You only get significant health benefits if you walk 10,000 steps per day while drinking 8 glasses of water.
4 Likes
… apparently that’s enough to kill us
4 Likes
… oxygen is dangerous too, better not breathe it 
5 Likes
I limit myself to a 21/78 oxygen/nitrogen mix. No point in taking chances.
8 Likes
3 Likes
Fossils tell tale of last primate to inhabit North America before humans
https://phys.org/news/2023-11-fossils-tale-primate-inhabit-north.amp
“Due to its unique morphology and its representation only by dental remains, its place on the mammalian evolutionary tree has been a subject of contention and debate. There’s been a prevailing consensus leaning towards its classification as a primate. But the timing and appearance of this primate in the North American fossil record are quite unusual. It appears suddenly in the fossil record of the Great Plains more than 4 million years after the extinction of all other North American primates, which occurred around 34 million years ago.”
—
“Our analysis dispels the idea that Ekgmowechashala is a relic or survivor of earlier primates in North America,” Rust said. “Instead, it was an immigrant species that evolved in Asia and migrated to North America during a surprisingly cool period, most likely via Beringia.”
6 Likes
2 Likes
I find this interesting, as I am a brunette but also have a higher pain threshold and more sensitivity to opoids – to the point of being dangerous to my health.
5 Likes
As a redhead with some definitely weird reactions to medicine, I found a bit of that interesting, and it makes me wonder what the mechanism is.
ut data shows they’re actually more sensitive to opioids, including mu-opioids, such as morphine and fentanyl, and kappa-opioids, although the latter effect may be specific to female patients.
I was given some hydrocodone after an operation to help manage pain. The first pill knocked me on my ass. I was out but good. Second pill the next day? Didn’t even notice it. It wasn’t any better than Tylenol. Didn’t bother with it again after that.
7 Likes
How does this play out when the hair on top of one’s head is brunette and the hair on one’s face is red?
3 Likes
I guess it depends on where the injury is. 
4 Likes
Why that’s the case is complicated. The MC1R gene affects a protein in melanocytes, the body’s pigment-making cells. Fisher’s team found that, in addition to changing that protein, the redhead MC1R variant also causes mouse melanocytes — and, theoretically, human ones — to produce less of a substance called POMC.
Science is hard, and it is worth keeping in mind that human bodies are incredibly complex Rube Goldberg contraptions, strung together of billions of years of evolution from whatever bits and pieces were available at the time. So a thing that was developed for one purpose (managing pain response, for instance) may be coopted to a completely different purpose, like maybe developing a more efficient Vit D synthesis chain. As a side effect of that, there may be a meaningless, but unavoidable alteration in hair color. These things do not have to be related in any way, it was just that this thing was lying around, and evolution seized on it to do something else. A large chunk of why medicine is hard comes down to this. Altering one receptor/enzyme/cofactor for a perfectly reasonable purpose can, and frequently does, cause completely unexpected side-effects due to some bizarre linkage to the target. It makes no sense, and is seemingly random, but once you figure out the evolutionary construct, it makes a sort of sense, more or less.
17 Likes
OK, so maybe not so much FTW as “about time”
In January 1970, the FDA revoked BVO’s status as GRAS, or “Generally Recognized As Safe.” At that time, manufacturers were using BVO at a level of up to 150 parts per million (ppm) in beverages. In response, the additive industry petitioned the FDA to keep allowing the use of BVO, but at a lower limit of 15 ppm. The FDA was still not convinced it was safe and called for additional long-term safety studies. But, it didn’t outright reject the request—instead, the agency allowed the use of BVO at the lower limit while the safety studies were being conducted, citing “an adequate margin of safety” at the reduced level.
So, 50 years later
The rat experiments, published in 2022, used levels of BVO that mimicked dietary exposure of humans at the 15 ppm limit. In feeding trials, researchers found abnormalities in the rats’ thyroids, alterations in their hormone signaling, and accumulation of brominated fatty acids in the heart, liver, and fat of all animals fed BVO.
Add stories like this to the reasons to avoid highly processed foods. There are a frightening number of compounds that are probably not good for normal body functioning, but are cheap and useful, and industry will fight tooth and nail to keep them available. I hate this timeline.
10 Likes
It doesn’t look like it’s in my tonic water - so my G&T’s are safe!
6 Likes
Along these lines:
Ultra-processed foods have garnered considerable negative attention in recent years. Dozens of observational studies have linked the food category to weight gain, obesity, cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and other chronic diseases, the Post notes. A small but landmark randomized controlled study in 2019, led by the National Institutes of Health’s nutrition expert, Kevin Hall, found that when inpatient trial participants received diets with ultra-processed foods, they ate roughly 500 extra calories a day compared to a control group of inpatient participants who were served a diet that was matched in macronutrients but did not include ultra-processed foods.
This could be a step in the right direction. Hopefully.
6 Likes
8 Likes
I think this guy needs a copy of that book if he wants a way to live longer!
2 Likes
But we know he’ll turn that down, flat… because is it really living if you can’t endlessly impregnate women!
1 Like
