4 ms·

..if your child is a rat

omginternets 5y ago
Ugh, this again. Animal models are excellent predictors of physiological responses in humans if they are used correctly. If you don't think this one is being used correctly, please tell us why. The "pple aren't rats" line is a knee-jerk response that adds nothing of value, save for revealing the ignorance of the person who utters it.
- bmeski 5y ago
  I have a degree in the biomedical sciences and I often see CS majors/software/math folks insert clear cut divisions between terms and things than could possibly correlate. I feel like a lot of people don’t understand how continuous certain parts of biology are (and aren’t).
  - dundarious 5y ago
    Different human populations have different microbiomes. Different mouse strains do too (presumably rats as well). Never mind the other (significant) differences between mice/rats and humans, wrt nutrition. The fat and protein content of rat milk is quite different to that of human milk, for example (yes, early development in these animals is also quite different, so it's not a simple "they need high protein, we need low" story -- it's just an example of the kind of meaningful differences that exist). So I think it's pretty important to note "this is just in rats so far". It doesn't mean 0 predictive power. But it's far from solid that the effect transfers to your average US citizen, for example. IMO, these types of animal studies are useful guides for further (hopefully human) research, but shouldn't influence your day to day behavior, or the choices you make for your child. There's ample reason to avoid empty calories from sugar for pure nutritional reasons anyway, based on human studies.
    - halpert 5y ago
      But what is the likelihood that this result applies to humans vs. doesn't apply to humans? It doesn't sound like you can say. There are also differences even between two different humans. Simply being different is not enough to discount a result using a model that has otherwise proven successful.
      - dundarious 5y ago
        I'm absolutely confident I can discount it in the sense of "reduce its predictive power" compared to a study in humans, but I already said I'm not discounting it in the sense of dismissing it entirely. > It doesn't mean 0 predictive power. BTW, I also think that most of the time you shouldn't change your daily behavior based on one single human study.
  - stefan_ 5y ago
    I have a degree and I'm extremely suspicious of any study that wants to extract strong statements from only experimental evidence connecting (1) a very basic ingredient of just about any foodstuff (2) the gut microbiome and (3) "memory function" as only observed through further experiments. You could make your career from studying just tiny tiny parts of 2 or 3 but instead we got a study that is trying to solve for the world.
- softwarebeware 5y ago
  It was more a comment on the headline which explicitly mentioned “your child’s…” Meanwhile, it’s about an early study which only suggests that we should do more research in the area.
  - whatshisface 5y ago
    It's not like we thought fat kids were healthy in the first place.
    - watwut 5y ago
      That does not make the "sugar damages your kid memory" statement true.

Ugh, this again. Animal models are excellent predictors of physiological responses in humans if they are used correctly. If you don't think this one is being used correctly, please tell us why. The "pple aren't rats" line is a knee-jerk response that adds nothing of value, save for revealing the ignorance of the person who utters it.

bmeski 5y ago
I have a degree in the biomedical sciences and I often see CS majors/software/math folks insert clear cut divisions between terms and things than could possibly correlate. I feel like a lot of people don’t understand how continuous certain parts of biology are (and aren’t).
- dundarious 5y ago
  Different human populations have different microbiomes. Different mouse strains do too (presumably rats as well). Never mind the other (significant) differences between mice/rats and humans, wrt nutrition. The fat and protein content of rat milk is quite different to that of human milk, for example (yes, early development in these animals is also quite different, so it's not a simple "they need high protein, we need low" story -- it's just an example of the kind of meaningful differences that exist). So I think it's pretty important to note "this is just in rats so far". It doesn't mean 0 predictive power. But it's far from solid that the effect transfers to your average US citizen, for example. IMO, these types of animal studies are useful guides for further (hopefully human) research, but shouldn't influence your day to day behavior, or the choices you make for your child. There's ample reason to avoid empty calories from sugar for pure nutritional reasons anyway, based on human studies.
  - halpert 5y ago
    But what is the likelihood that this result applies to humans vs. doesn't apply to humans? It doesn't sound like you can say. There are also differences even between two different humans. Simply being different is not enough to discount a result using a model that has otherwise proven successful.
    - dundarious 5y ago
      I'm absolutely confident I can discount it in the sense of "reduce its predictive power" compared to a study in humans, but I already said I'm not discounting it in the sense of dismissing it entirely. > It doesn't mean 0 predictive power. BTW, I also think that most of the time you shouldn't change your daily behavior based on one single human study.
- stefan_ 5y ago
  I have a degree and I'm extremely suspicious of any study that wants to extract strong statements from only experimental evidence connecting (1) a very basic ingredient of just about any foodstuff (2) the gut microbiome and (3) "memory function" as only observed through further experiments. You could make your career from studying just tiny tiny parts of 2 or 3 but instead we got a study that is trying to solve for the world.
softwarebeware 5y ago
It was more a comment on the headline which explicitly mentioned “your child’s…” Meanwhile, it’s about an early study which only suggests that we should do more research in the area.
- whatshisface 5y ago
  It's not like we thought fat kids were healthy in the first place.
  - watwut 5y ago
    That does not make the "sugar damages your kid memory" statement true.