[HN Gopher] A Brief History of the Miracle Bacterium
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       A Brief History of the Miracle Bacterium
        
       Author : mailyk
       Score  : 44 points
       Date   : 2025-03-23 15:59 UTC (7 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.asimov.press)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.asimov.press)
        
       | melagonster wrote:
       | This is crazy fun :) I'll try to find more information of this
       | clade.
        
       | dr_dshiv wrote:
       | https://nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2164-...
       | 
       | Here's a fascinating 1969 article about the same bacterium called
       | "From Superstition to Science." -- The whole thing is worth a
       | read, but I especially loved how it traces the blood effect back
       | to Pythagoreanism. Pythagoras the Biologist!
       | 
       | It quotes a 170 AD satire by Lucian, "the sale of creeds" about
       | the god Hermes auctioning off different philosophies.
       | 
       | "Pythagoreanism: Of living animals I eat none. All else I can
       | eat, except beans.
       | 
       | First Buyer: And why no beans? Do you dislike them?
       | 
       | Pythagoreanism: No. But they are sacred things. Their nature is a
       | mystery. Consider them first in their generative aspect; take a
       | green one and peel it, and you will see what I mean. _Again boil
       | one and expose it to moonlight for a proper number of nights, and
       | you have--blood._ What is more, the Athenians use beans to vote
       | with."
        
       | profsummergig wrote:
       | This is such a traditional British way to go about scientific
       | inquiry. Unlikely such experiments would be allowed today. Seems
       | we've lost something.
        
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       (page generated 2025-03-23 23:00 UTC)