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BS: Who's Who in Your Body?

21 Dec 06 - 01:05 PM (#1915879)
Subject: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

You are outnumbered! At least that's what I was reading in my newspaper this morning.

Did you know that according to recent scientific research coordinated by Jeffrey Gordon of Washington University of Medicine in St. Louis, very little of what is in your body is you? In fact only one out of every ten cells in the human body is actually human. The rest are germs, primarily bacteria which "cover the skin and inhabit every orifice."

You may read more about this intriguing study in the journal NATURE. I'd prefer not to. I already feel ill enough.

Hope you all have a nice day!

Charley Noble


21 Dec 06 - 01:40 PM (#1915907)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Ebbie

ewwwwwww Sometimes I am better off NOT thinking about things.

Thanks, Charley.


21 Dec 06 - 01:43 PM (#1915910)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: GUEST,Seiri Omaar

Well, at least we're not Martians.


21 Dec 06 - 02:07 PM (#1915930)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: McGrath of Harlow

Me and my bacteria have consulted and we think this all sounds very divisive and cellist. Solidarity for ever. Cells and Germs United shall never be defeated!


21 Dec 06 - 02:14 PM (#1915937)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Amos

IS this the germ of an idea, or the idea of a germ?

This just reduces the "I am a body" school ad absurdum. One tenth "I", 9-tenths water...


A


21 Dec 06 - 02:14 PM (#1915938)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Cluin

Watching Mythbusters the other night and they were checking to see if tiny quantities of feces ended up on our toothbrushes that sit in the cups or holders in our bathrooms.

Turns out they do. The presence of coliform bacteria (bacteria found in human and animal waste) was found on all toothbrushes tested. Even the test group which was kept covered over in another room. Turns out this stuff is pretty ubiquitous and unavoidable any where we live.

Bon appetite!


21 Dec 06 - 04:09 PM (#1916022)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: bobad

Can't we all just get along?


21 Dec 06 - 04:12 PM (#1916026)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Gizmo

As humans, and also many other mammals, we are born with a certain amount of bacteria in our bodies, in fact, we wouldn't be the way we are without our single cellular chums, we live symbiotically in harmony. It is only when we have an imbalance of these life forms that we become ill.

OUr DNA btw is also made up of fragments of bygone viruses that have not been around for centuries, yet part of their molecular structure gets incorporated in ours as a kind of inherited genetic memory. If we to encounter that virus, those with the code would fare better than those without.

I am of course summarising this heavily, and I find it all incredibly fascinating.

I personally think that I am who I am, bacteria, warts and all.


21 Dec 06 - 04:25 PM (#1916042)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Bill D

A mighty creature is the germ,
Though smaller than the pachyderm.
His customary dwelling place
Is deep within the human race.
His childish pride he often pleases
By giving people strange diseases.
Do you, my poppet, feel infirm?
You probably contain a germ.
    Ogden Nash, "The Germ"


21 Dec 06 - 04:30 PM (#1916047)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: bobad

Meet the critters that live in your eyelashes.


21 Dec 06 - 04:34 PM (#1916052)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Slag

The body is just a temporary vehicle for the soul. Wow! That should stir some debate!


21 Dec 06 - 04:47 PM (#1916070)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

I think it's time that WE ALL had a drink!

The research is actually very supportive to the symbiotic germs that we require to survive, but points out that particular germs in our digestive tract seem responsible for some of us becoming obese.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble and his germs


21 Dec 06 - 04:49 PM (#1916073)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Cluin

I'll be back later. I'm off to pull out my eyelashes now.


21 Dec 06 - 06:49 PM (#1916190)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Don Firth

. . . we are not alone. . . .

Don Firth


21 Dec 06 - 07:39 PM (#1916233)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: McGrath of Harlow

Pretty well all the creatures who live in and with us are either harmless or helpful.

And there's been research suggesting that attempts to bring up kids in a way that tries to avoid them having a fair amount of contact with dirt is liable to have a disastrous affect on their health. Here's a BBC story about that from years back - Dirt could be good for you


21 Dec 06 - 07:52 PM (#1916241)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: number 6

jeeeeeeezuz.






holy sh&t.



I'm outta here.

biLL


21 Dec 06 - 09:10 PM (#1916295)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: JennyO

When I saw this thread title, I was prepared for it to be something started by the GUEST who started the 'natural person' thread. That's a strange one.

Anyway, I'm inclined to believe there is some truth in that "dirt is good for you" theory. My mother was fanatical about germs, always slathering disinfectant everywhere. Years later, when we were grown up and left home, guess who always seemed to be coming down with tummy bugs while the rest of us were healthy?

Anyway, I think the eyelash mite is kinda cute!


21 Dec 06 - 09:18 PM (#1916308)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Bee-dubya-ell

There's bacteria, there's mites, there's dirt, and then there's toejam. Gotta draw the line somewhere.


21 Dec 06 - 09:26 PM (#1916318)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: JennyO

EEEEEEEEEEEEEUUWWWWWW!!!


21 Dec 06 - 09:30 PM (#1916321)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

Here's to the MIGHTY MITE!

You know, they looks a little like lobsters or a Morton Bay bug!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble et al


21 Dec 06 - 10:15 PM (#1916340)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: freda underhill

There's germs, there's bugs, and then there's the ashes of dying stars, which Stephen Hawking (A Brief History of Time) says our bones are partially comprised of.. we are just a pot of gumbo!


21 Dec 06 - 11:34 PM (#1916367)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: JennieG

And don't forget navel lint!

yum yum......

Cheers
JennieG


22 Dec 06 - 03:48 AM (#1916451)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Paul Burke

Ashes of dying stars? Every naturally-occurring element heavier than lithium (if you've taken yours today) was once at the core of a star. All your carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon, phosphorus, sulphur, chlorine and the rest (and some of the hydrogen too). That makes me feel good, how about you?

As for your cells (I'm not a cellist McG, though I play the fiddle a bit), you're not so much a unity as a coalition, or better still an ecosystem. Even the cells themselves are symbiotic systems, it's believed that the mitochondria are ancient bacteria that came to live with the nucleic DNA and they have their own pedigree separate from the nucleic line.


22 Dec 06 - 04:11 AM (#1916463)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Metchosin

Shout all you want it doesn't matter,
Don't you know that I am mostly water,
Seventy percent, don't worry 'bout the rent
The rest of me is finding it harder.


22 Dec 06 - 09:40 AM (#1916665)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

Just as long as the whole crowd can coordinate enough to lift this coffee mug to my lips, I'm easy!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


22 Dec 06 - 10:46 AM (#1916740)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Bill D

what you gotta do is, you gotta have ways to intimidate them internal bugs & such:


There was an old lady from Clyde
Who ate forty apples and died
The apples fermented
inside the lamented
and made cider inside her insides



There once was a lady named Perkins
Who simply doted on Gherkins
They were so nice
She ate too much spice
and pickled her internal workin's


22 Dec 06 - 12:36 PM (#1916837)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Don Firth

In an episode of Star Trek, TNG, silicon creatures discovered on a planet that was initially believed to be uninhabited addressed humanoids as "ugly bags of mostly water."

And those were the diplomats!

Don Firth


22 Dec 06 - 01:51 PM (#1916884)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Amos

Well, I can see their point...

A


22 Dec 06 - 05:26 PM (#1917033)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

The germs of our body are notorious,
They cover the skin and inhabit every orifice,
There are good un's and bad un's,
And mama and dad un's,
And without 'em there would be no more of us!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


22 Dec 06 - 06:55 PM (#1917080)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Little Hawk

The subject of this thread is another one of those things that matters about as much as which tie George Bush decides to wear tomorrow... ;-)

Not at all, in other words.


22 Dec 06 - 07:08 PM (#1917091)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: freda underhill

we are one, but we are many...


22 Dec 06 - 11:09 PM (#1917225)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Joe_F

An amusing, discursive book on the subject of this thread is _Life on Man_ by Theodor Rosebury (Macmillan, 1969).

I once knew someone who was given massive doses of antibiotics because of a social indiscretion, and consequently lost his intestinal bacteria & had continuous diarrhea until he could grow them back. Evidently some of our guests do important work.


23 Dec 06 - 09:56 AM (#1917427)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Charley Noble

Little Hawk-

Are you suggesting that this thread belongs below the BS LINE?

The research results are actually very interesting but I admit to being more bemused than impressed with their conclusions. Maybe that's because I am not particularly obese.

As an additional disclaimer, I should admit that my resident germs helped to keep me in the Peace Corps when my Draft Board had other more grave intentions back in 1967.

The banner ads below describe how we can properly cleanse outr bodies, inside and out!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


23 Dec 06 - 05:11 PM (#1917702)
Subject: RE: BS: Who's Who in Your Body?
From: Alice

There is a Chinese product sold at this web site that describes how to collect Demodex from your facial pores and see them under a microscope.
http://www.demodexsolutions.com/ Look under the FAQ.
eewww makes the skin crawl.