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gwern comments on Conspiracy Theories as Agency Fictions - LessWrong
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Hm... When I asked on Wikipedia, I was told it was in part due to the hygroscopicness of honey: not enough water to support bacterial life.
These experimental findings on How honey kills bacteria attribute the bulk of the antibacterial action to a specific protein defensin-1 that the bees put into the honey.
And yet, someone who applied honey (or distilled alcohol!) to a festering wound thinking that it would disorient the encamped pathogens and thereby give the body's defenders an opportunity to rally, without understanding the actual mechanism, could still be successful.
Sorry, but why are these being upvoted? It's a cute analogy - but this is far from a "model" as was claimed. Try making some predictions from these explanations and see how horribly awry they go: why just honey? I should be shoving waffles into my wounds whenever I get a scratch, since everyone knows waffles are incredibly tasty. This analogy might work to convince an uncooperative child to take his antibiotics or get a shot, but it's not going to cut it as a useful model. The only reason this is working is that you already know the answers!