Hacker News Reader

Comment by timkpaine | Hacker News Reader

I am a very sweaty person, and I always get destroyed by mosquitos more than those around me. It's funny how sometimes meaningful research merely confirms things people already believe to be "obvious".

View on HN

I used to be a very sweaty person, but always had less moquito bites than those around me (though I did have quite a bit if I was alone). So it's far from trivial.

(And preepting the question: I stopped being ultra sweaty after a 20 day water-only fast, never to be sweaty again)

You only had water for 20 days? How do you do that?

People can go without food for a lot longer than they can go without water. 20 days is near the upper end, and not something you should do often, but very much within the normal human limit.

EDIT: s/food/water/

Its quite common with prisoners on hunger strikes. Apparently the feeling of hunger stops after a few days. Have to mention that you should be rather careful with that, the long hunger strikes where people died after month were with a forced feeding tube. With 20 days of total starvation you are already up there.

Refeeding is the dangerous bit, I recall reading. Needs medical supervision, at any rate.

A holocaust survivor once told me her mother died after liberation of the camp by English troops, because they started eating the ample supplies that the guards had kept for themselves. Truly tragic.

Appetite goes away after 48 hours or so, and then it’s easy until appetite or hunger come back, which take 3-40 days depending on your health, fat reserves, etc.

I had lost my appetite that time, so even first two days were easy.

On phone, so hard to google, but there have been a few we’ll documented cases of people going a whole year with just water, vitamins and ridiculously little protein (losing 100-250 pounds of fat in the process).

Also google valter lungo - fasting 2-3 days at a time is very healthy for you.

For onlookers, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Barbieri's_fast

Small typo: Valter Longo, and you can google Fast-Mimicking Diet (FMD). Highly recommended both as stuff to read, or a 5-day fast to try.

> I stopped being ultra sweaty after a 20 day water-only fast, never to be sweaty again

Was that the goal of the fast? And if yes, where did you learn that this works?

No goal. I lost my appetite, and I don’t eat unless I have appetite.

Took about 20 days for it to come back. Actually felt hunger at that point, which is a distinct feeling from appetite - one rarely felt in the 1st world)

I am the same way but I started taking vitamin b1 and that seemed to help me a ton in reducing the number of bites.

What’s your blood type? I have a double trouble situation with being super sweaty and being o negative (which seems to also be an attractant).

I'm facing the same problem & I've heard people talking about certain blood group being more attractive to the mosquitoes;but has this been proven?

The article doesn't mention blood group & specifically mentions that the merit of the research in finding the path i.e. CO2, Odour.

I dont' understand how blood can form path, unless it applies to only second bite i.e. Mosquitoes prefereing individuls with certain blood group after tasting it once.

> I've heard people talking about certain blood group

It's O-type blood that's far more attractive to mosquitos.

I lived in Florida my whole life and have spent a lot of time in tropical places around the world. I do not generally attract mosquitoes, much less than people around me. I have O-type blood.

In the South, we have a saying when you attract them: "You must have that sweet blood"

It's unfortunate that the epistemology of science is such that we can't just take certain things for granted like this, but I understand why it is the way it is. I find psychology research to be particularly guilty of this, so much that in my head I often refer to it as the science of pointing out the obvious.

The thing is that while a lot of things that seem obvious will be confirmed, a lot of seemingly obvious things will turn out to not be true. So we need to apply scientific methods in order to determine which “truths” really are true and which are not. (In cases where the truth is testable — not everything is.)

Beyond that, the fact that they have identified what receptors the mosquitoes use for sensing sweat means, like the article says, that new ways to foil the mosquitoes from sensing humans might be possible to devise in the future.

For psychology, sadly it’s more that researchers are lurred towards seemingly obvious or seducing results.

The reproductibility project was really a god send in this respect: https://osf.io/ezcuj/

I am a very sweaty person and mosquitos do not touch me. When other people suffer, I usually did not even notice there are any mosquitos around at all. So not that obvious for me.

Can you share your blood type? I’m o neg, of the sweaty persuasion, and get destroyed by the buggers. My father in law is AB, is probably normal on the sweat spectrum, smokes and mosquitoes don’t bug him.

I'm a sweaty dude and I'm also O-. I very rarely ever notice mosquitoes around and maybe contend with 2-3 bites a year. My wife is an A type, who doesn't sweat profusely, but she is harassed by mosquitoes every year. She gets it really bad, to the point where we're both actively trying to defend her against them with sprays and portable fans when we're out hiking or backpacking, etc...

While outcomes may be obvious, mechanisms are seldom obvious. Understanding mechanisms often helps us discover new outcomes that weren't so obvious before.

I don't buy it. I'm not sweaty at all and mosquitos always 'liked' me more than those around me.

Everybody sweats, you too. I don't think you need to be very sweaty to attract mosquitos, but everybody's sweat is different so that likely plays a role.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com