6 ms·

The effects of grounding (earthing) on inflammation

30 points by tunnuz 3y ago

tunnuz 3y ago
Had to truncate the title. Is anyone here familiar with the concept of grounding?
- stareatgoats 3y ago
  There was some knowledgeable discussion last time the page was posted, August 29 last year, 66 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32640848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32640848
  - chillingeffect 3y ago
    Wow, the confident misassertions in some of those comments! Fortunately many of them were able to be attenuated. Thx for the link. I see two key questions: 1. How does static electricity inside the body interact with the inside? 2. How to measure the current out of the mat? As pointed out on the prev discussion, it is non-trivial bc the voltage is large and the current is small.
- wsintra2022 3y ago
  Read the book by the dude who came up with it many years ago when I was in Australia. I walked everywhere for a while barefoot after that. The conspiracy being that someone somewhere knew about this so they created footwear as insulators to disconnect us from the earth, maybe the devil invented shoes! Hide those hoofs ;)
- agumonkey 3y ago
  Electric imbalance "may" theoretically interfere with your own body biological processes, so people thought being connected to ground to rebalance things a bit would be beneficial. I don't know anything about the reality of it, but, there's Michael Levin's research reviving bioelectricity as a very important layer in tissue level logic (morphogenesis).. so who knows how important it is to ensure a good electrical state.
graphitout 3y ago
Very interesting. Eight healthy subjects used for testing. I am guessing that the effect is not limited to humans alone. Shouldn't it be easier to do a larger study on animals?
malfist 3y ago
This is an unblinded, non controlled study. It would be unwise to take it's findings too seriously
- asystole 3y ago
  Everything about this, from methodology to writing style, screams crackpot to me.
bloopernova 3y ago
(2015) Fascinating! The study has a lot of information, although other discussions have cast doubt on the financial motivation of an author.
- WillDaSilva 3y ago
  Notably, it appears the authors of this study are the owners of https://www.earthing.com https://www.earthing.com, which sells products to help ground people. This is called out in the study. Given this massive conflict of interest, I can't put much stock into these findings until they're replicated by independent researchers. Absent that, I'll assume that this study is manufacturing a (possibly false) scientific basis for buying the grounding products.
  - MightyBuzzard 3y ago
    [dead]
tomohawk 3y ago
A family member has a lot of problems with inflammation. Having seen many doctors at many institutions, all that's been learned is that the medical establishment doesn't really seem to have much of an idea about inflammatory disease, other than being able to apply labels. So far, any progress that has been made by this family member is down to following scientific method in their diet - doctors have been very unhelpful. This family member is part of support groups full of people with similar experiences. This sounds like quackery, but given the incompetence in this area of the current medical establishment, we'll have to take a look at it.
- doix 3y ago
  While the current medical establishment isn't perfect, and I have many anecdotes of them failing my family/friends and I, they are definitely better than those so called support groups. I refuse to believe they are good for you. Just a bunch of people complaining and enabling hypochondria. Psychosomatic symptoms are a powerful thing. Hanging out with a bunch of people that complain about their symptoms and finding similarities with them isn't good. By all means, expirement with diet or whatever else. But no good can come from those support groups. Or maybe I am just too cynical...
  - bozhark 3y ago
    You’re only considering the impact of the negative potential and failing to regard the positive potentials of people’s value. Humans are social beings.
  - tomohawk 3y ago
    I think you may be too cynical. People in support groups can provide invaluable input. When you go to a doctor or surgeon, you are getting a professional's perspective. When you talk to a support group, you are hearing from people who have actually experienced the results of that. For example, another family member had a major surgery. Prior to getting the surgery, they talked to specialists at some really good institutions about what they could offer. There were surgical and non-surgical options available. However, the questions that were asked came from being in contact with a support group. These were people who had had the various procedures, and who had had them at various institutions. Without that input, we would not have been able to ask good questions, or be very discerning about what these specialists were saying. Without the support group, we would have been lost in that process. EDIT. I should also add that at the facility where the surgery was done, we met several people who had gone to very highly esteemed hospitals for the same kind of thing, but were having to have a 2nd go at it at the facility we chose. That could have been us. We learned that even well credentialed people at highly respected places will perform procedures they have little experience with.
aaron695 3y ago
[dead]
dmitrybrant 3y ago
In other words, touch grass?
- mikro2nd 3y ago
  No. Touch soil. There is good, scientific evidence that skin contact with bare soil (walking barefoot in natural surroundings, gardening without gloves) makes humans happier, and the mechanism is this: there exists a species of bacteria found everywhere on Earth (even Antarctica, apparently) that exudes a compound which, on contact with the skin, triggers the production of endorphins, making is feel happier. I'm skeptical of the electrical-conductivity related claims in the article, but contact with the Earth being good for us is at least explained/explicable.
exabrial 3y ago
How to people sell these products? I could understand selling the product, but not making outlandish claims and letting people reap the placebo effect… to falsely claim actual success is a whole nother level of fraud.
- theshrike79 3y ago
  apt uninstall morale That's it. I still regret that I had ethical issues and good morals or I'd be a millionaire along with my classmates. During the dotcom boom we had a ton of ideas, all of them ranging from sketchy to unethical. A good bunch of them was invented by someone else later on.
chkaloon 3y ago
"Inclusion in an NLM database does not imply endorsement of, or agreement with, the contents by NLM or the National Institutes of Health." - good. I was wondering how the NIH got involved in this
- chillingeffect 3y ago
  I recommend considering not just this paper but the dozens of others by the authors. Pubmed shows over 100 papers on legit-looking studies on reasonable journals on this and other topics.
hkt 3y ago
This would be hilarious were it not for the fact that the authors are so clearly trying to prey on people who are suffering.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
tunnuz 3y ago
Sorry I didn’t mean to endorse this, I’m just surprised to see peer reviewed studies on this since I never heard about it before.

30 points by tunnuz 3y ago

tunnuz 3y ago

Had to truncate the title. Is anyone here familiar with the concept of grounding?

stareatgoats 3y ago
There was some knowledgeable discussion last time the page was posted, August 29 last year, 66 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32640848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32640848
- chillingeffect 3y ago
  Wow, the confident misassertions in some of those comments! Fortunately many of them were able to be attenuated. Thx for the link. I see two key questions: 1. How does static electricity inside the body interact with the inside? 2. How to measure the current out of the mat? As pointed out on the prev discussion, it is non-trivial bc the voltage is large and the current is small.
wsintra2022 3y ago
Read the book by the dude who came up with it many years ago when I was in Australia. I walked everywhere for a while barefoot after that. The conspiracy being that someone somewhere knew about this so they created footwear as insulators to disconnect us from the earth, maybe the devil invented shoes! Hide those hoofs ;)
agumonkey 3y ago
Electric imbalance "may" theoretically interfere with your own body biological processes, so people thought being connected to ground to rebalance things a bit would be beneficial. I don't know anything about the reality of it, but, there's Michael Levin's research reviving bioelectricity as a very important layer in tissue level logic (morphogenesis).. so who knows how important it is to ensure a good electrical state.

graphitout 3y ago

Very interesting. Eight healthy subjects used for testing. I am guessing that the effect is not limited to humans alone. Shouldn't it be easier to do a larger study on animals?

malfist 3y ago

This is an unblinded, non controlled study. It would be unwise to take it's findings too seriously

asystole 3y ago
Everything about this, from methodology to writing style, screams crackpot to me.

bloopernova 3y ago

(2015) Fascinating! The study has a lot of information, although other discussions have cast doubt on the financial motivation of an author.

WillDaSilva 3y ago
Notably, it appears the authors of this study are the owners of https://www.earthing.com https://www.earthing.com, which sells products to help ground people. This is called out in the study. Given this massive conflict of interest, I can't put much stock into these findings until they're replicated by independent researchers. Absent that, I'll assume that this study is manufacturing a (possibly false) scientific basis for buying the grounding products.
- MightyBuzzard 3y ago
  [dead]

tomohawk 3y ago

A family member has a lot of problems with inflammation. Having seen many doctors at many institutions, all that's been learned is that the medical establishment doesn't really seem to have much of an idea about inflammatory disease, other than being able to apply labels. So far, any progress that has been made by this family member is down to following scientific method in their diet - doctors have been very unhelpful. This family member is part of support groups full of people with similar experiences. This sounds like quackery, but given the incompetence in this area of the current medical establishment, we'll have to take a look at it.

doix 3y ago
While the current medical establishment isn't perfect, and I have many anecdotes of them failing my family/friends and I, they are definitely better than those so called support groups. I refuse to believe they are good for you. Just a bunch of people complaining and enabling hypochondria. Psychosomatic symptoms are a powerful thing. Hanging out with a bunch of people that complain about their symptoms and finding similarities with them isn't good. By all means, expirement with diet or whatever else. But no good can come from those support groups. Or maybe I am just too cynical...
- bozhark 3y ago
  You’re only considering the impact of the negative potential and failing to regard the positive potentials of people’s value. Humans are social beings.
- tomohawk 3y ago
  I think you may be too cynical. People in support groups can provide invaluable input. When you go to a doctor or surgeon, you are getting a professional's perspective. When you talk to a support group, you are hearing from people who have actually experienced the results of that. For example, another family member had a major surgery. Prior to getting the surgery, they talked to specialists at some really good institutions about what they could offer. There were surgical and non-surgical options available. However, the questions that were asked came from being in contact with a support group. These were people who had had the various procedures, and who had had them at various institutions. Without that input, we would not have been able to ask good questions, or be very discerning about what these specialists were saying. Without the support group, we would have been lost in that process. EDIT. I should also add that at the facility where the surgery was done, we met several people who had gone to very highly esteemed hospitals for the same kind of thing, but were having to have a 2nd go at it at the facility we chose. That could have been us. We learned that even well credentialed people at highly respected places will perform procedures they have little experience with.

aaron695 3y ago

[dead]

dmitrybrant 3y ago

In other words, touch grass?

mikro2nd 3y ago
No. Touch soil. There is good, scientific evidence that skin contact with bare soil (walking barefoot in natural surroundings, gardening without gloves) makes humans happier, and the mechanism is this: there exists a species of bacteria found everywhere on Earth (even Antarctica, apparently) that exudes a compound which, on contact with the skin, triggers the production of endorphins, making is feel happier. I'm skeptical of the electrical-conductivity related claims in the article, but contact with the Earth being good for us is at least explained/explicable.

exabrial 3y ago

How to people sell these products? I could understand selling the product, but not making outlandish claims and letting people reap the placebo effect… to falsely claim actual success is a whole nother level of fraud.

theshrike79 3y ago
apt uninstall morale That's it. I still regret that I had ethical issues and good morals or I'd be a millionaire along with my classmates. During the dotcom boom we had a ton of ideas, all of them ranging from sketchy to unethical. A good bunch of them was invented by someone else later on.

chkaloon 3y ago

"Inclusion in an NLM database does not imply endorsement of, or agreement with, the contents by NLM or the National Institutes of Health." - good. I was wondering how the NIH got involved in this

chillingeffect 3y ago
I recommend considering not just this paper but the dozens of others by the authors. Pubmed shows over 100 papers on legit-looking studies on reasonable journals on this and other topics.

hkt 3y ago

This would be hilarious were it not for the fact that the authors are so clearly trying to prey on people who are suffering.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

tunnuz 3y ago

Sorry I didn’t mean to endorse this, I’m just surprised to see peer reviewed studies on this since I never heard about it before.