[extropy-chat] Effectiveness of Medicine (was: Robin Hanson on Cynicism)

[Morris Johnson]

Nutrigenomics has added food to the list of mechanisms
that regulate genetic expression.
Darwin and Crick meet Einstein so to speak.
If you can invest units of time and thought to
monitor, reflect and modify your environment and substance
intake (food and drink) you can modify the natural course of events
programmed into your genes and if some epignetic
evidence is taken more broadly , very nearly alter the DNA itself.

Medicine has progressed from magic bullets to deal with catastrophe
to the weekly reprogramming regime Raymond Kurzweil does
to understand and provide ongoing optimizations of the
DNA 's responses to its own subroutines.

The regulatory people or should I say bureaucracy
still operates as if the entire population is totally
infirm and must be protected against their own stupidity.

I will give to the regulators that over the last 50 years
human bodies have been able to procure and consume a wide
range of substances never before available at one time.
The cocktail of food, natural health products, RX meds
and environmental chemicals is now for some persons
phenomenally complex. I know personally that I consume
chemistry that I understand in chunks but must admit
I really don't have a frickin' clue about from a global
nutrigenetic or epigenetic sense. However, at age 50
with kids gone , I feel I will take the risk that I will
drop dead tomorrow as a result of my tinkering
against the possibility that my next 50 are just the run-up to
many more.

Medicine is still seen as a field where the experts
should fully control the silly ignorant meddlers.

One interesting case in point.

I went to a Natural Health Products meeting this last week.
One of the presenters showed how various sources of smoke
similar to what is used to smoke foods can be captured,
processed to remove known carcinogens and recombined
into a broad range of chemistries, smells, tastes and colors
for inclusion into foods. The labels would just say natural
flavor or smoked but indeed the food industry is telling
its players that functionality that defies regulation is the goal.
Antioxidant and food nutritional modifying chemistry
of the smoke compounds can be added without fear of
requiring health bureaucracy's approval processes.

So knowledge leveraged money spent on individually driven health choices can
dramatically effect the
effectiveness of medicine and do so at quite a nominal
cost in comparison to the critical care medical products
and services. Even where individual choices lead to catastrophic results it
is a good thing as it can add to the knowledge base
of those who did not make the "catastrophic choices".


MFJ
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