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Soybean oil affects hypothalamus, causes genetic changes in mice: study (2020)

• sydbarrett74 5y ago
  Any fried foods are atrocious for one's health. Frying is the cooking method that creates the highest levels of advanced glycation end-products, which are deadly.
• tpush 5y ago
  In mice. Let's temper the usual nutritional conspiracy allegations and grand proclamations of effects on humans until someone trained and knowledgable provides an interpretation of this study. Most of these rodent studies end up not being applicable to humans anyway.
  • softwarebeware 5y ago
    Agreed. From the post: > A caveat for readers concerned about their most recent meal is that this study was conducted on mice, and mouse studies do not always translate to the same results in humans.
  • cottager2 5y ago
    Do you have a source for the claim that most studies done in mice don’t hold up? As far as I know, mice are quite a good proxy, although there are some differences. It seems like it would be a complete waste of time to study mice if most results didn’t hold.
    • zdragnar 5y ago
      The post itself includes a caution against applying this information directly to humans. It is a sign further research is warranted, nothing more (as opposed to completely pointless).
    • The_rationalist 5y ago
    • 09bjb 5y ago
      Mice strike the best balance for science of animals who are decent proxies for humans, are inexpensive to breed and genetically manipulate, and who don't trigger much ethical backlash. It seems to me though that the extent to which mouse biology and behavior translates well to human biology and behavior might also be the extent to which it's totally immoral. "Yes, but think of how many future lives I'll save by vivisecting this sentient or semi-sentient being..."
    • Avshalom 5y ago
      You can start with following footnotes from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_mouse#Limitations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_mouse#Limitations or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_testing#Scientific_criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_testing#Scientific_crit... I guess; I doubt it's possible to show what % of mouse studies hold up or don't hold up.
  • andreilys 5y ago
    There is plenty of research done on the harmful effects of seed oils. It’s not a stretch to assume this is yet another study demonstrating this in mice models.
    • jonnycomputer 5y ago
      But there also seems to be a ton of research suggesting the seed, nut and legume consumption is very healthy...
      • andreilys 5y ago
        Yes however that’s different than consuming processed seed oil.
• chakintosh 5y ago
  Recommended reading: The Hacking of the American Mind by Prof. Robert Lustig https://www.amazon.com/Hacking-American-Mind-Corporate-Takeover/dp/1101982586 https://www.amazon.com/Hacking-American-Mind-Corporate-Takeo...
• justaman 5y ago
  Eat fresh, local, natural. Butter, simple olive oil, animal fats. Food trends are trends because they are profitable. The people telling you its healthy are those selling it to you. The US must also move away from soy beans and corn syrup.
  • PretzelPirate 5y ago
    We should also remember that humans can be perfectly healthy without consuming animals and soy products in moderation aren’t harmful. We can eat a whole foods, plant-based diets without negative health effects or the environmental damage caused by factory farming.
• raxxorrax 5y ago
• roywiggins 5y ago
  It's worth pointing out that the "genetic changes" in question are changes in gene expression.
  • version_five 5y ago
    Could you elaborate on that? It doesn't surprise we that "genetic changes" is used sensationally, just would like to know what is actually happening and whether it's uncommon or something pretty normal?
    • crowbahr 5y ago
      In the simplest terms: Gene expression constantly changes. It's a field known as epigenetics. You have tons of genes, not all of which are constantly active. You have histones in your DNA that allow certain portions to be read while others are locked away. This changes how your genes activate.
      • VeninVidiaVicii 5y ago
        Gene expression is not just epigenetics, bacteria also obviously express genes, but largely have no epigenome. Gene expression changes due to environmental signals, and it happens all the time.
      • valarauko 5y ago
        Gene expression >>> epigenetic changes. Epigenetics is just one of the mechanisms that regulate gene expression in some organisms, but there are many many more mechanisms at play. All cells of a given cell type don't express the same genes at the same level, or even maintain the same expression profile from hour to hour.
      • robwwilliams 5y ago
        Close. But much of the control of gene expression is not formally epigenetic. Much is due to modulation by transcription factors and mRNA splicing machinery. Clearly related to DNA access for transcription but not what is typically meant by epigenetics.
• simonsarris 5y ago
  > The same UC Riverside research team found in 2015 that soybean oil induces obesity, diabetes, insulin resistance, and fatty liver in mice. Then in a 2017 study, the same group learned that if soybean oil is engineered to be low in linoleic acid, it induces less obesity and insulin resistance. > “The hypothalamus regulates body weight via your metabolism, maintains body temperature, is critical for reproduction and physical growth as well as your response to stress,” Italics mine. Linoleic acid is what induces torpor (hibernation) in mammals. We are mammals. People in the modern world are possibly something like half hibernating, inclusive of mental effects and of course the effect on difficult-to-remove-weight. The rise in Soybean oil consumption is an enormous change in the human diet over the last 50 years. The scale of it replacing so many fats, especially formerly animal fats, is just huge. See: Humans and Hibernating Mammals React to The Same Amount of Dietary Linoleic Acid in the Same Way. By Becoming Torpid. https://fireinabottle.net/humans-and-hibernating-mammals-react-to-the-same-amount-of-dietary-linoleic-acid-in-the-same-way-by-becoming-torpid/ https://fireinabottle.net/humans-and-hibernating-mammals-rea... (I submitted that article because I think its worth its own discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30456454 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30456454)
  • hinkley 5y ago
    We are also feeding those beans to cows, pigs, and I think chickens? People have been complaining about lineolic acid rising in these meats too. In a way I think this gives some ammo to the vegetarian philosophy, but I'd like to know the lineolic acid content of tofu, since bean curd is not exactly equivalent to whole beans.
  • softwarebeware 5y ago
    It's interesting to try and square the multiple conflicting findings about the effect of the modern diet on the brain and other observed phenomena such as The Flynn Effect (https://ourworldindata.org/intelligence https://ourworldindata.org/intelligence) that mean IQ is increasing over time.
    • stakkur 5y ago
      Maybe 'IQ', a somewhat suspect measure, isn't very useful.
• renewiltord 5y ago
  Soybean oil the most widely consumed? I would never have guessed. Figured canola would be.
  • brimble 5y ago
    Looks like generic "vegetable oil" is soybean oil. That explains it.
  • qiskit 5y ago
    I figured the cheapest oil ( vegetable, canola, etc ) would be the most widely used cooking oil as well. I've never even heard of soybean oil let alone know anyone who uses soybean oil.
    • Broken_Hippo 5y ago
      In some places, generic "vegetable oil" is all or mostly soybean oil, even some of the cheap brands. The midwest US has lots of corn and soybeans, and it is pretty natural that soybean oil would be fairly common. And honestly, a lot of oils seem obscure. I use grapeseed oil, but hadn't heard of it 10 years ago. I don't know anyone else that does either. They sell it in one of the grocery store chains here, though, and I decided to try it. Something similar must be the case for soybean oil: Some stores in Norway sell a bottle labeled 'soybean oil', so someone must be buying it.
    • jccooper 5y ago
      "Vegetable oil" is likely to be partially or mostly soy, as it's the cheapest vegetable oil.
  • dmoy 5y ago
    It's not even close. Soybean oil is like 4-5x the consumption volume as canola. Which makes sense if you've ever seen rural Midwest. So much soybean, everywhere.
    • dmoy 5y ago
      for more context - soybean is used to stuff nitrogen back into the soil, for the real cash crop (corn, etc). So what you'll see is fields rotate between corn & soybean, or corn, corn, & soybean. The US produces about 4 billion bushels of both corn and soybeans per year.
• jacobmischka 5y ago
  What is soybean oil traditionally called in the US? I've never actually seen "soybean oil" myself (though it surely exists). Is this the same as "vegetable oil"?
  • ethbr0 5y ago
    If you check the ingredients list, it will list soybean oil. It has to for soy allergies. From looking at cooking oils yesterday, you'll see either a mix (soy, canola, olive, etc) or a specific oil (canola) in the ingredients list.
  • some_random 5y ago
    Yes vegetable oil is usually soybean in my experience, check the ingredients.
    • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
      In the UK, something marked "vegetable oil" is basically going to be rapeseed (canola), but sometimes sunflower seed oil if it's come from Europe. If it is marked "pure vegetable oil" it essentially always 100% rapeseed. Rapeseed grows very easily here, and we don't grow soybeans -- they barely grow at all here. Soya is a notifiable allergen in the UK -- it must be labelled as such when it's in an unrefined form. And even if it's refined, the law still says the origins of oils have to be declared. The combination of these two things (cost and allergens) means that if an oil has soya on it, you'll know from the front label. Indeed, if it's anything other than rapeseed it'll probably be marketed that way.
  • zach_garwood 5y ago
    I believe you're right. Most (if not all) of the "vegetable oil" I've encountered has been soy bean oil.
  • zymhan 5y ago
    It is indeed frequently sold as "Vegetable Oil", which is a generic term. However, if you read the Ingredients, you'll find that most Vegetable oils are composed of mostly, or pure, Soybean Oil.
• shaicoleman 5y ago
  Recommended viewing: Dr. Chris Knobbe - Diseases of Civilization: Are Seed Oil Excesses the Unifying Mechanism? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kGnfXXIKZM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kGnfXXIKZM Here's a slide where he shows that soybean oil induces diabetes (in mice): https://youtu.be/7kGnfXXIKZM?t=2341 https://youtu.be/7kGnfXXIKZM?t=2341 The talk makes the case on how it's also applicable to humans.
  • unicornporn 5y ago
    https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/no-need-to-avoid-healthy-omega-6-fats https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/no-need-to... https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29610056/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29610056/
    • shaicoleman 5y ago
      For me it's enough to look at the process of making vegetable oils (acid wash, oxidation caused by high temperatures, bleaching, deodorization, degumming, etc.) to conclude ultraprocessed oils are not healthy for you. https://youtu.be/rQmqVVmMB3k?t=988 https://youtu.be/rQmqVVmMB3k?t=988 From personal experience, my health significantly improved after replacing vegetable oils with butter, coconut and olive oil.
• globalise83 5y ago
  Seems from the article that soybean oil contributes to making people obese and unhappy.
  • criddell 5y ago
    Maybe. The study only looked at mice though.
    • hungryforcodes 5y ago
      And mice happiness might be hard to evaluate.
    • slothtrop 5y ago
      There are others. The skyrocketing rate of use of vegetable oils correlates quite highly with rate of obesity.
• Invictus0 5y ago
  I'm not obese. I have a family history of obesity. On the contrary, I am a bit underweight, and I have tried very hard to gain weight and have never managed to accomplish much. What are obese people eating that I'm not eating? What foods are high in soybean oil?
  • willchang 5y ago
    You can start with fried items from McDonald's: https://querysprout.com/what-oil-does-mcdonalds-use/#:~:text=For%20some%20people%2C%20it%20may,of%20its%20main%20cooking%20oils.
  • gelert 5y ago
    Have you ever kept a log of the food you eat in a day? Admittedly I come at this from a very different perspective being obese, and having been much more obese in the past, but actively logging my food and retrospectively calculating calories gave me a much better sense of how much I was actually eating. When you've recorded some data on that it would be productive to calculate your basal metabolic rate, which are the calories your body uses on the daily (so any exercise adds on to that). Comparing those two figures might be productive. Of course there may be genetic factors going on but perception is so powerful it's the first thing I'd question
  • micromacrofoot 5y ago
    My experience with obese people in my family is that the most consistent theme is quantity. If you're eating 1,000 calorie meals and don't work out all the time you're going to be obese no matter what you're eating. Sugar and carbs definitely help pack the calories, but I've seen people eat 1,000 calorie salads.
• sosuke 5y ago
  TLDR; I spent way too long thinking about this in the short time I looked at it. I still want to post my rambling but at the same time take it all with a good dash of salt. That title though. Why does the UoC feel the need to use clickbait titles? I guess it becomes a mouthful when it is "America's most consumed cooking oil, which is soybean oil, causes genetic changes in the brain." But my first though is ... I've never bought soybean oil afaik. Is soybean oil vegetable oil? Because I buy vegetable oil. Ah clarification later in the post "Additionally, the team notes the findings only apply to soybean oil — not to other soy products or to other vegetable oils." The difficult part is that most of the things I consume that use soybean oil I don't have a choice in what oil they used. Sure I can not eat those chicken nuggets but the easier solution would be to change the manufacturing process to use something better right?
  • jderick 5y ago
    Yes, vegetable oil is typically soybean oil.
    • sosuke 5y ago
      I went to the kitchen just now. Damn. So vegetable oils OTHER than soybean oil is fine for mice.
      • pigeonhole123 5y ago
        Slightly less damaging. High heat processed oils are probably not great in general.
  • Klonoar 5y ago
    >"Additionally, the team notes the findings only apply to soybean oil — not to other soy products or to other vegetable oils." This was the bit I was honestly curious about. I've taken quite a liking to tofu recently and have been curious if too much is possible. I still eat a fairly balanced diet so I'm not too vexxed on it, but it's a good distinction here.
• ketanmaheshwari 5y ago
  Title should probably mention the article is talking about Soybean oil.
• ck2 5y ago
  Practically live on google scholar past two years, hope they never stop it. https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_vis=1&q=Sladek+Soybean https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_vis=1&q=Sladek+Soybean Two thoughts, be wary of academics with "specialties" until their work is reproduced and/or peer reviewed. Also people are not exactly rodents so they need to reproduce this in humans which is understandably far more difficult.
• atlantas 5y ago
  My understanding is that most of the oils we use are unhealthy. They are highly processed and inflammatory. The good oils are avocado oil, extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil. Is this correct?
  • andreilys 5y ago
    Yes afaik, although I’ve heard some ppl say that coconut oil has too much saturated fat making it not great for you. Avocado oil seems to be the best?
    • sydbarrett74 5y ago
      My research shows that coconut oil's benefits are chiefly as a topical treatment. As far as ingesting it, the benefits are minimal to nonexistent, and better derived from other sources.
      • andreilys 5y ago
        Yea I guess the chief benefit of using coconut oil is you’re not ingesting seed oils which seem to be quite harmful.
  • baby-yoda 5y ago
    avocado might not be so trustworthy, see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30105062 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30105062 ghee is a great alternative IMO.
    • ______-_-______ 5y ago
      Has anyone done the research to find a reputable olive oil brand?
      • exhilaration 5y ago
        Consumer Reports, from 10 years ago: https://imgur.com/a/ChyyFnw https://imgur.com/a/ChyyFnw Personally I only purchase California olive oil, I don't trust anything coming out of Europe due to the risk of adulteration. If you want a widely available brand: California Olive Ranch but look at the label carefully, you only want their 100% California olive oil.
• adamgordonbell 5y ago
  What products contain soybean oil? I use canola or olive oil, but not sure I've ever bought soybean oil. Is there any reason to think canola would be better?
  • whalesalad 5y ago
    No. Virtually all seed oils are terrible for you.
  • politician 5y ago
    Someone above said that it's usually marketed as "vegatable oil".
  • zach_garwood 5y ago
    "Vegetable oil" seems to usually be all or mostly soy bean oil. I believe margarine is also made largely from soy, as well.
  • 09bjb 5y ago
    Canola is a branding name to distract you from the fact that the oil is technically from the nearly un-marketable "rapeseed".
    • cameronh90 5y ago
      In the UK, we call it rapeseed oil.
    • SquareWheel 5y ago
      Canola is a genetic evolution of rapeseed. They are not the same thing.
      • undersuit 5y ago
        Meh, it's all just Rapeseed. No one considers Granny Smith apples to be a different species from Red Delicious cultivars.
• hirundo 5y ago
  I went all carnivore 15 months ago, and a side effect of that is the removal of all seed oils from the diet. The results include complete remission of my diabetes and associated fatigue and brain fog, the loss of more than 60 excess pounds, greater joy of life and emotional stability, and a new, regular desire to exercise and move my body. I don't know how much of that is about cutting out seed oils. I am getting large amounts of butter and tallow in my diet.
  • udbhavs 5y ago
    Did you cut out carbs as well?
    • timbit42 5y ago
      Likely since carnivore means all meat.
  • gruez 5y ago
    >I went all carnivore 15 months ago, and a side effect of that is the removal of all seed oils from the diet. The results include complete remission of my diabetes [...] It's equally plausible that all the effects stemmed from removing carbs.
  • fswd 5y ago
    I've been eating beef tallow past three weeks. Not strictly carnivore, but using the broth and oil from my cooking pots. Wow I feel great. The best part is that the beef tallow is free. I went to the butcher and asked for some fat trimmings, they laughed and asked me what for. To render tallow. I got a 5lb bag for free. Also I discovered I can use Rosemary in the fat, for flavor and memory improvement.
• KerryJones 5y ago
  Another related source of information is The Big Fat Surprise by Nina Teicholz, Erin Bennett. It goes deep into pretty much every major nutritional study from 1950-2005 and shows a lot of how soybean and many other seed/vegetable oil was originally founded on poorly constructed studies and how there is likely much more harm from them. Highly recommended. It lines up well with this article.
• telchior 5y ago
  Taking account that this is unproven in humans -- it's enough for me to avoid soybean oil, as cooking oil choice is not very important for my palate. That said, which oils would you use for frying and baking? Most high smoke point oils are, like soybean, polyunsaturated, so I'd guess that they could have some of the same (proposed) negative effects. Bonus points if the alternative is widely available (I see potential options like avocado oil and ghee, which may not be in my local stores). Edit: To clarify, the following oils are ALSO very high in PUFAs and thus might have similar issues to soybean oil: grapeseed, safflower, sunflower, corn, walnut, cottonseed. Somewhat lower but still fairly high in PUFAs: sesame, canola, peanut. Finally, some oils are low in PUFAs but not suitable for the same uses as soybean oil. Olive oil is one of these.
  • withinboredom 5y ago
    Humanity has been using Olive Oil for at least 1000 years. So that seems pretty safe to me.
    • gruez 5y ago
      Humanity has also been drinking alcohol for thousands more, doesn't mean it's safe.
      • lkxijlewlf 5y ago
        Used to be safer than the water. Some places here in the US, it may still be.
      • withinboredom 5y ago
        Alcohol is certainly safe, just not while operating machinery or so much that it poisons you. These are pretty much modern problems. Back in the day, it was safer to drink alcoholic beverages than water. Alcohol wasn’t as strong back then, or use industrial methods so this is like comparing apples to apple juice.
      • jazzyjackson 5y ago
        fwiw while fermentation is at least as old as farming, distillation into liquor only came about in the renaissance. you have to get really competetive to overdose on beer.
• toss1 5y ago
  Result of designing the food supply chain for manufacturer convenience and profit, instead of health of the people. Yeah, but it's the "free market" so we're all supposed to cheer at new products and boo at regulations.
  • daze42 5y ago
    The whole point of the free market is choice so that when people realize that certain things are unhealthy, they are able to switch to something else. Also, we aren't exactly in a free market at the moment: https://farm.ewg.org/progdetail.php?fips=00000&progcode=soybean https://farm.ewg.org/progdetail.php?fips=00000&progcode=soyb...
  • collegeburner 5y ago
    It's the government that wrote the current food pyramid and teaches it to people in schools.
    • toss1 5y ago
      And you believe that this was done with no influence from the corporate producers?
• dinero_rojo 5y ago
  I kinda doubt there's a ton of overlap between "right wing" twitter and HN, but there's been a decent amount of hate on seed oils (especially soybean oil) over there lately. Here's one of the bigger accounts promoting it in case anyone here'd wanna glance at what those people might be saying: https://twitter.com/SeedOilDsrspctr https://twitter.com/SeedOilDsrspctr
  • exhilaration 5y ago
    Oh wow, they're using Pepe the Frog: https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2016/09/28/pepe-joins-echoes-new-hate-symbols https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2016/09/28/pepe-joins-ec...
  • lanfeust6 5y ago
    You mentioned right wing. I suspect it would be owing to the politicization of meat consumption and advocacy for the carnivore diet.
    • dinero_rojo 5y ago
      Now that you mention it, I don’t remember ever really hearing about this stuff before the “meat is a treat” thing started going around. So you’re probably correct about that to some degree.
• shadowgovt 5y ago
  > In all likelihood, it is not healthy for humans. I'm sure their mouse studies are showing them something, but this is the kind of bold claim that wants to be tested anthropologically as much as bio-pharmacologically. China is the leading consumer of soybean oil. It's been a dietary staple since the 11th century. Any claim it's generally unhealthy has to reconcile with the fact that it's been used for 1000+ years. Perhaps one could claim "not optimally healthy," but it's not a novel chemical.
  • slothtrop 5y ago
    In aggregate it has, but the processing and quality of the oil has certainly changed. Notwithstanding, there has been a steep increase in total consumption of vegetable oil since the mid 20th century, owing to boxed / processed products. It's possible that the primary issue is oil consumption is not as moderate as it was.
    • adrian_b 5y ago
      Yes, the fact that the Chinese have been using soybean oil for one thousand years may be completely irrelevant for the properties of the soybean oil produced today. Until last century, the oil was produced by pressing. Now it is produced by solvent extraction, which extracts much more oil, but it may also extract other substances, which were not extracted by pressing. The research commented here has shown that not the actual fat from soybean oil causes problems, but another unidentified component. It is quite possible that the dangerous soybean oil component is something that is present only in the modern soybean oil, obtained by solvent extraction.
      • slothtrop 5y ago
        That makes me wonder if pressed soybean oil is available. I'll have to look for it.
• rob74 5y ago
  Interestingly enough, soybean oil is virtually non-existent over here in Germany - at least not as oil that you can buy (here the dominant ones are canola, good ol' sunflower and olive - the latter not for frying though), and I also haven't heard of it as an ingredient in industrial foods, but I wouldn't vouch for that.
  • Pyramus 5y ago
    It's a very German thing to not use olive oil for frying. It took me by surprise when living abroad, and to realise it's a common frying oil in Mediterranean countries but also in the UK.
    • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
      Economics, probably -- sunflowers and canola grow more easily. Olive oil is a nice pan-frying oil, it's what I use. Linguistic thing: When Americans talk about oil for frying, in my experience, they are a fair bit more likely than us to specifically mean deep frying, for which olive oil is no use. Way more of a deep-frying culture, from several different influences. American cooks are slightly more likely (than the Brits at least) to use the term "broiling" for shallow/pan-frying. Unusual word here.
      • ryeights 5y ago
        “Broiling” would refer to using the broiler on one’s oven, I’ve never heard that term used to describe pan-frying. Terms I have heard are sautéed and seared
        • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
          The main difference is the direction of the heat though. Top down rather than stove top. More or less the same deal otherwise. "Seared" and "sautéed" we do use! It's just we also use "frying" for that, and "frying pan".
        • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
• sinuhe69 5y ago
  Because the 3 most consumed oils are soybean, corn and canola oils, I wonder why didn’t they study the 3 oils at once. The effects, if any will be easily visible through differences.
• Bedon292 5y ago
  I should not be surprised that soybean oil is the most widely consumed oil, but I had not actually realized it. I had to look it up; It is in margarine, mayonnaise, and most vegetable oils. And I just had not payed that close of attention.
• JPKab 5y ago
  This stuff should be banned outright. Fatty liver is a big deal. Insulin resistance is as well. Both lead to high blood pressure, heart disease, and Type II diabetes. The impacts on our health care system from these conditions dwarf anything else. It should be noted that these conditions, along with obesity dramatically increased the death/hospitalization rate for COVID.
• a_c 5y ago
  It all started with ancel keys' https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancel_Keys https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancel_Keys suggestion that cholesterol and animal fat are bad to human. Whole industry started because of this claim, plant based cooking oil, margarine, trans fat. Each targeted in replacing one aspect of animal oil. Each are later found to be (more) harmful than animal fat. I would recommend the book big fat surprise https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16130316-the-big-fat-surprise https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16130316-the-big-fat-sur... if anyone is interested in learning how the oil industry evolved
• cm2012 5y ago
  This lines up with that big research paper that came out last year saying the obesity epidemic almost certainly has an environmental cause beyond pure calories available, based on water table data, etc.
• Flankk 5y ago
  > January 23, 2020
• imwillofficial 5y ago
  This is wild, but also would explain a lot of the obesity issues in the west.
  • 30367286 5y ago
    We already have explanations for the obesity issues in the west. It's tempting to look for "the one thing," but the story is far more interesting than that: https://www.publichealth.org/public-awareness/obesity/ https://www.publichealth.org/public-awareness/obesity/
• JohnJamesRambo 5y ago
  I used to eat sardines every day trying to get the health benefits of fatty fish. They were packed in soybean oil. I drank the oil too. With time I began to have bizarre mental issues that I finally tracked down to the sardines. Sardines packed in olive oil don’t cause this issue. That’s my anecdata to share.
  • hashimotonomora 5y ago
    Care explaining what bizarre mental issues?
    • JohnJamesRambo 5y ago
      I guess it would best be described as enhancement of repetitive, obsessive thoughts and just in general not feeling good and even angry for the rest of the day after eating them. It was a really weird time.
      • digitalsushi 5y ago
        I have the same thing. It took me ten years to rule things out. Plain as day, if I have soy oil, I will go a little wayward emotionally, mentally, and if I have enough, also noticeable skin issues - canker sores, flaking skin, scalp pimples, and random itchy patches I'll scratch to bleeding. Oh, and if I have enough, in a short amount of time, I can easily trigger a migraine. Sushi with soy oil, mayonnaise (soybean oil), and fried foods are all drifting away from me. I'm not allergic to soy - I went to an allergy doctor and did the little skin application test, and it's not a histamine reaction. So the term is "sensitive" - I'm "soy sensitive". If I eat 'clean' for 14 to 21 days, I get a clarity that compels me to continue avoiding it. I'm happy to connect with anyone (profile) that wants to swap notes on this - it's incredibly frustrating to figure out. Dealing with it, not so much. Almost all aspects improve with its avoidance.
        • ghastmaster 5y ago
          See my comment about the gallbladder please.
• WhompingWindows 5y ago
  This title is pretty click-baity in my opinion. Why doesn't the title contain the words "soybean oil"? It seems bizarre to use the words "most widely consumed cooking oil" without mentioning which one. And referring to changes in gene expression as "genetic changes" kind of fear-mongers, given most things we eat lead to "genetic changes" in our bodies...everything we eat is processed by proteins which are regulated by gene expression.
  • DoneWithAllThat 5y ago
    Because it’s clickbait! How can anyone not see that from the title alone? Even a cursory reading of it shows it to be ridiculous fearmongering nonsense.
• _aqmj 5y ago
  Ah! Finally an explanation :D
• jelliclesfarm 5y ago
  The three oils/fat I have been taught to use in my Indian kitchen are: sesame seed oil, ghee and coconut oil. Sesame seed oil because it has a high smoke point. Ditto with ghee. The choice of oils always has to do with smoke point and hence what we use it for in the kitchen. [..] Sesame oil is full of antioxidants. Along with vitamin E and phytosterols, it contains lignans, sesamol, and sesaminol. These compounds help fight free radicals in your body, which may reduce your risk of developing chronic diseases. Sesame oil has a balanced ratio of omega-3, omega-6, and omega-9 fatty acids.[..] And I am from the south of india which is very hot. In the northern climes where it gets colder, sesame seed oil is substituted with mustard seed oil. I don’t use olive oil for anything that requires heat. Mostly for salad dressings or drizzling etc. good olive oil..esp unrefined olive oil has very low smoke point. It’s actually harmful to use it for frying etc. Regionally where olive oil is more abundant, grape seed oil is used for high smoke point cooking. I am also fond of avacado oil these day. I still stick to the trinity of coconut/sesame/ghee…but I also need to test other oils for diff gigs.
  • 2Gkashmiri 5y ago
    we have decided to go with having mustard seeds pressed for oil while being physically present for the process. the result is a much much better oil than the one that comes packaged. they say its "plain unprocessed oil" but there is a significant difference between what we get in our press and what comes in a bottle.
  • znpy 5y ago
    > It’s actually harmful to use it for frying etc. Claims like this are BS. South italian here. People from south italy have traditionally produced and used olive oil pretty much exclusively and for pretty much everything. Frying stuff is a huge part of the tradition. No relevant problem ever found regarding that. On the contrary: the mediterranean diet is a well known healthy diet.
    • james-redwood 5y ago
      Tradition doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good. I agree though, olive oil may not be the best oil to fry with but I don’t think it’s harmful. If you’re cooking Indian cuisine it’s probably a bit of a waste though.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• dukeofdoom 5y ago
  What makes diet studies even more difficult is that you can have genetically identical twins, and they will react differently to diets only because of their gut bacteria. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xY0GKu-PM58 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xY0GKu-PM58
• scythe 5y ago
  I'm glad that this study was published -- it seems interesting -- but I hate the controls chosen. Coconut is a weird oil. It contains a lot of lauric acid, a fatty acid found in high amounts in coconut, palm kernel oil, and pretty much nothing else. You should also compare soybean to a normal oil, like olive oil, palm oil, duck fat, butter, lard, canola, or something else. Imagine you want to evaluate the effect of switching to [insert your favorite language here] on programmer productivity, so as a control language for comparison, you choose Haskell. Doesn't that sound just a little weird?
• verall 5y ago
  Soybean oil has less partially hydrogenated oils than other deodorized oils, making it potentially the healthiest of the deodorized oils. Obviously deodorized oils are not very healthy, but I honestly don't understand all the posts like "Eat only coconut oil/butter/lard". For the "appeal to science", there's plenty of data that diets very high in saturated fats is a risk factor for heart disease. For the "appeal to nature", ancient peoples did not have our modern access to animal fats, hunter gatherers ate a lot of seeds, nuts and bugs to fill out a diet that otherwise ate small lean game with occasional big fatty hunting successes.
  • freewinz 5y ago
    This comment comes off as extremely uninformed; there is far more chemistry involved in nutrition than the tiny factors you mentioned. Appealing to science could also be eating a higher saturated fat diet like in France where heart disease is lower than in the US. There is lots of science that is ignored by the ignorant and uninformed. Not to mention omega6 vs omega3; what you say is "appeal to nature" is actually appealing to science for some chemistry
    • verall 5y ago
      I really don't understand why calling me ignorant or uninformed is neccesary. I'm just bringing up some counterpoints - something else to consider, I'm not recommending a diet based on soybean oil or anything. I'm curious if you have any direct response to my points - do you know of any reasons that could make another deodorized oil a better option? I would really love to hear it, since I do recommend people that soybean oil is healthier than deodorized palm, canola, or peanut oil.
• mderazon 5y ago
  I consume a lot of Tahini (sesame seeds) Anyone has any idea about how healthy it is ?
• abeppu 5y ago
  > Used for fast food frying, added to packaged foods, and fed to livestock, soybean oil is by far the most widely produced and consumed edible oil in the U.S. Just in terms of the scope of the problem ... is there any evidence that these findings apply to humans eating products from livestock fed with soybean oil? If not, surely what matters in this context is not how much is "produced and consumed" but how much is consumed by humans?
• dustractor 5y ago
  Over the last 3 decades I've had the experience of working on and off in the restaurant industry so I've been able to observe what happens to my body and which type of health issues seemed to always disappear when I'm not working in a kitchen versus when I am, and I have narrowed it down to only the kitchens where there was soybean oil in the fryer that correlated with extreme sinus issues.
• artursapek 5y ago
  Follow https://twitter.com/SeedOilDsrspctr https://twitter.com/SeedOilDsrspctr to learn more!
• robwwilliams 5y ago
  Do not take this work seriously unless you are a male inbred mouse of the C57BL/6N persuasion. This is a classic N=1 study of one sex and one genome of mouse. As such this work is of almost no know relevance to other strains of mice, let alone to humanity. If you want an example of how mice dietary studies should be done then look to the National Institute on Aging and its Interventions Testing Program. They use both sexes and mice that are as genetically diverse as humanity. N-of-1 studies should be deprecated by journals and by NIH. Embrace diversity before making broad translational claims.
  • asdff 5y ago
    We use model systems because they are often in fact representative of the systems we are actually concerned about but cannot reliably measure like we could in a lab environment with an established model system. This does not mean the work is meritless.
    • robwwilliams 5y ago
      It is only meritorious as a pilot study to do the work properly. Would you consider an n of 1 study of a human a basis for commenting on dietary interventions? i hope not.
  • nomel 5y ago
    It's should be taken as a serious indication that further study is needed.
    • TaylorAlexander 5y ago
      Thank you. "Don't extrapolate to humans off of one mouse study." != "Don't take this seriously."
    • xracy 5y ago
      Then that should be the title of the article... If you want to be taken seriously for future studies, don't write a clickbait title off of a sample size of 1... The article as written is making strong claims about a population it doesn't define very well...
• voldacar 5y ago
  It's nice to see the anti seed oil discourse ramping up lately, but I'm sort of pessimistic about this. Like what is the endgame, exactly? Seed oils are in basically everything. Trying to avoid them is like trying to avoid endocrine disruptors by not touching plastic or eating anything that has touched plastic. It's sort of an absurd thing to even attempt, it would drive you insane.
  • trts 5y ago
    yes, they are difficult to cut out. Your options are everywhere very much narrowed. But In 90% of cases I've been able to find a satisfactory alternative. It is interesting how two simple rules (no seed oil, no corn syrup) almost entirely prevent you from putting terrible things in your body. It also repeatedly enforces a more mindful attitude towards diet. I experimented with removing seed oils for the past six months or so. Almost every year in the winter I get a lot of pain in my joints and especially where previous injuries have occurred. Halfway through this season I've had very little discomfort, and it has been a bad winter where I am. Recommend checking out this "How It's Made" segment on the process of making this stuff comestible (it involves bleach, very high temperatures and chemical refinement): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cfk2IXlZdbI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cfk2IXlZdbI
    • malloryerik 5y ago
      No corn syrup or seed oil sounds like a wise choice. What do you do about eating at restaurants? Just avoid dishes that are likely offenders? And soybeans themselves, as well as unfermented tofu, is OK?
      • trts 5y ago
        Whole foods, steamed or grilled vegetables, legumes, butter or olive oil, fish, eggs, or other protein that isn't fried. Fewer ingredients are generally better. Ingredients that have ingredients are worse.
  • scythe 5y ago
    >Like what is the endgame, exactly? A clear understanding of why these oils cause these problems would be a good start, methinks.
• champagnois 5y ago
  I remember writing soy is basically poison and definitely not a health food here on HN not long ago. People would be smart to wise up to this sooner rather than later. It is still an extremely unpopular stance because many are lead to believe that this dirt cheap source of protein is "okay".
  • unbalancedevh 5y ago
    There seems to be a lot of info that it's both great for you and terrible for you. This is probably a good case for when "all things in moderation" is a reasonable approach.
• errantmind 5y ago
  Eventually people will realize that the vast majority of the foods they buy at the store are: * Undernourishing: lacking historical nutritional value * Lopsided / Disproportionate: ingredients are wildly over/ under represented wrt 'nature', like extreme levels of PUFAs in products due to added seed oils * Addictive Filler: Added suger or other added sweeteners, added corn derivatives, etc The only way to really avoid this is to go to extremes. For me that means cooking all my own food and tracing as many of my ingredients back to their sources and vetting them. Just buying 'USDA Organic' isn't enough these days, I need to ensure the various farms are not contaminating their soil with pesticides / fertilizers, among other factors. What I'd really like to see, and this is a bit out there for HN, is a US certification for farmers practicing both USDA Organic and Korean Natural Farming (a somewhat radical organic approach to farming). I trust KNF with my health.
  • frankfrankfrank 5y ago
    What astonished me is that it has been shown that the vegetables and fruits of today, at least the commercially available ones, are substantially less nutritious than what was available in the past.
• johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
  I listened to a great CBC-produced story on all of the "propaganda" surrounding soybeans back in the 90s... there were stories floating around that it raised estrogen levels in men and made you grow man-boobs basically if you ate it. I remember my friends joking about it at the time. CBC wrote it off as completely without basis, said the chinese had been subsisting off of them for thousands of years, if they are fine eating it so should we be etc... It was a convincing argument... but then again Canada grows a huge amount of soybeans and CBC is always pro-government so what to believe? Perhaps there was some truth to the rumour?
  • stuckinhell 5y ago
    Probably, I know I distrust most of the food "science". When I stuck to "food" pyramid, I was the most unhealthy, overweight, and unhappy I've ever been. When I basically switched to high fat, high protein, and lowish carbs,I got healthier and more importantly my hormone profile went back to normal and I wasn't depressed anymore. It's astounding what lies the government pushes around food, and how damaging it can be to your life!
    • kayoone 5y ago
      The thing with food science is that not every human is the same and people react differently to different things. Some people may thrive on a high fat diet, other might tolerate or even need more carbs, it really depends and isn't black and white. Thats why it's important to look at the sample size of studies among other factors.
      • cgriswald 5y ago
        Is there some evidence that humans really react that differently all else being equal? Literally anything that can affect our bodies might be a confounding factor: sleep; water intake; type, frequency, duration, and difficulty of exercise; sunlight exposure; climate (average temperature, humidity, temperature swings, atmospheric salinity); elevation; latitude, etc...
• marricks 5y ago
  I used to be so pro-science, but the more you follow it the more you see the stumbles (Folic acid causes cancer, but doesn't stop it) and just how much studies are funded by big corporations and can be easily killed if results start turning out unfavorably. Older I get the more hippy-dippy I feel about food. We should probably have simple food, vegetables and grains, as our main staples. That's what people used to mostly eat and people that do eat that are healthier. The next big scare about this or that oil, or tofu (which is a staple in many populations which are healthier than the US), come and go. And if they ever get contradicted you won't ever hear it.
• epolanski 5y ago
  As a former chemist researcher I would like to point out: studies on mice do not imply the same consequences in humans.
  • timbit42 5y ago
• csours 5y ago
  Published Study Link: https://academic.oup.com/endo/article/161/2/bqz044/5698148?login=false#233371809 https://academic.oup.com/endo/article/161/2/bqz044/5698148?l... Skip to methods for the good stuff. I wonder if it would be possible to add a feature to HN whereby you could have a secondary, important link. I know on some occasions the original link is replaced with a better one.
• xapata 5y ago
  > Additionally, the team notes the findings only apply to soybean oil — not to other soy products or to other vegetable oils. That's odd.
• yoloyoloyoloa 5y ago
  If this study were to be taken seriously then I would want to know if there is a link between soybean oil and narcolepsy.
• mderazon 5y ago
  And yet, American heart association "wholeheartedly" recommends these oils: https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-eating/eat-smart/fats/polyunsaturated-fats https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-eating/eat-s...
• Tucanix 5y ago
  Gene expression changes are very common with food. What you eat commonly changes gene expression, this is why inherited traits are not very relevant to your health. What diet you inherit is much more important. If you have a family history of a certain illness it's most likely that your diet is what is expressing those genes and not your inherited traits. This also means if you change your diet you can plot whole different disease and health outcomes. Most people are going to assume this article is bad news because they don't understand this fact, that makes this article pretty suspicious (without having read it) in my mind. Industry propaganda "science" isn't uncommon, a few years ago a big set of papers were published that were basically made up evidence that were completely bogus that was written by a pro-industry lobby, the reason was because of a pro plant based diet health related documentary that came out at the same time. It's a tactic of sewing doubt in peoples minds, if people have doubt they wont change their behavior or oppinion for the better. I'm gonna read this article later and I hope it's not propaganda..
• nurettin 5y ago
  So it's the oil.
• type0 5y ago
  At last, now we know what genetic changes are responsible for proliferation of soydevs /s