Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors • Hacker News Board

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#511

Post by cwkoss » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:00 PM UTC

hojjat12000 wrote: post #473

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in men, there is a very clear mechanism. If you have excess body fat, your aromatase may be overexpressed, and if so, you will convert more of your testosterone to estradiol. This interacts with the hypothalamus' negative feedback loop, lowering your GnRH, (and therefore your LH/FSH) making you less fertile and lowering your testosterone until homeostasis is achieved.

I was recently watching a video on Doublespeak[0], one of the types of doublespeak is to bombard the audience with technical jargon which means you automatically win, unless they know more technical terms than you do! In your case, your comment does not mean anything to me (or probably 99% of the HN users). Instead of this, you could at least cite a reputable source for this claim, this would be 100 times more effect…

I think your comment, particularly your use of the phrase "bombard the audience with technical jargon", is a much better example of double speak than then comment you're replying to.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#512

Post by Retric » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:04 PM UTC

Nasrudith wrote: post #406

Retric wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evolution and selective breeding don’t arbitrarily modify DNA. The actual methods are small random changes, copying from some other location possibly backwards, or removing segments. GMO significantly expands what kinds of changes are possible. In practice the difference is generally not that significant, but there is some increase in risks. Personally, I would prefer a different label for new GMO foods. Presumably,…

Do you know how they discovered methods of genetic modification? Retroviruses in nature. Look at HPV for one as a cause for cancer and the number of viruses embedded in human DNA. Evolution includes all of those. Of course /nothing/ meets the goal posts of "arbitrary" including state of the art genetic modification.

We have moved past simply copying and pasting DNA and can now add arbitrary genetic sequences to any organism. Natural rice retroviruses are unlikely to carry jellyfish DNA let alone something designed from scratch.

As I said it’s probably not that meaningful of a difference, but malicious actors have serious tools to work with here not just random changes.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#513

Post by cwkoss » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:04 PM UTC

hojjat12000 wrote: post #486

Animats wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just bio terminology. I can't tell if it's correct biology but the words are neither nonsense nor obscure.

I did not say they are nonsense, or obscure. I said "technical jargon". I said to most of the audience, this doesn't mean anything, and to those that this means something, they probably already know this anyways. So, for the general public (non-biologists) you have to either explain it differently (at least don't use acronyms). or at least cite a reputable website so that we, normies, know you are not trolling!

This is a forum for technical discussion. Use google if you want to to understand something and you don't.

It is unreasonable and not the goal of this forum use a level of discourse here so that all comments can be understood by general public. This a bunch of nerds chatting, not US Weekly.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#514

Post by pseudalopex » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:06 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #134

bpodgursky wrote: post #35

Would it be... unreasonable... to point out that the fall in sperm quality, egg quality, and overall hormonal disruption is happening concurrent with a blurring of overall gender identification, predominantly in the youngest generation? Identification as trans or other non-binary status is incredibly high among the gen-z cohort. Might be unrelated social upheaval, but would anyone really be surprised if we weren't ac…

> Identification as trans or other non-binary status is incredibly high among the gen-z cohort. The highest study estimate I've seen is 3%, almost all others are between 0.7% and 1%, with even boomers around 0.5%. (For Gen-Z kids, parental belief that children are trans or have non-binary identity is many times higher, though, but that's clearly more about social priming than “hormonal poisoning”.) > Might be unrelat…

3% included people just questioning their gender identity.[1]

[1] https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/141/3/e201716...

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#515

Post by pseudalopex » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:09 PM UTC

CryptoPunk wrote: post #117

arp242 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think Caitlyn Jenner is gen-Z, or The Wachowskis. I mean, maybe there is a link? It's not inconceivable I suppose, but I am not aware of any evidence, and purely comparing numbers of people is not a very good way of going about this. You will find there are a lot more gay people in the United States than in, say, Saudi Arabia too. But that doesn't mean there are environmental factors in the US that make peopl…

It's also entirely possible that cultural factors can influence the number of people who develop a homosexual sexual orientation. Humans are highly malleable and affected by culture.

Not malleable enough for conversion therapy to work.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#516

Post by RGamma » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:10 PM UTC

Darmody wrote: post #201

RGamma wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm thinking in terms of an organism going against its own ecosystem. Imagine if a new species of killer ant evolved that has no natural predators, procreates quickly and eats up its habitat. For a short while it's going to be the greatest species in its ecosystem... Of course we likely wouldn't see such an ant because it would have wiped itself out by resource exhaustion unless it adapted (or e.g. a natural predator…

"Imagine if a new species of killer ant evolved that has no natural predators, procreates quickly and eats up its habitat. For a short while it's going to be the greatest species in its ecosystem..." That happened long before humans existed and we still have animals with no natural predators. Also earth is not a patient. Earth doesn't care about you or about the ecosystems. Many years ago there was no life on earth a…

The depletion of the ecosystem is crucial for my example (no animal does that without consequences for itself or its environment)

Earth being a patient was metaphorical speech. And sure we can be nihilistic about it, at which point all is said and done.

The hope is we don't recklessly risk throwing away the results of millions of years of natural evolution and thousands of years of cumulative cultural achievement because capitalism overvalues consumer convenience. That's idiocracy-level kind of shit.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#517

Post by com2kid » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:14 PM UTC

danlugo92 wrote: post #207

slipper wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience, Teflon will always be scratched. Yes, in theory you could "use it correctly", but nobody ever does. So it's better to simply not have them.

Whats a good alternative? The ceramic ones?

Ceramic pans will always fail after a short bit of time. Cook's Illustrated has yet to find one that can pass their durability tests.

That said I wish they'd test the Granitestone Pro as other reviewers have said the Granitestone holds up better than other ceramic pans.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#518

Post by esja » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:15 PM UTC

mvh wrote: post #459

My dad (professor at University of Arizona) interviewed Shanna Swan, a scientist profiled in this article, recently. Anyone interested can find the episode here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/reproductive-health-sh...

Some of the other episodes look great as well. Thanks for sharing!

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#519

Post by acdha » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:17 PM UTC

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #455

acdha wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Weight loss and proper exercise will probably deliver 99% of the improvements for 99% of the people. In addition to be factually incorrect, consider how what you said sounds to the many people who are healthy, active but are having problems with something they thought would be easy. This is very stressful for many people, seeming especially cruel after years of worrying about accidental pregnancy, and the medical t…

At least in men, there is a very clear mechanism. If you have excess body fat, your aromatase may be overexpressed, and if so, you will convert more of your testosterone to estradiol. This interacts with the hypothalamus' negative feedback loop, lowering your GnRH, (and therefore your LH/FSH) making you less fertile and lowering your testosterone until homeostasis is achieved.

Note that I wasn't saying that it wasn't _ever_ true — only the 99% hyperbole. It'd be awesome if the solution was that simple and most of the couples I know would love to have something which could be done with that level of difficulty, expense, and personal risk.

Re: Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

#520

Post by cwkoss » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 8:18 PM UTC

cblconfederate wrote: post #346

esja wrote: post #101

Can these endocrine disruptors also contribute to gender dysphoria?

Given that there isn't a dramatic increase of homosexual population, its probably not a major cause. In fact IIRC homosexual men with high T tend to be "more exclusively homosexual". It doesn't help that most research on the subject seems to be from the 70s, and i don't find many recent studies. ( I guess, because contemporary science)

Gender dysphoria is usually associated with gender identity rather than sexual preference.