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Comment by mona_simpson | Hacker News Reader

Take-away from that is to look up the literature /before/ carrying out the self-experimentation. It could have saved the nasty experience with the retina cyst which sounds very nasty.

I guess we normally only get to hear of the self-experiments with great results and advances for science and medicine. The not-so-good results can tend to get buried both figuratively and literally.

Hope you're fully recovered.

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At the same time, I would not restrict what a grown rational and self-aware human (emphasize rational and self-aware) is and isn't allowed to do with themselves. See biohackers, attempts at cyborg conversion, and Dallas Buyers Club. I don't recommend it. But whatever, they are individual agents. Of course, if they're actively promoting misinformation, especially that which affects people negatively, as Ron Woodroof apparently did with AIDS drugs, that's another story....

I'm sure someone who's never exercised before could die of cardiac arrest as soon as they step on a treadmill.

I think it's slightly disingenuous to suggest that one should never take risks because there are possible downsides.

Nicotine exists in tomatoes, potatoes, etc. Should I remove these from my diet because they contain nicotine, which might possibly cause a cyst in my retina? Surely, we would both agree that argument is nonsensical.

> Surely, we would both agree that argument is nonsensical.

It's nonsensical because the dose of nicotine in either is basically zero, unless you're eating pounds of raw tomato leaves.

Lots of unhealthy or actually poisonous chemicals exists in your tomatoes, but in very low levels... dosage is what makes the difference...

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