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Hic Hic Hooray: Hiccups Explained
Anonymous Hero writes "Finally after millions of years (and zillions of hiccups) New Scientist gives us an explanation for this most annoying and least obvious of adaptations!"
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Earths only been around for like 7000 years.
...try being taken seriously at work when you have the hiccups...
BlackNova Traders
Why do I yawn when I see someone else yawn?
*hic* post *hic*
w00t! first post?
punch Cowboyneal in the face. works every time.
and knowing is half the battle!
Let's get drunk and delete production data!
Smelly Linux hippies need to free up valuable space for more Mountain Dew and pizza.
Because basically, we are fish....
People who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.
i seem to suffer badly from hiccups. I've even gone to the doctor for them, because I get them so often. However for me, i only get one at a time. I'll hiccup once, and then 15 minutes later i'll hiccup again. It drives me nuts, and often gives me headaches.
If they found a cause, i'll be first in line when the fix is available.
Pardon me for posting off-topic, but I am looking for a story that was posted on /. some time last summer around June or July. It was about a program that was being designed for Pocket PC that would allow you to input by way of scrolling boxes that would automagically guess the next letter in a specific word by making the next concurrent box bigger and smaller according to the dictionary used. If someone could please reply to this question, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks
PS Can someone at least reply before modding me down this time?
With that out of the way, could they now explain why certain Slashdotters have the need to post lame "FIRST POSTS. I ROXERS UR BOXERS?!" Yeah.
AMD will die within five years implies IBM exec
Only room for two players at the high-end
By Arron Rouse: Thursday 06 February 2003, 13:54
IBM MIGHT NOT BE THE BEST choice of friends for AMD if the attitude of Bill Zeitler is anything to go by. He is predicting IBM and Intel will be the only players at the high-end of the chip market in five years time.
In a gaffe that can only sour relations with AMD, Zeitler - Senior Vice President & Group Executive, Server Group - let slip to Fortune that he thinks the rest of the 64bit competition will fall by the wayside.
AMD is pinning its hopes on its x86-64 technology, all of its new products over the next few years are offshoots from Opteron. If Opteron and its successors are dead in five years, it would leave AMD with nothing. The obvious inference is that Zeitler doesn't expect AMD to be around in five years time.
AMD has worked hard to make its new 64bit processor a success and has gained enormous support within the industry, including from IBM. It is sure to come as a nasty shock that while IBM has been helping AMD along it has also been sharpening the knives behind its back.
BOO! no? still have hiccups?
George W. naked! taking a dump!
see? you can scare the hiccups out of someone!
I am the lord of the pun. Dance Knave!
---
Couldn't they just tell us how to stop them? I really don't care what and where in our evolution they come from....
How about a sure fire way to stop them, besides standing on my head while holding my breath and taking 10 sips of beer while counting backwords from 20.
So, people (hic) get hiccups (hic) because we used to (hic) have gills. Fscking wonderful...(hic) (hic)
Why didn't they (hic)come up with, or at least (hic) mention, a working cure (hic) for them... (hic) (hic) (hic)
Webmaster Wanted - Entropic Reactions
This sounds way too fishy to me ;-)
It had to be said I'm afraid :-P
Are you local? There's nothing for you here!
I was hoping they were caused by something cool like mass-hypnosis or alien mind control.
I'm starting to think this isn't the best place to promote my Anti-Sig Campaign.
That's the only cure for hiccups that i've seen work for (almost) everyone. Thankfully I'm always at a bar when i get hiccups - hmmm, maybe there's a correlation there...
Try a teaspoon of white sugar with lemon juice poured on top to soak in. Eat it. No more hiccoughs.
Works every time.
I'm sorry, where did that article provide the explanation? I saw theory, but no proven, scientific answer, as the last two paragraphs indicate...
I'd always thought hiccups were the natural reaction to getting royally tanked.
There are four boxes used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order.
Wow, hiccups are the precursor to sucking. I remember when DOS would hiccup occasionally. We all know that it's taken that next step. :-)
The doctor also said that they have no clue why it happens, and that at least one study had shown that if you bring a baby out into bright light they will often start hiccuping. I keep pointing my daughter at the sun, but so far, nuthin. :)
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
The article seems to indicate that this is a concept - something that may have arisen from brainstorming, and may not be backed up by any data at all!!
This "explanation" is apparently supported by the thinnest of threads in terms of evolutionary history, and hard evidence is not presented to back this claim. This does not stop the Slashdot editors from posting this as "stuff that matters."
Please let the brainstormers check their ideas with research, show correlation, then causation, then present their findings in a way that can be checked by others.
This hypothesis, if you can call it that, is not tested and is perhaps not testable.
Why this reflex motion a) exists at all, and b) why it persists, if it descende from the frog may only be fodder for spectulation.
Science requires more than mere speculation.
Phooey.
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
I'm not sure how to take this
On one hand, it is an interesting development. Tracing the 'roots' of us all
On the other it seems quite a trivial thing to be searching for answers on. Why does it matter, really?
Perhaps there are more nefarious purposes for the information gathered. I don't like the sound of that
The article relates a new theory, nothing more. It's a promising theory, and one which can be disproven easily. If the test fails to disproove the theory, then it can be taken more seriously as an explanation. Still, it may never be PROVEN, per se.
Boss: take a look at this code, I don't know how long it's been around, but it must have some use right?
...
...
private class Brain {
try {
} catch(UnknownException e) {
this.hiccup();
}
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
You mean...*hic* the bag thing... *hic* doesn't work? *hic*
How much did it cost to figure this out?
Please tell me it cost less than it did to develop the square watermellon. Or Windows XP. Both useless products.
We'll meet a man who's been hiccupping for over 30 years.
"!Hic! Kill me. !Hic!"
Some men spend their entire lives trying to kill themselves for having been born. --Ross MacDonald
There is a trick to making them go away. It takes some concentration, but you can consciously prevent your muscles from doing that to you. I wish I knew how to explain it - it's like teaching someone to burp on command - I just "know" how to do it, but I'm not sure how to explain what to do.
You get hiccups when you've drunk too much.
These doofus scientists don't even watch TV or go to the pub, obviously. Boffins.
Blearf. Blearf, I say.
Anyone got any sure-fire techniques?
Score one more for the we came from a puddle of sludge team!
Not that I wouldn't prefer creation over evolution. Probably wouldn't have hiccups. Thanks a lot, natural selection.
like people coughing in a theatre, once one person starts the others follow.
:
My hypothesis
Falling asleep and/or coughing is a dangerous activity with predators around. So when one person coughs and gives the game away it would be prudent to get your coughing over and done with now rather than when it goes quiet again.
With yawning maybe it's a trigger to take an oxygen blast before it's necessary.
Will that do?
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
I'll have to show to article to the wife. That way the next time I get the hiccups, she'll understand why I start going for, uh well, if you read the article you'll know.
Have you ever noticed hiccups in babies.
:)
My brothers just had a little girl. She quite a noisemaker - Cries almost all the time. Now I've noticed that sometimes in her rare quiet periods when she gets hickups - she doen't seem to care.
Now this is a child that uses high screaming as the first symptom of hunger, or any othe discomfort - but when she has hickups she doesnt seem to notice. She'll just go on watching our faces - or whatever little people does for fun. This is even though every hickup makes her little body jump.
While not even resembling proof for anything - it might suggest that the theory that suckling and hickups are related behaviour is not that far of.
I get the worst hickups myself. My little 100kg 190 cm body, shakes in cramps an my head and throat aches - and they last for a long time. We once threw a dinner party - and I had the hickups all through dinner - quite conversationkiller
Knowing why and how it happens is good, but what about healing hiccup?
For most of us, hiccups are just a small annoyance for a couple of minutes, but I remember watching a medical TV emission where people explained that they suffered from chronical hiccups. These persons could have hiccups for several days (night and day), and their life was not funny at all.
JB.
Having finished that research, they are now trying to determine the cause of slashdotting.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Rotenone?
or Rex Hunt?
Irene KHAAAAAAN!
If only I had known this in elementary school. It would have saved me from detention.
Remember how all of the school health books had a little blurb on hiccups? The Q&A form went like this:
Q: What causes hiccups?
A: Hiccups are a spastic contraction of the diaphragm combined with the closing of the windpipe. Drink some water...
I got in trouble for not accepting that. The teacher gave the class the same answer and I told him: "OK, so that's what they are, but WHY do we get them?" Same answer again. So I explained to the teacher and the class the difference between cause and effect.
2 hours after school...oh, the trauma! Freakin' great way to foster a sense of inquiry.
I know a way to prevent them....Try this...Fill water in your mouth and hold your nose with your hand...(such that you can't breathe)...Do this for a few seconds...and then release your nose...You will find them gone!! Try again for few seconds if the hiccups still persist!!
don't women hiccup when they get my 10cc delivered at 38mph? Are they just *that* good at closing off their glottis?
When I read the title, I thought maybe Taco was going to explain why Slashdot has been as stable as a Windows 3.1 box on a Packard Bell for the last few weeks.
I pigeonhole spicy food into five personal categories, with examples: mild (Korma), hot (Madras), hiccups (the hotter types of Indonesian Tom Yam), painfully fiery (Vindaloo), and too hot for me (Tindaloo and hotter).
... :-)
I'm prepared to accept the possibility of ancestry shared with fish, but I've never heard of fish eating curries
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
next they can hopefully figure out why everyone does really stupid stuff to get rid of hiccups!
/me does a headstand and chugs a glass of water
[I can picture a world without war, without hate. I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it]
I have this argument with my significant other all the time. She gets hiccups fairly regularly - perhaps once a month. I haven't had the hiccups in over 15 years.
When I was young, I remember reading an article that suggested hiccups were purely psychological. Since then, I've been convinced that it was purely a matter of will.
Occasionally I'll get a single hiccup - usually after drinking a carbonated beverage of some variety. But I know that hiccups are psychological, and I never have a second hiccup. As I said, this has worked for over 15 years.
My significant other? She swears that it's some biological function. Her hiccups? They last for at least five minutes - sometimes up to half an hour.
Call me crazy, but at least I'm hiccup-free.
Rotenone?
or Rex Hunt?
Displaying a pack of fish fingers?
Displaying a picture of a big shark, toothed whale, otter or seal?
Throwing a fishing net over the victim?
Electric shock?
Dynamite?
I guess we know why drinking water doesn't help.
they need to find out why we still use Outlook Express.
Karma: Bad due to google bombing - Robert Watkins woz 'ere.
I know a way to prevent them....Try this...Fill water in your mouth and hold your nose with your hand...(such that you can't breathe)...Do this for a few seconds...and then release your nose...You will find them gone!! Try again for few seconds if the hiccups still persist!!
The parent to my post was referring to having the hiccups while at work. I don't really suggest you try this while in a meeting!
No, that's alright, no thanks necessary.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
...that was interesting. But after years of experimentation, I'm still holding onto my theory that the primary cause of hiccups originates from the Guinness brewery. ;-)
I'd volunteer to be part of the suckling & hiccuping brain study. I'd be particularly interested in the suckling part.
Simple logic:
1. the beer bottle is the teat
2. you suckle it
3. suckling teats invokes hiccups
4. 1&2&3 -> you get hiccups
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the article seems to be a bunch of speculation.
It would be great if this research could help bring an end to Chronic Hiccups, a condition in some people which lasts for hours, days, or, in extreme cases, indefinitely, as a result of various illnesses of the lower abdomen. This could help afflicted people return to a normal lifestyle and regain their social life.
-
I thought this was real. They use the unproven theory of evolution to explain this away. Bah.
I will continue to think what I always thought was the cause of hiccups. We hiccup to prevent demons from entering our bodies.
saru mo ki kara ochiru
More useful would be figuring out:
a) Why we yawn.
b) Why, when we yawn, does it cause someone ELSE to yawn.
c) What can I do to STOP yawning.
I swear, every time I'm reading my toddlers their books, I start yawning like crazy. Irritating, that.
In response to the article though: fish huh? Uhhhhh... Ok, buddy. Back to the drawing board then?
- OrbNobz
Warning: Your sig has expired. Please enter a new one:
Unfortunately, Creationists are anti-rational.(some might say that they are ir-rational, but I won't go that far.)
THe problem with Creationism is that it isn't Science, it is Religion. It isn't Science because it can't be disproved.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
UNIX can prevent hiccups in the first place with the nohup command.
nohup whoami
"UNIX: It sure beats drinking a glass of water while standing on your head!"
Jesus Christ, the guy just asked you to post a goddamned link. For fuck's sake. Got any links so an atheist like myself can get some Jesus in him?
Would you respect the opinion of someone that claimed the tooth-fairy created earth 38 minutes ago? Your beliefs are just as fucking outlandish. Remember, a stupid belief held by millions is still a stupid belief.
They didn't mention whiskey, even once! %)
Getting scientific information from New Scientist is like getting international news from USA Today.
postmodernsideshow.com
Probably caused by guilt.
I always feel like a little kid when I get them
Now you've spoiled it!
That was going to be Michael Jackson's defense.
Ha, now instead of holding my breath, jumping up and down, drinking water, etc to get rid of hickups, I can just ask the closest female to let me suckle :)
...why do I get hiccups while smoking a cigar? Does that mean my 'inner fish' is a non-smoker?
Max
Woot w00t w007.
This article doesn't explain pr prove anything!
It's just theory and speculation.
I take nothing for granted untill proven to me.
And now, I want them to explain me why when people drink alcool, lots of time they will have hiccups.
I'm always amaze how "Team of scientists" can come with not so complete theory like that.
WHat are they doing all day?
Of course, if you *don't* believe in evolution, this pretty much doesn't explain anything.
Check the Guinness book of world records... there's a guy who has had the hiccups for 60 years or so... Oh, the poor soul. C'mon scientists, he's waiting on you! ;)
"To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit." -Stephen Hawking
Even though I don't know the biology behind it, I do know that a common cause for hiccuping is eating too fast. A drink of water always cures that for me. Is there a fishy explanation for that, too?
This is the real signature
(Beats those shadows on the cave wall, don't it?)
I don't know how scientific my technique is, but it's practical. :)
Place both of your fingertips so that you feel the "bottom" of your rib cage, about 2 inches above either side of your belly button. Then move your fingers down about an inch, and then finally push in about an inch. Basically, you're pushing on your diaphragm. Hold for about 30 seconds. (Basically two hiccup cycles.)
I discovered it after learning musicians should be breathing from their diaphragm. Has worked like a charm over the many years.
Cheers
This has only failed me once in the last ten years. YMMV.
1. Get a glass of water.
2. Take a deep breath and let it out, but don't push it out. Don't worry if you hiccup during that breath.
3. Without taking another breath, start taking *tiny* sips of the water; try to take at least one per second. Swallow each one. Keep your epiglottis closed as much as you can, in case you hiccup in the middle of doing this.
4. After 10-15 sips, the muscles in your mouth and throat will start to get tired, making it more difficult to do this. Keep going.
5. After a few more sips you won't care about the tired muscles, because you'll really REALLY want to breathe. Force yourself to take a couple more sips, then stop drinking and take that breath.
You should have no more hiccups after this. If you keep hiccuping wait a few minutes and try again. If it doesn't work on the second try, you're screwed. Also, this will not work if the hiccups are from being drunk and it may not work if they're a side-effect of medication.
I'll prove thier hiccupping is similar to sucking nipples. Send me a big-breasted 20 year old centerfold-type chick over, and when I start hiccupping, i'll put my mouth on her nipples. She'll tell me what she thinks it feels like. Damn, I smell grant money.... gotta go...
today is spelling optional day.
Anyone consider that this might spark up an evolution vs creation debate? I mean not like evolution needed any more supporiting theories/proof, but there are some people out there that can't accept anything.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
First off, from the subject line, no, this is not a post about how getting the hiccups during a job interview can kill your hopes and dreams.
From the article: another (theory is) that they prevent amniotic fluid entering the lungs (of babies). If their purpose is to prevent liquid getting into the lungs, points out Christian Straus at Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris, you would expect the closure of the glottis to be associated with the contraction of the muscles used for breathing out, as in a cough, not those for breathing in.
Would someone like to explain to Mr. Straus that there is a greater chance of aspirating amniotic fluid when one is breathing in, than when one is breathing out!?!
There's a problem for fighter pilots called photopic sneeze which affects them when they are suddenly hit in the eyes with bright sunlight and can cause loss of control at high speeds. Interesting that some guy here mentions a drinking buddy who used to both sneeze and hiccough when out drinking. Wonder how closely these two spasmodic reflexes are linked.
C'mon, that article was just a *theory*
I KNOW the real cause is that aliens have implanted the hiccup reflex as a form of study. By observing the hiccup distribution frequency and duration of all humans simultaneoulsy, they can tell how close we are to The Big Hic - then they come and get us.
to know how to stop them! I mean, knowing WHY we do it is kinda interesting, but an article that definatively tells how to end the hiccups...That would be worth a Nobel!
Always value the individual over the system. --Bruce Lee "I don't need a Sig - I have a custom 191" - me
Doesn't this sound like childbirth in reverse?
"The cup... the drop... it's a YES!"
I don't know about the rest of you, but I only get hiccups when I have air trapped in my stomach. I've found there are two ways to get rid of them (for me). Both involve burping. The first is to swallow more air by closing off the windpipe and sucking air into the stomach, which almost immediately causes me to burp and usually takes both the trapped air and the new air I swallowed with it. This is what I've always assumed that my hiccups were trying to make me do, so bully on the article that was posted. The second, which I prefer, is to tense my stomach muscles in such a way that at the next hiccup, the air is forced out of my stomach. Using these techniques, I rarely hiccup more than three times. In fact, the last time I couldn't get rid of them was right after I had my wisdom teeth removed (years ago) and I was still recovering from the effects of whatever valium derivative they used.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
I can induce about three large hiccups when I take the first few swallows of a heavily carbonated soft drink. The effect does not re-occur during the rest of the drink.
Might be a basis for some further research since it starts a hiccup. Does this happen to anyone else?
It seems like Darwin is under similar pressures to maintain backwards compatibility for gills that we no longer use as Intel and AMD are under pressure to maintain backwards compatibility for the x86 processors.
We can't get rid of that legacy reflex to exercise our gills because there's too much software written on top of it.
The only time I get hiccups is if I do something like eat too big a chunk of bread without adding enough liquid to get it down the pipe quickly. I'm only this stupid a couple times a year. I can kinda feel the food going down too slow, and I know a hiccup fit is coming, especially if I can't get water down there quick enough. And sure enough, it does. I continue to hiccup until the food passes.
Or isn't this a hiccup?
I guess it must be genetically programmed to surrender to the Germans every few decades or so...
Used to be a pretty popular theory that the develpomental stages of an individual of some species (ontogeny) mimic its anchestral path (phylogeny). I'm going from vague memory here, biology people will no doubt correct me. But it is a wierd kind of time-shifting. For example, they'd say that babies look like and behave like some species that we evolved from, say, tadpoles. Everybody would use this to prove their pet misanthropic theory. For example, they'd say was less advanced here than because they behave like say chimps, so they're still as a race stuck in that stage. Hitler used this argument, for example.
Stephen J. Gould wrote a very nice book about it "Ontogeny Recapitulates Phylogeny." For a minute there, it seemed that the researcher was saying that human babies behave like tadpoles, but perhaps it's more like we just kept the same mechanism around as a building block.
Many cures for hiccups involve a contraction of the diaphragm and stomach muscles - scaring, drinking water, holding breath. As a kid, that led me to invent my own cure, which always works for me.
I theorized that, like blinking, sneezing or coughing, a hiccup was trying to clear some sort of irritating blockage. So I tried manually pressing in and slightly up just on and below the breastbone while trying to burp - basically adding a bit more strength and persistence to the action of the diaphragm. Now it may just be me - but when I've been hiccuping, this always causes a sort of foamy burp, and the hiccups end.
Now it could just be that the diaphragm gets stretched a bit and stops contracting (like stretching a cramping muscle). But my theory has always been that some foam has built up and feels like a blockage to the stomach. It wouldn't show up on any medical imaging, so it isn't surprising that it wouldn't have been detected. And since hiccups are commonly associated with eating or drinking too fast or drinking fizzy drinks - getting air into your stomach, it doesn't seem TOO improbable.
Anyhow - call it wacky if you want, but my hiccup cure has never failed me.
This is exactly what happens to me as well. I don't know what it is about having air trapped that triggers the hiccups, but it rarely lasts very long for me. I also get rid of them by drinking a large glass of water, or soda. Water forces out the air, and the soda adds more air, both causing a burp. When those aren't available, I do what you do. However, it only happens where there is a little air in there. When there is more, it's just a burp.
However, there is one kind of uncontrollable hiccup I get. It occurs when I eat something that is too hot, too fast, like biting into a jalapeno when I'm not expecting it. My family and friends laugh at me when this happens. It has nothing to do with trapped air. If I build up the heat before biting into that jalapeno, I don't hiccup.
What I'd really like to know is how to get rid of them easily and as fast as possible. Anyone got interesting theories? I've heard a couple like drinking a whole glass of water quickly. Standing upside down, holding your breath, etc. If you have a semi-scientific reasoning behind your theory it's even better.
The article seems to indicate that this is a concept - something that may have arisen from brainstorming, and may not be backed up by any data at all!!
This "explanation" is apparently supported by the thinnest of threads in terms of evolutionary history, and hard evidence is not presented to back this claim. This does not stop the Slashdot editors from posting this as "stuff that matters."
Please let the brainstormers check their ideas with research, show correlation, then causation, then present their findings in a way that can be checked by others.
This hypothesis, if you can call it that, is not tested and is perhaps not testable. Why this reflex motion a) exists at all, and b) why it persists, if it descende from the frog may only be fodder for spectulation.
Science requires more than mere speculation.
Phooey.
Anomaly
I've found that taking a gulp of coca-cola and letting it fizz in my mouth before swallowing usually does the trick. If no carbonated beverage is available, swishing water in my mouth really hard, then swallowing really fast also works.
Need a Linux consultant in New Orleans?
I see all sorts of weird techniques being presented all over this story, but I haven't see anyone present the most simple solution. I can't think of a time this hasn't worked for me. Just hold your breath. Usually you have to do it for at least 30 seconds. You have to hold it and almost be pushing the air down in your throat, if that makes sense.
Forget the whales - save the babies.
Okay, I don't know about most of you, but I ceased having problems with Hiccups. I used to hiccup all the time, or when I would get them, I couldn't stop for a while. I have finally figured out how to make myself stop hiccuping. I just have to swallow as soon as one comes up. 99% of the time I can stop it right after 1/2 of a hiccup. Has anyone else figured out this technique, or is it just me?
... how do I get rid of them? And why aren't hiccups painful for children, but painful for many adults? And why do I get them after I've eaten too fast, but not after I've drank too fast?
If it turns out that this theory is correct, how will it help us get rid of them?
I'm so disappointed that it appears that the only point of the article/theory is to try and explain hiccups in utero.
Key to financial independence: Spend less than you earn. Save and invest the difference. Do it for a long time.
It seems that this is where staunch liberalism leads to.
There is nothing better to write about than hiccups - and look at the article!
Those guys have nothing to write about, full of "suggestions" and "Plausible idea" "hard to proove" is gradually passed from publicist to journalist until at "slashdot" it ends up beinf a hard scientific evidence.
Shame!
Where do I find some beter, conservative forum, which cares less about movies or computer games and more about technology?
Hiccups are terrible. But since my nose job last monday(of which I'm recovering right now and yes..it was for medical reasons) I learned that sneezing is terrible with an broken nose. Even more terrible dan hiccups in a conversation.
Oops...I failed surpressing it again...I'm afraid the screen of my ibook is covered (again) with a mixture of blood and slime...
...solving the one about hicups is the one I cared about the least. By far.
-- Contradictions only exist in thought - not in reality.
- Take a deep breath: This is not one of those long drawn out affairs. Sit or stand up straight. Lean forward just a little. Open your mouth. Open your throat. Inhale all the way. It should take less than a second to fill your lungs.
- Pause: about half a second should do it.
- Top off:Now draw in as much more air as you can. If you do it right you should feel some stretching in your abdomen.
- Pause
- Exhale normally.
- Take a normal breath. (You don't want to hyperventilate.
- Repeat 2 more times. If your hiccups persist repeat sets of two until they're gone.
Notes:If you're having trouble drawing a proper deep breath try sticking an empty toilet paper roll in your mouth and breathing through that.
At no time should you actually close your mouth nose or throat. Keep your airways open.
The Math Maestro Tutoring Services in Seattle
Wow... So at one time they actually taught health in health class? The last time I took it, it consisted of:
This was the required 10th grade health class at my EPHS (in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, USA). No way out of it. I actually had to take this class instead of the CompSci prerequisite course I wanted to take. So I ended up having a couple free hours later on in the year that, due to the prerequisite only being offered 1st quarter, could not be filled with any fun, non-stupid classes.
My little brother's suffering through "Health 10" right now. His teacher is really into "role playing" skits, and outright said that anyone who didn't enjoy doing the role playing crap was mentally ill or something (I believe "very low self esteem" was the precise words she used). Nice way of saying "anyone who isn't like me and doesn't like what I like has something wrong with them because I am perfect." I know plenty of people that have good self esteem and just don't like doing crappy plays. Hell, I remember some survey a while ago that said being in front of people was the #1 fear of Americans (death was #3). Last I checked we weren't killing ourselves off by the millions. Others maybe, but not ourselves.
About 15-20 years ago, I happened to burp simultaneously with a hiccup. Since that time, I have NEVER hiccupped more than three times when I get them (I used to have those hour-long sessions).
So I suggest chugging a Pepsi and then trying to time a burp with the hiccup.
New Scientist? You may just as well read Weekly World News.
I don't really suggest you try this while in a meeting!
Why not? It could get rid of the hiccups. I am sure the rest of the people in the meeting could relate. And if it didn't work, and you hiccuped with a mouth full of water, causing you to inhale a portion of it, and then invoulantarily cough and spew that water all over the conference table, well, that would just provide some comic relief that was probably sorely needed anyway.
Right?
Perhaps this is just a troll, but the teacher was right.
Conservation of energy applies to the entire system, not just to part of it. When compressing the piston, you give it some kinetic energy. Some of this kinetic gets transfered to the the gas molecules. In each collision between the piston and a gas molecule, the gas molecule gains KE and the piston loses it. Conservation of energy is not violated.
On the other hand, a collision between two molecules within the gas cannot give the gas as a whole any more energy than it had to start with, precisely because of the principle of conservation of energy. Answer A is therefore absolutely wrong.
Perfectly elastic collisions are not defined as those which conserve energy as all processes conserve energy when the whole system is considered. Elastic collisions are those which do not result in some of the KE being converted to some form of energy other than kinetic. Usually the other form is heat, but of course on a molecular scale, heat IS kinetic energy.
"The Milliard Gargantubrain? A mere abacus - mention it not."
A girl at work had the hiccups. She was plied with cures and sure enough eventually her hiccups subsided. It was a bit cruel, but I told her to cough into her hand, and sure enough her hiccups returned.
"And that's how you get them back" I said as she chased me up and down the stairs.
Environmentalism is the new Victorianism. Everyone ties on a green corset and pretends we're virtuous.
I actually reread this to make sure I had understood it right.
Sincerest apologies. And congratulations for convincing your teacher she was in the wrong.
"The Milliard Gargantubrain? A mere abacus - mention it not."
When you yawn, you're readjusting the pressure inside your head. It's why your ears pop. When someone else yawns, they've just altered the pressure around your head so now YOU have to calibrate your pressure to match the NEW air pressure.
[The team]proposes that the brain circuitry controlling gill ventilation in these early ancestors has persisted into modern mammals.
Talk about legacy code persisting in later builds!
Take a pen or pencil and put it long-ways in your mouth. Now go to a faucet or water fountain and try to take a sip of water for about 5 seconds. Your hiccups will be gone. When I was in high school, my French teacher would shake a jar with change in it at you. She would give you some money for each time you hiccupped. Of course in front of a whole classroom of people, you hated to hiccup in the first place. Nobody ever hiccupped after she started to shake that jar. So, IMO there could be a scientific explaination, or it could be all in your head!?!?
When all else fails, piss on it. At least you will feel better in some kind of way.
OK, of course the real question we all have is how the hell do you get rid of them? Well, I'll tell you. At the risk of incurring aspersions from the little jonnie scientists among us, I now share with you my secret cure:
/.
Hold a paper towel tightly over a glass of water and drink the water through the towel.
There you have it. One of the world's most vexing problems solved by a doofus on
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
My dad had a stroke a few years back... and one of the side effects was that his gag reflex was gone. Now to the point...
Last summer, he had a pancreatic infection, which caused hiccupping (yes it does!). Not just hiccupping, but 24/7 hiccupping. The problem is that the gag reflex is one of the human body's main defenses against hiccups. Since he had no gag reflex, he couldn't stop. After a week of this, he looked like death warmed over. They finally figured out what drugs to give him to get him to stop. (Sorry, can't remember the name).
If you've never had 24/7 hiccups, believe me, it sounds funny, but it is no picnic at all...
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
Here's what really pisses me off about hiccups.
Whenever I get hiccups, which happens frequently and is really uncomfortable, the only thing that works FOR ME is to drink a glass of water upside-down (ie bend over and drink from the opposite side of the rim).
Yet every time I start doing this people go "Why bother with that, you should just hold your breath" or "Why don't you just drink a glass of water normally" or "Try elecrocuting your gonads with a car battery" (OK, I made the last one up, but it would probably work).
People can get really argumentative about this as well. Everyone thinks they know the One True Answer To Hiccups.
If you are lucky, there will be a technique that works for you (preferably one that doesn't involve gymnastics or extensive preparation). It won't work for everyone else!!!!
"The Milliard Gargantubrain? A mere abacus - mention it not."
It's an interesting theory. But wrong.
We all did. That's one of the purposes amniotic fluid provides the fetus. (hey, I have 4 kids so I've been through this a lot).
I'm reminded of that scene in the Abyss where the navy seals provide the liquid oxygen to the diver. He says, "we all did it for 9 months. Your body will remember."
-- DuckWing
the common folk and perhaps in non-science professionals
Ah, the little people. But in reality I think this kind of reporting can have a much broader appeal. A hundred years ago an educated person with the inclination and free time could access, synthesize and have some grasp on a fairly broad and significant cross-section of most of the serious work going on in the science community. In this day and age it is totally impossible for even a serious science professional to grasp more than a fraction of the breadth and depth of scientific research. At a time when more and more "average" people have virtually no comprehension of the basic issues of science (while the potential impacts of science on our lives and ecology steadily increase) and when science professionals become more and more specialized, good popular reporting is important and relevant. And a little "oooh-aaah" factor is a valid way to make that reporting accessible.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
being memebers of the phylum Chordata, we all had gills at some point as all members of Chordata do. Ours just come and go while we are in the womb.
still hate hiccups. Pity those poor suckers in Guinness that hiccup for decades on end.
I suspect that most of the hiccup cures out there work to the extent that they induce a somewhat meditative state of mind.
My cure is fast and inconspicuous:
1.) focus your eyes on any fixed object. Hold your eyes steady.
2.) ignore your focal point and (w/out moving your eyes) "stare" at everything in your peripheral vision.
Usually works w/in 10 seconds. I don't think it's ever failed me except when I've been drinking.
The average "bizarre" hiccup cure probably requires or induces the same kind of concentration that my technique does. Some cures undoubtedly work only by virtue of being a novel experience and these you would expect to only work a few times (just long enough for you to tell someone else about them).
-Nick
Even better: drink some water upside down. A few gulps and I'm cured every time, never failed. Of course, you look kinda funny with your head bent between your legs while feeding yourself a glass of water from around the back. ;-)
I would like to state for the record that I believe in Deities and Demigods.
Specifically I take as my Holy Work the book "Deities and Demigods" TSR 2013 (first printing).
This means that I am in good company in believing in Vishnu and other Hindu entities, but it also means I believe in Great Cthulhu.
Not only do I believe in Cthulhu, but I believe he has AC 2, 400 HP and 80% magic resistance.
"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wagh'nagl fhtagn."
graspee
Start with this simple method:
1) Hold your breath HARD for a full ten seconds (very deep breath).
2) Let the air out of your lungs very very slowly for a full 10 seconds (this is hard to do, actually)
3) Close your eyes and think of something boring or calming, like the color green, for a full 10 seconds.
Provided you don't get a hiccup between or during the steps (which means start over, by the way), you'll find they are gone completely. As you use this technique more and more, you can feel internally how hiccups stop (by smoothing out the twitches in the diaphram) and eventually you don't need this technique. Now if I get the hiccups all I do is change my breating rate and they go away instantly. I would never have learned how to do that if it were not for this simple, non-goofy, non-complicated technique. Thanks mom!
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
My family has always recommended eating a tablespoon of sugar to cure hiccups. It actually works, which is the amazing thing.
If this article is correct, and hiccuping has to do with suckling, I wonder if the influx of sugar sort of "makes sense", in that the action of hiccuping is really a desire or need for sugar. Hmmm...
Anyways, try it out next time you've got a bad case.
Adam
I get the hiccups really bad, sometimes their really pretty painful so I've tried everything and this one works for me. For some reason, if I'm laying or even sitting down and get up too quickly, especially if I jump right out of bed in the morning, I get the hiccups almost every time.
Vote Quimby.
Yawns actually have no relevant impact on the oxygen levels in your bloodstream. A good deep breath is the equivilant of a yawn in oxygen intake capacity. However, the true meaning of a yawn is the subconscious use of the yawn as a sign of sleepiness of boredom. Also, to explain why yawning is "contagious" I must use this model. Imagine a classroom of some 30 kids. A boring topic is being discussed by the teacher. A single kid yawns. Other kids' brains, seeing the first yawn, registers the yawn. In the subconscious level the brain's gamma waves align with the yawner's. Thus the yawn is passed on. However, some kids may believe that the topic is interesting (us nerds) and therefore does not yawn as a sign of boredom. Others might not even see the yawners. Thus the phenomenom is explained in simple terms
I hiccup when I eat spicy food. Clearly this is caused by brain circuitry inherited from primaeval tadpole-like creatures trying to crawl their way out of the chilli-infested waters of the Amazon into a cool, fresh pit of naturally occurring yogurt.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
Everyone knows that the main cause of hiccups is beer. I have been studying this phenomenon for years. I should know.
Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise. - William Shakespeare
I've found that forcing myself to vomit usually cures hiccups.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
... then why doesn't my dog hiccup? Or my cat? Why am I the only one in the house who retains this behavior from our common mudskipper ancestor?
Pardon the pun, but this sounds fishy.
One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
Straus thinks the real test of theory will be to look at the specific neurons that control hiccups and suckling. If the team is right, he says, most of the nerve cells that are active during suckling should also be active when we hiccup.
So, they just came up with a wild hare-brained idea, and they could very well be completely wrong, because nobody's actually tested it yet. Or am I missing something?
Since I personally believe in Creation rather than Evolution, I'm skeptical anyway. It was once thought the appendix was an evolutionary leftover and no longer served any useful purpose, until we figured out what it was for.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
I know a girl in college who couldnt NOT yawn when she saw someone else do it. A couple of frineds of mine started yawing in front of her for about two hours. She kept yelling at us to stop. Kind of cruel, but she started by yelling at us when we just happened to yawn naturually.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
--
|-_-| . o O ( bEef!)
Have a crazy redheaded chick sneak up behind you and stick a finger in your ear id hiccup. Works like a charm.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
This has always worked with me too.
It helps if you've had any relazation training. The best way I've found to describe it is to concentrate on your chest and try to relax the muscles that are unusally tense. It takes some practice to get it right but it usually works.
Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.
To cure someone else: Simply bring the tip of your index finger to the tip of their nose, just barely making contact. Hold still and wait. Try not to laugh. Within 30 seconds, their hiccups should be gone.
I'm not sure why it works; I always assumed that it tends to make one's breathing more shallow, or something like that. Now that I've read the article, though, I wonder if it has something to do with the nursing instinct. An infant's nose is usually touching the mother while nursing.
It's probably too late to get a response, but...
I almost always get a single hiccup after around 3 gulps of bubbly beverage. Soft drinks, beer, or anything will bubbles will cause me to hiccup exactly once, or twice if I gulp several times without breathing. It does not cause a fit of hiccups to follow. Water, juice, milk, and anything else without bubbles does not cause this reaction. I have never seen this behavior in any other person. Does anybody have an explanation or other examples of this?
Duffy
"This wound is beyond my ability to heal. We need Elvis medicine!"
Wow, my grandmother told me that tip for hiccups a LONG time ago. She told me to breath in, tilt my head back, and drink. It always worked for me, until recently.
Now I just breathe in enough air to really fill my lungs in and wait. It usually works. My thought on this was the lungs, being so full of air, hold the diaphragm down (so the contraction is not as major), and it will cause the spasms to stop.
Rob
-----
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I used to own that computer. Always wondered what happened to it. Curse you, Commander Taco!
Your mom always gets the hiccups when she blows me. Right after I shoot a hot steamy load down the back of her puss-coated throat, actually.
So let me get this straight, hiccups are a suckling reaction. So, to get rid of the hiccups the best thing to do must be to suck on a woman's breast. All I can say is ... "hic."
Yah me too. I think the hiccup is due to my stomach (the inside) feeling ticklish or not fully comfy. It could be the same for other people, but I'm not doing much research in this field ;).
If I bend forward and burp the air out, the hiccup usually goes away.
Of course if the tickle is due to something else then that won't work.
I mean many people move involuntarily if they are tickled, so what happens if they are tickled from inside? I figure a hiccup is one possible response.
To get air out of your stomach you just have to practice and you don't have to be hiccupping. Draw in your stomach and press the air upward. You will evenutally be able to get all the air out pretty quickly and easily when you have developed a sense for it.
I learned how when taking martial arts. It was much more uncomfortable to get kicked in the gut with air in your stomach. Most of the fighters I knew would spend a few seconds clearing the air out before sparring.
I can condense this part of the class into "don't do stupid shit." Of course the school prefered spending 3-4 weeks on it rather than my 5 seconds.
I agree "don't do stupid shit" takes fewer than five seconds to say, but I predict the inevitable next question: "What is stupid shit?" The school spent 3-4 weeks on explaining to the little children exactly what "stupid shit" is.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Here is a cure, that has always worked for me, and is very simple (I don't get hiccups very often, so the sample size is small).
Just take a heaping spoon full of sugar (or a couple packets of sugar), and swallow it all at once. My mom is a nurse and she taught me this. She told me that it stimulates your gag reflex and thus stops your hiccups.
It is kind of nasty swallowing this huge pile of grains, and I guess it's 50+ empty calories, but if you've got the hiccups and other remedies have not worked (or are too complicated/too much work), give this a shot.
Computers don't make mistakes. What they do, they do on purpose.
I can't hold my breath for more than 20 if I really try. How the hell do people hold their breath for that long? Or is it just they think it's 45 seconds, but it's really only 15-20?
I wonder how old your ferrets are.
According to a FAQ that's posted at many animal hospital sites, "It is completely normal for a puppy to have hiccups off and on throughout the day."
What's interesting is that it concludes, "Eventually puppies grow out of them." (That explains why my adult animals don't hiccup.) The question, then, is why do humans not grow out of it? It is apparently neotony (adult retention of juvenile characteristics) but to what advantage? Or did it 'come along for the ride' with something else that does help us? If so, what?
One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
hiccups explained
catchy title...too bad it's krunk. Should've read hiccups given yet another theory by yet another crackpot
There are many similarities between hiccuping and gill ventilation in animals like tadpoles
Sure, and there are many similarities between the way the Straus takes a crap and the way a lab rat takes a crap.
Did anyone else here ever get hic-burps? A really nasty hiccup, you know, the sort that steals all your air and makes your chest feel like someone was having a bit too much fun with an vice grip, followed by a powerful, painful buuuuurraaap that just kind of tears it's way out? They weren't any fun. Rather embarassing, really. Especially when they reduced me to tears. It's not funny! Really!
Well, ok. So it kind of is. But only because it doesn't happen to me anmore. Be a great weapon though...
Smell you later, Smell you later forever is brilliant! and who can forget "China, you used to be cool." "China still cool! You pay Lata, LATA!" Not that I go to EW for an informed opinion on the simpsons anyway.
It's about the changing state of your physical body. Yawning aids in the relaxation of your physical and emotional state, preparing it for the nights sleep, or when you wake up.
:)
Ever had a morning or night right before bed when you didn't yawn?
Yes, this is why. O2 count has nothing to do with it. It's been medically proven.
"We'll be meeting the man who's been hiccuping for the last 30 years!"
"[hic] Kill me. [hic] Kill me. [hic] Kill me."
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
hiccups and gills weren't in our past,
they are our future.
think about it, same with webbed feet and hands
not genetic mutations, they are our next evolutionary step
We spend our lives learning, if you like learning life is hard. it can never be only the ups the downs will always co
Try to hiccup If you do it right, you won't hiccup. Pass on this information will ya. It seems that this is one cure that really works but isn't in the general hiccup cure lore. Nothing better than seeing a big goofy grin spread across a cured person's face.
Did anyone else have a strange inclination to hickuping while reading that article? Sort of like reading something on respiration/breathing, how you're suddenly conscious of your own breathing.
I close my eyes, slow my breathing and relax. It's worked every single time... it has occasionally taken a couple of goes but it's always worked. No wierd remedies... no standing on head... or drinking water backwards.
that the New Scientist article really doesn't have a clue why we hiccup and is just proposing another naff hypothesis. The thing about gills is Weekly World News quality thinking.
Hiccuping is probably due to some unstable interneuron connections that do something useful sometimes but can become irritated and go into spurious oscillation.
Heart palpitations are conjectured to have a similar cause: external stimulation (physical pressure, mostly) of the vagus nerve, which otherwise should be getting information only from the brain stem.
I'm surprised these guys didn't try to link it to reverse-sneezing in dogs.
That has got to be the dumbest piece of inane material I've ever seen posted in a semi-intelligent forum. I shudder to think how many people are dumber for its submission. Thanks for nothing, Slashdot.
Even the "scientist" say its not even proven and would be very hard. Yet already im sure theres thousands of people out there claiming its FACT!
Lies spread faster then truth...
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esp. after noticing myself last night & this morning
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
This has never failed me during the last 35 or so years:
:-)
1. Get a glass of water (or another favourite drink)
2. Take a mouthful of water but don't swallow it yet.
3. Shut your ears with your fingers.
4. Swallow
5. Repeat Step 1-4 2 or 3 times
6. Be happy
Dunno why. YMMV.
open (SIG, "</dev/zero"); $sig = <SIG>; close SIG;
And as the glottis blocks your throat, increase the pressure in your mouth as is you wanted to force the water out of your ears. That old fish nerve thinks the water is going through your gills, and the hiccup is cured.
I read a while back that hiccups are simply a stray signal sent down the phrenic nerve that causes the diaphragm to spasm. Stimulation of the phrenic nerve often relieves the hiccups and that is why some of the sipping and gulping water techniques are employed (and also why hiccups are often triggered by gulping food or beverages). It's easier just to manually massage the phrenic nerve. It lies on the right side of the windpipe, deep in the muscle groove and is easiest to access just above the collar bone. I've used this technique on myself and others with only one or two failures over the last several years.
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
For me yawning also works for pressure adjustment (don't know the english term): it makes my ears 'pop' (yeah i learned scuba diving and know of other ways too, but yawning also works for me). Sitting in a plane i wondered if you couldn't help people by making them yawn during starting and landing. This might work especially well with babies, since you can't explain to them how to adjust the pressure, but you might make them yawn by yawning in front of them.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
Sorry for mailing this article, I've obviously made a typo (168!=186) ....
that's the price for being up all night and doing some "quick"
checks before you go to bed
-- Herbert Rosmanith
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