Not even eyeballing an amount? You would just as easily put in a fistful of cayenne or oregano as put in a pinch, or all you had left in a bottle?
I eyeball. I pinch. I just don’t take out the little spoons, unless it’s absolutely evident from a recipe that measuring is crucial. I did take chemistry. 
ETA: it also depends on the freshness of my herbs/spices. So even written measurements don’t take that into account - I guess they assume that everything is in optimal shape. Sometimes things are a little long in the tooth … like me.
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Sorry for not reading all the intervening replies, but this Guardian story doesn’t seem to explain anything very well as it relates to cross-contam.
Sure, people grab their spice containers with contaminated hands (never ME, of course, LoL). But does it matter? Not if they desiccate and the bacteria die.
Thinking about this, my unconscious habit of wiping down spice jars is not a result of a fear of germs. I realize it was upbringing. Growing up, mom had one of those old-fashioned wooden spice racks that hung on the kitchen wall, so the jars had to be clean (just like counters, appliances, etc). I wonder now if, had I grown up with spice jars behind closed doors would they be cleaned as regularly?
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Good point. My exposed stuff does get wiped off more frequently, but I think that’s just dusting, (for me), frankly.
I’ve got too much stuff. The wall-hanger with the most frequently-used stuffs. Two shoe boxes (loving labeled by one of my daughters). The other couple of overflow areas of other stuffs here and there.
I’m probably sloppy enough like most kitchen cooks that at any given time, you could find some contamination on them, frankly.
Edit - sorry the photos came out a bit weird/cuts. They looked fine in the uploads.
Anyway, my point is that I wonder how this study comports with real life actual dangers relating to infection?
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Very cool!
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I think you need to lend me your daughters. I have way too much stuff and it’s taking over an entire cabinet.
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Bingo.
C’mon, anyone, who has done any amount of cooking, knows this. …Right? Am I wrong about that?? At least I would think anyone who shows an interest in cooking know this. Mise en place really helps to lower risk of contamination. Are there people who are interested in experimenting with different recipes and researching ingredients and techniques who are unaware of cross-contamination???
Loved the bit at the end about english cooking having no herbs/spices.
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Which was actually the main reason I shared it. 
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I dont know . I have the 10 second rule . After 50 years in my kitchen it seems to work . Has never been a problem.
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Truly this is something I don’t worry about at all! H and I do mise
en place usually, wash our hands if cutting meat, or if they’re otherwise messy. If we have to reach for something in the moment, and spice jar gets dirty (rare), it will get a wipe off before returning to its spot in the drawer/cabinet. All sorts of terrifying bacteria can get scraped up from just about anywhere, including our own skin - just something we all live with, and the reason hygienic practices are hopefully followed, within reason.
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From the folks here who mocked my description of my habit of practicing mise en place I guess many don’t find it essential as I do.
For those of you who proclaim your habit of wiping your spice jars; if you’ve gotten pathogens on your spice jars, wiping them will serve to smear the pathogens over a larger area.
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Well, then lets all just toss everything into a giant petri dish of microbes because theres no hope.
Burn it all, we’re gonna die.
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Who here mocked you about your mise?
I’ve been wearing a tin foil hat to bed for 50 years, with nary an alien abduction. QED 
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I live next to the mountain with the lemurians .
