4 ms·

most information medical doctors get in their training about nutrition is generally unsubstantiated

thaumasiotes 7y ago
Sure, but it's official unsubstantiated information. ;D
mywittyname 7y ago
Nutrition science is hard. It has long timelines and relies largely on self-reporting and meta-analysis because it's unethical to study humans like we would mice and perform actual control studies. That's not even getting into the monetary and political factors involved. It took decades for society to agree that smoking was bad for your health, because of all the money paid to bribe scientists, doctors, and politicians. And this was obvious. The food industry is orders of magnitude larger in monetary terms, and involves far more people, many with political influence worldwide. I give doctors a pass on this.
- thaumasiotes 7y ago
  It would make sense to give them a pass on not knowing correct nutritional information if they admitted they didn't know correct nutritional information. The situation that actually obtains is that they're passing off incorrect information as correct. That shouldn't be excused by the fact that knowing correct information is difficult.
  - PeterisP 7y ago
    It's absolutely justified to pass off the information that according to our best current knowledge is the approprate recommendation as of now - the fact that knowing the underlying correct information is difficult, and noone knows for certain if it's entirely correct or there are more nuances to be found doesn't mean that we should just shrug and act as if we have no information whatsoever. We do have some data that allows us to make useful decisions that are more likely than not to be correct. As long as that's the best we have, we should use that information.
- autoexec 7y ago
  I'm not sure it's a good idea to give doctors a pass because of how easy they are to bribe. It's a fair point that we can't allow unethical studies, but the fact that doctors and scientists are so vulnerable to bribery is a larger issue that should be addressed and would probably improve a lot more than just nutrition science/medicine. I don't see many easy answers, but giving doctors or scientists a pass for the current situation seems a bit too generous.
  - asdff 7y ago
    I don't think there is any evidence to say that doctors and scientists are any more susceptible to bribery than any other person. There are millions of doctors and scientists in this country. Are they all on the payroll? Of course not. Free pass away, unless you truly believe that one bad apple must sour the whole bunch.
    - autoexec 7y ago
      I don't think people in those jobs are more susceptible to bribery, but the jobs themselves enable and support it. A person could bribe me at my job, but even if I took the money there is oversight and someone would see something was mishandled and I'd be quickly fired. The systems in place to prevent doctors and scientists from taking money to push drugs or falsify data are failing us which is how companies regularly use scientists to get whatever results they want published and drug companies bribe doctors to prescribe harmful medications unnecessarily. Anyone can be bribed, but not many of us could get away with it at the scale that brought us things like the opioid crises and few of us have literal lives at stake when we are tempted to act unethically.

Sure, but it's official unsubstantiated information. ;D

Nutrition science is hard. It has long timelines and relies largely on self-reporting and meta-analysis because it's unethical to study humans like we would mice and perform actual control studies. That's not even getting into the monetary and political factors involved. It took decades for society to agree that smoking was bad for your health, because of all the money paid to bribe scientists, doctors, and politicians. And this was obvious. The food industry is orders of magnitude larger in monetary terms, and involves far more people, many with political influence worldwide. I give doctors a pass on this.

thaumasiotes 7y ago
It would make sense to give them a pass on not knowing correct nutritional information if they admitted they didn't know correct nutritional information. The situation that actually obtains is that they're passing off incorrect information as correct. That shouldn't be excused by the fact that knowing correct information is difficult.
- PeterisP 7y ago
  It's absolutely justified to pass off the information that according to our best current knowledge is the approprate recommendation as of now - the fact that knowing the underlying correct information is difficult, and noone knows for certain if it's entirely correct or there are more nuances to be found doesn't mean that we should just shrug and act as if we have no information whatsoever. We do have some data that allows us to make useful decisions that are more likely than not to be correct. As long as that's the best we have, we should use that information.
autoexec 7y ago
I'm not sure it's a good idea to give doctors a pass because of how easy they are to bribe. It's a fair point that we can't allow unethical studies, but the fact that doctors and scientists are so vulnerable to bribery is a larger issue that should be addressed and would probably improve a lot more than just nutrition science/medicine. I don't see many easy answers, but giving doctors or scientists a pass for the current situation seems a bit too generous.
- asdff 7y ago
  I don't think there is any evidence to say that doctors and scientists are any more susceptible to bribery than any other person. There are millions of doctors and scientists in this country. Are they all on the payroll? Of course not. Free pass away, unless you truly believe that one bad apple must sour the whole bunch.
  - autoexec 7y ago
    I don't think people in those jobs are more susceptible to bribery, but the jobs themselves enable and support it. A person could bribe me at my job, but even if I took the money there is oversight and someone would see something was mishandled and I'd be quickly fired. The systems in place to prevent doctors and scientists from taking money to push drugs or falsify data are failing us which is how companies regularly use scientists to get whatever results they want published and drug companies bribe doctors to prescribe harmful medications unnecessarily. Anyone can be bribed, but not many of us could get away with it at the scale that brought us things like the opioid crises and few of us have literal lives at stake when we are tempted to act unethically.