←back to thread

The health benefits of sunlight may outweigh the risk of skin cancer

(www.economist.com)
279 points petethomas | 2 comments | 19 Sep 25 04:46 UTC | HN request time: 0.498s | source
Show context
pinkmuffinere ◴[19 Sep 25 07:09 UTC] No.45298755[source]▶
It’s tempting to see things like this and think “well of course it does, because that’s how we evolved”. But I think that might just be post-rationalization? At the very least, I think the argument _doesn’t_ hold for periodic famine, extreme temperatures, most disease, etc even though we also evolved with those things. Is there any guiding principle that separates the things-we-evolved-with-that-are-good vs the -that-are-bad? Or is it really just a case-by-case examination?
replies(5): >>45298762 #>>45299023 #>>45299467 #>>45299663 #>>45304373 #
1. Jweb_Guru ◴[19 Sep 25 07:10 UTC] No.45298762[source]▶
Entirely case by case. It's further confounded by the fact that a bunch of things that are bad for us don't exert strong selective pressure in the first place.
replies(1): >>45301708 #
2. annsjdhs ◴[19 Sep 25 13:54 UTC] No.45301708[source]▶
> don't exert strong selective pressure in the first place

This assumes we understand how these things work in the first place. It’s very likely our understanding of evolution is incomplete.

I make this mistake a lot:

1. See thing that’s been done a long time a certain way

2. Modern recommendation is don’t do thing

3. Revised modern recommendation says “actually wait, do thing”

4. Revised modern recommendation is now ok because our incomplete model has been updated, whereas it should have always been ok because it’s been that way for a long time

Put another way: we should give more weight to a repeated pattern observed over thousands of years and heavily question any science that goes against it. Both sides are just estimations, but nowadays it’s almost assumed “old ways bad”. Way too many cases that end up being “way humans have operated for millennia is actually ok”.