Coding arguably requires talent - although Microsoft has been proving consistently for half a century that you can be a successful software company with piss-poor engineers.

But even if AI produced perfect code, then producing software essentially requires no talent. I'm not saying it's a bad thing in itself, but it moves the act of producing software squarely into the realm of everyday mediocre accessible to everyday talentless people.

And on top of that, the fallacy is that AI simply doesn't produce anywhere near anything that resembles perfect code. But of course, Microsoft is desperate to have you believe otherwise...

I'll just say this: I'm glad I'm at the end of my career as a software engineer, because I didn't spend a lifetime honing my skills to end up a mediocre types-question-guy.

The stress level measurement is what the smartwatch pretends to supply you - a feature that entices you to purchase the watch, if you're interested in knowing your stress level.

What's being monetized is the raw data - accelerometer measurements, O2, location... whatever the hell those things measure to do what they pretend to do - because a lot of really invasive and personal information can be inferred from those measurements.

collect data on you for monetization.

You've been modded funny but it's absolutely true.

Lithium aspartate, for example

The least-harm principle. There's essentially universal agreement that low (dietary-range) levels of lithium are not harmful, while the research as a whole is strongly suggestive of a benefit (but has not yet met the standards of, for example. an EPA regulatory standard for lithium in drinking water). Lithium, at the doses necessary, costs basically nothing, takes seconds to take, and is orders of magnitude away from the levels where potential toxicity symptoms can arise. To me, that's an easy call. Also, Alzheimer's runs in my family, so there's an extra factor weighing on the scale.

No issues with aspartate. It dissociates fully upon dissolution. L-aspartate is a building block to proteins. D-aspartate is also naturally found and used in the body.

All of the salts you listed fully dissociate in water.

Nothing weird about sodium fluoride, fluorosilicic acid, or sodium fluorosilicate. Sodium fluoride is a simple salt, dissociates immediately upon dissolution to Na+ and F-. Fluorosilicic acid and sodium fluorisilicate result in a fluorosilicate ion (SiF-2) which rapidly hydrolyzes to Si(OH)4 + 6F- + 4H+. Si(OH)4 (orthosilicic acid) is the form of soluble silicon which plants and diatoms consume and is perfectly normal in water in the tiny amounts from fluoridation (like 6 micromolar concentration). Ocean surface water near Antarctica for example is up to ~80 micromolar concentration. And it goes without saying that minuscule amounts of sodium in water are also perfectly normal. The addition of the fluoride ion is the only actually meaningful impact.

Dial "996" for more information.

Really annoying that lithium orotate became the standard way to deliver lithium, given that orotic acid is toxic and mutagenic :P

TL/DR, it affects the enzymes that regulate these processes.

Lithium is naturally present in the diet, but it varies by orders of magnitude depending on where you get your water and where your food was grown / grazed, with most people today on the lower end of the intake. Mineral spring waters in particular tend to be much richer in lithium than river / lake water, and also the fact that municipal water supplies' range limitations on the quantities of common minerals (sodium, potassium, calcium, etc) will also tend to reduce lithium, could be argued that, on average, the average person in the past might have consumed more. But it still would be quite varied on a regional basis.

Note that drinking lithiated water used to be a popular health trend. Indeed, 7-Up was originally called 7up Lithiated Lemon Soda (though the claim of being lithiated was actually a lie in their case, and they ultimately had to remove it!).

It always strikes me as weird that people would be shocked that a substance commonly prescribed to affect the brain... affects the brain.

Beyond increasing BDNF activity (which promotes neuron survival and new growth), one of the main therapeutic targets is Glycogen synthase kinase-3 beta, which controls a wide range of developmental parameters for neuronal development, including discouraging regeneration and promoting apoptosis, and is pro-inflammatory (CNS inflammation is itself associated with Alzheimers). Lithium reduces its activity, both with direct and indirect inhibition. While GSK-3B is essential to a degree, overactivity of GSK-3B is associated with a wide range of neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's.

Lithium also helps promote cleanup (misfolded proteins, degradation products, etc) via autophagy by reducing the activity of IMPase... at least at low doses. At high doses, it can cause the inverse effect, due to its GSK-3B and mTOR impacts. In general, though, it seems to typically be pro-autophagy.

There have been quite a few studies that do just that. Well, not "taking lithium", as in the medication, because typical psychiatric doses of lithium (hundreds of milligrams per day) are like 2-3 orders of magnitude higher than typical dietary doses. But dietary doses themselves vary by orders of magnitude (some European studies put consumption in some places in Europe as low as a couple micrograms per day, while in places in northern Chile some people consume ~10mg per day), because lithium is so widely varied from place to place. One study found for example that one Slovakian bottled water product had 10 milligrams per litre, while the mean European bottled water had less than a microgram per litre. In most places, peoples' dietary consumption is closer to the lower end than the upper end. And the studies strongly suggest that people who naturally consume the higher amounts of lithium have lower rates dementia (there's also positive, though weaker, evidence for lower rates of violent crime and suicide). In general, it seems to be neuroprotective.

It's been argued that we should probably be lithiating water, e.g. that there should be minimum and maximum standards for lithium in drinking water the same way that there are minimums and maximums for numerous other minerals, with a provisional recommended daily intake of 1mg per day based on the evidence. But given the huge backlash to fluoride in water, I can't even imagine how harsh the backlash to lithium would be, given that people associate it with being a psychiatric medication (even though that's at doses orders of magnitude higher). It's just not going to happen.

I personally take 1mg of lithium a day. Which is well within the normal dietary range (in some places in northern Chile people naturally consume ~10mg per day!). A common supplement form is lithium orotate, but it's a weird choice - it's chosen because it's covalently bonded into a molecule which is delivered into cells whole, to "make it more effective", but A) that's not how normal dietary lithium is delivered, and B) orotic acid isn't exactly healthy. Instead, I make my own (both concentrate and diluted solution). I start with lithium carbonate, and while it's not available in food grade (anywhere I've found), it's a very common compound available at high purity (>99,5%), with easy composition tests - crimson flame test, density tests (offset by a typically poor packing density), low solubility in water but high bubbling solubility in weak acids (with no precipitate), etc). Because it's poorly soluble & tastes like baking soda / mineral water, I also add citric acid to the solution, forming lithium citrate. Even if the impurities were pure lead, the amount would still be small when you're only taking 1mg a day. But actual impurities are mostly (A) water, (B) other lithium compounds (hydroxide, chloride, sulfate, etc etc), and (C) other similar mono- and divalent cations to lithium, such as sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, plus some iron, alumium and silicon due to their ubiquity in nature and presence in processing.