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Health Urban Myths

GNC said:
it claims that the smell of burnt toast when there's none about meaning you're having a heart attack
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I seem to remember something in "My House is Haunted" or similar ghost-related topics that one of the posters could smell toast in her/his home at odd hours... anyone remembers it also?
 
Mythopoeika said:
Maybe the alcohol saved him? It dilates blood vessels.
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Hurrah! At least it bought him more time.

Maybe there is something in that old adage “you go when you’re meant to go and not before”

T63
 
dejanmikic said:
I seem to remember something in "My House is Haunted" or similar ghost-related topics that one of the posters could smell toast in her/his home at odd hours... anyone remembers it also?
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I'm reading "Cursed Britain" at the moment and there's a mention of how witches would smell sulphur when meeting the Devil - I wonder if the burning/toast thing is a related/distorted folk memory?
 
INT21 said:
I heard it was the smell of burnt rubber that was the sign of a potential stroke. No smell of anything when I had my TIA in 2007 (same year as the stroke, not a good year).
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I have been experiencing strange phantom smells for about a year. At first it was cigarette smoke, then a kind if burning rubbery smell and now it's a general smoke/dust/spice smell that sometimes becomes almost unbearable. I thought it was a new plant we had bought or maybe a neighbour standing on their balcony and smoking but we have since moved and neither the plant nor the neighbour came along for the ride. It was about the time we also bought a hamster and I wondered if it was his musky smell which I could pick up on but then I started smellig it in the car too.

However, I don't think I've ever smelled it when I'm at other places or out shopping etc. If I did then I would probably need an MRI.

A possible candidate is a fakir effect I do called Human Blockhead where you drive a 6 inch nail into your nose. The smells started about 6 months after I started doing the effect. I haven't injured myself doing it but maybe I've made my nose more sensitive.
 
Ringo said:
A possible candidate is a fakir effect I do called Human Blockhead where you drive a 6 inch nail into your nose. The smells started about 6 months after I started doing the effect. I haven't injured myself doing it but maybe I've made my nose more sensitive.
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You might have nailed it.
 
Here's one that still goes about: the human body restores itself completely every seven years. There's no truth to that, especially as some parts will be older than others anyway.
 
Ringo said:
A possible candidate is a fakir effect I do called Human Blockhead where you drive a 6 inch nail into your nose. The smells started about 6 months after I started doing the effect. I haven't injured myself doing it but maybe I've made my nose more sensitive.
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That may well be a contributing factor.
Kudos to you for doing such a risky thing on stage. You must have a high tolerance for pain.
 
GNC said:
Here's one that still goes about: the human body restores itself completely every seven years. There's no truth to that, especially as some parts will be older than others anyway.
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Yes, no, sorta ...

The old simplistic claim that all cells everywhere in the body are replaced in approximately 7 years has been refuted. However ...

Research findings over the last few decades demonstrate the body does replace most all its cells, but not all at the same rate and (so far as we know to date) a few specific types of cells (e.g., neurons in the cerebral cortex) aren't replenished at all.

Different organs' cells get replaced at different rates. Some have turnover rates measured in days, while others have working lifespans measured in weeks, months, or years.

It was discovered about a decade ago that even heart muscle cells are replenished during one's life, but the turnover rate is quite low (circa 1% in young adulthood) and decreases in later years. Bones are estimated to be completely replenished on the order of every 10 years, but the new versions get weaker with advanced age.

The time scale for a complete turnover in those cells that do "recycle" is currently estimated to be on the order of 15 years.
 
Myopia results from the overall structure of the eye (excess focal length) and isn't really dependent on the cells. However, certain eye cells are among the ones that don't get replenished ...

About the only pieces of the body that last a lifetime, on present evidence, seem to be the neurons of the cerebral cortex, the inner lens cells of the eye and perhaps the muscle cells of the heart. The inner lens cells form in the embryo and then lapse into such inertness for the rest of their owner's lifetime that they dispense altogether with their nucleus and other cellular organelles.
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SOURCE: https://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/02/science/your-body-is-younger-than-you-think.html
 
James_H said:
Another is eight glasses of Water a day.
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I have heard that that health tip was started by the bottled water companies when they first started selling bottled water.

What a crock. The bottled water is purchased from local municipal waters. And some people believe that it is better than tap water. It is tap water for which they are paying a premium. Currently there is a moratorium in Ontario against Nestle:

https://environmentaldefence.ca/201...eeds-to-extend-its-water-bottling-moratorium/
 
Here's one for the cold weather, Northern Hemisphere: all the heat in your body escapes through the top of your head, so wear a hat if you go out in freezing temperatures. If that were true you could go outside in the snow wearing nothing but a hat and be perfectly warm.
 
GNC said:
Here's one for the cold weather, Northern Hemisphere: all the heat in your body escapes through the top of your head, so wear a hat if you go out in freezing temperatures. If that were true you could go outside in the snow wearing nothing but a hat and be perfectly warm.
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It's only wrong when they state 'all'. A lot of heat does escape from your read. probably why people get headaches in a cold breeze.

Do as I do, always wear a wooly hat. (except on our rare summer days).
 
They usually say most of the heat, which isn't true either.
 
GNC said:
Here's one for the cold weather, Northern Hemisphere: all the heat in your body escapes through the top of your head, so wear a hat if you go out in freezing temperatures. If that were true you could go outside in the snow wearing nothing but a hat and be perfectly warm.
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The wind-chill factor is the thing to look out for - if the air was completely still, it would be possible to walk around in a cold climate with just thin clothing. Not sure about the walking about naked thing, that would be unwise.
 
Min Bannister said:
I hear it as "most" of the heat. I do believe it is a disproportionate amount though. 20% or something. Though maybe that is the case for any other non-extremity left uncovered.
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The Wallace Rule of Nines* suggests that, as a rule of thumb, the head comprises 9% of the body’s surface area. I’ve heard estimates of heat loss through the head ranging from Min’s 20% to an implausible 50%. The fact is that heat loss through the head is directly proportional to its surface area of skin, i.e. 7-10%.

*Ever wondered why medical personnel are able to give astonishingly accurate estimates of the area of damaged skin a burn victim has suffered, and why those estimates are so often divisible by 9? Well, now you know.

maximus otter
 
There must be an element of hair coverage at work here surely? I'm going to lose more heat through my head than Phil Spector did at the time this was taken, for example.

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Ringo said:
However, I don't think I've ever smelled it when I'm at other places or out shopping etc. If I did then I would probably need an MRI.
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If you can smell smoke and nobody else can, you probably need to see a doctor. It might just be sinusitis, but it could be symptomatic of an upcoming stroke, or of developing schizophrenia. On the other hand, maybe your wife is just having an affair with a smoker, in which case they are really bad at hiding their activities. Or perhaps you are one of those lucky people who has someone living in their walls rent free? As none of these possibilities are good, I would look into ruling each of them out via evidence.
 
ChristLionQC said:
I'm reading "Cursed Britain" at the moment and there's a mention of how witches would smell sulphur when meeting the Devil - I wonder if the burning/toast thing is a related/distorted folk memory?
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Smelling smoke when nobody else does is symptomatic of many medical problems, and often suggests there is something wrong with the brain.
 
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