dilemma" for reasons unknown to all but the publisher).

The only cells that appear to need glucose are those of the brain. However, it is easy to get the wrong idea even here. After a few days' fasting, the brain starts to use ketones which are produced as a by-product of metabolozing fat for fuel. A rather small minimum amount of glucose still seems necessary, but the liver manufactures this through gluconeogenesis. Indeed, the paper cited above clearly implies that the body can manufacture everything it needs for full health in the absence of any food intake at all, provided fat reserves are adequate. If the only source of protein were the body's own muscles, etc., no fast could possibly extend longer than a few months at most.

The only reason why we have all been told that glucose is the body's normal fuel source is that we live in a grain- and sugar-fed society. Hunter-gatherers obtain much less glucose and regularly fast for varying periods. As long as one does not eat carbohydrates, fasting does not cause hunger. For instance, as I write this I have eaten no solid food (only some coffee with cream and soup) for over 40 hours. I feel great, and have absolutely no desire for food.

Most people have no idea how addicted they are to TV or any of its replacements. Just don't watch any TV or related content (YouTube, Torrents stuff, DVDs ...) for a week.
Going to the movies you can do as long as it is part of a social gathering.

I am sure most people will show signs of withdrawal. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... for some extra info.

Next time you can try to subdue the 230lb gorilla high out of his gourd on Meth then... Let me know how that works out for you. When tasers don't work, you get this: http://www.nydailynews.com/new...

Tasers are also more often used by female officers. Should we ban female officers because they don't have the physical strength to subdue 50% of the male population? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

You could cover the entire planet surface with trees and it still wouldn't be enough. It's time to start using technology to produce billions of machines that actively and permanently remove carbon from the air.

Okay. But until we have such machines, the most readily available carbon-sink, cost-effective and easily deployed with unskilled labour, is the tree.

Or you could attack the alleged problem - heat - directly.

Orbital sunshades can give you as much cooling as you want. But that's pretty high tech (though far cheaper than the economic damage of most of the current prescriptions.) But there are cheaper and easier ways.

For instance: You could change the albedo so the Earth, or large parts of it, turned black in the infrared window. This can be done with a number of materials, some of them very cheap (like 0.8 micron glass microspheres - about a tenth the diameter of red blood cells).

Such microspheres, embedded in a plastic film with the bottom side silvered for reflectivity, produce 93 watts per square meter of net COOLING in the direct noonday sun - and they work 24/7. That's good for 10 degrees C (18 F) - which is more than four times the temperature rise that the global warming proponents are saying is catastrophic. The material can be made for $0.50/square meter even with current processes.

Without the mirror coating and plastic film, just scattered over the existing surfaces, I'd expect them to do at least half as well (as long as they were on top), and be a hell of a lot cheaper. So if they aren't more of an inhalation hazard than desert sand, scattering them over things like the Sahara could both drastically drop its temperature and substantially reduce that of the planet, as well.

But you'd better be REALLY SURE the planet is actually warming up - rather than, say, falling into the next ice age in a few hundred years. Sweeping up those glass beads (or undoing a number of other "warming mitigations") might be more difficult than deploying them.

If you read the peer-reviewed article on the test from 2001, you'll find it actually correlates fairly well with clinically diagnosed depression in their tests.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

"In 580 patients who underwent a structured psychiatric interview by a mental health professional to determine the presence or absence of major depression using DSM-IV diagnostic criteria."

in this case it's being done for a very positive reason, which is that it's known to reduce the transmission of AIDS

Nope, the preponderance of evidence say the transmission of AIDS is either unaffected or enhanced by circumcision.

Almost any claims that circumcision protects from AIDS quote the infamous Camp Orange/Orange Farms study. That study consists of an egregious list of scientific misconduct. For example, the circumcised group had received sexual education while the control group did not -- so it's not surprising that men who had a downtime and were taught safe(r) practices will have less AIDS. The researchers' bias was so strong they immediately destroyed the control group "so they can benefit too" before even the data was tabulated.

Let's take a look at other studies:small increase of risk; no effect; large increase. Or for gay men: UK, US, Scotland.

On the other hand, there's a significant increase of MtF transmission.

But, if a study is funded by the Gates Foundation, it will be stopped early "because of futility" of protection, while in fact the preliminary data show a strong increase of risk.

Or, papers outright lie about the conclusion: "Declining Rates in Male Circumcision amidst Increasing Evidence of its Public Health Benefit -- in all categories other than one the "benefit" is negative, and the only category where circumcision slightly wins (heterosexuals with syphilis) had a sample of 6.

(though I'm circumcised, as are most American men, and I don't consider myself "mutilated"

I'm sorry for you. Alas, people who suffer from some malady tend to have a strong bias that "it's the right thing to do". For example, the strongest driver for female circumcision are older women who were circumcised themselves. Same for the deaf.

even if it does (theoretically) reduce a little sexual pleasure

"theoretically", "a little"?!? While you're unable to make this test yourself, you can ask an intact friend: wear regular underwear (ie, not commando, not boxers), retract the foreskin, try walking. For extra bonus, do it where there are people around so you can't adjust (this randomly happened to me a couple times). The chafing is so strong it's a pain. If penises get so calloused such chafing is not noticeable, there's hardly any feeling left.

in this case it's being done for a very positive reason, which is that it's known to reduce the transmission of AIDS

Nope, the preponderance of evidence say the transmission of AIDS is either unaffected or enhanced by circumcision.

Almost any claims that circumcision protects from AIDS quote the infamous Camp Orange/Orange Farms study. That study consists of an egregious list of scientific misconduct. For example, the circumcised group had received sexual education while the control group did not -- so it's not surprising that men who had a downtime and were taught safe(r) practices will have less AIDS. The researchers' bias was so strong they immediately destroyed the control group "so they can benefit too" before even the data was tabulated.

Let's take a look at other studies:small increase of risk; no effect; large increase. Or for gay men: UK, US, Scotland.

On the other hand, there's a significant increase of MtF transmission.

But, if a study is funded by the Gates Foundation, it will be stopped early "because of futility" of protection, while in fact the preliminary data show a strong increase of risk.

Or, papers outright lie about the conclusion: "Declining Rates in Male Circumcision amidst Increasing Evidence of its Public Health Benefit -- in all categories other than one the "benefit" is negative, and the only category where circumcision slightly wins (heterosexuals with syphilis) had a sample of 6.

(though I'm circumcised, as are most American men, and I don't consider myself "mutilated"

I'm sorry for you. Alas, people who suffer from some malady tend to have a strong bias that "it's the right thing to do". For example, the strongest driver for female circumcision are older women who were circumcised themselves. Same for the deaf.

even if it does (theoretically) reduce a little sexual pleasure

"theoretically", "a little"?!? While you're unable to make this test yourself, you can ask an intact friend: wear regular underwear (ie, not commando, not boxers), retract the foreskin, try walking. For extra bonus, do it where there are people around so you can't adjust (this randomly happened to me a couple times). The chafing is so strong it's a pain. If penises get so calloused such chafing is not noticeable, there's hardly any feeling left.

in this case it's being done for a very positive reason, which is that it's known to reduce the transmission of AIDS

Nope, the preponderance of evidence say the transmission of AIDS is either unaffected or enhanced by circumcision.

Almost any claims that circumcision protects from AIDS quote the infamous Camp Orange/Orange Farms study. That study consists of an egregious list of scientific misconduct. For example, the circumcised group had received sexual education while the control group did not -- so it's not surprising that men who had a downtime and were taught safe(r) practices will have less AIDS. The researchers' bias was so strong they immediately destroyed the control group "so they can benefit too" before even the data was tabulated.

Let's take a look at other studies:small increase of risk; no effect; large increase. Or for gay men: UK, US, Scotland.

On the other hand, there's a significant increase of MtF transmission.

But, if a study is funded by the Gates Foundation, it will be stopped early "because of futility" of protection, while in fact the preliminary data show a strong increase of risk.

Or, papers outright lie about the conclusion: "Declining Rates in Male Circumcision amidst Increasing Evidence of its Public Health Benefit -- in all categories other than one the "benefit" is negative, and the only category where circumcision slightly wins (heterosexuals with syphilis) had a sample of 6.

(though I'm circumcised, as are most American men, and I don't consider myself "mutilated"

I'm sorry for you. Alas, people who suffer from some malady tend to have a strong bias that "it's the right thing to do". For example, the strongest driver for female circumcision are older women who were circumcised themselves. Same for the deaf.

even if it does (theoretically) reduce a little sexual pleasure

"theoretically", "a little"?!? While you're unable to make this test yourself, you can ask an intact friend: wear regular underwear (ie, not commando, not boxers), retract the foreskin, try walking. For extra bonus, do it where there are people around so you can't adjust (this randomly happened to me a couple times). The chafing is so strong it's a pain. If penises get so calloused such chafing is not noticeable, there's hardly any feeling left.

It's a self-administered test - you do NOT need to go through google. The link to the US National Library of Medicine paper with the test and how to score it is here. The relevant section:

Over the last 2 weeks, how often have you been bothered by any of the following problems?
0=Not at all,1=Several days,2=More than half the days,3=Nearly every day

1. Little interest or pleasure in doing things 0 1 2 3
2. Feeling down, depressed, or hopeless 0 1 2 3
3. Trouble falling or staying asleep, or sleeping too much 0 1 2 3
4. Feeling tired or having little energy 0 1 2 3
5. Poor appetite or overeating 0 1 2 3
6. Feeling bad about yourself—or that you are a failure or have let yourself or your family down 0 1 2 3
7. Trouble concentrating on things, such as reading the newspaper or watching television 0 1 2 3
8. Moving or speaking so slowly that other people could have noticed? Or the opposite—being so fidgety or restless that you have been moving around a lot more than usual 0 1 2 3
9. Thoughts that you would be better off dead or of hurting yourself in some way 0 1 2 3 The total is your score.

Interpreting the score:

The vast majority of patients (93%) with no depressive disorder had a PHQ-9 score less than 10, while most patients (88%) with major depression had scores of 10 or greater. Scores less than 5 almost always signified the absence of a depressive disorder; scores of 5 to 9 predominantly represented patients with either no depression or subthreshold (i.e., other) depression; scores of 10 to 14 represented a spectrum of patients; and scores of 15 or greater usually indicated major depression.

In other words, this is something that any web monkey could bang out in a really short time, so don't be too impressed with the Googles. With the ready availability of web-based tests based on the PHQ-9, there is absolutely NO need for yet another one, so it looks like this is just to start getting people used to the idea of handing over their medical info directly to Google.

Best as I could gather, it's part of a long document referenced as PHQ-9: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... The actual questionnaire is down in the Appendix.

Nope. Estrogen increases muscle mass and tone

Every bodybuilder wet-dream ! Oh wait, no they're just loading with tes and gh :-/ [including females]

Nope. Estrogen increases muscle mass and tone, even without exercise. The effects are enhanced with exercise, and can be quite striking. Also increases lifespan..

So her lifespan is probably longer than most women (since most aren't on HRT), and definitely longer than if she had stayed a man. Between the two, she's probably gained a decade - and a decade that will be of the same or better quality than a man 20 years younger because of the reduction of risk of stroke, heart attack, hip fractures, better muscle tone, better, more youthful skin appearance, reduced risk of melanomas, etc.

Finally - a simple pill to extend life span - and it's cheap. Who needs expensive beauty cremes that falsely claim to reduce wrinkles when you can get the real thing? Too bad it's not for non-transsexual XY dudes (or female-to-male transsexuals), just genetic and transsexual women need apply. Guys are stuck with just getting older and pruney, and dying younger. But hey, it's your funeral.

Nope. Estrogen increases muscle mass and tone, even without exercise. The effects are enhanced with exercise, and can be quite striking. Also increases lifespan..

So her lifespan is probably longer than most women (since most aren't on HRT), and definitely longer than if she had stayed a man. Between the two, she's probably gained a decade - and a decade that will be of the same or better quality than a man 20 years younger because of the reduction of risk of stroke, heart attack, hip fractures, better muscle tone, better, more youthful skin appearance, reduced risk of melanomas, etc.

Finally - a simple pill to extend life span - and it's cheap. Who needs expensive beauty cremes that falsely claim to reduce wrinkles when you can get the real thing? Too bad it's not for non-transsexual XY dudes (or female-to-male transsexuals), just genetic and transsexual women need apply. Guys are stuck with just getting older and pruney, and dying younger. But hey, it's your funeral.

Yea,

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

Abstract

There is growing evidence of a distinct set of freshly-emitted air pollutants downwind from major highways, motorways, and freeways that include elevated levels of ultrafine particulates (UFP), black carbon (BC), oxides of nitrogen (NOx), and carbon monoxide (CO). People living or otherwise spending substantial time within about 200 m of highways are exposed to these pollutants more so than persons living at a greater distance, even compared to living on busy urban streets. Evidence of the health hazards of these pollutants arises from studies that assess proximity to highways, actual exposure to the pollutants, or both. Taken as a whole, the health studies show elevated risk for development of asthma and reduced lung function in children who live near major highways. Studies of particulate matter (PM) that show associations with cardiac and pulmonary mortality also appear to indicate increasing risk as smaller geographic areas are studied, suggesting localized sources that likely include major highways. Although less work has tested the association between lung cancer and highways, the existing studies suggest an association as well. While the evidence is substantial for a link between near-highway exposures and adverse health outcomes, considerable work remains to understand the exact nature and magnitude of the risks.

Background

Approximately 11% of US households are located within 100 meters of 4-lane highways [estimated using: [1,2]]. While it is clear that automobiles are significant sources of air pollution, the exposure of near-highway residents to pollutants in automobile exhaust has only recently begun to be characterized. There are two main reasons for this: (A) federal and state air monitoring programs are typically set up to measure pollutants at the regional, not local scale; and (B) regional monitoring stations typically do not measure all of the types of pollutants that are elevated next to highways. It is, therefore, critical to ask what is known about near-highway exposures and their possible health consequences. ...
(see more-- follow link)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

----

And the decline in *local* pollution is something I just thought of in the parent post. I had never seen anyone else bring it up. It's a concept that needs to be spread (and used every time someone brings up electric car pollution in an argument.

Yea,

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

Abstract

There is growing evidence of a distinct set of freshly-emitted air pollutants downwind from major highways, motorways, and freeways that include elevated levels of ultrafine particulates (UFP), black carbon (BC), oxides of nitrogen (NOx), and carbon monoxide (CO). People living or otherwise spending substantial time within about 200 m of highways are exposed to these pollutants more so than persons living at a greater distance, even compared to living on busy urban streets. Evidence of the health hazards of these pollutants arises from studies that assess proximity to highways, actual exposure to the pollutants, or both. Taken as a whole, the health studies show elevated risk for development of asthma and reduced lung function in children who live near major highways. Studies of particulate matter (PM) that show associations with cardiac and pulmonary mortality also appear to indicate increasing risk as smaller geographic areas are studied, suggesting localized sources that likely include major highways. Although less work has tested the association between lung cancer and highways, the existing studies suggest an association as well. While the evidence is substantial for a link between near-highway exposures and adverse health outcomes, considerable work remains to understand the exact nature and magnitude of the risks.

Background

Approximately 11% of US households are located within 100 meters of 4-lane highways [estimated using: [1,2]]. While it is clear that automobiles are significant sources of air pollution, the exposure of near-highway residents to pollutants in automobile exhaust has only recently begun to be characterized. There are two main reasons for this: (A) federal and state air monitoring programs are typically set up to measure pollutants at the regional, not local scale; and (B) regional monitoring stations typically do not measure all of the types of pollutants that are elevated next to highways. It is, therefore, critical to ask what is known about near-highway exposures and their possible health consequences. ...
(see more-- follow link)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

----

And the decline in *local* pollution is something I just thought of in the parent post. I had never seen anyone else bring it up. It's a concept that needs to be spread (and used every time someone brings up electric car pollution in an argument.

The calculator leads more people to believe that they are not overweight!

Sure. Just read again : the BMI does not take fat into account. You can have other tests that are much better (water displacement, pinch testing), but BMI is a rule of thumb that can be wrong for some. The page even mentions it : https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/heal...

Although BMI can be used for most men and women, it does have some limits:

• It may overestimate body fat in athletes and others who have a muscular build.
• It may underestimate body fat in older persons and others who have lost muscle.

So before being so heated up, just read what people write.

Another flat out lie, easily disproved if you had bothered to look at.. well.. anything at all instead of bullshitting.

References needed. Since BMI IS a simple rule out of height and weight, they can't do a BMI study other than computing the BMI on the official formula !

But please, if you think otherwise, give some extra links that would show that the BMI statistics are done out of water displacement or pinch testing.

And even your personal experience is consistent with what I'm trying to explain : BMI is a stupid rule of thumb, and for your case, you had to had other tests than the official BMI to prove that you were not overweight.

Let me repeat this. The BMI you link to is a standard index. (Index means ... number that has its limited meaning). It is not a "Body fat measurement". It is an index that on average reflects the amount of fat. On average only.

BMI is the measure of BODY fat! A 28 BMI means that you are more than 25% body fat regardless of how much muscle you have. These calculations are certainly estimates for which you can use water displacement and other methods for more precise numbers but the estimate is about the percentage of mass you have which is FAT.

Healthy numbers are different for men and women, but since we have entered the SJW territory of asking "gender" we now have a number for both sexes even on Government sites which is horrifying. A healthy woman should have more body fat than a healthy man and a different BMI. Why? BIOLOGY! Breast tissue is needed for feeding infants and women are the only sex that can perform that vital function. (biological males who grow breasts through medical issues or hormone therapy can not feed infants.) Testosterone impacts muscle density and mass.

If you don't know something either ask or figure it out before spewing dangerous statements.

First, there have been no reported deaths from this infection as per the article, so how exactly is this deadly? Dangerous, potentially deadly? So, please, lets title these articles responsibly. The remainder of this post is not meant to bash the parent, just to define terms and clarify concepts. My opinion is at the end.

Not a doctor, but there is only a little overlap between antibiotics and antifungal medications.

The term antibiotic covers both anti-bacterial agents (e.g. penicillin) used against bacteria, and anti-fungals (e.g. fluconaole/Diflucan), and technically, they also refer to anti-virals (e.g. aciclovir), but in the most common use, antibiotics refer to antibacterials, and never to antivirals. There are no medications that treat both bacteria (prokaryotes [no nucleus]), fungus (eukaryotes [true nucleus]) simultaneously; yes, bleach (sodium hypochlorite) can destroy both, but internal use is discouraged [and as referenced in the wikipedia article, your body's neutrophils (a type of white blood cell - cells that fight infection) uses hypochlorous acid as an antimicrobial . So.....yes and no. [sorry that kept getting longer and longer]

This stuff is resistant to Diflucan (I'm not trying to spell the generic name correctly right now),

Flu con a zole - that's not too hard....Talimogene Laherparepvec...that's hard. :-)

which is often handed out with much less oversight than antibiotics.

Ummm, no. You can get pretty powerful topical antibiotics and topical antifungals over the counter. Fluconazole is an oral antifungal that still requires a prescription (at least in the US and other "responsible" countries).

Any bio-female could probably get a few doses for a yeast infection without seeing their doctor; calling in and asking is all most require since it is a common ailment.

It is a common ailment, but it is also a true infection that can be cultured and proven, and usually requires treatment. (I don't want you to poo-poo this aliment :-), pretty miserably for those afflicted), and unless there is a well established relationship between physician and patient, an exam is required (and strongly encouraged to rule out other more dangerous diagnoses).

The problem is that many primary care doctors have been told that C. albicans (the common human strain) can not become resistant. I was told the same, only to be corrected by a very indignant Tropical and Infectious Disease specialist who had seen that first line drug become useless in a few cases.

I see fluconazole resistant candida albicans frequently (reported 7% resistance rate), but I work at a tertiary care referral center, so YMMV. Never been under the illusion that it could not become resistant. Every organism (meaning microbial species) given enough time and opportunity can become resistant to just about anything.....The only thing that microbial organisms will never become resistant to is fire, well heat anyways (shout out to the the post below).

But this doesn't mean we need to panic and shut down Madagascar. There are other classes of drugs, like the old standby nystatin, and other families of antifungal medications in the larger azole drug category. This should be treatable if caught early. The danger is that drugs like nystatin can not be absorbed so

Tryptophan isn't "wrongly" said to make you sleepy - it does make you sleepy. The myth is that it's tryptophan to blame when Americans get sleepy after a Thanksgiving feast, when in reality most of the blame lies on the mass consumption of carbohydrates. Turkey is no more tryptophan-rich than many other meats, such as chicken.

Actually, our intestinal tract is that of a frugivore and shares no traits with mammals adapted to eating meat. The articles you linked are not scientific, and the Harvard article reads like a student paper in human evolution.

Evolutionary theory is the heart of what paleoanthropologists study, and there is no consensus among them about meat eating "making us human". Although some do make that claim, perpetuating the outdated logic of the "Man the Hunter/Man the Killer" theories of the '40s and '50s. Contrasting this, some modern scientists believe that the consumption of tubers was actually the energy source that led to increasing encephalization (brain enlargement) and gut reduction. Others argue it to be starches more broadly, and many effectively claim that any energy-dense food source would do the trick. The goal was simply reaching reproductive age after all, not avoiding cancer or reaching ripe old age in a healthy state.

The starch and tuber hypotheses used to get shot down because the earliest controlled use of fire didn't seem to emerge until relatively recently (200,000-400,000 years ago), and root starches require cooking in order to fulfill the kind of calorie counts that would have been necessary. With older and older dates emerging for human's control of fire (possibly as early as 1.7 million years ago), there is a growing belief that the development of cooking with heat in general was the key contributor to encephalization.

Anyone claiming that there is a scientific consensus on these matters simply isn't reading enough paleoanthropological literature. Every single dietary claim has been argued ferociously for decades. There are a few simple facts that no one seriously working in the field would argue however:

The human digestive system is that of a frugivore and has no specific biological gut adaptations that would be expected of a species that "evolved to eat meat". The same is true of our hominin ancestors. And based on dental calculus analysis and corprolite data, our ancestors ate shit-loads of plants.

We have no specific biological adaptations to eating meat. Our teeth are those of herbivores, and our digestive system is that of a frugivore. Based on dental calculus analysis and corprolite data, our ancestors ate shit-loads of plants.

But we do have at least one specific biological adaptation that is a result of eating meat. Our intestinal system and muscle mass as evolved to much smaller than equivalent animals that are pure herbivores.

http://time.com/4252373/meat-e...
http://news.harvard.edu/gazett...

Some folks think that these adaptations allowed us the luxury of evolving larger brains...