[HN Gopher] The Topography of Tears
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       The Topography of Tears
        
       Author : omarfarooq
       Score  : 52 points
       Date   : 2021-09-15 09:00 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (kottke.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (kottke.org)
        
       | Fnoord wrote:
       | > All tears contain a variety of biological substances (including
       | oils, antibodies and enzymes) suspended in salt water, but as
       | Fisher saw, tears from each of the different categories include
       | distinct molecules as well. Emotional tears, for instance, have
       | been found to contain protein-based hormones including the
       | neurotransmitter leucine enkephalin, a natural painkiller that is
       | released when the body is under stress.
       | 
       | Can this be used to detect 'fake tears' or 'fake remorse'? Or,
       | the opposite, to prove 'real tears' or 'real remorse'? Could it
       | be applied with regards to law, such as a lawyer proving their
       | client has regret over their actions, or a prosecutor arguing the
       | perpetrator does not _really_ feel the way the defense argues
       | they feel?
        
         | Ajef wrote:
         | This seems "easy" to manipulate. Crying on demand is (in my
         | experience) quite close to feeling those emotions by
         | remembering certain situations in your life that will produce
         | the emotions your looking to act out. So I doubt it would work
         | for your use case very effectively.
        
       | tosser0001 wrote:
       | I wish the link could go to the actual source:
       | 
       | https://www.rose-lynnfisher.com/tears.html
        
       | hwestiii wrote:
       | The title perhaps inspired by the Peter Carey novel "The
       | Chemistry of Tears"?
        
       | jelliclesfarm wrote:
       | this is mostly from a very old smithsonian article. i have that
       | one handy in my bookmarks. that and the one that explains why
       | 'men can't cry' as much women(due to differences in prolactin and
       | men having larger tear glands that prevents tears from 'spilling
       | out'). recently, there has been a rash of mad moms encouraging
       | their sons to cry like in some kind of bizarre social experiment
       | when the poor dears are not biologically built to turn on the
       | waterworks like we can.
        
       | dmux wrote:
       | I see that this site gets posted quite a bit, but isn't this
       | particular post just blog spam? 70% of the post is a quote from
       | the linked Smithsonian article.
        
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       (page generated 2021-09-17 23:02 UTC)