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Scientists Find Link Between Parkinson's Disease and the Appendix (gizmodo.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: Scientists have found further evidence that the gut, or more specifically the appendix, might play a role in the development of Parkinson's disease. The international team of scientists reviewed two datasets, including a large registry from Sweden, and found that removal of the appendix was associated with a decreased risk of developing Parkinson's disease. They also found that the human appendix contains clumps of a protein called alpha-synuclein in a form associated with the disease. There's more work to be done, and the authors are not advocating that people preemptively remove their appendixes, but they hope that the research could provide a pathway towards treatment.
The study found that of the 1,144,745 Swedes who did not have appendectomies, 1,608 had Parkinson's, but of the 551,003 who had, only 644 had Parkinson's. This is amounts to a 16.9% decrease in the odds of acquiring the disease -- but in absolutes, that's the difference between an 0.14 percent chance of acquiring the disease for those who hadn't gotten their appendix removed versus an 0.11 percent chance for those who had. The effect was also stronger in those living in rural areas, according to the study published today in Science Translational Medicine. The researchers also found that for those who had appendectomies at least 30 years before developing Parkinson's, the procedure was associated with a 3.6-year delay in disease onset. The appendix samples contained alpha-synuclein proteins and shortened and mis-folded alpha-synucleins like the ones found in people with Parkinson's disease. Professor Viviane Labrie from the Cancer of Neurodegenerative Science at the Van Andel Research Institute in Michigan suggests that the alpha-synucleins "can travel up the nerve that connects the G.I. tract to the brain." She added: "If it were to enter the brain, it can seed and spread from there and have neurotoxic effects that could eventually lead to Parkinson's disease."
The study found that of the 1,144,745 Swedes who did not have appendectomies, 1,608 had Parkinson's, but of the 551,003 who had, only 644 had Parkinson's. This is amounts to a 16.9% decrease in the odds of acquiring the disease -- but in absolutes, that's the difference between an 0.14 percent chance of acquiring the disease for those who hadn't gotten their appendix removed versus an 0.11 percent chance for those who had. The effect was also stronger in those living in rural areas, according to the study published today in Science Translational Medicine. The researchers also found that for those who had appendectomies at least 30 years before developing Parkinson's, the procedure was associated with a 3.6-year delay in disease onset. The appendix samples contained alpha-synuclein proteins and shortened and mis-folded alpha-synucleins like the ones found in people with Parkinson's disease. Professor Viviane Labrie from the Cancer of Neurodegenerative Science at the Van Andel Research Institute in Michigan suggests that the alpha-synucleins "can travel up the nerve that connects the G.I. tract to the brain." She added: "If it were to enter the brain, it can seed and spread from there and have neurotoxic effects that could eventually lead to Parkinson's disease."
Nothing!
The numbers are so miniscule it is not even worth discussing. It's equivalent to my buying two lottery tickets instead of one.
Caution: Contents under pressure
So do I need to get my appendix removed?
Zoid.com
So the purpose of the appendix is to increase your risk of Parkinson's Disease? I'm not convinced.
It may not be intelligent but it is common enough that there is an official term for it. Manufactured obsolescence.
"a policy of planning or designing a product with an artificially limited useful life, so it will become obsolete after a certain period of time."
554k have had appendix removed in this study which included 1/5th the population of Sweden. That's a lot. Removing an organ should always be a last resort, and should be much more rare. All this proves is that modern medicine is much more "wandering around in the dark" than they would have you believe.
Keep your appendix, keep your tonsils, and keep your foreskin...unless removing it is *the only way* to prevent imminent death.
when you work backwards from your conclusion.
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So adter decades and decades of work people figured out Ulcers were bacterial not a defect in proteins coating the stomach walls.. Very recently it came to light that Alzheimers may be a viral or bacterial infection and the amyloid plaques actually are a defense mechanism. WHich explains why all the anti-amaloid drugs failed.
Amaloids come from a kind of protein misfolding.
Now they are attributing parkinsons to misfolded protein.
This study is interesting because we now suspect the appendix's purpose is to be a place where gut bacteria can go dormant and wait to re-seed the gut to maintain diversity. In the age of antibiotics and the rise of c. Difficile the appendix reseed may have become more important. THose infections are now treated with fecal transplants.
So appexicies harbor "good" bacteria. Perhaps the misfolded proteins their are their to keep them alive and dormant or to knock down the infection by bad bacteria (appendicitis). Perhaps it is the bacteria migrating to the brain that is brining along the misfolded proteins.
Just saying this sounds like "here we go again" when it comes to blaming the proteins for a bacterial problem. But maybe they are right. THe thing is, and the clue to the other two cases,was asking why didn't those bad proteins get evolved away. The appendix is not only in other species but it has been independently evolved in multiple species. It's there for some damn good reason and so are the proteins screted there.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
The one thing that we can deduce from this study is that 100% of the people that had appendectomies don't have an appendix anymore.
--
Together we can change the world, just one random act of kindness at a time. -- Ron Hall
All I got from it was proof we've poisoned our environment collaterally in ways we had previously not even considered, and thus natural protections are no longer sufficient.
I could be that people who have some genetic profile are more likely to get Parkinsson and problem with their appendix. Or it could be that people who eat a certain food or exercise in a certain way are more (or less) likely to get Parkinsson and problem with their appendix.
Still possible. It would obviously have to be a malicious, detail-obsessed and sadistic superbeing. Of course, the quality of the result rather strongly indicates that the biological part of human existence is the result of a typical evolutionary optimization process. These universally deliver mediocre or worse results. Their main advantage is that the can be run unsupervised once the conditions have been set. Although it looks now very much like the human race does not have effective ways to restrict its own growth and hence will wipe itself out and that the actual use of available intelligence in individuals is not enough to stop that. Hence this would be an optimization result in the "failure" category. As it has taken over the process, the way to deal with it is a reset and restart.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
What is not a different discussion is that your "Creator", if existent, bears full, unlimited responsibility for the result. With unlimited power comes unlimited responsibility. And do not give me this "works in mysterious ways" crap. There really is only a choice between "fuckup" and "asshole" here.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
There appears to be a strong positive correlation between people who vote for Trump and people who have their heads up their ass.
Just sayin'.
Have also noticed over the last decade or so that there's a strong correlation between parties adopting smug, condescending, holier-than-though opinions of the superiority of themselves and their party ... and losing nearly a thousand legislative seats, most of the governorships, both houses of congress, the White House, the Supreme Court, and the good will of millions of two-time Obama voters who turned their backs on their former default party exactly, specifically because of people like you. Ever noticed that?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I'd argue that we are living outside what we were designed for.
By designed, I mean our technology has advanced far in excess of evolution and natural selection. We have not had nearly enough time to adapt to the environment that we ourselves created. Natural selection is a joke in first world countries considering that we can keep the braindead alive, so that isn't helping either.
We're rapidly outgrowing our fish tank, and I think the only (somewhat) lasting solution will be genetic modification or one seriously huge culling of the population, both of which are pretty disturbing.
I'm pretty sure this underlines the fact that humans were not designed by some intelligent superbeing in the sky.
I'm honestly not sure how you draw that conclusion at all. Many religious people believe that there is a purpose behind these sorts of things. That they are opportunities to learn and grow. Children certainly do not grow as individuals when they have every problem in life solved for them.
Indeed. Thanks for the reference. As so often, the classical references are far better what you can do by yourself.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
So malevolent and dishonest? I like it.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Interesting! So, people who are predisposed to eventually developing Parkinson's disease, are at an increased risk of having that manifest as an inflamed appendix requiring operation. Not only that, but this seems to be an early warning sign before the main disease (Parkinson's) manifests as well.
Brought to you by the "In medicine the exact reverse causal hypothesis always also sounds entirely reasonable too" department.
Incidentally, every time somebody discovers yet another brain-gut-axis link, I feel more and more sorry for Andrew Wakefield.
This seems like a very low correlation for the cause to be the appendix. More than likely the appendix is merely capturing and concentrating these proteins, perhaps well before the symptoms of Parkinsons have manifested. That hardly means the appendix is the source of the proteins.
Better known as 318230.
That's not a very useful definition of the word "good" for most of us. We want a definition for which "good" actions are actions we should take. For example, flooding the earth, wiping out almost every human and almost every land animal is not something we want to encourage people to do, so we don't want to label it "good". Even if you could find a way to argue that it was the lesser of two evils, we would still want to label it an evil. It sets a really bad example otherwise.
If we start removing appendices, there won't be any place in the medical books to list the connection to Parkinson's!
I'm pretty sure this underlines the fact that humans were not designed by some intelligent superbeing in the sky.
What an odd conclusion.
Starting with the fact that we've had fallible bodies throughout history, and it didn't lead most people that conclusion. It's not like we just discovered that bodies are fallible or in some ways non-optimal.
Usually you folks just think that you've discovered war or natural disasters, as though the ancients had never heard of such things and that's why they had such crazy theories. Now you think you've discovered aging or disease?
Those prone to appendicitis be less susceptible to Parkinsons for the same reason they suffer appendicitis in the first place. There are know genetic factors in the predisposition to both diseases.
Could there be some other environmental cause? Pesticides and herbicides exposure is a known risk factor in Parkinsons.
Appendectomy is know to slow peoples recovery after bouts of food poisoning, because their gut flora recovers more slowly. The Appendix is known to be a reservoir of these.
I like to see how this compared with non-surgical intervention for appendicitis, which was reported recently as as gaining favour for that latter reason.
For anyone who's interested in this topic, the book "The Problem of Pain" by CS Lewis is one Christian's attempt to address precisely this issue: how can God be good if His world is full of pain?
I'm not saying Lewis resolves the question, just that there are educated Christians out there who are aware of the issue and try to deal with it.
Unfortunately, the "Christian" "thinkers" who, for example, try to explain why murder is ok if you spend enough on military equipment seem to get a lot more attention.
It is grounds for further investigation.
Furthermore the researchers do not claim it is.
Strawman cliches are not +1 insightful.
Or we are.
Very recently it came to light that Alzheimers may be a viral or bacterial infection and the amyloid plaques actually are a defense mechanism.
That possibility is NOT a recent revelation. We have no evidence of a specific pathogen but that's been on the list of possible causes for a long time. More than a few types of cancer are caused by viruses and many other diseases we don't normally associate with viruses or bacteria. My wife is a pathologist and she's spoken about this very topic to me 20 years ago. It wouldn't at all be shocking if some or even all Alzheimer's turned out to be caused by a pathogen. We just don't have strong evidence currently to support that hypothesis though perhaps there has been some recent data that I'm not aware of. (obviously i'm not an expert)
THe thing is, and the clue to the other two cases,was asking why didn't those bad proteins get evolved away.
For there to be an evolutionary pressure it needs to have an effect on reproduction. Lot's of diseases don't affect anyone until after they have passed the age where they would spawn offspring so there is no direct mechanism to remove the proteins from the gene pool.
One could say that the system was never perfect.... when he was apparently finished, he only said that it was "very good". On the scale of things, that basically meant that God graded his own work at about a B.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I'm honestly not sure how you draw that conclusion at all.
Don't feel bad; neither does he.
Oh I dunno, it might be kinda nice to have chloroplasts.
It's a rebuttal to "Intelligent Design", which is a pseudoscientific model that is basically creationism disguised by attempts at appearing scientific. It cites things like the eye as being too perfect to have evolved, and so on. If appearance of design supports such an idea, appearance of non-design/suboptimal design is against it. It isn't good science or good theology, basically the biology equivalent of 'flood geology' or young earth creationism. ID is a fringe evangelical idea they tried to push into schools a while back, it stands apart from theistic evolution like most mainstream orthodox religions go along with.
Car manufacturers are not omnipotent. Stop lying.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
It's as if a million mics were held out and suddenly all were dropped...
Mmm. Except for the "detail obsessed part" that description fits pretty well with most theology. Particularly if you regard Jesus as deific propaganda.
So, the perfect being, the embodiment of Love, who created the universe made us "defective by design"? Is that your assertion?
You are welcome on my lawn.
Here's an interesting popular press article from this year talking about the slow turn on this theory. Sure people have had that on the list of possibilities but no proof. Now the pendulum is swinging that direction, but only recently.
https://www.statnews.com/2018/...
It really is turning THIS YEAR, because it's only in the last year that the most advanced and well studied Anti-alzheimer's drugs targeting plaque forming pathways failed. Thus old speculations are being reconsidered and there's a body of proof to support them.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
An analogy is not an analogy when it grossly misrepresents what is going on. Then it is just a lie. But I can see you just want to promote your messed up view of the world.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
In fact, at almost 60, I'm still 100% factory equipment! Appendix, wisdom teeth, no body parts have been removed. My mom said the reason I was the only one in the family that didn't have to have their wisdom teeth removed was because I had a big mouth. LOL, well, she was right in a way. ;)
That they are opportunities to learn and grow. Children certainly do not grow as individuals when they have every problem in life solved for them.
Ah yes, those infants with bone cancer surely are learning a lot about life before they die at the ripe age of 2. (But obviously they never grow.)
Nonsense. There are many things that a car manufacturer could do to control your actions. A car manufacturer could require that everyone who drives the car pass a breathalyzer test. A car could analyze driving patterns, detect erratic driving, and begin slowing the car until such time as it can safely stop, then shut down. And so on.
The difference is that a car manufacturer cannot force you to buy their car over one that lacks such nanny features. However, with the addition of government regulations to coerce the other car manufacturers into following suit, such approaches could easily become reality.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Can't wait to rip your shitgibbon out of office
Let me guess. You couldn't wait to watch him lose to Hillary Clinton, either, right? You probably also couldn't wait to see a last minute fictional smear job prevent him from seating his second staunchly originalist SCOTUS nominee, right? To say nothing of how all of those new circuit and appellate judges were going to be slavish liberal activists, yeah? And you were probably just drooling at the prospect of the economy tanking and minorities furious with him for continuing the sort of job erosion they experienced under Obama, right? I'll bet you were especially anxious for a war to break out on the Korean peninsula - you'd have just had a little Hillarygasm over that one, I'm sure. Bet you couldn't WAIT for Trump's promise to ditch NAFTA and renegotiate a better Canada/Mexico/US trade deal to completely fall apart, right? And needless to say, you were probably one of those people absolutely convinced that Mueller would have long since had him locked up over his obvious RUSSIA! collusion. How's all of that working out for you? Never mind, I'm sure you're mostly just excited about the Blue Tsunami that's going to take over the senate so that Trump doesn't get to put yet another justice or two in place. That's looking like a sure thing for you right?
Meh. I'm not going to trouble myself with the usual substance-free juvenile babbling of someone who thinks "Your's" is a thing. Have fun getting your legislative agenda, phony impeachments, and judicial preferences through the senate, Shillary, with Schumer still having to fetch McConnells's coffee.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The numbers are very interesting from a scientific point of view
Really? One of the first rules of scientific data analysis is that correlation does not imply causation. So far there is literally nothing to see here scientifically. It only becomes interesting if they actually manage to find that the appendix has a role in causing Parkinsons. Given the tiny effect on the actual rate of the disease it is unlikely to have any sort of major role since you are only ~16% less likely to get it without your appendix. Indeed the very weak correlation suggests that either there are many different causes or it is something very different that may, itself, weakly correlate with having an appendectomy.
That they are opportunities to learn and grow. Children certainly do not grow as individuals when they have every problem in life solved for them.
Ah yes, those infants with bone cancer surely are learning a lot about life before they die at the ripe age of 2. (But obviously they never grow.)
Often times religious people believe that those are learning opportunities for the parent and not the child. Science can neither prove nor disprove the existence of a god. Anyone who knows science knows that is not within the realm of science to begin with. So whether or not you believe in god, this research cannot possibly show that god doesn't exist. End of story.
A related study also found that people with freckles live longer and happier lives. Go science! Go science! Go science! Whoop! Whoop!
It is well documented historical fact that the Ku Klux Klan is the military branch of the Democratic Party.
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>"I am so tired of these "opinions" being posted where you scream "Correlation is not causation""
Good thing what you think doesn't matter because you are an anonymous coward.
Indeed. And as soon as a car is in "full nanny" mode (and we will see that, too many humans are just unsafe drivers and that will give us self-driving cars as the only choice eventually), all responsibility for accidents is with the manufacturer.
With power and control comes responsibility. A mythical "supreme being" is not exempt from that.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.