Why some feces float and others sink
phys.org
phys.org
A jump into the lake and removing of trousers resulted in an "Aqua Dump". But alas it was a floater, rather than sinking to the unknown depths. It was a shocking discovery at the time.
What I really want to know is what happens to "ghost feces"... Sometimes you know one dropped into the toilet but it is nowhere to be seen...
Water affects this but not much; or you get a rocket-floater that dives down and comes up on the "other side" of the built-in trap.
A quick Google suggests that digesting fiber changes the gas/air content.
Understanding our gut is an overlooked part of medicine and biology. I think theres a certain taboo around the subject. But you can learn a lot about health, your mood, sleep cycles, etc from what comes out the other end. We need more research in this area.
A decade or two ago, fecal transplants were considered joke medicine. Now its an important tool in treating certain gut infections: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fecal_microbiota_transplant
Was talking about that with my GP. His view was that there's a lot of variance on that front, and that we shouldn't read too much into it. In particular, it's not because your shit isn't "perfect" that you're unhealthy, and there's not much to do about it anyway.
Don't shoot the messenger! I know this is HN where people want (and think they can) optimise everything,
On a lighter note, this paper is _really_ studying the gut flora which we do know has at least some impact on immunological function.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzXPyCY7jbs
>The German toilets, the old type -- now they are disappearing but you still find them -- it's the opposite. The hole is in front. So that when you produce excrement, they are displayed in the back, they don't disappear in water. This is the German ritual, you know, use it every morning, sniff, inspect your shits for traces of illness. It's High Hermeneutic. I think the original meaning of Hermeneutic for Germans may be this.
Žižek: Ideology and Toilets:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpSiMbkhkuE
>"It is easy for an academic at a round table to claim that we live in a post-ideological universe, but the moment he visits the lavatory after the heated discussion, he is again knee-deep in ideology."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics
>Hermeneutics (/ˌhɜːrməˈnjuːtɪks/)[1] is the theory and methodology of interpretation, especially the interpretation of biblical texts, wisdom literature, and philosophical texts. Hermeneutics is more than interpretive principles or methods we resort to when immediate comprehension fails. Rather, hermeneutics is the art of understanding and of making oneself understood.
We called this the "shit shelf". And it had the unfortunate side effect of exposing the smell, so you got used to flushing during and not just after.
From the History of European Stool Inspections, Henry O.R. Scrap (Oxford 2003)
Nominal determinism.
Here in Italy we are checked every two years at +50yo: huge lines of people dropping off their small amounts of (safely stored in an appropriate container) poo. A few weeks later...good news, or bad, in the post. Both my wife and I were a bit embarrassed at first, being relative youngsters, but the over 70s - a great day out for them.
I figure this is why the parent post is recommending more research into the area. Your GP is probably right that you shouldn't look and draw conclusions, but I'm curious as to whether it's because conclusions can't be drawn, or because we simply haven't learned how to draw the right conclusions yet.
"Not perfect" for means "meh" (sometimes too solid, sometimes too liquid, sometimes with weird things inside, ...). If I had systematically a weird poo I would be worried.
At the same time: it is not because your poo is "perfect" that everything is fine. Some things you cannot see, some other are not there but somewhere else (even related to colon, stomach, ...)
One interesting corollary of the article-- I wonder if human corpses sink or swim in accordance with their former flatulence-- and how much the old tale about eating after dinner is determined by these selfsame gasses!
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Harvey_Kellogg#Battle_Cre...
There was an old movie from the 1990s about Kellogg: https://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/story/entertainment/2019...
It’s also confused these days with the more sensitive and specific FIT test. FOBT has no relevance in modern medicine.
A visual inspection is usually enough to tell me about low-level contamination.
Recurring or high level ingestion becomes fairly evident to anyone within earshot, and effects usually last more than a week :/
And maybe fecesbook would be a good name for such app.
I still don't know exactly what caused it, if it was the gluten or the modern issue that industrial bread (even whole grain) isn't given enough time to rest (long-term fermentation?) so that it then continues to work inside the gut causing the problems, given a certain unhealthy gut microbiome which either can't deal with it or somehow goes crazy on it.
It was not just bread, though. Also oatmeal and cereals, so it isn't that clear.
It was always related to the amount of gas which would end up in the feces.
And gut bacteria are involved, so this is super relevant to Hackernews.
No. As a cited article concludes: "Thus, stools float because of an increased content of gas or water (or both); the floating stool should not be considered a sign of [excess fat in feces]." [1].
[1] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM197205042861804
> Prior to the 1970s, scientists believed that fecal matter either sank or floated depending on the amount of fat it contained. Experiments showed that not to be the case.
Maybe it's because I've gone through various hobbies related to fermentation but trapped gas seems like the most obvious and likely answer. Especially when you see bubbles around floaters. It's also very simple to test...take a floater, put it in a vacuum just above where water will start to boil off, then see if it still floats. Alternatively, compare its displacement before and after smooshing it through a fine grate. (Note I said simple, not easy xD)
I was also puzzled by those diagrams showing how you are supposed to sit on a western toilet seat. But then I watched some bits of one of those crual japanese tv show where their collapsed all the walls of some public toilets when a poor guy was at it (I hope it was an act). To my own surprise the japanese are sitting facing the flusher/wall, not facing the door. Plus you have countries where squat toilets are the norm.
Sex is another area where there are few social norms since you never learn by imitating peers (other than porn which is a terrible model).
You won the internet today, sir.
Yeah no, that is not a "Japanese" thing. I have no idea what show you were watching but it was probably just a gag, or a way to avoid having to show his genitals, or something that one person did for whatever reason.
There are some people who sit that way. For example, British comedian Bob Mortimer said on an episode of Taskmaster that he does it because his anus is unusually high.
Is it to avoid "mud" ejecting into / against the toilet seat?
Thanks for the link and timestamp info!
Now granted, traditional Japanese toilets are getting rare in Japan, it's mostly western style toilets now.
It was a slow and spiritual journey, like walking on knees to the Basilica of Guadalupe.
The exceptions seem to mostly be older fast food places and roadside taverns.
Plug your ears.
I don’t know exactly why it works but for me it’s magical in its ability to get things moving.
If you have stage fright while at the urinal, start going tricky math problems in your head.
In my country, where drug use is not such a big problem, bathrooms have actual brick walls, giving a person inside much more privacy.
> Experiments showed that not to be the case. Instead, trials with healthy human subjects showed that the difference was due to the amount of gas in a given fecal sample.
According to the study, naturally about half of the population of mice produce floaters. When you collect stool samples of that half and inject it on the other half, they also start producing floaters. On the other hand, when you sterelize the gut of the floater group, they start producing feces that sink.
Fat content seems not to be related.