4 ms·

Sure. "Scientific" consensus then.

gruez 8mo ago
That just shifts the problem around. Where's your evidence that there's a "Scientific consensus"? So far as I can tell there's only two studies, a in-vitro one (ie. the OP) and a cohort study from 2023. If an in-vitro study and a cohort study are all you need to claim it's "quite well studied" and that there's a "consensus", I think your bar is awfully low. On the second page of HN there's a story where some is commenting that mRNA vaccines cause heart issues, citing one study, and I'm sure that the vaccines quacks have more studies than just that one. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46969206 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46969206
- nerdsniper 8mo ago
  I don’t think you searched at all. I’ll come back later with links, but maybe you could search a bit harder in the meantime. I’ve read dozens personally. The link in my top level comment (to another HN thread) will link you to 4 related studies and I walk through some of the logic behind how they choose their methodologies. You’re really leaning hard into the sea-lioning trope. Here’s the link again for anyone else who completely missed it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44623976 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44623976 For those who actually have any level of intellectual curiosity in this, that should get you started on some of the central research.
  - gruez 8mo ago
    >Here’s the link again for anyone else who completely missed it: Going through the links you provided: [0] Berry 2025: the in vitro study from OP that I mentioned earlier [1] Witkowski 2023: the 2023 cohort study that I mentioned earlier [2] Witkowski 2024: study that found ingesting erythritol "enhances platelet reactivity in healthy volunteers". It doesn't attempt to prove that it actually causes negative health outcomes, but it does speculate that "may enhance thrombosis potential". I'm not sure how reliable that speculation is, given that the study doesn't say (at least in the abstract) whether "platelet reactivity" is an accepted proxy for thrombosis" (eg. similar to cholesterol is an accepted proxy for CVD). It concludes "discussion of whether erythritol should be reevaluated as a food additive with the Generally Recognized as Safe designation is warranted". Again, at best this is consistent with "there's a consensus that we should look into erythritol", not "there's a consensus that erythritol is harmful" [3] This is just a blog that links to Witkowski 2024. So in conclusion, you have 1 cohort study, 1 in vitro study, and 1 in-vivo study. I await your "dozens" of studies. >You’re really leaning hard into the sea-lioning trope. So what's the implication here? That anyone can make spurious claims about there being a "medical consensus" on some controversial topic, drop a few studies, and then when there's people pushing back denounce them as "sea-lioning"? If we adopted this attitude we'd still be proclaiming that there was a "medical consensus" that ivermectin cured covid, and I can actually turn up more than 3 studies for that[1]. [1] https://c19early.org/imeta.html https://c19early.org/imeta.html
    - nerdsniper 8mo ago
      Thank you. In review, I have realized that a lot of the sources I read over the past year were just official-sounding perspectives on the same limited number of studies.

gruez 8mo ago

That just shifts the problem around. Where's your evidence that there's a "Scientific consensus"? So far as I can tell there's only two studies, a in-vitro one (ie. the OP) and a cohort study from 2023. If an in-vitro study and a cohort study are all you need to claim it's "quite well studied" and that there's a "consensus", I think your bar is awfully low. On the second page of HN there's a story where some is commenting that mRNA vaccines cause heart issues, citing one study, and I'm sure that the vaccines quacks have more studies than just that one. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46969206 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46969206

nerdsniper 8mo ago
I don’t think you searched at all. I’ll come back later with links, but maybe you could search a bit harder in the meantime. I’ve read dozens personally. The link in my top level comment (to another HN thread) will link you to 4 related studies and I walk through some of the logic behind how they choose their methodologies. You’re really leaning hard into the sea-lioning trope. Here’s the link again for anyone else who completely missed it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44623976 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44623976 For those who actually have any level of intellectual curiosity in this, that should get you started on some of the central research.
- gruez 8mo ago
  >Here’s the link again for anyone else who completely missed it: Going through the links you provided: [0] Berry 2025: the in vitro study from OP that I mentioned earlier [1] Witkowski 2023: the 2023 cohort study that I mentioned earlier [2] Witkowski 2024: study that found ingesting erythritol "enhances platelet reactivity in healthy volunteers". It doesn't attempt to prove that it actually causes negative health outcomes, but it does speculate that "may enhance thrombosis potential". I'm not sure how reliable that speculation is, given that the study doesn't say (at least in the abstract) whether "platelet reactivity" is an accepted proxy for thrombosis" (eg. similar to cholesterol is an accepted proxy for CVD). It concludes "discussion of whether erythritol should be reevaluated as a food additive with the Generally Recognized as Safe designation is warranted". Again, at best this is consistent with "there's a consensus that we should look into erythritol", not "there's a consensus that erythritol is harmful" [3] This is just a blog that links to Witkowski 2024. So in conclusion, you have 1 cohort study, 1 in vitro study, and 1 in-vivo study. I await your "dozens" of studies. >You’re really leaning hard into the sea-lioning trope. So what's the implication here? That anyone can make spurious claims about there being a "medical consensus" on some controversial topic, drop a few studies, and then when there's people pushing back denounce them as "sea-lioning"? If we adopted this attitude we'd still be proclaiming that there was a "medical consensus" that ivermectin cured covid, and I can actually turn up more than 3 studies for that[1]. [1] https://c19early.org/imeta.html https://c19early.org/imeta.html
  - nerdsniper 8mo ago
    Thank you. In review, I have realized that a lot of the sources I read over the past year were just official-sounding perspectives on the same limited number of studies.