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I'm curious how they compare "fasting" - which people have been doing for thousands of years and has traditions in nearly every major historical + religious cul

I'm curious how they compare "fasting" - which people have been doing for thousands of years and has traditions in nearly every major historical + religious culture and cost nothing with "jade eggs." Doesn't quite seem equivalent...

jerf 7y ago
I've been doing some fasting lately, and what has deeply shocked me is precisely that I'm not "staggering about hungry for days". It's surprisingly easy once you get over the initial hump. (Note: I'm not saying it's necessarily easy in an absolute sense; I'm saying it's surprising how easy it is. Based on my upbringing I would have guessed after hour 4 I'd be in constant serious hunger, and it's not like that.) I've come to understand that what I interpreted as "hunger" in the past was basically a sugar craving. I don't know how long it would take real hunger to get to that level, but even in a two-day fast I'd only gotten up to more-or-less "I could eat, yeah"... still a long ways from the hunger I've had in the past. (Also, my interest in it has actually been coming from the scientific side, rather than the traditional side or crazywhack theory or any sort of Puritan impulse. I have an autoimmune disease, and there's been a lot of interesting work on those and fasting lately.)
- joelrunyon 7y ago
  For a lot of people - what they think is "hunger" is really just "boredom." That - or a carb addiction. Once you start reading about autophagy, fasting doesn't really seem that crazy after all.
  - rhinoceraptor 7y ago
    It's almost as if pre-modernity humans didn't have infinite supplies of hyper-palatable food available 24/7...
paulcole 7y ago
Yes, religions have never accepted money for perceived benefits or relied upon physical symbols of faith.
andreilys 7y ago
Yes it truly boggles the mind, but then you realize most of these outlets are struggling for clicks and it all starts to make sense.

jerf 7y ago

I've been doing some fasting lately, and what has deeply shocked me is precisely that I'm not "staggering about hungry for days". It's surprisingly easy once you get over the initial hump. (Note: I'm not saying it's necessarily easy in an absolute sense; I'm saying it's surprising how easy it is. Based on my upbringing I would have guessed after hour 4 I'd be in constant serious hunger, and it's not like that.) I've come to understand that what I interpreted as "hunger" in the past was basically a sugar craving. I don't know how long it would take real hunger to get to that level, but even in a two-day fast I'd only gotten up to more-or-less "I could eat, yeah"... still a long ways from the hunger I've had in the past. (Also, my interest in it has actually been coming from the scientific side, rather than the traditional side or crazywhack theory or any sort of Puritan impulse. I have an autoimmune disease, and there's been a lot of interesting work on those and fasting lately.)

joelrunyon 7y ago
For a lot of people - what they think is "hunger" is really just "boredom." That - or a carb addiction. Once you start reading about autophagy, fasting doesn't really seem that crazy after all.
- rhinoceraptor 7y ago
  It's almost as if pre-modernity humans didn't have infinite supplies of hyper-palatable food available 24/7...

paulcole 7y ago

Yes, religions have never accepted money for perceived benefits or relied upon physical symbols of faith.

andreilys 7y ago

Yes it truly boggles the mind, but then you realize most of these outlets are struggling for clicks and it all starts to make sense.