• infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net
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      6 hours ago

      Yes, beetles in general don’t smell great to me. They leave a fecal-like scent on my fingers when I hold them (Which I’ve always assumed is some sort of musk and not actual feces). I can smell ants too, but it’s only when they’re scared: They seem to release a chemical that smells to me like Windex the moment they realize they’re possibly in danger. I didn’t know that made me special, but I do know that others might not be able to smell it as I’ve had conversations about this with people who didn’t know wtf I was talking about. I’ve heard that it might be formic acid? Not sure.

      Funny because I don’t normally have a very sensitive nose. And I’m not a super-taster, cilantro tastes like cilantro to me (Fresh and herbally).

    • YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today
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      7 hours ago

      Yes! I’m not super sensitive to them, but one time in school I had one land on me and curiosity got the better of me. Never again!

  • childOfMagenta@jlai.lu
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    13 hours ago

    Are we talking formic acid from crushed ants or just there is an ant around and they can smell it?

    • infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net
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      6 hours ago

      Not just crushed ants, I smell it when they’re scared and running, but undamaged, as well. Calm ants though, they don’t smell to me. I always assumed it was a warning chemical to other ants, or a deterrent for predators with more sensitive sniffers than I.

  • LemmyKnowsBest@lemmy.world
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    15 hours ago

    Some people can smell ants. Some people can smell Parkinson’s disease.

    I don’t think I can smell either of those but I can smell B.O.

  • I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world
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    12 hours ago

    There is a type of ant that smells like rotten coconut when squished. Is that what they’re talking about?

  • Lemminary@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    Whatever, keep your ant-smelling superpower, I’m not jealous. At least cilantro doesn’t taste like soap to me! :P

    • kautau@lemmy.world
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      21 hours ago

      We need a study on if that’s the divide. If you can smell ants you also think cilantro tastes like soap

      • lengau@midwest.social
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        20 hours ago

        Cilantro: tastes like soap

        Can smell ants: no

        Sorry, I’m a counterpoint. I got the worst of both.

        • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
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          19 hours ago

          I’m with you. Can’t smell ants, but cilantro is soapy.

          There are lots of little genetic quirks out there. I experience Arnold’s Reflex, that is, I cough when I stick a cotton swab in my left ear canal. (Only my left. My right doesn’t react.) There’s also the Photic Sneeze Reflex, which is where you sneeze when looking at light. I don’t have that, but around 35% of the population does.

          I’m sure there are countless more little things like this that people just haven’t talked about/gathered enough data on yet.

          • Denvil@lemmy.ml
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            17 hours ago

            Every single time I walk outside, 3 sneezes sometimes more because of the sun. Although I’ve never met somebody else who does the same

            • Ignis@lemmy.today
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              8 hours ago

              My mom does that, but I believe it may be a sign of a tick, or at least that’s what my father once told me. Worth checking out in any case.

              • Denvil@lemmy.ml
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                56 minutes ago

                Either I’ve had a tick for the past 19 years, or its unrelated in my case

            • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
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              16 hours ago

              I learned about the Photic Sneeze Reflex when discussing the frustration of cancelled sneezes (you know, when you feel one coming on, but then it just doesn’t happen and it leaves you feeling weird.) He told me, “When that happens, I just look at a light.” I had no idea what he meant. Meanwhile, he thought it was normal for everyone. We both learned something that day.

              • Denvil@lemmy.ml
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                45 minutes ago

                An entry for ACHOO syndrome in the National Library of Medicine, by a Laura Dean (I think?) from 2012 claims 1 in 4 people will be pushed over the edge to a sneeze when they already have one on the edge, but “pure” photic sneezing is “far less common” although there is no number given, so I have no idea how rare or common it is to just straight up sneeze from light without already having to sneeze

          • XeroxCool@lemmy.world
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            18 hours ago

            I didn’t know about the cough reflex. I’ll have to check if it’s both sides. Can you taste iodine? It’s present in hot pink food dye, making things like pink peeps taste worse than yellow or blue for me

        • swelter_spark@reddthat.com
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          17 hours ago

          Stinkbugs only smell bad if you scare them. They never smell bad to me, either, but I also try not to scare insects.

          • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            17 hours ago

            Idk if scooping them up and putting them outside is scary to them, but I’m told people can smell them just from being in the same room with them, or crushing them, and I’ve done (or been near) all of the above yet never smelled one. And they’re constantly sneaking in my house so I should have by now I think.

            • Zanathos@lemmy.world
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              8 hours ago

              It’s smarter to release them back outside because crushing them releases a pharamone that attract more stink bugs. Ants and bees do the same too.

            • Smoogs@lemmy.world
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              16 hours ago

              Maybe it’s you who has bo and just can’t smell it. Everyone else has been hinting.

              • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                15 hours ago

                Do stink bugs smell like BO?

                Though when I do, I do smell it, and I shower regularly, and it only comes up when talking about stinkbugs, so I’m doubting your hypothesis regardless.

      • ameancow@lemmy.world
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        17 hours ago

        I can smell ants strongly and have an aversion to them, and cilantro tastes wonderful to me.

      • Wilco@lemmy.zip
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        20 hours ago

        Exactly! Cilantro tastes like soap to me, but my kids love it. That is so weird. Ant smell and probably snake smell are the same I bet. I have heard old people say they can smell a snake around.

        • KurtVonnegut@mander.xyz
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          20 hours ago

          I am afraid that cilantro does taste like soap to me but that people around me have been telling me long enough that it’s tasty that I started to like it.

          Tldr: I now like the taste of soap.

          • e8CArkcAuLE@piefed.social
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            9 hours ago

            i’ve had a similar experience, at first it was incredibly soapy to me. now i genuinely like it and i don’t taste the soap anymore. how could that work though if it’s a genetic trait? could this be stronger in some variants of cilantro? or even on the culantro/cilantro divide?

          • chatokun@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            12 hours ago

            I’m slightly in this. I love cilantro, but when I heard it tastes like soap to some I just thought “I guess a little bit it does taste that way… but the rest of it tastes better.”

  • Digestive_Biscuit@feddit.uk
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    17 hours ago

    I never knew about this. Is this the same gene which makes people like/dislike bitter foods?

    Years ago at a place I worked at, food manufacturers, the R&D team did a taste workshop. 5 cups of flavours, salt, bitter, water, umami, sweet. The bitter one just tasted of water to me. They called it “bitter blind”

    • Klairabelle@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      There’s a couple different chemical compounds that can activate your bitter receptors (caffeine for instance) but there are a few bitter chemicals like Phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) or N-Propylthiouracil (PROP) that have been linked to variations in a specific gene (TAS2R38). Where I used to work we used PROP strips you’d just put on your tongue to categorize participants into tasters, non-tasters, and potential super-tasters. If it tasted like nothing, you didn’t have the genetic variant. If it tasted like bitterness, it could either be not that bad or, for example in my experience, it’s really really terrible and takes some effort to remove from the tongue.

    • ameancow@lemmy.world
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      17 hours ago

      I can smell ants and it’s a pretty weird smell, but I don’t get any of the bitter food problems that some people have with certain vegetables.

      With the exception of mushrooms. For some reason mushrooms spark that same sensitivity to ant scents, it’s a similar sickly scent and makes me think of decay and loamy undergrowth and is very unappetizing so I’ve never enjoyed mushrooms.

      • stylusmobilus@aussie.zone
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        8 hours ago

        decay and loamy undergrowth

        That’s about the closest descriptor I can think of as well. Ants are more metallic to my scent than mushies but that’s it.

        • ameancow@lemmy.world
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          8 hours ago

          I tried truffles once and that came closer to tasting the way ants smell than regular mushrooms. As you said, more metallic, sharper and more “alien.” People seem to like truffle a lot, I guess I will save money in my life by not having that indulgence.

          • stylusmobilus@aussie.zone
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            8 hours ago

            I haven’t tried truffles.

            Funnily enough I like mushrooms. The smell of ants never used to bother me that much either; finding out it’s selective is intriguing.

  • jaybone@lemmy.zip
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    20 hours ago

    I think I can hear ants. People probably think I’m crazy. Like if you bend down and get your face really close to their trail. It’s like a buzzing sound. Like static on an old TV. Creepy as fuck.

    • Loui@feddit.org
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      8 hours ago

      I usually can’t but when hiking in fall we came to a big anthill and you could hear the leaves rustling below their little legs.

      I was so exited as I had never heard that before.

    • 9blb@feddit.org
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      19 hours ago

      Could it just be the reflections of ambient noise you also get when you hold your ear close to any surface? The old “If you hold a seashell to your ear, you can hear the ocean” kind of thing.

    • LemmyKnowsBest@lemmy.world
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      15 hours ago

      You’re the first person I’ve ever heard say you can hear buzzing sound of ants. I don’t doubt you, because why would you lie about something like that, but I would like to hear more people agree they can hear this and I want to read a scientific study.

      • BoosBeau@lemmy.world
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        14 hours ago

        That person is a liar!! I listen to ants all the time and the only sound they make is smooth jazz.

      • jaybone@lemmy.zip
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        13 hours ago

        I’m also terrified of having insects inside of the house. So it’s possible this is some kind of psychological reaction (?) rather than actually hearing them? But to me it “sounds” as I describe in the above post. Maybe someone can find something more scientific, like a study, I too would be curious.

  • cybervseas@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    I’m tired of microblog screenshots that self-censor 😕

    Also that’s cool. I’m pretty sure I cannot smell ants. But it’s also possible there are ants everywhere I go, so I can’t discern what part of the background smells are the ants.

    • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
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      19 hours ago

      I was watching “deep dives” on Youtube yesterday and was getting confused by all the censoring. Even the word “sex” was censored, and like… what? Not just SA (which I understand censoring), but sex itself? In a video ostensibly designed for an adult (or at least teenage) audience?

      It’s hard to follow a story when words get censored that you don’t expect to get censored. In my mind I think something much worse is being said, and have to pause and rewind to ensure I understood correctly. The best part is, the creator wasn’t even from the US, land of the Puritans. I expect Europeans not to be afraid of sex, but I guess this is what Youtube is doing to the world?

      • XeroxCool@lemmy.world
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        18 hours ago

        That degree of censorship usually implies the content is dual posted to TikTok in my experience

        • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
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          18 hours ago

          That’s weird, because the videos I watch are 1-2 hours long (or longer.) Informational deep dives are practically the opposite of Tik Tok.

          • XeroxCool@lemmy.world
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            17 hours ago

            I mean it’s my general experience, not a hard rule. Just because the TikTok algorithm actively promotes content with high interaction without any requirement for accuracy doesn’t mean there’s no educational information on the platform.

            Alternatives:

            • condensed clips are crossposted to tiktok
            • self censorship to the strictest level to minimize risk of demonetization
            • self censorship to avoid a mature rating, so viewers don’t have to log in to watch
            • self censorship to the strictest degree based on all popular platforms’ requirements because that is “the internet”

            People have always doe weird censorship things as both users and admin. Forums used to **** everything. Then things were free. The big companies started facing public pressure for beings the hosts of content and locked down again.

    • ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip
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      17 hours ago

      People complaining about the censorship is significantly more annoying than the actual tiny little blur on one single letter in one single word.