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Comment by anyfoo | Hacker News Reader

Huh:

"I mistook them for inky caps [...] even though I spotted an Amanita nearby [...] I should have been more suspicious as mushrooms do grow in colonies."

"I couldn’t find my Mushroom book, was in a hurry, so I trusted my judgment, fried them up in olive oil, and ate them as a side dish."

"I should have recognized then that they weren’t inky caps, because inky caps exude a black substance when you fry them."

"At that point, I got concerned. I covered it up by saying, “I’m OK, I know what I’m doing and I don’t feel sick.”"

That's... a lot of interesting decisions, for something potentially so deadly. Had I known this person afterwards, I think I might have politely declined any dinner invitations.

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I found interesting that he closes his post with an excerpt about how safe mushroom picking is, and how adverse outcomes only happen to ignorant fools who know nothing about mushrooms and don’t bother learning.

In an article that opens with “here is a list of things I know and books I read, and here’s how I poisoned myself anyway.”

And instead of thanking the doctors for their heroic effort, he credits his woo-woo "visualization" techniques.

That was in the section wondering why he survived but the other 2 people in the same hospital didn't. Would those 2 people have gotten different doctors or gotten less effort from the doctors?

"I found out that of three people admitted in 2006 to Strong Memorial with Amanita poisoning, I am the only one to have survived; 66% died."

The death rate for Mushroom Poisoning in the US was apparently something like 2.9 per year since year 2000.

He's really just discounting the 99.something% who survive for effect because two died in the hospital he was at. If that is even true.

> "the 99.something% who survive"

For this mushroom, it's certainly worse than that. It seems likely to me somebody quoted him the "without medical attention" survival rate.

> "Mushroom poisoning is more common in Europe than in America.[71] Up to the mid-20th century, the mortality rate was around 60–70%, but this has been greatly reduced with advances in medical care. A review of death cap poisoning throughout Europe from 1971 to 1980 found the overall mortality rate to be 22.4% (51.3% in children under ten and 16.5% in those older than ten).[72] This has fallen further in more recent surveys to around 10–15%.[73]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanita_phalloides#Similarity_...

That doesn't change the point that he ended up in the same hospital that by chase had >2/3 of the total number of related deaths in the country.

The people dying was the outlier

It's not like the doctors, nurses, and other staff are at liberty to release medical information about the other patients he encounters. So all he heard, at best, were anecdotes.

Mushroom poisoning and Amanita poisoning are very different things.

Yeah. And after my quotes above, the author notes that even after realizing that the intense sickness is likely related to the mushrooms, they still kept denying it.

But they do find time in the article to pass some judgment on "busy" "city" folks and their presumed inability to endure silence. Even though that's a different kind of "judgment" than the kind demonstrated above, I find it somehow hard to be receptive to it... 8)

Mistaking Amanita virosa for inky caps is like mistaking a grapefruit for a pear. I don't understand how you can make this mistake if you have even minimal mushroom foraging experience.

When they are small, and if you only go by your own memory I'm sure it can happen...

"Destroying angels are sometimes mistaken for edible mushrooms such as young puffballs, button mushrooms, and meadow mushrooms."

https://www.mushroom-appreciation.com/death-cap.html

I mean all of those at least look vaguely like amanitas in their full or immature form. Whereas inky caps look NOTHING like amanitas in any form.

It's more like confusing a grapefruit with a kitten or something.

Because he got himself poisoned right when he ignored everything he knew should do.

Actually, it looks like a common sort of decision tree that a normal person goes through when they have a medical problem.

And it is the same sort of decision tree people go through when nothing is wrong.

How many times have you heard a friend say "my heart behaves strangely sometimes".

Sometimes I have heartburn, or sweat more that expected and I wonder...

So when you have unexpected heartburn or excessive sweating, is that also after you picked a mushroom that you knew (or thought) looked similar to a very, very deadly one, with more than one indication that the one you ate was likely not the harmless one you mistook it for?

no, I meant in relation to a heart attack.

> That's... a lot of interesting decisions, for something potentially so deadly

The thing with bad decisions is, most of the time, they work out OK, until they don't. This gives people a false sense of confidence, which makes a eventual downfall more surprising to them.

Every drunk driver who causes an accident has driven drunk hundreds of times before without causing one. They think they drive better drunk than most people do sober. They get away with it many many times, until one time they don't.

The same rule applies to the lab technical who doesn't wear proper PPE, the researcher who doesn't double-check their Excel formulae before sending the paper for publication, etc.

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