5 ms·

It continues to astound me how little we actually seem to know about anatomy, especially women's anatomy (hold the jokes, folks).

M_Grey 10y ago
We can't know much about what we haven't bothered to seriously study for very long.
danharaj 10y ago
Yea, especially for common disorders like Polycystic Ovary Syndrome and Endometriosis. We don't know why they happen and our treatments are surprisingly meager considering how many women are affected in total.
- acaciapalm 10y ago
  Then there was that huge study that showed the birth control pill causes loss of sex drive and depression[0]. [0]https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/03/pill-linked-depression-doctors-hormonal-contraceptives https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfr...
  - kevinnk 10y ago
    That study showed a "link" (i.e. correlation) between hormonal contraception and first diagnosis of depression or use of antidepressants. That's not the same as showing the pill causes depression! Even the study authors explicitly say that more study is needed before we can definitively say there is cause and effect.
    - acaciapalm 10y ago
      It's difficult to truly prove, but many women have noticed this and complained about it. It is only now that they are finally actually looking in to the possibility. I find it incredibly ironic that people take it as a given that women's hormones might affect moods (PMS, anyone?), but then brush off women's concerns that taking large doses of female hormones might --in fact!-- have an affect on mood.
      - kevinnk 10y ago
        To be clear, I'm not denying the possibility that hormonal birth control can cause depression or that many women experience problems while on it (I've heard similar complaints to what you're describing). What I'm commenting on is your misrepresentation of what the study is "proving".
        acaciapalm 10y ago
        I used the word "show" not "prove" for that reason. Point taken though: in the future, I will use "showed a link" or "found correlation". I am really very careful not to use the word "proved" for the same concerns you have.
        kevinnk 10y ago
        Not to keep arguing a dead point, but the word I cared about was "causes" not "show". The study shows pretty definitively ("proves") that a correlation exists. It does not show that hormonal birth control causes depression. Regardless, I appreciate that you're making an effort to be careful. I've just been seeing this particular study making the rounds on Facebook and I felt like I needed to point out what the study actually says.
        acaciapalm 10y ago
        Regardless of semantics, I'm glad you see it being shared on Facebook. I really hope it inspires women to stop taking their pills and go all Lysistrata until there is more research done and/or a better solution is invented. I mean, it's the same thing that was invented back in the 1960s. There's been very little progress. I wish they could invent something semi permanent for men. Then we could cease having the current child support debates. Temporary vasectomy would be awesome for the world.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
colejohnson66 10y ago
What astounds me is that the human brain doesn't even know it works (at least consciously). Your brain tells your body what to do, but your consciousness has no idea how. <rant> For me, that's what's so amazing about neural networks! If you could ask an individual neuron why their f(x) is the way it is, they probably would only be able to tell you that "that gets the result the brain wants". They're like individual computers, yet they can't work alone; only when put together does what they're doing make sense. </rant>
- bordercases 10y ago
  I wonder why we don't have several conscious thoughts at once.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    I sometimes feel I do, but then my sense of introspection goes bonkers.
  - bbctol 10y ago
    Perhaps we do! How do you know that your autonomic nervous system isn't consciously regulating your breathing, digestion, and heartrate, blissfully unaware of the less important unconscious processes that acquire food and move about. (I wrote a science fiction story along these lines once, that was described by readers as "uh... interesting, I guess.")
    - bordercases 10y ago
      Hell, I'd read it. Still kicking around a copy?
  - nnq 10y ago
    My theory is that we can have several conscious thoughts at once but most of us suppress this most of the time because without a clear "winner thought" that gets the attention and gets to decide what reality is and gets to control the body, you'd end up with what people with schitzophrenia or other psychoses have... I'd also bet that the first "human-type & human-level" AI will be quire insane by human standards at least if we don't get this inner attention focusing part right from the first time. Considering that this insane AI will also get super-human pretty fast, I'm pretty scared of what it would do before it gets itself to some sort of inner equilibrium or "sanity"...
mrob 10y ago
Examples of recently discovered human anatomy: Structural and functional features of central nervous system lymphatic vessels. (2015) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26030524 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26030524 A newly discovered muscle: The tensor of the vastus intermedius. (2016) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26732825 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26732825 There's probably more not yet scientifically described.
agumonkey 10y ago
Somehow reminds me of the anesthesia mystery too. It just works (tm).
gabrielgoh 10y ago
Forget internal organs, it amazes me that scholarship in the 15th century was completely ignorant the clitoris. From Wikipedia > Gabriele Falloppio (discoverer of the fallopian tube), who claimed that he was the first to discover the clitoris. In 1561, Falloppio stated, "Modern anatomists have entirely neglected it ... and do not say a word about it ... and if others have spoken of it, know that they have taken it from me or my students"

M_Grey 10y ago

We can't know much about what we haven't bothered to seriously study for very long.

danharaj 10y ago

Yea, especially for common disorders like Polycystic Ovary Syndrome and Endometriosis. We don't know why they happen and our treatments are surprisingly meager considering how many women are affected in total.

acaciapalm 10y ago
Then there was that huge study that showed the birth control pill causes loss of sex drive and depression[0]. [0]https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/03/pill-linked-depression-doctors-hormonal-contraceptives https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfr...
- kevinnk 10y ago
  That study showed a "link" (i.e. correlation) between hormonal contraception and first diagnosis of depression or use of antidepressants. That's not the same as showing the pill causes depression! Even the study authors explicitly say that more study is needed before we can definitively say there is cause and effect.
  - acaciapalm 10y ago
    It's difficult to truly prove, but many women have noticed this and complained about it. It is only now that they are finally actually looking in to the possibility. I find it incredibly ironic that people take it as a given that women's hormones might affect moods (PMS, anyone?), but then brush off women's concerns that taking large doses of female hormones might --in fact!-- have an affect on mood.
    - kevinnk 10y ago
      To be clear, I'm not denying the possibility that hormonal birth control can cause depression or that many women experience problems while on it (I've heard similar complaints to what you're describing). What I'm commenting on is your misrepresentation of what the study is "proving".
      - acaciapalm 10y ago
        I used the word "show" not "prove" for that reason. Point taken though: in the future, I will use "showed a link" or "found correlation". I am really very careful not to use the word "proved" for the same concerns you have.
        kevinnk 10y ago
        Not to keep arguing a dead point, but the word I cared about was "causes" not "show". The study shows pretty definitively ("proves") that a correlation exists. It does not show that hormonal birth control causes depression. Regardless, I appreciate that you're making an effort to be careful. I've just been seeing this particular study making the rounds on Facebook and I felt like I needed to point out what the study actually says.
        acaciapalm 10y ago
        Regardless of semantics, I'm glad you see it being shared on Facebook. I really hope it inspires women to stop taking their pills and go all Lysistrata until there is more research done and/or a better solution is invented. I mean, it's the same thing that was invented back in the 1960s. There's been very little progress. I wish they could invent something semi permanent for men. Then we could cease having the current child support debates. Temporary vasectomy would be awesome for the world.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]

colejohnson66 10y ago

What astounds me is that the human brain doesn't even know it works (at least consciously). Your brain tells your body what to do, but your consciousness has no idea how. <rant> For me, that's what's so amazing about neural networks! If you could ask an individual neuron why their f(x) is the way it is, they probably would only be able to tell you that "that gets the result the brain wants". They're like individual computers, yet they can't work alone; only when put together does what they're doing make sense. </rant>

bordercases 10y ago
I wonder why we don't have several conscious thoughts at once.
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  I sometimes feel I do, but then my sense of introspection goes bonkers.
- bbctol 10y ago
  Perhaps we do! How do you know that your autonomic nervous system isn't consciously regulating your breathing, digestion, and heartrate, blissfully unaware of the less important unconscious processes that acquire food and move about. (I wrote a science fiction story along these lines once, that was described by readers as "uh... interesting, I guess.")
  - bordercases 10y ago
    Hell, I'd read it. Still kicking around a copy?
- nnq 10y ago
  My theory is that we can have several conscious thoughts at once but most of us suppress this most of the time because without a clear "winner thought" that gets the attention and gets to decide what reality is and gets to control the body, you'd end up with what people with schitzophrenia or other psychoses have... I'd also bet that the first "human-type & human-level" AI will be quire insane by human standards at least if we don't get this inner attention focusing part right from the first time. Considering that this insane AI will also get super-human pretty fast, I'm pretty scared of what it would do before it gets itself to some sort of inner equilibrium or "sanity"...

mrob 10y ago

Examples of recently discovered human anatomy: Structural and functional features of central nervous system lymphatic vessels. (2015) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26030524 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26030524 A newly discovered muscle: The tensor of the vastus intermedius. (2016) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26732825 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26732825 There's probably more not yet scientifically described.

agumonkey 10y ago

Somehow reminds me of the anesthesia mystery too. It just works (tm).

gabrielgoh 10y ago

Forget internal organs, it amazes me that scholarship in the 15th century was completely ignorant the clitoris. From Wikipedia > Gabriele Falloppio (discoverer of the fallopian tube), who claimed that he was the first to discover the clitoris. In 1561, Falloppio stated, "Modern anatomists have entirely neglected it ... and do not say a word about it ... and if others have spoken of it, know that they have taken it from me or my students"