Am 15.09.2011 20:43, schrieb Orchid XP v8:
> On 15/09/2011 07:41 PM, clipka wrote:
>
>> Is toxicity (mild or extreme) of fungi to mammals...
>>
>> a) rare, found only in very few species, or
>> b) frequent, found in multiple - even very different - species?
>>
>> Is it therefore...
>>
>> a) probably a stray coincidence, or
>> b) probably an indication that it gives those fungi a systematic
>> evolutionary edge?
>
> Now you're asking relevant questions.
>
> To the laboratory! Let us all eat fungi! For science!!

Those questions were actually intended to be purely rhetoric. I'd have 
expected the answer to the first one to be common knowledge, and the 
answer to the second to be easily deductible from that.

Okay, let's add two other questions:

Are lay people warned to...

a) not eat self-collected fungi that have a certain well-known look, or
b) not eat /any/ self-collected fungi unless they're /absolutely/ sure 
of what they are?

Is this because...

a) the toxic species of fungi are so few that they can easily be 
described and remembered, or
b) the toxic species of fungi are too many to be easily described or 
remembered?

Post a reply to this message