[HN Gopher] Four Thieves Vinegar Collective - Harm Reduction for...
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Four Thieves Vinegar Collective - Harm Reduction for the Living
Author : Beijinger
Score : 143 points
Date : 2024-09-07 14:19 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (fourthievesvinegar.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (fourthievesvinegar.org)
| Beijinger wrote:
| This is FYI and NOT an endorsement!
| samtho wrote:
| I am legitimately unsure why you felt the need to make this
| comment.
|
| If you were uncomfortable posting this it here because you
| think that someone else might take it an endorsement, then why
| did you post it? People post things they find interesting and
| disagree with all the time. What are you afraid of?
| Beijinger wrote:
| This is hackernews. I had problems in the past that people
| mistake this for an endorsement.
| zero-sharp wrote:
| Healthcare in the US is terrible, sure. And making medicine more
| accessible is a great thing. But I feel like the term "right to
| repair" is being hijacked here. A manufacturer that creates a
| piece of technology can theoretically publish repair instructions
| and provide parts (at a reasonable cost). This is different than
| the issue of accessibility in the drug space?
|
| Maybe I'm making a fuss over nothing, but it just stood out to
| me.
| jstanley wrote:
| Why is it different?
| MobiusHorizons wrote:
| Who is the manufacturer of the item to be repaired? How is
| the manufacturer preventing repair? What design decisions
| artificially limit repair to parties other than the
| manufacturer? How does the manufacturer use existing
| regulation (eg DMCA or copyright) to prevent repair or access
| to information necessary for repair.
|
| All of these questions make sense for right to repair, and
| are mostly nonsensical in this case, since drug companies
| don't manufacture bodies.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| Essentially the instructions and tools to repair your own
| body are restricted and only accessible to those who can
| afford to pay for the health care systems processes. Have
| an obvious infection? Spend a ton of money going to a
| doctor to get a prescription to give to a pharmacy to
| dispense at highly marked up substance that's easy to
| manufacturer at a tiny unit cost. You had no right to cure
| your own infection. You had to pay dozens of middle men for
| something straight forward.
|
| I'd note that in most of the world you would just go buy
| the antibiotics directly from a pharmacy for almost
| nothing.
|
| Now - I'm not saying self medicating with antibiotics is
| either good for you or the world, I'm saying at least in
| the US, you don't have that right.
| mnau wrote:
| Please stop trying to co-opt established term for your
| pet cause.
| MobiusHorizons wrote:
| Believe me, I agree that this is a problem. I have lived
| in other countries, and have seen how broken certain
| aspects of US healthcare are especially with regards to
| cost. These problems are just totally different than
| "right to repair" if in no other way than that the legal
| solutions would be completely different. For example any
| right to repair legislation would have no bearing on drug
| prices.
| grayhatter wrote:
| If it was easier to get the federal approval required to
| produce medications wouldn't that lower the cost of
| producing those medications?
| wpietri wrote:
| That's some very careful cherry picking you've done there
| with your example. Maybe next time you're in a pharmacy
| you'll take a look at the aisles and aisles of over-the-
| counter medicines and devices available and do some
| thinking about your belief that "instructions and tools
| to repair your own body are restricted and only
| accessible to those who can afford to pay for the health
| care systems processes".
| grayhatter wrote:
| I don't understand what you're trying to say, because
| there are low potency options that are available over the
| counter, that means the most effective treatments are
| correctly access restricted?
|
| Can you name an over the counter antibiotic that
| successfully treats a staph infection? or strep throat?
| or sinus infection?
| wpietri wrote:
| I am saying his cherry-picking of antibiotics
| specifically while he make dramatic claims is ignoring
| all of the over-the-counter mediation sold in the
| pharmacy. There are quite a lot of illnesses one can
| treat without ever talking to a doctor. I don't know what
| other people's ratios are, but my use of OTC medication
| and "tools" is maybe 10x more frequent than stuff that's
| gatekept by a doctor.
|
| He is also ignoring the reasons that we have ended up
| with this system. Some of them are kind of dumb, but some
| of them are about valid problems. That's very different
| than what "right to repair" is fighting, which is mostly
| about exploitative companies trying to maximize revenue
| at the expense of their customers.
|
| [Edit: misunderstood who replied; correcting pronouns]
| pennybanks wrote:
| its kind of wild your trying to create sides in this fake
| debate and then somehow trying to side with repairing
| electronics over peoples health?
|
| why though lol, do you hate sick people? or just have no
| empathy for people in general?
|
| who cares about technicality and semantics and whois
| using whos catch phrase better... we should be discussing
| an issue far more important, like so much more important
| its funny to even compare. then being able to switch your
| iphone battery out.
| wpietri wrote:
| I have no idea why you take any of that away from what I
| wrote. I am in favor of both repairing electronics and
| people's health. I'm just saying that the right-to-repair
| framing for medical stuff is not a great way to look at
| it.
| grayhatter wrote:
| > Who is the manufacturer of the item to be repaired?
|
| This isn't important to the point, but for the sake of
| argument; lets say society is the manufacturer.
|
| > How is the manufacturer preventing repair?
|
| Local legal regulatory groups that deem some method of
| fixing (treating) some defect (health condition) too
| dangerous to allow.
|
| > What design decisions artificially limit repair to
| parties other than the manufacturer?
|
| Company (local agency) wont allow my neighborhood repair
| shop to buy (or make) replacement screens (medications) or
| batteries (contact lenses).
|
| > How does the manufacturer use existing regulation (eg
| DMCA or copyright) to prevent repair or access to
| information necessary for repair.
|
| Existing is a stretch considering the age of the DMCA. But
| drug scheduling in the US is an equivalent and equally
| nonsensical application of logic for example.
|
| > All of these questions make sense for right to repair,
|
| I know how to fix it, but because of laws and regulations
| and decisions outside my control, I'm unable to apply that
| knowledge.
|
| > and are mostly nonsensical in this case, since drug
| companies don't manufacture bodies.
|
| The DMCA is your own example, and it's a law built and
| advocated to enable control, and reduce supply
| artificially.
|
| There's definitely a point to be made and a discussion to
| be had about the origins for control over health and
| medical issues. I think permitting the sale of snake oil is
| harmful to society, and we should prevent it so people
| don't have to become experts in human biology to not get
| conned. But treating chronic health conditions shouldn't be
| as hard as it is.
|
| The core of right to repair, is you shouldn't be allowed to
| prevent me from, or make it and possibly difficult for me
| to improve something I own and control. I think saying I
| own and control my body and health is a fair assertion, so
| the same argument applies; it's wrong to make accessing
| repair options for my health as hard as it is if I'm
| willing to try to fix it.
|
| I'd say the same concepts behind right to repair apply more
| so to the body because I can't just replace it.
| samtho wrote:
| In some ways, the gatekeeping of healthcare should be met
| with more resistance than repair an item that someone else
| made but you now own.
|
| Your body is something that belongs to you, you technically
| manufacture, yet you are legally forbidden from applying
| known and often the most effective remedies to your own
| body if you don't engage with a giant government-sanctioned
| system that can charge you whatever they want.
|
| To top it all off, the rules are not even consistent and
| are motivated by reasons other than what is best for the
| patient.
|
| For example, taking more than the maximum dose of Tylenol
| at can cause long-term or permanent liver damage. This is
| still available over the counter with no restrictions
| whatsoever.
|
| On the other side, we can see that the DEA was created to
| enforce drug policy (or rather racism and classism via drug
| policy) which has the effect of making access difficult for
| many people who are prescribed scheduled substances. Yet we
| have a opiate crisis that managed to appear within this
| draconian regulatory environment.
|
| Then we have situations like the FDA which been aware of
| the dangers of high sugar in diets, but the sugar
| industry's dollars into "studies" managed to convince them
| that "dietary fat" is the problem.
|
| The "for your own good" argument only works if they
| actually acted for our best interests, but time and time
| again, it's shown to us that this is just a big game in
| which we have no say in, yet we are all subjected to.
|
| We should have the right, as an informed human, to
| independently decide what we want to do to or put into our
| body, just as we should have the right to choose what we
| wish to do with our possessions.
| mnau wrote:
| > In some ways, the gatekeeping of healthcare should be
| met with more resistance than repair an item that someone
| else made but you now own.
|
| That is never the case. Humans are very risk averse and
| risk of broken product is infinitely smaller than risk of
| screwing up with your health.
|
| That's how we ended up with the straightjacket system.
| Rachet goes only one way, there is a crisis (e.g.
| thalidomide in 70s, snake oil salesmen and so on), we
| rachet it up to ensure confidence.
|
| The consequences of a single case of problem have a
| decade long consequences. E.g. baby formula was
| contamined in China (wiki "2008 Chinese milk scandal"),
| 300k were sick, six children died. Baby formula is not
| trusted even a decade and half later and imported stuff
| is used.
| MobiusHorizons wrote:
| I agree this is a totally different thing. It definitely feels
| like they are trying to make use of the feelings people have
| about the right to repair movement for their own agenda. Some
| might say co-opt, others riff off of. I can see that there are
| some similarities, but power struggle and regulatory situations
| are totally different.
| kevmo wrote:
| If you just make a post about healthcare in the USA being
| awful, it's highly likely to be removed/booted off the front
| page. Call it a "right to repair", though, and you're hitting
| the sweet spot for HN.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| Exactly. They've taken a popular term and applied it where it
| doesn't fit.
|
| You may have a "right to repair" something you bought. You
| didn't buy your body.
|
| Drug safety is an old, old issue. We can argue about how it's
| applied without dragging in popular phrases that don't apply.
| pennybanks wrote:
| i mean we could. but it seems like you wouldnt want that
| since your brining it up yourself. seems very like a very
| easy thing to ignore since it doesnt seem any malicious.
| unless there are trademarks im not aware of.
| blackeyeblitzar wrote:
| Interesting concept. I love the idea of a right to repair for our
| body.
| ZunarJ5 wrote:
| I just saw this writeup on them:
| https://www.404media.co/email/63ca5568-c610-4489-9bfc-779180...
| Apfel wrote:
| Saw these guys talk at DEFCON this year, absolutely fantastic
| presentation. It was so powerful and important that I'd actually
| recommend watching it before pretty much everything else from the
| con.
| greyface- wrote:
| Recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rQklSmI_F0
| polishdude20 wrote:
| I've watched a bunch of this. Does he mention where to get
| the precursors to the medicines he's trying to make?
| michaelbuckbee wrote:
| I'm not a big fan of getting dental work done, much less "DIY
| home dental" so was pretty skeptical of what they could possibly
| be doing and was really pleasantly surprised by their tooth seal
| instructions.
|
| They're taking a somewhat well-known cavity prevention and enamel
| remineralization treatment that has the unfortunate side effect
| of turning your teeth black and replicating steps from a study to
| avoid that.
|
| One of several studies they link to:
| https://www.scielo.br/j/bdj/a/rHSG9jRQDdY7sCFZzpNXYXy/?lang=...
| robodale wrote:
| My wife is a clinical pharmacist (rounds with medical doctors and
| provides detailed patient analysis of their drug needs).
|
| This article blew her mind.
| oidar wrote:
| In what way?
| easyThrowaway wrote:
| Never felt too much at ease with the DIY medicine arguments. I
| mean, I agree _on principle_ with the idea of not being at the
| whims of the pharmaceutical industry, but they always give me the
| feeling of being just one step away from going fully "Cancer/HIV
| is caused by mobile phones and you can cure them with vitamin C"
| and "Covid is a big pharma conspiracy" kinda people.
| vitehozonage wrote:
| I think it's very sad and a big problem that people like you
| don't have the capacity/willingness to appreciate nuance
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| A lot of people with rare conditions are pretty much forced
| to become experts on it to where they're reading the
| literature and going to conferences. The medical community
| isn't set up to help you if you have an uncommon issue and
| aren't a relentless self advocate.
| im3w1l wrote:
| Some people could manage their health much better than the
| current system. Other people would totally try to cure their
| cancer with vitamin c.
|
| A parallel that comes to mind is "accredited investors". These
| are people that have chosen to opt out of the guardrails and
| been allowed to by fulfilling certain criteria. Maybe something
| like that would make sense for medicine.
| lores wrote:
| It's starting to be the case. Patients with terminal cancer
| can opt into experimental treatments.
| pstuart wrote:
| Lots of existing medicine is a crap shoot -- look at the
| possible side effects many of them have (including death).
|
| I don't believe in the conspiracies you listed, but I
| absolutely believe there are plenty of conspiracies in plain
| sight (AMA restricting the number of doctors and fighting
| against single payer, the FDA being in bed with big pharma,
| etc).
|
| We all should have the right to control our own bodies (which
| extends to recreational chemicals). For those compounds that
| are not yet vetted, we should have the right to make informed
| choices.
| samtho wrote:
| I am not sure how you got to this slippery slope that doesn't
| have a good reason to exist.
|
| This movement is not about filling capsules with powdered
| ginger to treat something that it's unable to. The goal is to
| synthesize molecules that have been studied and that we know
| work as a replacement for having to pay a doctor to get
| permission to buy them.
| knowitnone wrote:
| If the problem is "having to pay a doctor to get permission
| to buy them", we should fix that through policy. I agree with
| you that this is a problem. Some things shouldn't require a
| doctor's involvement like an ultrasound, even medication. If
| I kill myself with taking a certain med (which many people
| are intentionally doing with drugs already), that would be my
| own fault.
| ldjkfkdsjnv wrote:
| Most medicine is complete bullshit, doctors have a specific set
| of protocols they have to follow to avoid mal practice. There is
| no nuance. Most pills will cause far more damage in long term
| dependency and side effects than they will solve. ESPECIALLY for
| psychiatric conditions.
|
| Medicine mostly makes sense with broken bones and physical
| surgeries.
|
| Don't even get me started on dentistry.
|
| For years, I struggled with severe dental issues, leading to
| advanced gum disease. Dentists told me I'd eventually need tooth
| extractions or major gum surgery. I've always hated going to the
| dentist.
|
| Two years ago, I decided to take control of my own dental care. I
| bought a dental scaler kit online and started removing plaque
| from the backs of my teeth. I learned the proper technique by
| watching YouTube videos and now do this about once a week. The
| results have been incredible--my teeth are spotless, I have no
| gum bleeding, and I haven't had any cavities. I still go in once
| a year for a professional cleaning of harder-to-reach areas like
| my molars.
|
| If you google whether you can do this, the internet is full of
| large WARNING YOU CANNOT SCRAPE PLAQUE OFF YOUR TEETH. Every
| single website is full of dentists screaming that you cant clean
| your own mouth. This is clearly bullshit, you can actually just
| scrape it off from the comfort of your own home. There's clearly
| some risk, but if youre an intelligent adult, you can do it.
| atentaten wrote:
| Any particular kit and/or videos you recommend?
| rqtwteye wrote:
| I also have my doubts about dentist advice after seeing the
| dramatically positive effects a waterpik and oil pulling had on
| me and several other people I know. No gum problems, less
| sensitive teeth. Due to several moves and my laziness I didnt
| go to a dentist for cleaning for more than five years. Last
| year I went again and had zero problems. Not even much plaque.
|
| I wonder why dentists don't tell everybody to get a waterpik
| first before any other treatments.
| nicolas_t wrote:
| I've actually had multiple dentists either telling me to get
| a waterpik or praising me for having one. That was in China
| (Japanese dentist though) and in France.
| howard941 wrote:
| A waterpik can push debris underneath your teeth. If you have
| receding gums I'd be very careful about using one (again).
| SoftTalker wrote:
| My dentist recommends and supports using a Waterpik.
| thebigspacefuck wrote:
| Electric brush made a huge difference for me
| tcdent wrote:
| I do this, too. And since we practice it far more regularly
| than a periodic visit to a specialist, we probably have cleaner
| teeth than most.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "Most medicine is complete bullshit, doctors have a specific
| set of protocols they have to follow to avoid mal practice."
|
| I mostly agree with this. Most doctors are just reading off the
| Epic professional version of WebMD for most
| symptoms/conditions. It's especially important to do your own
| research and be your own advocate for any serious conditions so
| that you can ask the right questions, which sometimes snaps
| them out of the scripted response and consider other
| possibilities or concerns.
| ldjkfkdsjnv wrote:
| Its risky for them to say anything that falls outside the
| guidelines. And they really dont have much to gain. They see
| so many patients
| ethanol-brain wrote:
| It sounds interesting, but it really feels like they are
| downplaying the risks here.
|
| I'd be hesitant to put anything mixed in a DIY device with off
| the shelf peristaltic pumps into my body without some additional
| analysis.
|
| If something like automated analysis was a possibility, then
| maybe this would be more alluring.
| XorNot wrote:
| Yep: as someone with a chemistry background, synthesis is the
| easy part.
|
| Purification and analysis? That's the hard part.
|
| Not getting screwed by additives, coatings or contamination?
| Thats what the big bucks in lab gear cost (i.e. a metered
| dispensing pump comes with a list of every element which
| touches the dispensed fluid).
| lubujackson wrote:
| Just seeing this for the first time, and I love the hacker ethos
| displayed here. Obviously there are Risks Involved especially for
| health care, but I appreciate the well-researched and documented
| reasoning behind their solutions. Let the people control their
| own lives a bit more.
|
| To me, the hacker mentality has, at its root, been about more
| about shortcutting red tape and discarding the guardrails the
| gov't put in place "for your own good". Often that comes hand in
| hand with rule breaking and illegal actions.
|
| But since healthcare has been so fully co-opted by moneyed
| interests it is good to see things like this and "medical
| vacations" grow in popularity - not because they are great
| solutions but because they underline how thoroughly the current
| system has screwed the pooch and will hopefully lead to real
| change.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I know someone whose wife was judged terminal, and he took her
| to Mexico for some unapproved cancer therapies. This is not a
| rich guy.
|
| (She's dead now, as you might have guessed.)
| petermcneeley wrote:
| >judged terminal ... She's dead now
|
| What is the intended message of this short story?
| stavros wrote:
| "Don't go to Mexico".
| woleium wrote:
| don't waste your last days with quacks
| stavros wrote:
| > more about shortcutting red tape and discarding the
| guardrails the gov't put in place "for your own good".
|
| Well, this really _is_ for the good of the vast majority of
| people. The problem is that this also applies to a minority of
| people, who have the skills to research thing and make educated
| decisions about things.
|
| It's not a bad general rule, but maybe it should be overridable
| in certain circumstances, e.g. when you are experimenting on
| yourself.
| avgDev wrote:
| There is a group that is producing medication that has yet to hit
| the market for self use. Someone got a hold of a patent, found a
| chemist and a lab willing to test the substance.
|
| I'm waiting for the actual medication to hit the market but if
| the FDA approval takes a long time, I will make the med myself.
| The substance in the medication has been used orally for a long
| time with a good safety profile and it was discovered that it can
| help regenerate nerves.
|
| Maybe I made all of this up to sound cool on the internet. If you
| know what I mean.
| QuantumGood wrote:
| The FDA does not take information from other countries into
| account much. EDIT: Foreign approval and use history can be
| supportive information in an FDA review process, but are not
| determinative factors for U.S. approval.
|
| For example, Promethazine has been popular in the UK for a very
| long time (ingredient in UK Sominex), but its not approved in
| the U.S. as a sleep aid.
|
| InHousePharmacy.vu/search.aspx?searchterm=promethazine
| lenerdenator wrote:
| Seems rather myopic to me.
|
| We already share critical intelligence with the Five Eyes
| countries; why not share medication safety/efficacy
| information with them too?
| NetworkPerson wrote:
| Because then you can't sue someone as easily in the US when
| you find out the drug popular in Europe actually caused
| cancer 50 years later.
|
| The US has to be sure it's completely safe. Or that it will
| make enough money to outweigh the lawsuits later...
| mnau wrote:
| > The US has to be sure it's completely safe.
|
| That doesn't make sense to me, who does US refer to in
| this case?
|
| The manufacturer is the one that would be sued and they
| generally only want to expediate process.
|
| FDA is one that aproves/denies application. They wouldn't
| get sued for using data from other countries (or at least
| no more that they already are).
| lenerdenator wrote:
| The "Five Eyes" countries are the United States, Canada,
| the UK, New Zealand, and Australia.
|
| Of the four countries that _aren 't_ the US, I'm sure
| that all have regulatory safety standards that would
| satisfy the safety and efficacy expectations of the
| American public.
| Beijinger wrote:
| I remember a blog post of an MD or psychologist about
| Russian/Soviet psychotropic drugs that are not used or
| unknown in the west and used as an analogy that if Russia
| had found new elements in the periodic table, and we would
| not use them.
| XorNot wrote:
| It might be worth considering that until very recently,
| Russia's military was _definitely_ supremely capable and
| on-par with NATO.
|
| Russia _lies_. About everything. And culturally Russians
| have been immersed in a narrative that they 're the
| absolute best in the world at everything, that all good
| ideas were originally Russian ideas (see how the
| narrative of LK-99 started getting modified before
| anything was verified).
|
| So do they have processes or techniques not used in the
| West? Sure it's possible: but it's also far more likely
| that the reason we don't use them is that the actual
| investigation of their effectiveness can't reproduce the
| results.
|
| Because no one looks up the clinical studies: they just
| repeat the fun narrative about big mysterious super-
| technology from behind the Iron Curtain. Which itself was
| essentially an invention of interest groups looking for
| funding in the West (i.e. there's was never a "missile
| gap" the US was going to lose).
|
| Like as noted here: you remember the story, but not any
| actual specific drugs or processes? Why?
| Beijinger wrote:
| EDIT: Someone found the link:
| https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/16/an-iron-curtain-
| has-de...
|
| I did not find the blog post anymore. But the blog linked
| to a pharmacy website that had tons of stuff available.
|
| A few links:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenazepam
|
| https://nah.sen.es/vmfiles/vol9/NAHV9N2202155_68EN.pdf
|
| https://cosmicnootropic.com/blog/popular-nootropics/
|
| https://medicine.umich.edu/dept/psychiatry/news/archive/2
| 020...
| Beijinger wrote:
| "It might be worth considering that until very recently,
| Russia's military was definitely supremely capable and
| on-par with NATO."
|
| I think Russia was not on-par with NATO after it
| collapse, at least not in conventional warfare. They
| missed the electronic revolution in warfare (See US-IRAQ
| Gulf War I). But they are now back on par, possibly
| better. Their jamming, air defense and rockets are top-
| notch, possible better than NATOs. They can disrupt our
| GPS System, we can't disrupt theirs since it is much
| younger, speak better.
|
| As a comparison: Germany had 3000 tanks during the cold
| war. Now they have 300, 200 operational. Russia looses so
| many tanks every month, and actually builds 100-200 new
| ones every month. Germany had ammunition for two days of
| warfare. After they gave some to Ukraine, they have
| ammunition for one day left.
|
| Russia has been underestimated. They are back and their
| future looks pretty good, even with a dubious leader.
| They won their war:
|
| Defeat of the West? Emmanuel Todd and the Russo-Ukrainian
| War https://www.thearticle.com/defeat-of-the-west-
| emmanuel-todd-...
|
| They have energy, they are not overpopulated, they have
| fewer problems with immigration. In fact, they're even
| looking for immigrants: https://movingtorussia.ru/ru
|
| In the US I can smell the recession and banks will go
| belly up very soon:
| https://www.visualcapitalist.com/which-big-u-s-banks-
| have-th...
|
| In Germany too. Without Russian Energy their
| manufacturing heavy country will deindustrialize.
|
| At the same time, Russia is actively trying to replace
| the US Dollar as the world reserve currency, together
| with BRICS+. If successful, this will have a tremendous
| impact on the US.
|
| I am not a Putin troll, and I hope that I am wrong. But
| the future has the nasty habit of taking unexpected
| turns.
| aguaviva wrote:
| They have not "won the war". Not by any stretch. That's
| just a pundit's plainly ideology-driven projection.
|
| The fact that this author chose to call their book _The
| Defeat of the West_ , and that its main thesis is that
| this defeat is due to the "vaporisation of Protestantism"
| should give one serious pause.
|
| Perhaps not the best source to turn to for a serious,
| impartial military analysis.
| Beijinger wrote:
| "Perhaps not the best source to turn to for a serious,
| impartial military analysis."
|
| Fair point. But it is from Emmanuel Todd. Who the f. is
| Emmanuel Todd?
|
| "Todd attracted attention in 1976 when, at age 25, he
| predicted the fall of the Soviet Union, based on
| indicators such as increasing infant mortality rates: La
| chute finale: Essais sur la decomposition de la sphere
| Sovietique (The Final Fall: An Essay on the Decomposition
| of the Soviet Sphere)."
| aguaviva wrote:
| It doesn't matter who he is, or what he said when he was
| 25. His perspective this time around is plainly warped,
| and his analysis is just as plainly flawed, given the
| current reality of what's happening on the ground in
| Ukraine. You can tell that all by yourself, without
| having to take some supposed visionary's word for it.
|
| That's what happens when people get lucky early in their
| careers. Sadly, it tends to go to their head.
|
| See also:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority
| throwaway12287 wrote:
| Link to blog post being described:
|
| https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/16/an-iron-curtain-
| has-de...
| knowitnone wrote:
| who cares what a blog post of an MD or psychologist says?
| If a new element had use, of course we would use it. Are
| you seriously telling me that if they discovered copper,
| we won't use copper?
| Beijinger wrote:
| https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/16/an-iron-curtain-
| has-de...
| jhbadger wrote:
| Weird analogy. The USSR/Russia _did_ discover new
| elements, and while there was a certain amount of arguing
| over names (as it wasn 't always clear who discovered
| them first), there was no "not using" them because they
| were Russian. That isn't how science works.
| e-_pusher wrote:
| There is the famous example of Thaladomide, which was
| approved by the regulators in the Germany and caused a
| disaster in birth defects:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide_scandal
|
| US FDA however was skeptical of the safety of the drug and
| never approved it for sale in US.
| slashdave wrote:
| > The FDA does not take information from other countries into
| account.
|
| The FDA doesn't care where data comes from. Much of drug
| testing in the US is done overseas in CROs.
|
| > but its not approved in the U.S. as a sleep aid.
|
| Approval is not automatic just because another country did
| so. Someone needs to take responsibility and formally apply.
| spondylosaurus wrote:
| It's still prescribed in the US for other uses though. I
| fucked up once and took one as an antiemetic, forgetting it
| was a sedative... right before I had an important meeting.
| Lesson learned :P
| MassPikeMike wrote:
| But for that kind of thing it would seem to be much easier
| and probably cheaper just to mail order the drug from
| overseas, or even book an inexpensive flight and buy some.
| For example, bromhexine and ambroxol are cold remedies that
| many people find effective, are not available in the US, but
| are easy to mail order from any number of Japanese sellers.
| The difficulty of hiring a lab or setting one up yourself
| would seem to be worthwhile only for new or unusual medicines
| that could not be obtained this way.
| pennybanks wrote:
| gettong those drugs are legal? and do you know someone in
| japan willing to do this ? sounds pretty specific.
| SuperShibe wrote:
| Out of actual interest for my own medical use: Which medication
| would this be about?
| paulddraper wrote:
| Fish antibiotics are amazingly cheap sources of an amoxicillin.
| LinuxBender wrote:
| Many stores are being forced to pull it for that reason. The
| prepping community used to promote it and that caught the
| attention of the wrong people. One alternative are a set of
| doctors doing very low friction online consulting and
| prescribing, some even selling kits with assorted antibiotics
| but they are also getting pressured to stop.
| sdwolfz wrote:
| "From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it
| disgusted me. I craved the strength and certainty of steel. I
| aspired to the purity of the Blessed Machine.
|
| Your kind cling to your flesh, as if it will not decay and fail
| you. One day the crude biomass that you call a temple will
| wither, and you will beg my kind to save you. But I am already
| saved, for the Machine is immortal..."
|
| This is basically what was going through my mind while browsing
| this website ;)
| TZubiri wrote:
| What is that, warhammer?
| sdwolfz wrote:
| Yes
|
| https://youtu.be/9gIMZ0WyY88
| lenerdenator wrote:
| This just feels like drug dealing with a far more benevolent
| motivation. I agree that it should ultimately be up to the person
| but there's a lot of ways this could go wrong.
|
| Remember, you're putting these substances in your body. Make
| damned sure you trust the person you got them from. Like, "I
| would trust you to raise my child in the event of my death"
| levels of trust.
| tcdent wrote:
| > Make damned sure you trust the person you got them from.
| Like, "I would trust you to raise my child in the event of my
| death" levels of trust.
|
| Do most people feel this way about formalized medical
| practitioners today?
| lenerdenator wrote:
| In theory they go through a lot of training and regulation to
| make sure that the goons stay out.
|
| It's not 100% effective, but I do trust my PCP more than a
| guy in Midtown selling PCP.
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| Well that's the point of DIY medicine, empowering people
| like yourself to make your own PCP. Of course you trust it
| more than the PCP from that guy in Midtown.
| jzemeocala wrote:
| I'm just waiting for the libertarian drug reform so that
| I can get my PCP from my PCP
| MSFT_Edging wrote:
| If you're a woman in the US, doctors will sooner call your
| issues anxiety and throw Xanax at you than to try to help you
| figure out the causes. Sometimes they'll even get mad at you
| if you don't want to take Xanax and suggest you're mentally
| unfit.
| silverquiet wrote:
| I'm not a woman and it wasn't Xanax, but Ativan was a
| miracle drug that cured many physical symptoms for me.
| Doctors follow an algorithm where they look for common
| stuff first ("when you hear hoof beats..."), and anxiety is
| very common; I believe more so amongst women.
| knowitnone wrote:
| so you're saying men don't mistakenly diagnosed with
| anxiety when it's not?
| singleshot_ wrote:
| I do, but I'm married to mine.
| knowitnone wrote:
| The alternative is to not visit a doctor of any sort. You
| might take that further and not visit a mechanic. Medical
| practitioners are not perfect. I trust they are doing their
| job and they can get it wrong. Medicine is not easy. People
| have to advocate for themselves if they don't think the
| doctor got it right.
| fph wrote:
| Isn't the point of DIY medicine that _you_ are the person
| making the drugs?
| lenerdenator wrote:
| Then make sure you trust the guy you got the instructions,
| ingredients, and equipment from.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Considering the issues with snake oil. And well what
| currently is marketed as magic cures for various things, I
| rather not trust most instructions...
| samtho wrote:
| The strange responses in this thread has solidified my belief
| that HN has strayed far from the "hacker ethos" that once
| existed, with many people just able to parrot the "correct"
| opinion de jour devoid of nuance.
|
| Whether or not something like this is a good idea is neither here
| nor there, rather the willingness to approach something with
| skeptical curiosity has really been lost, and it is
| disappointing.
| grayhatter wrote:
| I appreciate your putting my recent disgust into words. I
| hadn't identified why it doesn't feel like hacker culture
| anymore but that's matches my aversion. Too many comments want
| to be right, and too few are trying to figure out how and why.
| saxonww wrote:
| I think there's a balance that some people don't appreciate.
| Hacking your health has some additional risk vs. some
| external system or process; your health is often
| irreplaceable, and you might not get a second chance if you
| screw it up. I think you should be a little more careful with
| DIY pharma than you would other things. And I think you
| should be very careful about evangelizing it to other people.
|
| It is the case that some people get so wrapped up in
| overcoming authority that it becomes the driving factor
| behind what they support and what choices they make. It's
| essentially the same thing you say you're disgusted with:
| it's not about figuring out how and why, it's wanting to be
| right and the authority to be wrong. The exact same behavior,
| just from the other side of the fence. Call this a strawman
| if you want, but I'm still asserting it's fact.
|
| This is why I don't immediately see groups like four thieves
| vinegar as positive. I don't know if the stuff they're doing
| actually works or not. I suspect that you don't know this
| either. It might work. They assert that it's simple and just
| use their stuff and boom, daraprim (or whatever). But what
| happens if it doesn't? The result is not a failure to adapt
| some device to do something it wasn't intended to do, or get
| data from a device the manufacturer would rather sell, it's
| direct impact to your health.
|
| Specific to their microlab, my immediate questions are around
| sanitizing or disinfecting it. I have skimmed the
| documentation and parts list. They recommend using 'water'.
| There's no discussion about distilled vs. deionized vs. tap
| water. There's nothing here about ensuring the mason jars and
| tubing are clean to any particular standard. I haven't seen
| any discussion yet about cleaning the reactor between
| batches, in terms of ensuring there is no residue from the
| prior batch. I sure hope I've just missed it, or this is
| called out as a 'human tasks' in each recipe. Contamination
| is ok (ish) with a Coca-Cola Freestyle machine at McDonald's.
| You can tolerate your Coke tasting like 8 other drinks. I
| don't think it's OK when making sofosbuvir.
|
| I think you should be able to do just about whatever you want
| to with your own body. Please be careful. But I don't think
| you should be able to set yourself up as a counterculture
| medical authority and not have people ask questions about it,
| especially because a lot of people _won't_ ask questions.
| lores wrote:
| Many hackers are now old enough to have reflected on dystopian
| science-fiction and come to the conclusion regulations are
| useful, sometimes. And many hackers realise most people are
| ignorant most of the time, us included, and do not trust
| amateurs to have all of sufficient knowledge, thoroughness, and
| benevolent intentions to manufacture powerful stuff you put
| inside you. I don't think curiosity is discouraged, just the
| impetus to turn it into action in this case.
| nataliste wrote:
| Are you British by chance?
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| I didn't necessarily get the same impression from the comment
| thread that you did, given that there are a range of responses.
| But I will say that the idea of intermingling the ethos of
| Right to Repair with the ethos of Self-ownership[1] is one of
| the most decidedly "hacker" novel ideas I've encountered on
| Hacker News and I don't have words for the joy I experienced
| browsing the submission.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-ownership
| knowitnone wrote:
| Tell us what you think after you try out their dental cream and
| DIY pharmaceuticals.
| tptacek wrote:
| It is probably impossible to write a good comment that has as
| its thesis a characterization of the whole of HN as a
| community.
|
| _Please don 't sneer, including at the rest of the community._
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| nicolas_t wrote:
| Ok, so I was interested in https://fourthievesvinegar.org/tooth-
| seal/ Was happy that they say it's completely safe but... there's
| no linked study that proves it's safe. On what basis is it safe?
|
| There's been multiple recent studies linking higher fluoride
| amount with reduced intelligence in children. How is that
| different?
| basch wrote:
| I don't believe you are supposed to ingest the tooth sealant.
| nicolas_t wrote:
| Well yes and they do mention you shouldn't leak it but given
| that it's on your teeth, how much leaches? Given that it
| degrades over a year
| literallycancer wrote:
| The fluoride added to the drinking water in the US exposes
| you to many more times than using a fluoride tooth paste,
| so any leeching from this is likely inconsequential.
| There's also papers linked in the website and it appears
| that it's an improved version of the silver diamine
| fluoride treatment, which a quick search reveals is FDA
| approved.
| grayhatter wrote:
| it's different because the risk analysis for individual
| decisions is completely disparate from the risk analysis of
| policy decisions.
|
| How is it connected?
|
| Also I'd be interested in you're citation for the fluoride
| assertion, the last I remember that was a conspiracy theory and
| the actual published research was mixed and inconclusive?
| nicolas_t wrote:
| > it's different because the risk analysis for individual
| decisions is completely disparate from the risk analysis of
| policy decisions.
|
| That's true, but when doing the risk analysis for individual
| decisions, it helps to have actual data to make that
| analysis. The website says it's safe without justification to
| say why it's safe, how it's similar to known-safe mechanism,
| etc.. "Trust me bro it's safe" is not exactly confidence
| inducing.
|
| > Also I'd be interested in you're citation for the fluoride
| assertion, the last I remember that was a conspiracy theory
| and the actual published research was mixed and inconclusive?
|
| There's this recent report. This is for countries where
| children received fluoride exposure amounts higher than 1.5
| mg fluoride/L of drinking water which is higher than what
| you'd get in the US.
|
| https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/whatwestudy/assessments/noncancer/.
| ..
|
| Most of the studies that show lower IQ are in Canada, China,
| India, Iran, Pakistan, and Mexico where those levels can be
| reached.
|
| Example of studies:
|
| - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18695947/
|
| - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6923889/
|
| - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3409983/
| thrance wrote:
| This looks more like a libertarian nightmare than an anarchist
| dream. I couldn't care less what you inject your body with, and
| will always support open science, but this is no solution to the
| USA's disastrous healthcare system.
|
| The real "right to repair your body" necessarily involves a
| socialized healthcare system, like in the rest of the West.
| cdev_gl wrote:
| As much as I'd love a long-term solution to dental cavities, I'm
| leery of any treatment using silver nanoparticles, which can
| cross the blood brain barrier and accumulate in the brain, where
| they've been shown (in mice and in human models) to contribute to
| neurodegenerative diseases.
|
| I'm not a biologist or chemist, so I don't know enough to judge
| if the method listed here is completely safe, but even a cursory
| google shows cause to be concerned:
| https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17435390.2018.1...
| HybridCurve wrote:
| While I can appreciate some of the intent to make certain
| healthcare more accessible, it is never a good idea to have
| anyone inexperienced attempt to perform some of the reactions
| required to synthesize medicines. This should always be done by
| experienced individuals with quality reagents and the proper lab
| equipment. While it might be easy to substitute a mason jar for a
| proper glass reaction vessel it is not so simple to find a
| substitute for a gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer in the back
| of your pantry.
|
| IMO, The test equipment required to analyze the results of the
| reactions is generally most cost prohibitive aspect of this type
| of 'research'. And this is where I have a problem with these
| guys: I don't see any plans available for building any of that.
| Building many of these devices is not out of reach for a skilled
| individual, and it makes more sense to me that this equipment
| should more readily accessible than a glorified Keurig machine
| for drugs. This kind of arrogance and lack of respect for the
| discipline required in organic chemistry is going to result is
| someone getting hurt.
| knowitnone wrote:
| We've always had the right to repair our body. We've just not
| always had the tools. My personal view on this is rather to
| opensource the tools like ultrasound, MRI, heart monitor, etc.
| This would give the people the tools to help diagnose issues
| without needing a doctor involved. It is taking a year just to
| see a doctor.
| ajb wrote:
| Question from a non chemist: Ok so you do some chemistry and
| produce a vial of supposed medicine, how do you tell that you
| didn't fuck up and produce something toxic? I guess a modern lab
| would just stick the result in a gas chromatograph or something
| but you're not going to have one at home.
|
| I vaguely recall (from, er, Sherlock Holmes) that old school
| analytic chemistry could figure out what an unknown chemical with
| cheap reactions and tests, but does anyone even know how to do
| that any more? Is it automatable?
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