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Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

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Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#111

Post by FranOntanaya »

milesvp wrote: post #94
SkyMarshal wrote: post #17

A simpler alternative is xylitol. Not a drug, no FDA approval required. It's a plant-based sweetener that cavity-causing mouth bacteria love to ingest, but which provides no sustenance to them. It essentially fills them up and then causes them to starve them to death, helping maintain minimum mouth bacteria. No bacteria, no cavities. Get it in mints or gum like Zellies or PUR (the only two I've found that don't inclu…

Please be careful pushing xylitol, "sugar alcohols" are neither a sugar or an alcohol. This, of course, is exactly the thing that makes them desirable as a sweetener substitute, the body doesn't really know what to do with the stuff, and, presumably, neither do common mouth bacteria. Sugar alcohols are known for causing digestive troubles, for this very reason, with the most notorious example being the Haribo "sugar…

Very much this. Specially if any relative has to watch their weight or sugar intake and a lot of "No sugar added" products are getting in the house, a very worrying amount of them are loaded with maltitol and its -ol friends. People don't understand why they are felling sick eating "health food" and go through a substantial amount of grief.

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#112

Post by drewm1980 »

b112 wrote: post #89
ceejayoz wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on the plant. I've got two GMO plants in my house right now; glow-in-the-dark petunias ( https://light.bio/ ) and purple tomatoes ( https://www.norfolkhealthyproduce.com/ ). The tomatoes breed true (i.e. the seeds have the gene); the petunias do not and must be cloned via propagation. Roses, fruit trees, etc. are the latter.

One could just eat other fruits, is there some reason the tomato, other than marketing "antioxidants", need be the purple fruit one eats? Maybe it's a different question. Does the flavour seem mostly the same? A drop in for recipes?

Grapes are for luddites! Seriously though, my grapes are so reliable at cropping compared to tomato plants I think it would be more interesting to engineer grapes to be tomato-like.

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#113

Post by seventyone »

I guess I am going to die from making my own kombucha, kefir, and yogurt because the FDA isn't regulating it.

WHAT IF... the mass increase in colon cancers in young people is due to gut bacteria colonies being taken over by a strain of bacteria in mouths that also survives stomach acids? What if that is causing the huge increase in IBS? What if the high carb diets and alternative sugars being consumed at mind boggling rates is a root cause? That the oral bacteria has been overtaken by a strain optimized for these carbs but is actively harmful to our bodies?

And what if fixing it is a treatment like this?

I'm willing to gamble.

Signed,

older millenial who has suffered with IBS for years

edit: If I could get a fecal transplant procedure in the USA to replace my gut colony I totally would.

edit2: fun fact -- did you know Sucralose accumulates in the environment because almost nothing breaks it down? it's pretty close to being a forever chemical. We can tell how much treated sewage injected into the water table is leaking into the ocean by measuring the amount of Sucralose in the ocean waters near the shoreline. That and nitrogen. But glug glug drink up those sugar free sodas and energy drinks!

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#115

Post by [deleted] »

adamsb6 wrote: post #92
jeffbee wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is associated with Bryan Johnson's book "Don't Die". The author advocates daily electrocution of your penis, among other moronic ideas. He has a bazillion followers among the petty VC crowd.

This was so shocking that I went to look it up, and discovered that there's a bit of a telephone game here. It's "shockwave therapy" that isn't eletric. It uses acoustics to cause microscopic damage, and which Johnson rates as a 9/10 on the pain scale, "at the tip."

[deleted]

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#116

Post by worik »

maxbond wrote: post #8

Whenever this topic comes up on HN it strikes me as bizarre that anyone thinks they can genetically modify a bacteria, release it into the wild - and that it'll stay genetically modified? Like the author mentions, bacteria are constantly swapping genes via horizontal gene transfer. Surely the bacteria in our mouths have found the optimal metabolism for their environment? Why wouldn't we expect our genetically modifie…

> ...create a Rube Goldberg machine in their genes that, say, killed them..

Bacteria are not machines, DNA is node code. Life is very different from mechanics

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#117

Post by everyoneinmusic »

jrd259 wrote: post #105

I'm disappointed by the somewhat ad-hominem attack on Silverbook for being a porn producer: "Aaron, based on his previous work as guy at a rationalist nonprofit, videogame producer, and porn producer, decided to recreate Hillman’s work." Previous work experience is irrelevant, and besides, don't at least some of aspire to being polymaths?

Funny joke, but many people consider pornography and its creators to be fundamentally immoral, anti-social and destructive towards civil society in general. So I think it's plenty relevant. Same reason Scott promoting the work of "sex researchers" who promote the same sort of thing is reason for many to be skeptical of his integrity.

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#118

Post by SamPatt »

twic wrote: post #52
pragma_x wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and that it'll stay genetically modified? I honestly think the play here is to have customers continually inoculate with the same, or even improved, versions of their modified bacteria. Possibly with a very strong antibiotic course in between if a clean slate is needed. That would provide ample room to stay on top of mutations and gene swapping in-situ. Otherwise, you don't have a continuous revenue model or a succ…

Or just brush your teeth twice a day.

Seriously - this is interesting tech but it seems like a mostly solved problem. Brush your teeth when you wake up, then floss and brush them again before you sleep.

Once it's routine (hopefully established in youth) it seems extremely easy to maintain.

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#119

Post by FeloniousHam »

jkingsman wrote: post #96
sleepydog wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can attest to its effectiveness against H. pylori. I've suffered from canker sores most of my life. The two things that have helped were avoiding sodium lauryl sulfate in toothpaste, and chewing mastic gum at least once a week.

Anecdotal +1. I've switched to non-SLS toothpaste and seen a dramatic drop in my frequency and severity of apthous ulcers (and, unfortunately, I get them often enough and badly enough that I can state causality with some certainty). I used to have a (powerful-to-the-point-of-personal-uneasiness) corticosteroid that I would put on them to dubious effect, but I haven't needed to resort to that at all since I switched a…

BTW, the best treatment I've found for canker sores is Canker Cover. I switched baking soda toothpaste, but I'm not convinced it had a material effect.

Re: Reasons not to take Lumina's anticavity probiotic

#120

Post by mrguyorama »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #54
Aurornis wrote: post #4

> I’ve also been disappointed for some months to see how many people I respect (and some I don’t respect) have been using it/promoting it. Taking unapproved drugs is a bad idea, no matter what rationalist bloggers with MDs, porn star/escort/sex researchers, Twitter guys, or conservative firebrands who get sick immediately after taking the unapproved drug tell you. The "rationalist community" has always been quirky an…

[flagged]

>I'm pretty sure using "biased" to denigrate other people is over, Gretchen.

Your username is literally "NoImmatureAdHom"

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