Suppressing a gene by using its antibody can lead to tooth growth: animal study

I have read that there was a time, in the distant past, where you paid a doctor only as long as you were healthy. I can come up with some problems even in that case, but I can't help but think it might still be an improvement over the current situation...

It would likely be performed by surgeons and monitored by orthodontists there couls be multiple teeth comming out, missaligned and so forth.

I'd much rather do things the old fashion way than risk all sorts of problem down the line, have multiple trips, wait months upon months for my teeth to regrow.

As a last resort, or instead of an implant, yeah, sure! But afik, the money you pay for materials are smaller than the surgeon's fee, so I see no incentive for a surgeon not to give you natural teeth if he could.

It could be that he'd make more money that, way, less checkups and so on.

Because it's the ethical thing to do.

This is utter nonsense. As someone close to the dental field, I can tell you that 99% of people already can have perfect teeth if they cut down/eliminate sugar consumption + brush and floss daily. No one does this. Pretty much all dentists want them too.

Fillings for example always degrade and need repairs after X years. Drilling and filling even the smallest cavity puts that teeth on a lifetime progression to bigger and bigger fillings, eventually a root canal, eventually an implant.

Cavities, on the other hand can be arrested (stopped), and if small can even be remineralised. Yes, most dentists don't tell you that!

Careful monitoring and patient education on the other hand can lead to permanently keeping that natural teeth, as our teeth are living and can heal.

My personal lived experience: a dentist told me I must fill 2 cavities six years ago. I got a second opinion. That dentist told me I should wait, focus on oral care, chew xylitol gum, and use a toothpaste with novamin.

Both cavities have "arrested" and need no restorative work.

Disclaimer: Not a dentist. Listen to your dentist you trust, and get second opinions if you have doubt.

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies; much less to render them necessary."

It is useful to actually read what Adam Smith said and understand it[1]. In fact, I thoroughly recommend reading Ricardo, Mill, Knight, Hayek, Keynes, and von Mises to understand the important conceptual battlegrounds in the history of economic thought.

Smith's problems were mostly about confusing value and price (and thinking there is a well defined, universal "the value" of something -- in this he is joined by Ricardo. Marx merely took those ideas and confused himself due to his lack of knowledge of linear algebra).

Note by "corporation" below, he is referring to trade associations. He is arguing, at the same time, against both licensing requirements AND subsidies for education at the same time (among other things).

He understood the nature of what you call the "invisible boot".

> People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible, indeed, to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies, much less to render them necessary.

> A regulation which obliges all those of the same trade in a particular town to enter their names and places of abode in a public register, facilitates such assemblies. It connects individuals who might never otherwise be known to one another, and gives every man of the trade a direction where to find every other man of it.

> A regulation which enables those of the same trade to tax themselves, in order to provide for their poor, their sick, their widows and orphans, by giving them a common interest to manage, renders such assemblies necessary.

> An incorporation not only renders them necessary, but makes the act of the majority binding upon the whole. In a free trade, an effectual combination cannot be established but by the unanimous consent of every single trader, and it cannot last longer than every single trader continues of the same mind. The majority of a corporation can enact a bye-law, with proper penalties, which will limit the competition more effectually and more durably than any voluntary combination whatever.

> The pretence that corporations are necessary for the better government of the trade, is without any foundation. The real and effectual discipline which is exercised over a workman, is not that of his corporation, but that of his customers. It is the fear of losing their employment which restrains his frauds and corrects his negligence. An exclusive corporation necessarily weakens the force of this discipline. A particular set of workmen must then be employed, let them behave well or ill. It is upon this account that, in many large incorporated towns, no tolerable workmen are to be found, even in some of the most necessary trades. If you would have your work tolerably executed, it must be done in the suburbs, where the workmen, having no exclusive privilege, have nothing but their character to depend upon, and you must then smuggle it into the town as well as you can.

> It is in this manner that the policy of Europe, by restraining the competition in some employments to a smaller number than would otherwise be disposed to enter into them, occasions a very important inequality in the whole of the advantages and disadvantages of the different employments of labour and stock.

> Secondly, the policy of Europe, by increasing the competition in some employments beyond what it naturally would be, occasions another inequality, of an opposite kind, in the whole of the advantages and disadvantages of the different employments of labour and stock.

> It has been considered as of so much importance that a proper number of young people should be educated for certain professions, that sometimes the public, and sometimes the piety of private founders, have established many pensions, scholarships, exhibitions, bursaries, etc for this purpose, which draw many more people into those trades than could otherwise pretend to follow them. In all Christian countries, I believe, the education of the greater part of churchmen is paid for in this manner. Very few of them are educated altogether at their own expense. The long, tedious, and expensive education, therefore, of those who are, will not always procure them a suitable reward, the church being crowded with people, who, in order to get employment, are willing to accept of a much smaller recompence than what such an education would otherwise have entitled them to; and in this manner the competition of the poor takes away the reward of the rich.

[1]: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3300/3300-h/3300-h.htm

> About ten million years ago, the common ancestor of apes and humans got a mutation that broke uricase, causing uric acid levels to rise. The mutation spread very quickly, suggesting that evolution _really_ wanted primates to have lots of uric acid for some reason. Since discovering this, scientists have been trying to figure out exactly what that reason was, with most people thinking it’s probably an antioxidant or neuroprotectant or something else helpful if you’re trying to evolve giant brains.

[1] https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/04/27/give-yourself-gout-for...

>Uric acid wGRS was not associated with fasting serum glucose, HbA1C, waist circumference, or BMI. On the other hand, waist circumference was causally associated with all the components of MetS including uric acid.

Here's what's happening: some genes are known to be associated with elevated uric acid. Other genes are known to be associated with increased waist circumference. Because several different genes are considered, it is assumed that the "side-effects" of these genes can be neglected; the failure of this assumption is called horizontal pleiotropy, and I don't feel confident assessing their methods on this point. MR is generally considered to provide a better degree of causality estimation than longitudinal data, because the genetic factors can be considered "prior" to other effects.

The authors find that the genes associated with uric acid are associated with worse cardiovascular symptoms, while they are not associated with other symptoms of metabolic syndrome; waist circumference genes are associated with all of the symptoms of metabolic syndrome. Also, the effect of weight circumference genes on uric acid levels is significant, while the effect of uric acid genes on waist circumference is not (a strange asymmetry, but I guess it makes sense).

So what the study really shows is that elevated uric acid appears to contribute to worse blood parameters. However, it doesn't contribute much to central adiposity.

Now, having teeth grow om your body randomly, thats a horror movie

Growing tissue like gums is relatively straight forward -- we do something similar with skin for burns but the actual physical structure that bonds the soft tissue to the hard teeth is complicated to produce and apply in practice.

I've got a full denture with implant posts on the top, and a partial on the bottom. It's not just a "given" that teeth will hold out till retirement age.