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Comment by bryceacc | Hacker News Reader

i have massive conflict with co2 monitoring, just like this article. I have monitored my air for years, mostly for PM levels from fires but co2 came with it. I became obsessed with lowering the co2 at the expense of cold temperatures, but I have never noticed a "cognitive" difference between 2k ppm and outside. instead I just feel physical unrest with seeing the high number, like I am suffocating on this "clearly bad air". Yet I am certain if I was completely unaware of it I would have no issues. Any time friends come over and it's winter, ppm in an apartment would be 2500+ and nobody cares

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I can tell. I’m thinking there is a lot of individual variance for co2 tolerance. I can feel 800+ ppm and after i have had the sensor a while can tell what the concentration is within 25% or so without looking. I also feel the cognitive effects, and moreso the positive effects of opening a window.

Different places I’ve loved have had significantly different characteristics for what co2 concentration defaults to.

I’m guessing a not so small proportion of mental health issues and things like chronic fatigue are actually breathing issues and sensitivity to higher co2 concentrations.

For me a big factor is I broke my nose long ago and don’t breathe as well as I should.

If you can, you should try a "blind" test outside your home sometime. i.e. Bring the monitor to a hotel room for your next stay, try to guess it, and then see what the actual number is.

Would you notice a cognitive difference if your cognition was affected by it?

There was a video I watched years ago where someone was on an airplane and basically tested how they'd react with a lack of oxygen. It was pretty crazy. He knew he needed oxygen, but didn't feel like he needed to do anything about it.

I think it was this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUfF2MTnqAw

I wonder if it's something you're more likely to notice in hindsight (and not at all if it's subtle). I was recently hypoxic (~78% SpO2) due to COVID-19, and felt absolutely fine at the time, but looking back, I was making some questionable decisions (waiting three hours after reaching 80% on a pulse oximeter before seeking any help) and my memory until I was placed on oxygen is pretty fragmented.

I had an attack of viral epiglottitis approximately 18 months ago and called 999 as I could feel my throat closing up. When the ambulance crew arrived they put a pulse oximeter on me, and my heart rate was above 130 and remained so even after sitting on the sofa for 10 minutes trying to breathe normally. SpO2 kept declining no matter how hard I tried to breathe, and they took me down to the ambulance and intubated me just as my fingertips started to turn blue.

Sadly I remember it all.

That sounds horrific, I hope you're OK now.

I was lucky enough to avoid intubation, but I suspect I wasn't too far away from it. CPAP with pure O2/a high-flow nasal canula at 90L/min pure O2 (I initially couldn't tolerate the CPAP mask for extended periods due to an anxiety disorder, though I felt myself becoming more fatigued over time on the HFNC) was keeping me at 88-90% (arterial blood gas measurement) initially, and that slowly started to climb a few days into treatment.

I thought I would but my talking houseplant disagreed so it's probably fine.

I guess different people are different. I feel "dumb and depressed" when in a stuffy room, and am cured the moment I am outside.

My wife does not notice any difference in herself. I dunno if she's less sensitive or maybe less aware.

right, CO₂ has become a (inter-)national psychosomatic obsession of the privileged class, but no one should be worrying about CO₂ at all, unless you work in some very specific industries. you'd need a ppm of 50,000-100,000 to feel any real effect from CO₂, or to see noticeable greenhouse effects from it. it's today's equivalent of fearing power lines or MMR vaccines. it's fretting on something that feels tangible and controllable, without delving deeper and examining the (social and mass) media-driven presumptions underlying those fears.

pollution, on the other hand, is a real concern. that's stuff like radon, VOCs, methane, dioxins, and SOₓ emissions. as such, one thing we should be doing with vigor and relentless focus is phasing out coal plants (if we were actually putting our priorities in the right place) rather than worrying about the sideshow that is carbon emissions.

This article is a about indoor air quality where co2 is a proxy measure of stuffiness...

It took me a sec to figure out you were talking about something totally different.

> you'd need a ppm of 50,000-100,000 to feel any real effect from CO₂

Have you used the wrong numbers here or are you advocating some novel and unorthodox ideas about CO2? Did you mean 5,000-10,000?

Because as far as I can tell, those (5-10%) are the levels where people start to do things like lose consciousness from CO2 poisoning.

No, I think he's correct based on the study linked from this other interesting comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34651244

The linked study directly states that loss of consciousness occurs after ~7 minutes of exposure to 10% CO2.

And that's the obvious threshold. After all, no one can tell whether they've been drinking until they wake up on the floor, right?

nope, that's exactly right. at 5-10% you feel real effects, not at 1200ppm or 3000 or any other psychosomatic level.

"poisoning" is a needlessly loaded word in this context. CO₂ is literally critical for life. just about any molecule/compound at those concentration levels (outside of those we co-evolved with, like nitrogen) will have noticeable effects as well.

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