TIL

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Re: TIL

Postby cmsellers » Fri Jun 15, 2018 5:57 am

So I found a fascinating blog written by a food crackpot. But this isn't your garden-variety food crackpot. It's not all gluten that's bad, only gluten from hybridized wheat. GMOs aren't just bad, we're probably being secretly fed GMO food.

However in the middle of all this insanity, is a post which (once you get past the GMO conspiracy theories) is interesting, and at least a bit worrying. Apparently, most wheat farmers in the US spray their crops with RoundUp before harvest, so that the crops die and ripen evenly and prematurely. Wheat which isn't ripe will also uptake RoundUp into the kernels, meaning we eat minute amounts of roundup.

Now, I know I should think like a toxicologist here. There's no evidence that RoundUp is poisonous to humans, and the quantities are minute. However it still disturbs me, I mean, there was no evidence that trans fats were harmful either for a long time, and like trans fats RoundUp is something not found in nature and therefore something we clearly don't need to eat. So despite my general contempt for organic stuff, I'll probably go out of my way to buy organic wheat in the future in order to not eat RoundUp.

I'm not sure if this is me being paranoid or the food crackpot being a stopped clock, but this was certainly something I learned today.
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Re: TIL

Postby Absentia » Fri Jun 15, 2018 7:21 am

In 2011, a Scottish whiskey maker experimented with aging their whiskey... IN SPACE. The whiskey was sent to the International Space Station and orbited the Earth for 3 years. They weren't able to send a full-size cask, of course, but miniature aging vessels were developed that produced a similar result in control tests on Earth.

The space whiskey was described by their master distillers as tasting like "antiseptic lozenges and rubbery smoke", which translates from whiskey critic lingo as "BLEGH!"
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Re: TIL

Postby IamNotCreepy » Thu Jun 21, 2018 6:13 pm

TIL that the Photic Sneeze Reflex, aka sneezing when you are exposed to sunlight, is also known by a much catchier name: Autosomal Compelling Helio-Ophthalmic Outburst or, ACHOO.

ACHOO.
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Re: TIL

Postby Malfeasinator » Sun Jun 24, 2018 2:24 am

cmsellers wrote:So I found a fascinating blog written by a food crackpot. But this isn't your garden-variety food crackpot. It's not all gluten that's bad, only gluten from hybridized wheat. GMOs aren't just bad, we're probably being secretly fed GMO food.

However in the middle of all this insanity, is a post which (once you get past the GMO conspiracy theories) is interesting, and at least a bit worrying. Apparently, most wheat farmers in the US spray their crops with RoundUp before harvest, so that the crops die and ripen evenly and prematurely. Wheat which isn't ripe will also uptake RoundUp into the kernels, meaning we eat minute amounts of roundup.

Now, I know I should think like a toxicologist here. There's no evidence that RoundUp is poisonous to humans, and the quantities are minute. However it still disturbs me, I mean, there was no evidence that trans fats were harmful either for a long time, and like trans fats RoundUp is something not found in nature and therefore something we clearly don't need to eat. So despite my general contempt for organic stuff, I'll probably go out of my way to buy organic wheat in the future in order to not eat RoundUp.

I'm not sure if this is me being paranoid or the food crackpot being a stopped clock, but this was certainly something I learned today.


Yeah, I got into an argument on Facebook a few years ago (bad idea, don't recommend it).

The problem is that we're always fucked. I don't know how many people remember the problems with lead. Lead in the gas, lead in paints, lead in plumbing pipes, lead in the food containers, yeah, sure, NO WAIT HOLY SHIT THAT'S A BAD IDEA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clair_Cam ... _poisoning

If it wasn't lead, it was asbestos - concerns were raised in the 1920s but it took until the 80s and 90s for major changes to happen.

If it wasn't asbestos, it was cigarettes, even second-hand. You know, good, safe, doctor-recommended cigarettes.

We kind of have a long history of denying the causes of health problems in the U.S. and that, sadly, will probably never change.

You bring up concerns like that though and people think you sound like the Unabomber, or the guy from Supersize Me, which was totally unfair to McDonald's, and please won't someone think of the mega cheeseburger peddlers.

The people you argue against are all going to sound like straight up thralls from the Blade movies, good little servants for their bloodsucking overlords.

So how can you have a decent debate? Well, here's how. You wait 30 years. Then you've won. Either you've died from cancer by then or you can say "Ha! Look at the news! I told you so! *cough*"

There's probably a latin term for "The dick is already in" that corporations use as legal defense to justify continuing to fuck everybody.

I'm joking, but only slightly.

But how can anybody debate any subject anymore in an informed way, without it getting weird? I mean, if you know, tell me. I'm trying to figure that out, myself. It turns out that getting into it with a stranger on Facebook just makes you look like a lunatic in front of your family and friends and people you haven't met yet, and it's logged forever.

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Re: TIL

Postby 52xMax » Sun Jun 24, 2018 3:52 am

iMURDAu wrote:It's not just age it's engine hours. 15 years of that coupled with poor maintenance seems like it would cause catastrophic engine failure with rods going flying like they were shot out of a cannon.


Clearly Italian auto mechanics are inferior to Cubans

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This is a picture taken in 2014 of a Street in Havana. Some of these cars are over seventy years old, and have been working as taxis ever since before the embargo.
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Re: TIL

Postby cmsellers » Mon Jun 25, 2018 3:58 am

Apparently, ganga is (quasi-)legal on the Ganges.
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Re: TIL

Postby iMURDAu » Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:45 pm

Ganga? You mean ganja? The Chronic, weed, pif, mary jane?
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Re: TIL

Postby cmsellers » Mon Jun 25, 2018 10:32 pm

Yes I do. I'm reefering to the demon weed: Maryhuana.
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Re: TIL

Postby Deathclaw_Puncher » Fri Jun 29, 2018 8:55 pm

TIL there's a Georgian tarragon flavored soda called Tarkhun and it's fucking delicious.
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Re: TIL

Postby LunarTeaHouse » Sun Jul 01, 2018 10:58 pm

@Malfeasinator your post reminds me of growing up in the 90s when my grandparents were constantly shoving the whole, "drink your milk, it will make your bones strong" or "drink your juice so you don't catch cold" down my throat. But, surprise, turns out milk is mostly fat and juice is mostly sugar, and the "health" benefits are just a load of malarkey.

I read recently that eating a piece of fruit is actually a lot better for you than drinking the juice, since so many things happen to the juice by the time it gets to your table, it's little more than sugar water with orange food coloring.
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Re: TIL

Postby SandTea » Mon Jul 02, 2018 12:36 am

Malfeasinator wrote:So how can you have a decent debate? Well, here's how. You wait 30 years. Then you've won.


Or lost. It's not absolutely certain. I mean, I'm not saying to stop avoiding whatever you think is going to kill you. Do you however you want but I'm not worried about it yet even if that makes people consider me a good little servant of my bloodsucking overlords. I will say that it's a good thing that Norman Borlaug saved a billion lives with some gmo grains. The worst proven problem with glyphosates are the resistant weeds that it could produce. You can ignore those links but I highly reccomend this one as one can be sure to take away whatever presumptions about herbicides they have going in, back out with them.

To be more on topic; TIL about Lautaro
who was a young Araucanian toqui who achieved notoriety for leading the indigenous resistance against Spanish conquest in Chile. Back among his people he was declared toqui and led Mapuche warriors into a series of victories against the Spanish


It's not the best documented story but by all accounts he was a... heh, I didn't think this happenstance would occur but might as well roll with it. He was a good little servant to his bloodsucking overlords. Until he wasn't and wrecked house. Disease and famine prevented total success and he was killed by the Spanish but if this isn't one of the great underdog stories that deserves some movie attention then I wouldn't know what would be. I mean they were making guns outta jungle materials. Like trees and shit.

Oh hey, there's a yt vid. Why would I think there wouldn't be?


Edit- yeah, LunarTeaHouse. Don't look into juice too much. It can get pretty... grey. ;) and expensive
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Re: TIL

Postby cmsellers » Tue Jul 03, 2018 7:41 am

When I was less fat, I really liked walking (and I still really like traveling) and I fantasized about someday walking the longest route migratory humans might have taken: from Cape Town, South Africa to the eastern tip of Tierra del Fuego, walking across ice from Siberia to Alaska.

Turns out, this guy had basically the same idea, and he actually acted on it, with his "Out of Eden Walk." He started in Ethiopia, which follows the consensus view of human origins (even the people who argue modern humans originated in South Africa don't argue for the Cape), but the fact that he's actually doing it is wicked impressive.
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Re: TIL

Postby Krashlia » Wed Jul 04, 2018 4:20 am

cmsellers wrote:
Spoiler: show
When I was less fat, I really liked walking (and I still really like traveling) and I fantasized about someday walking the longest route migratory humans might have taken: from Cape Town, South Africa to the eastern tip of Tierra del Fuego, walking across ice from Siberia to Alaska.

Turns out, this guy had basically the same idea, and he actually acted on it, with his "Out of Eden Walk." He started in Ethiopia, which follows the consensus view of human origins (even the people who argue modern humans originated in South Africa don't argue for the Cape), but the fact that he's actually doing it is wicked impressive.


It almost sounds like pilgrimage.
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Re: TIL

Postby cmsellers » Thu Jul 05, 2018 1:07 am

Krashlia wrote:It almost sounds like pilgrimage.

I mean, in a way, it is. Except that modern pilgrims fly most of the way.
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Re: TIL

Postby SandTea » Thu Jul 05, 2018 6:03 am

pffft... real pilgrims crawl.
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