Psychology was invented as a means of studying society

That sounds more likely "Sociology". If you are actually trying to talk about Psychology then your claim seems wrong.

There could be a whole new continent of health improvements achievable by managing the body's bacterial ecosystem in the way a professional gardener manages a botanical garden.

Is eating an effective way to do that? In the world's cultures there's a wide variety of pro-biotic fermented foods. Do these exist merely because people like the taste? Surely they partly exist as a coping strategy for rotten food, but is that all? I doubt it. In some cultures they're eaten regularly. Let's list some:

• yogurt / cheese / cottage cheese / sour cream / kefir / etc.
• sauerkraut / kim chee / pickled vegetables
• fermented tofu (e.g. stinky tofu)
• fermented rice
• kombucha

Diet generally can dramatically affect which bacteria thrive in the gut (e.g. I recall evidence about sugar consumption, but can't find it). [I don't list bread or wine because as far as I know the agents are mostly dead before we eat them. For that matter, I'm not sure how much is alive in commercially available cheese.][Hygiene practices vary substantially too which probably has an important effect.]

One day we will raise the sanity waterline by selling Rationality Yogurt.

It's not quite probiotic, but the bacteria in sourdough seriously reduce the negative effects of wheat gluten; apparently, bread fermentation was widespread across wheat-eating cultures.

As a medical student who has been closely reviewing probiotic research, I would like everyone to know that research is extremely important.

Perhaps it will be the greatest breakthrough in medicine of the 21st century. This angle is one of the primary reasons that the 'calories in=calories out' theory doesn't function as a successful principle for people trying to lose weight and keep it off. I recommend looking into the GAPS diet for anyone suffering auto-immune problems, since auto-immune disorders are all primarily caused by dysregulation of the digestive system.

Some ideas on the yogurt study (also being an opportunity to explain some of the nuances):

1. there is an incredible breadth of biodiversity in the gut, and yogurt only typically contains one or two strains, in this case it looks like one.

2. gut bacteria number in the trillions, so a short-term regime of any probiotic food or supplement won't necessarily provide its benefits quickly. A significant amount of the benefit is also delivered in the chelating and detoxifying properties of healthy bacteria, which can over time remove harmful toxins built up in intestinal bile; a significant build-up may take years to fully flush though, and other health problems may still still inhibit it.

3. other things in the diet will impact bacterial growth just as much as the addition of yogurt. Foods high in sugar could very easily be inhibiting the multiplication of the yogurt's probiotic bacteria (after being ingested) by encouraging the growth of competing bacteria associated with negative health. Food eaten then also becomes the basis for the bacteria's food, so a poor quality diet could sabotage the probiotics.

4. the quality of the yogurt which the probiotic was added to will impact the growth of bacteria tremendously. The pasteurization process itself makes the yogurt less healthful and can create an environment less conducive to probiotic multiplication.

5. no distinction is made whether the stress can be considered 'justified' or not; it would be undesireable to be less stressful in a situation where stress is justified and helpful. The study also seems not to account for variance in difficulty of course load, since students may have signed up for classes with intuitive knowledge of the additional stress received through their usual gut bacteria.

6. there are also a variety of standard practices in preventing contamination, which I assume the group carried out

Lund, Sweden - despite not living here that long, just a few months, I've gotten a good grip of it. Pros: Massive university that serves as an intellectual meetingplace, everything from feminism to transhumanism in unofficial lectures, a particle accelerator is being built if you're into that kind of thing, and it's possible to get EVERYWHERE with a bike.

Cons: Difficult to get anywhere fast with a car, the weather can be less than enjoyable, housing prices are fairly high and we might be heading for an economical crash soon, and it would likely seem quite different moving here from outside europe.

In short: Economical value low, cultural value high.

Hmm would an AI be superior or inferior if it were unable to not think Bayesianally?

Yudkowsky recently posted something interesting on this, let me see if I can find it...

There is also a more detailed paper by Lattimore and Hutter (2011) on discounting and time consistency that is interesting in that context.