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I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

blog.mycology.cornell.edu

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Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#161

Post by cc81 »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #140
forgotmypw3 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're really tasty and good for you. There's also a deep primal satisfaction from eating something directly from the wild earth. It's also a long-standing tradition in many cultures. If you know what you're doing and are very careful and cautious, it is a pretty low-risk activity.

The ratio of benefit to potential drawback seems unappealing though. There are plenty of other types of food that would fulfil that "deep primal satisfaction from eating something directly from the wild earth", and orders of magnitude more if you also include the sea.

I guess. But for many you learned from your parents or someone who knows and you usually pick a small subset that you are sure of

If you look at a page with our most poisonous mushrooms in Sweden: http://svampguiden.com/giftsvampar/lista/

and compare it with edible ones: http://svampguiden.com/matsvampar/lista/

As someone who rarely picks I would never pick a white mushroom for example because it is high risk even there are edible variants. However I'm sure when it comes to chanterelles and penny buns for example and those (+ one or two more) are plenty for me.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#162

Post by cc81 »

alkonaut wrote: post #107
klipt wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided you don't assume that knowledge that works in Sweden works anywhere else in the world.

It doesn't - which is why a lot of people get sick in Sweden every year and it's heavily skewed to people who aren't Swedish. I'm not sure if it's because they lack knowledge entirely, or because the knowledge they had didn't transfer. Few swedes would pick a white mushroom at all, and most would know that it at least shouldn't be white both on top and underneath because that's deadly.

That fits me, I just wrote a comment saying that while I feel very comfortable picking the standard 2-4 mushrooms in Sweden I would never try and pick a white one even if know we have some edible species.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#163

Post by greencore »

catalogia wrote: post #38
thaumasiotes wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so? This is pretty much the same idea as an Irish petty king inviting in some Norman troops to show the other petty kings who's boss. (It turned out to be the Normans, of course.) Penicillin works by killing other similar things.

Some mushrooms kill you, others save your life, and yet others expand your mind. It's subjective, but I consider it incredible.

There was a 50yo man in Lithuania that made bet that he will not die from Amanita phalloides (because scientist are hiding the truth etc.) as he didn't die from Amanita muscaria previous year.

So he died in 5 days.

https://www.15min.lt/naujiena/aktualu/lietuva/vyras-sumane-p...

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#164

Post by hajile »

Udo wrote: post #137
SuoDuanDao wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the subject of 'prayers from friends and family' being an intellectually and theologically bankrupt theory, here's a meta-study on the phenomenon. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Cindy_Crawford/publicat...

That doesn't address my criticism of the premise. I chose to critique the assertions made of why prayer helps. You address the question of whether it helps. It's one of these "distance healing" prayer studies, and a meta-study at that. If you dig down into any of these data sources, you will find plenty of wishful thinking is involved in the design of the individual studies. But again, whether you believe that it wor…

There seems to be a deep misunderstanding of religion here.

"Prayer is the opening of the heart to God as to a friend. Not that it is necessary in order to make known to God what we are, but in order to enable us to receive Him. Prayer does not bring God down to us, but brings us up to Him"

Just before giving His disciples the Lord's Prayer in the New Testament, Jesus says, "But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him."

Then the prayer itself follows up saying, "After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen."

There's a lot of philosophy tied up in all of that (even for non-Christians). Most people who win the lottery go bankrupt in short order. If you aren't ready for a good thing, it can be destructive. Prayer is an acceptance that God knows what is best for the universe. It helps the person praying to become "in tune" with God's plan and accept that plan no matter if it is personally costly.

As you can see, "Begging for someone's life" is a very different mindset. The change in mindset from prayer's self-reflection can instill a positive outlook which improves medical outcomes. If the outcome is terminal, that same self-reflection can help a person reach acceptance and turn their remaining time into a more positive experience (and help with their loved ones after they have passed away).

That is all true even if there were nobody listening because they believe it to be true.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#165

Post by egdod »

zipwitch wrote: post #43
egdod wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm curious if parents still admonish their kids not to eat wild mushrooms. Absolutely. Really, eating anything you find in the wild is risky unless you’re completely sure what it is. (Wild strawberries are pretty easy to identify, for example.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mock_strawberry They fooled me once. I picked and ate one, noticed it didn't taste right almost immediately. Once you look more closely, the fruit is quite obviously different in shape and texture, but the leaves are near-perfect and the fruit is the right color. It certainly gave me a quick and fortunately danger-free reminder that there's a world of difference between "hey that looks l…

That’s crazy. Maybe strawberries aren’t as easy to identify as I thought.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#166

Post by mda »

somehnguy wrote: post #31
jpuderer wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A surprising number of people seem to think that. No correlation AFAICT. Some of the best mushrooms are colorful (eg. chanterelles).

Chanterelles are great because there are only 2 other mushrooms that are even close in resemblance and neither of them is particularly poisonous. One just tastes bad and the other will cause a stomach ache. They're also very easy to tell apart from the real deal even for a novice like me. Harvested and ate a bunch a few weekends ago with a buddy. Delicious.

You mean Omphalotus olearius and Hygrophoropsis aurantica? First one could be very nasty, maybe not deadly but very painful. Easily possible to confuse with Cantharellus cibarius, See https://www.wemjournal.org/article/S1080-6032(15)00475-5/pdf

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#167

Post by mda »

alkonaut wrote: post #106
nlh wrote: post #76

Can someone give me a quick explainer on why it’s appealing to pick & eat ANY mushrooms in the wild at all? I’m probably just a dumb “city kid”, but I don’t see the appeal whatsoever. I’d love to get some perspective on why folks enjoy this.

I only pick the "best" ones around here (Chanterelles, boletus), and those happen to be risk-free because of how they look. I don't pick mushrooms where I'd need to use my judgement to decide whether it is deadly or delicious. It's also very few that are this toxic, and I don't know of anything I'd like to pick that even resembles it (I'd never pick a white mushroom, for example - and that alone lets me dodge the dea…

Careful. Chanterelles has 2 lookalikes, one is poisonous (Jack o lantern)

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#168

Post by Udo »

hajile wrote: post #164
Udo wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't address my criticism of the premise. I chose to critique the assertions made of why prayer helps. You address the question of whether it helps. It's one of these "distance healing" prayer studies, and a meta-study at that. If you dig down into any of these data sources, you will find plenty of wishful thinking is involved in the design of the individual studies. But again, whether you believe that it wor…

There seems to be a deep misunderstanding of religion here. "Prayer is the opening of the heart to God as to a friend. Not that it is necessary in order to make known to God what we are, but in order to enable us to receive Him. Prayer does not bring God down to us, but brings us up to Him" Just before giving His disciples the Lord's Prayer in the New Testament, Jesus says, "But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions…

It's true that I lack a good understanding of religious thinking, thank you for helping out there.

> That is all true even if there were nobody listening because they believe it to be true.

I absolutely agree, whatever contributes to the patient's positive attitude helps. As does the involvement of friends and family. This is why I felt that I shouldn't criticize the perception of the overall effect so much, because I do agree that there is a positive mechanism at work here.

It is with the metaphysical aspects themselves where I have trouble, and in a sense that's how this whole thread got started because it seems a stark contradiction.

But coming back to your explanation, I agree, if your god wants to see signs of compliance from you and your social circle, it does stand to reason that people would believe this would cause him to intercede in the universe's processes in order to spare your life when he would not have seen the necessity to do so before.

SuoDuanDao's point then was that the idea that your god would change his mind on account of prayers is not theologically bankrupt (in hindsight this was a very poor choice of words by me) because it works. My thesis however, was that even if prayer works that doesn't mean the specific reasoning behind it is automatically valid.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#169

Post by rkachowski »

Gatsky wrote: post #154
rkachowski wrote: post #117

The author seems to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the bible (referencing individual psalms by number), wears a cross around his neck to hospital, practises all kinds of eastern religious meditations (recommends "Awaken the Healing Light of the Tao" in the midst of describing himself in a diaper on a CAT scan machine). On top of this he works as a particle accelerator operator at cornell. And still eats some of th…

This is a pretty uncharitable comment friend... presumably you aren't the intended audience for this article. Anyway, you've never met anyone like this before? I meet people like this all the time. They are much more interesting than those devoted to hyper-rational atheism AKA the Times New Roman of metaphysics. For one, these 'half-baked' types tend to be staggered by genuinely marvelous things, rather than just the…

No, I have never met a particle physicist that meditated his way into eating the notorious death cap and thanked god and spirituality for saving him.

I find it pretty sad that you'd preclude rational people from being able to experience genuinely marvelous things. I can tell you that there is a whole spectrum of rational thought, including both your hyper rational and 'interesting' people. I don't think you actually believe that these people live a myopic life of sterile scrutiny and flavorless examination.

The road is long my friend, and you have a distance to travel.

Re: I Survived the “Destroying Angel” (2006)

#170

Post by Accujack »

rkachowski wrote: post #117

The author seems to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the bible (referencing individual psalms by number), wears a cross around his neck to hospital, practises all kinds of eastern religious meditations (recommends "Awaken the Healing Light of the Tao" in the midst of describing himself in a diaper on a CAT scan machine). On top of this he works as a particle accelerator operator at cornell. And still eats some of th…

There were three words missing from the article that are necessary for me to have taken the author seriously.

"I was stupid"

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