Following a collective decision isn't the best choice in cases like this; asking a lot of people is fine for cases where everyone has similar knowledge levels (guessing beads in a jar), or for coordination problems where the fact that a lot of people decide a thing is in itself important (things like on which side of the street to drive and social norms like that).

That's true; I figured, though, that people on LessWrong would probably be equipped to make this sort of decision, and I further figured that if no one thought I'd get some rare and terrible disease then I probably wouldn't.

It's not just my judgment I'm relying on, in other words - I was mainly concerned that I was missing some important bit of common sense that said "NEVER eat anything that was in a toilet!" (Uh... well, you get what I mean.)

You ''probably'' get in contact with dirtier things (keyboards, shaking hands), and the digestive system is ''pretty'' robust (you should probably be more concerned about what goes near an open wound or your eye than about what you swallow).

Thanks. Makes sense; I'm pretty paranoid about handshakes, too - I always wash my hands afterward. And you can forget about me touching a public phone or keyboard!