Gyroscopic Investing

Maddy wrote:I would hazard a guess that for most people, alienation (in the Marxist sense of having lost the feeling of "connectedness" and meaning in what we do) is a far bigger problem than boredom or whatever else it is that propels technophiles to be constantly pushing the envelope. I predict that one of these days, there will be a backlash against technology and people will be signing up in droves for Outward Bound-type experiences and classes in hog butchering and candlemaking. Above all, people want to feel REAL, and technology is driving us further and further away from that.

Maddy wrote:

MachineGhost wrote:Rich people always get what they want in the beginning. Either get rich or wait your turn.

Well when the elite go to Mars, could we just keep them there?

MangoMan wrote:That doesn't answer my question. Even if the price comes down eventually, at the beginning only the rich will be able to participate. And that will raise all kinds of ethical issues with everyone else.

MachineGhost wrote:I'm not complaining. What you were talking about is essentially in the medical realm. Have you seen the price of anything in health care come down in price, even after the idiots in Washington made that an expressed goal of Obamacare?

Rich is relative. What constitute rich in your mind? What constitutes rich in this application?

MachineGhost wrote:

MangoMan wrote:That doesn't answer my question. Even if the price comes down eventually, at the beginning only the rich will be able to participate. And that will raise all kinds of ethical issues with everyone else.

I'm not a bioethicist and if they're gonna pass a law or outlaw a treatment because of "fairness", we will just go out of the country via medical tourism to more enlightened (or greedy) countries to get whatever done. It is a losing proposition for only those that want to play by the rules (lack the balls or are just simply naive) that other people have decided is in your own best interest. I have only two words to say to that.

MachineGhost wrote:I'm not complaining. What you were talking about is essentially in the medical realm. Have you seen the price of anything in health care come down in price, even after the idiots in Washington made that an expressed goal of Obamacare?

That's sick care. There's no profit in eliminating sickness or reducing costs. It's an entirely different paradigm than the one I'm talking about. Let's be honest. Regenerative medicine is not going to be welcomed with open arms by the powers that be; it isn't now, its not gonna be for a long time. You will wind up dead waiting for the Byzantine bureaucracy to stamp its feeble "approval" on anything revolutionary. You will have to take matters in your own hands if the Byzantine bureaucracy is not moving fast enough. Stem cell therapy is a success for many debilitating conditions yet the FDA, the NIH, the lamestream media and Big Pharma consistently lie, lie, lie and spread even more lies about it being "risky", "ineffective", "worthless", "useless", or a "scam". The bigger the lie, the more people will believe it.

Look, life is not for the weak and winners are not handed to you by Big Mommy or Daddy government. It may not be fair, but this is reality. If you want to be a winner, either in terms of being rich or practical life extension, you have to grab it. No one is going to do it for you.

Rich is relative. What constitute rich in your mind? What constitutes rich in this application?

Hmm, not rich enough to afford the first iteration but rich enough to afford the second or third at much lower costs before the 20-30 years it takes the FDA to stamp "approved" because it threatens the crony profits of the status quo.

Being rich alone is not enough, of course. You also have to be informed, you also have to believe and you also have to know where to get access. Make it a habit now or you're gonna join the back of the queue.

Mountaineer wrote:Spoken like a true Darwinian. Screw everyone else but me. Sad. But I doubt you will understand.

Maddy wrote:Interesting that the author doesn't cite return to heirloom varieties as one of the answers, although his own analysis would suggest that might be the most important factor.

Desert wrote:As Maddy likely knows better than all of us, soil is repairable and improvable. Healthy soil is a bit like a living organism, teeming with microbes and decaying organic material. By the way, making compost in the high desert is very frustrating; it takes forever. It's good to be down here in the South where everything rots almost immediately (including the house).

Maddy wrote:The problem with cedar in compost is that it rots VERY slowly, which is why it has some good applications in landscaping. It also contains oils that are toxic to other plants. That's why you don't see much growing underneath cedar trees. So yes, it could very well be your culprit.

I'm not aware of cedar residue being harmful to ingest, although it's very common for people who work with cedar day in and day out to develop serious allergic reactions that go full-blown analphylactic. I recall that there is some debate about the advisability of using cedar around small animals.

Dear Idiots at the FDA,

When I saw that the FDA is proposing an update to its definition of "healthy," I thought that the agency might rely on the most current science to support any such changes. I was disappointed to learn this was not the case.

The agency is harmonizing its healthy definition with the new Dietary Guidelines. But just look at what the Dietary Guidelines say about saturated fat, sodium, and cholesterol. Briefly put, the guidelines advise reducing or limiting all three, despite good evidence to the contrary, some of it even now acknowledged by the government. For example, the government otherwise now admits that dietary cholesterol is not an issue. So why should it be reduced or limited? Not only is dietary cholesterol not an issue -- many people taking statin drugs end up with too little cholesterol, which is the basic building block for all of our hormones. We will die if we don't have enough of what the government calls "bad cholesterol."

If the FDA looked further, the agency would see the most recent evidence showing that saturated fat is not linked to heart disease, and that too little sodium intake can pose many health hazards. And one cannot advise on the amount of sodium without considering the balance with potassium. The FDA notes that many people are low in potassium, but again it is balance that is crucial -- yet the recommendation for potassium remains unchanged.

The new Dietary Guidelines no longer recommend a low-fat diet, so the total fat component of the "healthy" definition is relaxed. Foods made up predominately of mono- and polyunsaturated fats will be able to be labeled "healthy" under certain conditions. It seems obvious to me that the FDA simply does not have the expertise to sort out these fats. The limits on saturated fat remain.

The second change pertains to the lower limits for nutrients. The specific nutrients listed above were included in the definition of "healthy" because they were identified as nutrients "of public health concern." The new Dietary Guidelines identify potassium and vitamin D as nutrients of public health concern, so now if foods contain at least a certain percentage of these nutrients, they can use the "healthy" label. This is of course ridiculous. Take unhealthy food and add some "nutrient of public concern" and now it is healthy?

It is interesting that the Dietary Guidelines identify specific nutrients of concern, but fail to recognize any role for dietary supplements in achieving recommended nutrient levels. In our official comments in response to the guidelines, we noted that the status of the American food supply is such that food, even if eaten properly, cannot supply all of the nutrients needed for healthy living.

Vitamins D and K are examples: there just isn't enough in food, even if you have the best diet and find the best food grown on great soil. Calling a food "healthy" which has only 10% of the vitamin D the government recommends you eat each day (a recommendation which is already pitifully low) is hardly going to address the nutrient deficiencies experienced by millions of Americans nor optimize the health of other Americans. As for vitamin K, the government does not yet appear to understand the essential role it plays, especially in making calcium available to our bones.

Notice that no limitations were placed on the amount of sugar or added sugar contained in the current definition of "healthy," which boggles the mind. So on the one hand, we have a completely phony definition of what "healthy" is, and on the other hand the agency is severely restricting companies' ability to communicate the real health benefits of their products.

In the final guidance document, I urge you to consult the most up to date science on these topics, as the Dietary Guidelines are woefully inadequate.

I was inspired to start CrowdMed after watching my little sister suffer for three miserable years with undiagnosed medical condition. As she bounced from doctor to doctor, I witnessed how ill-equipped our medical system is to help people with complex illnesses, thanks to a perfect storm of over-specialization, lack of care coordination, redundant testing, over-medication, misaligned incentives, and more.

Since launching our site in 2013, I’ve read thousands of CrowdMed patient stories eerily similar to my sister’s, and was shocked to learn than 1 out of 3 American families have experienced an unresolved medical issue after seeing multiple physicians. This is why CrowdMed must exist.

The problem is that outside of a few expensive interdisciplinary hospitals, medicine remains an individual sport. CrowdMed is making it a team sport, harnessing the collective intelligence of a global medical community rather than requiring a patient to see one doctor at a time. After resolving 1,500+ real-world medical mysteries to date with dramatic, validated improvements in cost, time, and clinical outcomes, we’ve proven that our approach works much better.

While our company is proud to be backed by some of the top venture capital firms in Silicon Valley, we decided to raise this financing round the same way that we solve patient cases -- by crowdsourcing! This way anyone who supports CrowdMed’s mission and believes in our business model can own a piece of our success, and nothing pleases us more.

Jared Heyman
Founder & CEO

https://wefunder.com/crowdmed

Desert wrote:http://www.theatlantic.com/science/arch ... rs/502967/