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Comment by serg_chernata | Hacker News Reader

Gut bacteria is in the news a lot lately. As an interesting side note, during one of Joe Rogan's podcasts someone mentioned that if you think of our digestive system as a tube connecting two holes in the body then everything inside of our stomach is external. I've never thought of it that way. Fascinating.

For anyone interested Joe's podcast is actually incredibly informative and dense with good information.

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"Joe's podcast is actually incredibly informative and dense with good information."

If you want to be informed with what ever the latest pseudoscience/conspiracy fad is. Rogan has a reputation for his lack of critical thinking. Fake moon landing, 9-11 "truther" BS, chemtrails... all things he has pushed on his show. Oh yeah don't forget to buy stuff from his line of supplements too! Imo, he is nothing more than a meathead snake oil salesman that happens to be funny too.

He has that reputation but he has also improved a lot over the years.

I am glad to hear that, but if you are looking for an actual science podcast there is too much competition out there for one that has "improved a lot over the years", imo. I recommend "This week in microbiology" for the topic of the OP, btw.

Also this week in virology if you like such things.

his podcast is pure entertainment, he says so himself quite often. he makes fart and dick jokes and says dirty words and drinks liquor and smokes weed while on air.

if you take this seriously and are somehow indignant about the content or the sponsors, that's on you, not him.

"if you're looking for real science, then..." -- well no kidding dude. it's entertainment and can serve as a jumping off point to do your own research.

having said that his UFC content is really good, but you're probably not into that sort of thing, what with your 'meathead' pejorative which i guess you think is somehow cool because we like computers and supposedly shun exercise? that's cool i guess.

You are 100% correct, and if the article had been about how fart, dick jokes, and UFC was identified for the first time as a key factor in Chron's disease then perhaps your correctness would have a point related to the discussion.

well, fortunately, you don't decide what can or can not be discussed in a thread, the community does through voting and moderation.

At least we are in violent agreement that Rogan is "for entertainment purposes only". :)

Pushed!? He often says the stuff is wacky but that he loves considering the ideas. He likes to talk to cranks.

What good are your ideas if they can't stand up to being challenged by the ideas of others?

I was just starting to get into his old podcasts when he was interviewing Bas Rutten and started saying how cutting out gluten made him a hundred times more healthy and fixed all his ailing woes. I couldn't believe some of the stuff he was saying it fixed. It was at least a bit funny because I guess Bas knew it was all BS since he uncharacteristically goes very silent while Joe peddles the anti-gluten bandwagon. I stopped listening after that.

Pretty sure Bas said that, not Joe

Topologically speaking, a human is a torus. Your digestive system is the hole in the doughnut.

Interestingly, this means in a two-dimensional world, an organism couldn't have a similar structure, since the digestive system would completely separate the animal into two halves.

Not to be obtuse, but wouldn't what is basically an anthropomorphic doughnut be fine in two dimensions? Or do you just mean that that would not likely be the digestive tract of such a thing?

But you can't have a doughnut in two dimensions either, the two sides would have to be separated by the hole or else it's not really a doughnut, it's just a circle without a digestive system.

Futurama had a fun episode that dealt with this.

https://theinfosphere.org/2-D_Blacktop

Where would you place the nostrils?

Assuming we can ignore your septum and the roof of your mouth, your respiratory system is basically just an indentation in your head. From a topology perspective, it doesn't really exist. Your lungs are on the outside.

But that's the thing, you cannot ignore those parts in topology. Even if they look small compared to the rest of the body.

Sure, but you could still be a functioning human without them. You'd be a mouth breather, but you could survive.

Mathematically, "inside" our stomachs and intestines are "outside" our body. They are also outside of our body by looking at epithelial tissue, which has an inside/outside orientation.

There are so many good podcasts I can never get into, because they are often multiple hours per episode. Joe Rogan often on the 3 hour mark. How do people find time to listen/watch all the good content out there?

TL;DR is the zeitgeist, and I want to fight it. I want to read long form articles, books and listen to these great podcasts, but the number of hours in my day don't seem to allow it.

Do people set aside time? Am I just inherently bad at managing my time?

Rogan's podcast is absolutely perfect background listening.

>> Joe Rogan often on the 3 hour mark. That's how long most morning radio shows are.

I listen to podcasts for at least 10 hours per week and I probably manage to listen to 20 hours of podcasts in that time. Most podcasts I listen to can be sped up to about 1.3x speed with no obvious loss in quality. Additionally I use a podcast app [1] that "removes audio gaps" which basically chops out "pauses" and "no sound" areas of the podcast.

[1] https://overcast.fm/

I also use Overcast, whose "smart speed" feature is very good. As far as finding time goes, I spend about 90 minutes a day commuting by foot and light rail, which combined with a cheap Bluetooth earbud (check Amazon) makes for very reasonable listening time. Perhaps something similar would work with your daily routine.

While driving; daily commute :)

> someone mentioned that if you think of our digestive system as a tube connecting two holes in the body then everything inside of our stomach is external.

For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure this was said somewhere in the Chris Kresser, Joe Rogan Experience podcast episode #842.[0]

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_2vNj8pshY

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