Re: A thought on LF

Another good chuckle you've given me. I like the way your mind works: "I'm losing the argument here so let's talk about what's in another thread." Sweet.

because the large intestines is where FLUID is absorbed

Well knock me over with a feather. It looks as if someone has been perusing medical resource materials. Wiki perhaps?

Your own evidence once again even refers to it as "feces"

What is "it?" Let me go over this again because I think you are catching on. The number and variety of bacteria found in feces is "similar" (is "quantitatively and qualitatively comparable") to what is found in the mucosa of an empty colon. So that is what they measure--what's in feces. Because it's easier and more convenient. You can take a sample, put it in a container, move it, refrigerate it, freeze it, whatever. As opposed to having to have a live person, or people, with an empty colon in the room with them where the microscopes are.

Also, let's use common sense. We've all seen diagrams of the colon, it's like the Greek letter mu. Starting from the anus: it goes up, hangs a left, then goes back down again. If I were to shove an instrument through your anus with a scoop attached to it, to gather a sample of mucous to count your bacteria, I'm really only gathering info from one small spot. Whereas fecal matter (a stool sample) that travels the length of your colon has been picking up flora as it moves along. So if you were a bacteriologist and enjoyed finding and counting bacteria, which method, which sample would you rather use?

I am not talking about the fluid concentrations of bacteria.

Huh??? "Liquid culture" is a lab term.

a mucusal lining where microflora grow and flourish in abundance.

Ahhh, now I believe we're making progress here. This is quite different from saying things like "the colon ... is NOT where majority of the intestinal flora live." This could be progress. We'll see.

the mucosal lining of the intestines can be washed clean.

This is a vague and meaningless term. Let's be precise. If you mean that you can wash all the fecal matter out of your colon with enemas, that's one thing. But if you think enemas will STERILIZE your colon, i.e. KILL ALL OF THE BACTERIA, you have NO CLUE WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT! GOD are you in need of some IQ points. By the way, if you prepped your colon by doing several enemas to wash out the fecal matter, then took some strong hydrogen peroxide--let's say food grade 35%--and did an enema with that, you know what would happen? There would be massive, non-stop fizzing and foaming as the HP reacted to every microbial organism that it came in contact with. I'm guessing it would last for hours. But I don't even think that one enema would kill everything. Then you could spend the rest of your life trying to replace all the bacteria you killed. Shame on me for even mentioning this, there may be suicidal people out there that I just gave an idea to. And who knows what the HP would do to the liver upon colonic reabsorption.

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"While the contents of the small intestine are normally sterile, the colon contains an enormous (~10¹⁴) population of microorganisms."

Note: "population:" a group of organisms LIVING in a particular place.

"[T]he small intestine contains low numbers of bacteria, some 100,000 to 10 million bacteria per milliliter... In the large intestine, the bacterial numbers can reach 100 billion per milliliter of fluid."

"This makes it difficult for bacteria to colonize the small intestine because they get washed out very quickly. As a result the concentration of bacteria in the small intestine remains relatively low."

"This slower flow rate gives bacteria in the colon time to reproduce so that they reach very high concentrations (10¹²-10¹³ bacteria per ml). Bacteria packed into the lumen account for about 35-50% of the colon contents and for around 2 lbs of total body weight in an adult. The colon is a holding tank for bacteria that participate in the end stages of food digestion."

I don't know how much clearer we can make it for you.

Also, in case that "distal" / "proximal" stuff went over your head, let me summarize for you. The part of the small intestine that is nearest the stomach (proximal) has the least amount of flora. The part that is farthest away from the stomach (distal) has much greater numbers of flora. So as you move along the small intestine from beginning to end, the numbers of bacteria continue to rise. This is the TREND. And so what do you think happens to that trend as the SMALL intestine turns into the LARGE intestine? You guessed it. It continues. Which is why the colon, even though it's shorter than the small intestine, has WAAAYYY more bacteria PERMANENTLY LIVING IN IT, EVEN WHEN EMPTY!

Cheers.