13 ms·

A Nuclear Jockstrap

83 points by Kliment 10y ago

lb1lf 10y ago
I wonder what will be the equivalent a hundred years down the line. In other words - do we do something today which will seem as hare-brained to our descendants as irradiating one's genitals does to us? (We probably do - but what will it be...)
- cgriswald 10y ago
  Supplements. Even the ones that seem to have some scientific validity for their intended purpose aren't dosed correctly and are often mixed with all kinds of unhealthy filler material depending on the source.
  - derefr 10y ago
    Ehh, "supplements" are just the operationalization (assembly-line-ization) of people consuming herbs for medicinal purposes. People have always done that, and I expect will always do that. Inconsistent dosing and random side-products are inevitable consequences, but nobody seems to mind. Though, I'm surprised there isn't a small movement of "home pharmacologists" who buy herbs (or supplement pills/powders) and then distill/reflux/recrystallize out the active ingredients and re-portion them into dosing media for their own use.
- tyingq 10y ago
  Chemotherapy and radiation as cancer treatment will likely look barbaric when something better comes around.
  - emondi 10y ago
    I thought the same but those do work at some level.
  - kwhitefoot 10y ago
    They are only barbaric if you know of a better alternative. Barbarism is bad behaviour when the better alternative is already known. We need to be careful when we judge the past to judge it on the facts known at the time. So, I agree that they will look barbaric once a pill free of side effects can cure cancer but it will only look barbaric, not have been barbaric.
  - DrScump 10y ago
    So will conventional surgery (or, as Dr. McCoy referred to it, "cutting and sewing people like garments").
- DougN7 10y ago
  I suspect vaping might.
- emondi 10y ago
  I'd say botox and silicone implants.
- teh_klev 10y ago
  Homeopathy.
  - Waterluvian 10y ago
    Which points something out about historical quackery: a lot of people knew it was nonsense even when it was new.
  - derekp7 10y ago
    I really wish there was a law that forbids using the Homeopathic label on a product that isn't really homeopathic, but just non-medicinal. For example, there are some teas or cough drops that are soothing when you have a bad cold (in a similar way to how lemon or honey helps you feel better). Often these are labeled as homeopathic, even though they contain no homeopathic poisons. I don't mind getting non-medicinal remedies, but when I see the homeopathic label I tend to shy away.
    - kwhitefoot 10y ago
      > even though they contain no homeopathic poisons. Something that is genuinely homoeopathic doesn't contain any of the poisons either. Or at least at such a low concentration that it is insignificant. From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions): Hahnemann advocated 30C dilutions for most purposes (that is, dilution by a factor of 1060). ... Dilution advocated by Hahnemann for most purposes: on average, this would require giving two billion doses per second to six billion people for 4 billion years to deliver a single molecule of the original material to any patient.
      - derefr 10y ago
        I think the parent's point was that things marketed as "homeopathic" usually have their active ingredient diluted into non-existence, so they're pointless to take for relief of the claimed symptom. Slapping the label "homeopathic" on something that actually does something is really annoying, then, because it'd make you assume it did nothing.
- Exofunctor 10y ago
  The fact that some people still slice up the genitals of infants for religious or cosmetic reasons.
  - weberc2 10y ago
    That practice dates back thousands of years, and it's still largely normal in many parts of the world. I don't think it's very analogous to this example.
  - paulddraper 10y ago
    sometimes hygienic reasons too
    - Exofunctor 10y ago
      > sometimes hygienic reasons too The idea that circumcision has substantive positive health effects has been thoroughly debunked in the presence of semi-regular washing, and the jury is out in third-world countries without sanitation. However, when you factor in the risk of infant mortality from infection or botched procedure in those same third-world countries, any (minor) health benefit that might exist disappears and goes negative. Hygiene also doesn't seem to be an accepted excuse for clitoral hood removal, even though it's anatomically identical (mutatis mutandis) to male circumcision and presumably has similar (minor) health benefits (dryer environments are harsher on bacteria). The one non-negligible semi-legitimate medical justification is in the case of severe phimosis, but that can almost always be treated with topical creams rather than surgery and doesn't manifest until adolescence anyway, so it's not an excuse to circumcise babies.
      - paulddraper 10y ago
        I don't know if the reason is sound, just as IDK if the "religious" or "cosmetic" are sound. I just know that it's a reason.
    - pareidolia 10y ago
      I for one appreciate not having a bare exposed urethra without defense against debris and contaminants.
- tzakrajs 10y ago
  Leadership training.
- iSnow 10y ago
  Burning fossil fuel by the gigaton comes to mind. If we stick to medicine, maybe the use of SSRI against depression, but I am not sure yet.
- M_Grey 10y ago
  The shit we breath and drink and surround ourselves with... the particulates, the nanoparticles of soot, the hundreds and thousands of chemicals in various concentrations and interactions we don't even pretend to understand. People will look back at that in the same way we do at people bathing in filthy rivers. Human beings driving cars. The activity that for years maimed and killed millions of people, but we did it anyway while worrying about terrorist attacks. I would suspect that at some point the notion of carrying a firearm is going to be pretty laughable, given what they'll be capable of then. Human doctors and the current standard of medical errors and deaths due to lack of cleanliness... which is a lot of death and suffering by the way. We do it now, like driving, because we have no choice, but as soon as we do humans doctors will look like barbers. So so much more. It takes time to start to see your own time from a future point of view, but once you start you can't stop. Then again, an alternative and perhaps more realistic view is that in a hundred years civilization will be collapsing, and these will be the last "good" days. Who knows?
  - Exofunctor 10y ago
    > The shit we breath and drink and surround ourselves with... Humans are healthier than ever. While nutrition will probably improve in the future, it's actually quite good right now. > Human beings driving cars. The activity that for years maimed and killed millions of people, but we did it anyway while worrying about terrorist attacks. That's because the utility of car usage is undeniably positive. Despite millions of deaths over the decades, humanity would be a lot worse off without cars to get around and transport goods. If you just mean humans as opposed to computers, then you're probably right. I do think it would be a net negative to society if humans were forced to stop driving, however. That would just be one more way to dull the human experience and go from living to surviving. > the notion of carrying a firearm is going to be pretty laughable, given what they'll be capable of then Do you mean to say that they'll be too powerful in the future? I'm not sure I understand the argument; presumably, there'll be some sort of limitation on what kind of weapons people are allowed to use. The restrictions are usually pretty silly and arbitrary right now (e.g. "no barrel shroud"), but I could imagine a future where there are laws like "no carrying around a weapon capable of putting out more than 10kW averaged over a minute".
- fit2rule 10y ago
  Pharmaceuticals. No doubt about it.
- paulddraper 10y ago
  Sensitivity training
- maverick_iceman 10y ago
  Our opposition to GMO food.
- mixedCase 10y ago
  I'm putting my money in "Shoving tons of carbs down our throats and wondering why we suddenly are obese and have type 2 diabetes".
- gabrielgoh 10y ago
  probably our entire conception of psychology and psychiatry will go a radical change. To think we still do electroshock therapy (lets induce a seizure in the brain and hope for the best!), have no idea how it works, and this is still considered by professionals as one of the most effective therapies for chronic depression is just evidence of how little we know about the brain.
- passiveincomelg 10y ago
  Some would say putting mercury in tooth fillings qualifies.
DrScump 10y ago
Posted earlier, 158+ points, 33 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13616574 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13616574

83 points by Kliment 10y ago

lb1lf 10y ago

I wonder what will be the equivalent a hundred years down the line. In other words - do we do something today which will seem as hare-brained to our descendants as irradiating one's genitals does to us? (We probably do - but what will it be...)

cgriswald 10y ago
Supplements. Even the ones that seem to have some scientific validity for their intended purpose aren't dosed correctly and are often mixed with all kinds of unhealthy filler material depending on the source.
- derefr 10y ago
  Ehh, "supplements" are just the operationalization (assembly-line-ization) of people consuming herbs for medicinal purposes. People have always done that, and I expect will always do that. Inconsistent dosing and random side-products are inevitable consequences, but nobody seems to mind. Though, I'm surprised there isn't a small movement of "home pharmacologists" who buy herbs (or supplement pills/powders) and then distill/reflux/recrystallize out the active ingredients and re-portion them into dosing media for their own use.
tyingq 10y ago
Chemotherapy and radiation as cancer treatment will likely look barbaric when something better comes around.
- emondi 10y ago
  I thought the same but those do work at some level.
- kwhitefoot 10y ago
  They are only barbaric if you know of a better alternative. Barbarism is bad behaviour when the better alternative is already known. We need to be careful when we judge the past to judge it on the facts known at the time. So, I agree that they will look barbaric once a pill free of side effects can cure cancer but it will only look barbaric, not have been barbaric.
- DrScump 10y ago
  So will conventional surgery (or, as Dr. McCoy referred to it, "cutting and sewing people like garments").
DougN7 10y ago
I suspect vaping might.
emondi 10y ago
I'd say botox and silicone implants.
teh_klev 10y ago
Homeopathy.
- Waterluvian 10y ago
  Which points something out about historical quackery: a lot of people knew it was nonsense even when it was new.
- derekp7 10y ago
  I really wish there was a law that forbids using the Homeopathic label on a product that isn't really homeopathic, but just non-medicinal. For example, there are some teas or cough drops that are soothing when you have a bad cold (in a similar way to how lemon or honey helps you feel better). Often these are labeled as homeopathic, even though they contain no homeopathic poisons. I don't mind getting non-medicinal remedies, but when I see the homeopathic label I tend to shy away.
  - kwhitefoot 10y ago
    > even though they contain no homeopathic poisons. Something that is genuinely homoeopathic doesn't contain any of the poisons either. Or at least at such a low concentration that it is insignificant. From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathic_dilutions): Hahnemann advocated 30C dilutions for most purposes (that is, dilution by a factor of 1060). ... Dilution advocated by Hahnemann for most purposes: on average, this would require giving two billion doses per second to six billion people for 4 billion years to deliver a single molecule of the original material to any patient.
    - derefr 10y ago
      I think the parent's point was that things marketed as "homeopathic" usually have their active ingredient diluted into non-existence, so they're pointless to take for relief of the claimed symptom. Slapping the label "homeopathic" on something that actually does something is really annoying, then, because it'd make you assume it did nothing.
Exofunctor 10y ago
The fact that some people still slice up the genitals of infants for religious or cosmetic reasons.
- weberc2 10y ago
  That practice dates back thousands of years, and it's still largely normal in many parts of the world. I don't think it's very analogous to this example.
- paulddraper 10y ago
  sometimes hygienic reasons too
  - Exofunctor 10y ago
    > sometimes hygienic reasons too The idea that circumcision has substantive positive health effects has been thoroughly debunked in the presence of semi-regular washing, and the jury is out in third-world countries without sanitation. However, when you factor in the risk of infant mortality from infection or botched procedure in those same third-world countries, any (minor) health benefit that might exist disappears and goes negative. Hygiene also doesn't seem to be an accepted excuse for clitoral hood removal, even though it's anatomically identical (mutatis mutandis) to male circumcision and presumably has similar (minor) health benefits (dryer environments are harsher on bacteria). The one non-negligible semi-legitimate medical justification is in the case of severe phimosis, but that can almost always be treated with topical creams rather than surgery and doesn't manifest until adolescence anyway, so it's not an excuse to circumcise babies.
    - paulddraper 10y ago
      I don't know if the reason is sound, just as IDK if the "religious" or "cosmetic" are sound. I just know that it's a reason.
  - pareidolia 10y ago
    I for one appreciate not having a bare exposed urethra without defense against debris and contaminants.
tzakrajs 10y ago
Leadership training.
iSnow 10y ago
Burning fossil fuel by the gigaton comes to mind. If we stick to medicine, maybe the use of SSRI against depression, but I am not sure yet.
M_Grey 10y ago
The shit we breath and drink and surround ourselves with... the particulates, the nanoparticles of soot, the hundreds and thousands of chemicals in various concentrations and interactions we don't even pretend to understand. People will look back at that in the same way we do at people bathing in filthy rivers. Human beings driving cars. The activity that for years maimed and killed millions of people, but we did it anyway while worrying about terrorist attacks. I would suspect that at some point the notion of carrying a firearm is going to be pretty laughable, given what they'll be capable of then. Human doctors and the current standard of medical errors and deaths due to lack of cleanliness... which is a lot of death and suffering by the way. We do it now, like driving, because we have no choice, but as soon as we do humans doctors will look like barbers. So so much more. It takes time to start to see your own time from a future point of view, but once you start you can't stop. Then again, an alternative and perhaps more realistic view is that in a hundred years civilization will be collapsing, and these will be the last "good" days. Who knows?
- Exofunctor 10y ago
  > The shit we breath and drink and surround ourselves with... Humans are healthier than ever. While nutrition will probably improve in the future, it's actually quite good right now. > Human beings driving cars. The activity that for years maimed and killed millions of people, but we did it anyway while worrying about terrorist attacks. That's because the utility of car usage is undeniably positive. Despite millions of deaths over the decades, humanity would be a lot worse off without cars to get around and transport goods. If you just mean humans as opposed to computers, then you're probably right. I do think it would be a net negative to society if humans were forced to stop driving, however. That would just be one more way to dull the human experience and go from living to surviving. > the notion of carrying a firearm is going to be pretty laughable, given what they'll be capable of then Do you mean to say that they'll be too powerful in the future? I'm not sure I understand the argument; presumably, there'll be some sort of limitation on what kind of weapons people are allowed to use. The restrictions are usually pretty silly and arbitrary right now (e.g. "no barrel shroud"), but I could imagine a future where there are laws like "no carrying around a weapon capable of putting out more than 10kW averaged over a minute".
fit2rule 10y ago
Pharmaceuticals. No doubt about it.
paulddraper 10y ago
Sensitivity training
maverick_iceman 10y ago
Our opposition to GMO food.
mixedCase 10y ago
I'm putting my money in "Shoving tons of carbs down our throats and wondering why we suddenly are obese and have type 2 diabetes".
gabrielgoh 10y ago
probably our entire conception of psychology and psychiatry will go a radical change. To think we still do electroshock therapy (lets induce a seizure in the brain and hope for the best!), have no idea how it works, and this is still considered by professionals as one of the most effective therapies for chronic depression is just evidence of how little we know about the brain.
passiveincomelg 10y ago
Some would say putting mercury in tooth fillings qualifies.

DrScump 10y ago

Posted earlier, 158+ points, 33 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13616574 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13616574