Five Cats writes
In article , Oz
writes
Five Cats writes

And penicillin kills guinea pigs....

Indeed it does. Stone dead.

If discovered today it would have been rejected on first screening,
never to be seen again.

Except that mice & rats are used a great deal more than GPs for testing.....

The guinea pig is one of the standard mammals.

Still I guess it might kill those as well.

No, it doesn't kill rats and mice.

--
Oz
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Tim Tyler writes
In uk.rec.gardening Jim Webster wrote:
: "Tim Tyler" wrote in message ...

: Our taste buds do their best to warn us about many plant toxins.

: so you don't eat peppers?

I often go easy on many pungent fruit and vegetables.

I'm not sure what your point was - since the fruiting bodies of
many peppers are neither particularly pungent nor terribly toxic.

Jalapenos are most definitely highly 'pungent', but not toxic.

Red kidney beans (a tad undercooked) are not at all pungent, and very
toxic.

Taste, and bitterness, are a crude and fallible test for toxicity.
Much better to know what is and isn't particularly toxic.

--
Oz
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Tim Tyler writes
In uk.rec.gardening Oz wrote:
: Tim Tyler writes
:In uk.rec.gardening Michael Saunby wrote:

:: All in all it's better to eat meat - animals generally defend themselves by
:: running away rather than producing toxins, so all you need is a means of
:: catching them.
:
:Not logical. You can't conclude it's better to eat meat because it can
:run away.

: I see you have missed the point completely.

The point was apparently:

Assertion: "All in all it's better to eat meat"
Justification: "animals generally defend themselves by running away
rather than producing toxins"

A dumb syllogism with a false conclusion.

It's a fact that toxin levels are lower in meats than vegetables.
However I suspect this goes against your religion.

:Meat is higher up the food chain for one thing - and thus will concentrate
:environmental toxins.

: But not pesticides, because they are biodegradeable - a requirement.

Please don't publicly spout mis-information like this on health topics.

It is in fact true.

An estimated 88% of all pesticide residues resident in food are found in
meat and dairy products.

Factually incorrect.

Numerous pesticides are concentrated in animal fat.

No, just DDT.

``Beyond reflecting long-term energy balance, [adipose] tissue offers a
relatively stable depot of triglyceride and fat-soluble substances, such
as fat-soluble vitamins, and pesticides. As a tissue it represents the
greatest reservoir of carotenoids in the body.

Carotenoids are, of course, natural. Carrots are full of them and at
MUCH higher levels than you find outside polar bear liver. They are, I
agree, toxic.

Halogenated hydrocarbons
may be measured in concentrations of hundreds-fold greater than those in
blood of the same individuals.''

DDT, there you go. Banned in the early 70's.

"Halogenated hydrocarbons" are typically pesticides and herbicides.

Not modern ones (ie post early-mid 70's).

Please try to keep up to date, say within the last 20 years or so.

It's not hard.

--
Oz
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Tim Tyler writes
In uk.rec.gardening Michael Saunby wrote:
: "Tim Tyler" wrote in message ...
: : "Tim Tyler" wrote in message
: : In uk.rec.gardening Tumbleweed

: : It makes reasonable sense:
: :
: : Our digestive tract has evolved to cope with natural toxins.
:
: : In which case we probably don't regard the food source as toxic at all.
: : Or not - in which case the toxins remain toxic to humans, and we
: : presumably have learned to avoid ingestion, or to process the food
: : so as to reduce the toxicity to levels we consider
: : acceptable. Similar to how we might deal with
: : foods we know to have been treated with 'artificial' toxins, really.
:
: Our taste buds do their best to warn us about many plant toxins.

: I've never tried raw soya but I reckon it's not good to eat. A lot of what
: we eat today needs some processing, to grow it in large quanties requires
: modern technologies. What alternative do you propose - starving people?

What alternative? - to promoting pesticides as safe?

Indeed they are.

Warning people that many pesticides are not safe - and encouraging them
to eat certified-organic produce - or at the very least wash their fruit.

Washing has no effect.

: The plants are happy to cooperate in making themselves taste pungent.
:
: By contrast, the artificial toxins have been designed to be tasteless and
: invisible to consumers.

: And safe!

Indeed - but that often appears to be a secondary requirement.

Not to the regulators, and they have the say that counts.

Corporations want their products to sell. Only if there is
significant damage which tracable back to them, and they can't
claim innocence through ignorance - do they apparently get concerned.

Nothing they say counts.
It's what the regulator says that counts.

Safety typically comes through regulation and testing - not
from the manufacturers -

yawn So what's new?

Heard of the 30 MPH speed limit?

but DDT should have taught us that
it is not an infallible system.

Indeed it taught us a lot. Not least that toxicity, biodegradeability
and carcinogenicity are important as well as other things.

Learned in the 60's, regulations in place in the 70's.
Ever increasing regulation ever since: gold plating.

Please try to keep up to date.

--
Oz
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"Oz" wrote in message
...

Red kidney beans (a tad undercooked) are not at all pungent, and very
toxic.

What is the toxin in kidney beans?

M

On Thu, 22 May 2003 22:11:15 +0100, Oz
wrote:



It's a fact that toxin levels are lower in meats than vegetables.
However I suspect this goes against your religion.

To hell with toxin levels. I've just been reading a news report
according to which the much-maligned Atkins diet, in which fat people
stuff themselves with meat and very little else, is both healthy and
efficient.
As you don't need to be fat to follow it, and it sounds delicious,
I'm going to try it.
To the butcher!
We leave at dawn!

--
Paul

http://paulrooney.netfirms.com/myweb/index.htm
Updated 13th May 2003

"Tim Tyler" wrote in message ...
In uk.rec.gardening Jim Webster wrote:
: "Tim Tyler" wrote in message ...

: Our taste buds do their best to warn us about many plant toxins.

: so you don't eat peppers?

I often go easy on many pungent fruit and vegetables.

I'm not sure what your point was - since the fruiting bodies of
many peppers are neither particularly pungent nor terribly toxic.

I think you better start doing some basic research, how pungent are red
kidney beans


on your taste bud and pungency test which are safest, red kidney beans or
peppers?

Jim Webster
--
__________
|im |yler http://timtyler.org/

On Thu, 22 May 2003 21:21:56 GMT, "Michelle Fulton"
wrote:


"Oz" wrote in message
...

Red kidney beans (a tad undercooked) are not at all pungent, and very
toxic.

What is the toxin in kidney beans?

M

Phytohaemagglutinin

see http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~mow/chap43.html

--
Peter Duncanson
UK

Oz wrote:

So what is the deadly dose of carrots,

It's a lot, but quite easily reached if you try.

Urban (or perhaps, rural) myth. See http://www.steelgirl.com/carrot.htm

--
Mike Humberston
Barnes, London

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Tim Tyler wrote:

The fungicides sprayed on strawberries are toxic to
animals like us.

If strawberries are supposed to be covered in fungicide then why is it that if I
keep strawberries in my fridge for more than a few days they rapidly become
covered in white fuzz?
--
Mike Humberston
Barnes, London

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Oz wrote:

Just to give you some idea I have visited a site where they could test
at these levels. They had three areas, with separate doors to the
outside and staff from each area were not allowed to touch each other
until their shift had finished. This was because if one of the 'low
level detection' area walked through the 'high level' area (where the
test applications were made) then they would totally trash the analysis
just from particles they picked up walking through.

This doesn't make sense. Analytical labs which are set up to detect extremely
small quantities of substances have to keep the samples isolated from all
possible contaminants and that will include keeping them isolated from
contamination by the people who are working on them.

Also it doesn't require particularly sophisticated equipment or test conditions
to detect pesticides on at the levels which are present on vegetables which are
purchased by consumers. A gas chromatograph fitted with an electron capture
detector will do it for many although combined gas chromatography/mass
spectrometry may be required for unequivocal identification of some compounds.

--
Mike Humberston
Barnes, London

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Michelle Fulton writes
"Oz" wrote in message
...

Red kidney beans (a tad undercooked) are not at all pungent, and very
toxic.

What is the toxin in kidney beans?

You will have to look it up, but fortunately it's destroyed by proper
cooking. New veggies buying the dried beans are particularly at risk,
and people have died. It tends to get reported in the UK about every
five years, usually few or no deaths because they have been cooked (just
not quite enough) but very ill people.

Best to buy it ready cooked in a tin.

--
Oz
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Mike Humberston writes
Oz wrote:

Just to give you some idea I have visited a site where they could test
at these levels. They had three areas, with separate doors to the
outside and staff from each area were not allowed to touch each other
until their shift had finished. This was because if one of the 'low
level detection' area walked through the 'high level' area (where the
test applications were made) then they would totally trash the analysis
just from particles they picked up walking through.

This doesn't make sense. Analytical labs which are set up to detect extremely
small quantities of substances have to keep the samples isolated from all
possible contaminants and that will include keeping them isolated from
contamination by the people who are working on them.

So it does make sense then.

Also it doesn't require particularly sophisticated equipment or test conditions
to detect pesticides on at the levels which are present on vegetables which are
purchased by consumers.

That's not what those developing and running the tests say.
Also it's not 'detect' it's quantitively measure.

A gas chromatograph fitted with an electron capture
detector will do it for many although combined gas chromatography/mass
spectrometry may be required for unequivocal identification of some compounds.

Very probably. Whilst arsenic and other heavy metals in mineral water
has been easily and readily measurable for years by very primitive
equipment. Heavy metals are not biodegradeable and only very slowly
excreted.

--
Oz
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Mike Humberston writes

If strawberries are supposed to be covered in fungicide then why is it that if I
keep strawberries in my fridge for more than a few days they rapidly become
covered in white fuzz?

For pesticides there is a 'last spray to harvest' interval.

This is to ensure that the pesticide levels in the produce when sold is
below the required limit. For a 'programmed' spray plan the 'last spray'
is timed to easily miss the *earliest* harvest date because it's
unsalable until after that date.

However the weather is fickle. You have (for something like
strawberries) to allow for the hot spell that brings them on quick, so
the typical spray to harvest period is much more than the minimum.

This mostly isn't a problem because fungi usually need very special
conditions to attack plants successfully. They need the right
combination of rainfall, humidity, temperature AND the spores must be
there in significant quantity. Keep the spore level very low and it
takes them a long time to mount an effective attack that is visible,
even if the plants are unprotected. So you get 'effective protection'
for some (significant) time after the spray has vanished.

The uk regulations and inspections are very harsh, not to mention most
growers grow in full view of dozens, sometimes thousands, of people
(like roads) making cheating highly risky. This is NOT so in many other
EU countries and effectively non-existent in most second and third world
countries. This is one reason, out of many, why UK producers are being
put out of business by outside producers.

Remember france, for many years, exported three times the amount of
organic wheat than it produced. The fraud was caught, but it took years
and was exceptionally obvious.

--
Oz
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Mike Humberston writes
Oz wrote:

So what is the deadly dose of carrots,

It's a lot, but quite easily reached if you try.

Urban (or perhaps, rural) myth.

http://www.feelhealthynow.com/FAQ/sk...h_diet_FAQ.htm

'm drinking carrot juice regularly and my skin seems to be turning
orange or yellow? What's happening?

There are two possible reasons why your skin is turning orange. Either
your body is unable to process all the carotene properly in the carrot
juice you are drinking and high-carotene vegetables you are consuming,
or your liver is toxic. Either way, the color shows up in your skin.

If you are having difficulty processing carotene:

You may be drinking too much carrot juice at once. Your body can't
really assimilate more than 8-10 oz. of carrot juice at one time (taken
on an empty stomach). So if you're drinking a bigger glass than that,
you could be causing your own problem. Instead, try drinking no more
than 8 oz. at a time. If you're trying to add extra carrot juice to your
diet (possibly because you're fighting cancer and want the extra
antioxidants), then drink 8 oz. of carrot juice and wait at least an
hour before ingesting more. Your body can handle it at this rate and you
shouldn't be getting discolored skin.

Remember that while excess carotene can often cause this condition in
children, it is uncommon in HEALTHY adults because their liver should
function well enough to convert the beta-carotene to vitamin A and
eliminate the rest from the body. As a rule, spinach juice won't turn
you green, beets won't turn you red, carrots won't turn you orange. We
usually get yellow / orange when we are jaundiced because our liver is
congested or it is casting off toxins. The skin is one of four organs of
elimination in your body. Some toxins will come out there.


http://216.239.37.100/search?q=cache...w.countrylife-
restaurant.co.uk/nuggets/cap1.pdf+%22vitamin+A%22+toxin&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Was that a good idea?

It's true that vegetables are an important part of a healthful diet.
It's also true that they are
increasingly being valued for their role in preventing disease. But five
pounds of one vegetable
every day? Judith's body eventually rebelled. Her skin took on a sickly
yellowish colour. Fearing
hepatitis, she rushed to the doctor. He explained that carrots contain
an orange-yellow dye
known as beta-carotene. The body handles reasonable quantities of this
substance, but excessive
amounts are stashed away in the liver, skin, and mucous membranes,
turning them the colour. of
a carrot.


http://endoflifecare.tripod.com/juve...ase/id228.html

Those who intend to take a supplement are advised to take only the
recommended dose, or the dose prescribed by one's physician, because
health risks can arise when there is too much of any given vitamin or
mineral in the body. Too much of this. .could lead to this.

Beta-carotene (Vitamin A)
Liver damage, yellowing of the skin (may also increase risk of lung
cancer in smokers), birth defects

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioaccumulate

Other compounds that are not normally considered toxic can be
accumulated to toxic levels in organisms. The classic example is of
Vitamin A, which becomes concentrated in carnivore livers: Polar bears
are the classic example: as a pure carnivore that feeds on other
carnivores (seals), they accumulate extremely large amounts of Vitamin A
in their livers. It was known by the native peoples of the arctic that
the livers should not be eaten, but Arctic explorers have suffered
vitamin A poisoning from eating the bear livers (and there has been at
least one example of similar poisoning of Antarctic explorers eating
huskie dog livers).


--
Oz
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