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Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

science.org

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Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#251

Post by collyw »

justsomeguy123 wrote: post #167
ssnistfajen wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you point exactly which part was "over-the-top" or "aggressive"? Or is calling out that factually incorrect things are, well, factually incorrect somehow unacceptable nowadays? The world needs less pseudoscience misinfo, not more.

I re-read your post and while it's not overly aggressive it's the difference in tone and approach that get you. The original poster was like the hippie encouraging home-made yogurt and you were like the school principal saying 'this is bull, store yogurt has scientifically the same benefits'. PS: I also learned while writing this I can't spell yogurt. Thanks spellchecker!

If you are worried about people's tone and approach, go over to 4chan for a bit then come back here. It should toughen you up.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#252

Post by collyw »

ssnistfajen wrote: post #171
justsomeguy123 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I re-read your post and while it's not overly aggressive it's the difference in tone and approach that get you. The original poster was like the hippie encouraging home-made yogurt and you were like the school principal saying 'this is bull, store yogurt has scientifically the same benefits'. PS: I also learned while writing this I can't spell yogurt. Thanks spellchecker!

Sadly the topic of lactose intolerance is rife with misinfo, biases, and dogwhistles, hence my rapid-fire questions in the previous comment. Most commercial yogurt products sold in grocery stores today are heavily laden with sugar and so mildly fermented that their probiotic quanlities are nearly nullified. Commercial unflavoured kefir is slightly better, but the overall probiotic effect is still questionable since w…

The majority of nutritional science seems full of bullshit to be honest. I remember how we laughed at the Atkins diet when it first appeared as well all knew so well that the science told us fat was bad. Now Keto diet seems to be gaining a lot of acceptance, and refined sugar is the real enemy. Refined sugar being bad for you seems to be one of the few things that is agreed on. Will that change in another 20 years?

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#253

Post by justsomeguy123 »

collyw wrote: post #251
justsomeguy123 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I re-read your post and while it's not overly aggressive it's the difference in tone and approach that get you. The original poster was like the hippie encouraging home-made yogurt and you were like the school principal saying 'this is bull, store yogurt has scientifically the same benefits'. PS: I also learned while writing this I can't spell yogurt. Thanks spellchecker!

If you are worried about people's tone and approach, go over to 4chan for a bit then come back here. It should toughen you up.

I'm not worried at all. I was just commenting why others may see that comment (not mine) overly aggressive.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#254

Post by socialdemocrat »

mulmen wrote: post #161

This article is mostly cliche popsci trash that isn’t worth reading. Good for a game of logical fallacy bingo. The only interesting development seems to be the methodology but that only gets a passing mention. The rest is basically fearmongering. > In humans, for example, gut bacteria influence how the immune system responds to pathogens and allergens, or interact with the brain, affecting mood. Ok. But what does tha…

I found it interesting and useful. Much more so than this criticism which comes across as overly pedantic. It quotes various researches. It isn’t meant to be a study or paper onto itself. Anyone interested in the scientific details would lookup the publications from the people mentioned. Articles like this is to give you an overview and spark some interest among the general public.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#255

Post by benknight87 »

I really enjoyed reading Fiber Fueled which basically lays out how all the latest science links our overall health very closely to the health and diversity of our microbiome. It will be interesting to see if new research continues to find evidence to support this. It's also a pretty convincing scientific argument in support for plant-based diets which, conveniently, is good for the planet and animal welfare as well.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#256

Post by qwerty456127 »

> “perhaps we can restore them with probiotics.”

Really? AFAIK probiotics, as well as antibiotics, can only affect the gut microbiome temporarily - it will restore to the baseline (defined in early childhood) if left alone and given some time. Isn't it so?

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#257

Post by dragonwriter »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #256

> “perhaps we can restore them with probiotics.” Really? AFAIK probiotics, as well as antibiotics, can only affect the gut microbiome temporarily - it will restore to the baseline (defined in early childhood) if left alone and given some time. Isn't it so?

> AFAIK probiotics, as well as antibiotics, can only affect the gut microbiome temporarily - it will restore to the baseline (defined in early childhood) if left alone and given some time. Isn't it so?

Seems to be more complicated, and differ for different types of bacteria in the gut microbiome.

https://www.embl.org/news/science/gut-microbiome-changes-ove...

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#258

Post by pcrh »

lbeltrame wrote: post #4

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

Interesting! In De Filippo et al., they mention that Bacteroidetes sp are absent in urban Europeans, but present in rural Africans; in the OP they mention a similar sounding Bacteroides being present in chimps but not in humans. Is there any similarity between these apart from their similar spelling?

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#259

Post by chiefalchemist »

mulmen wrote: post #161

This article is mostly cliche popsci trash that isn’t worth reading. Good for a game of logical fallacy bingo. The only interesting development seems to be the methodology but that only gets a passing mention. The rest is basically fearmongering. > In humans, for example, gut bacteria influence how the immune system responds to pathogens and allergens, or interact with the brain, affecting mood. Ok. But what does tha…

All good points.

But it's scary because without gut bacteria we'd all be dead. We depend on them so much that I sometimes wonder if they're the host and we're the "parasite".

What you said about correlation v cause and such is spot on. And perhaps the article fails because of what you listed.

Nonetheless, losing half of something that our living depends doesn't feel like grounds for celebration. The fact that we just don't know, well that's concerning as well.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#260

Post by feet »

mulmen wrote: post #161

This article is mostly cliche popsci trash that isn’t worth reading. Good for a game of logical fallacy bingo. The only interesting development seems to be the methodology but that only gets a passing mention. The rest is basically fearmongering. > In humans, for example, gut bacteria influence how the immune system responds to pathogens and allergens, or interact with the brain, affecting mood. Ok. But what does tha…

Having a community of different species is good. The way that those communities work is that they keep each other's populations in check. If we go out of balance and one dominates we can see disease states coming from not only an imbalance of metabolic products but even infection from the population that went out of control.
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