4 ms·

This really seems like confusing science with science headlines in the newspaper.

FreezerburnV 12y ago
And yet, for a while now, the general "scientific consensus" has been "fat is bad for you", while recently it seems to be changing to "wait, fat isn't as terrible for you as we though, and could actually be quite healthy". I'm pretty sure the "fat is bad for you" stuff wasn't just science headlines in a newspaper for the past however many years. This is the main thing that he is talking about, where something makes into the mainline, including doctors telling people how to eat and live, and then suddenly people realize they had it all wrong and that what has been prescribed for years is actually very bad for you. Like cigarettes back in the day, (or even radiation and coke!) and fatty food now. EDIT: references for claims about cigarettes[0], radiation[1], and coke[2] being said as good for you (though I think I may have exaggerated about doctors recommending coke) [0] http://www.oddee.com/_media/imgs/articles/a171_c5.jpg http://www.oddee.com/_media/imgs/articles/a171_c5.jpg [1] http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/01/Radium_therapy_-_1913.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/01/Radium_therapy... [2] http://www.vrouwen.nl/files/0/0/1/2/00121242.jpg http://www.vrouwen.nl/files/0/0/1/2/00121242.jpg
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > And yet, for a while now, the general "scientific consensus" has been "fat is bad for you", No, it hasn't. The general scientific consensus may have been that most Americans are consuming fat in general, and certain varieties of fat in particular, at levels which are unhealthy, and therefore that most Americans would be better off reducing fat intake in general, and certain common varieties of fat intake in particular. It may be that many people have overgeneralized this scientific consensus into a popular misunderstanding of "fat = bad", but that, again, is mistaking popular view (and the mass marketing of "low fat" products) with scientific consensus.
  - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
    And this has been shown to be unproven, right? That was all over this forum a month ago - thousands of studies and no smoking gun. Fat isn't bad; obesity is bad.
    - matthewmacleod 12y ago
      And this has been shown to be unproven, right? I'm pretty sure that's not the case, and that there's a direct link between high saturated fat intake and cholesterol levels, for example.
    - dragonwriter 12y ago
      > And this has been shown to be unproven, right? On the specific issue of saturated fat and heart disease (saturated fat isn't the only problem fat -- trans fats are also an issue), its been shown to be more complicated than earlier thought; there's pretty strong evidence that certain high-saturated-fat foodstuffs are associated with higher risk of heart disease, but some large scale studies that seem to indicate that saturated fats overall do not appear to be (and there is some indication that certain saturated fats may actually be beneficial to an extent.)
      - jerf 12y ago
        But you've given away Scott's point. We've been listening to how bad saturated fat is for my entire lifetime pounded into the public with the maximum volume science has available to it at the highest governmental and science authority levels, and now, oops, mea culpa, it's more complicated than we thought, and right now it's not exactly out of the question that "saturated fat" will be entirely removed from the "bad thing" or even "consumed too much by Americans" column in another 10 to 20 years. No matter how upset you get about people being a bit glib about what the consensus said (and frankly I'm not sure I couldn't establish "science said saturated fat is bad, full stop" with just a bit more effort than I'm willing to put in right now), you can't get out of the fact that the pounding was apparently unjustified, and there's a nontrivial chance it was flat-out wrong. Science and scientists shouldn't expect to escape from those decades of being wrong at maximum volume and the corresponding vicious evils inflicted on the world (because after all the US consensus has been exported all over the world), and it would be utterly and completely irrational for me not to update my beliefs based on this evidence.
- jellicle 12y ago
  Do any of your links have anything to do with science, or just libertarian marketing? (Lie to people, take their money, and retire.)
- asynchronous13 12y ago
  I have a parent who was a dietician. I can tell you that for at least 35 years the scientific consensus has been that some fats are good for you. Every time a new fad diet rolled through the news headlines I would get a lecture about how stupid the new fad was and how to properly eat a healthy diet. If you believe the headlines, however, you'd never know that the science hasn't changed.
Tombone5 12y ago
Yeah, and for extra points using that same style of misleading headlines for his title. Would it really have been so bad to put a "nutritional" into the title to produce something related to the actual topic?

And yet, for a while now, the general "scientific consensus" has been "fat is bad for you", while recently it seems to be changing to "wait, fat isn't as terrible for you as we though, and could actually be quite healthy". I'm pretty sure the "fat is bad for you" stuff wasn't just science headlines in a newspaper for the past however many years. This is the main thing that he is talking about, where something makes into the mainline, including doctors telling people how to eat and live, and then suddenly people realize they had it all wrong and that what has been prescribed for years is actually very bad for you. Like cigarettes back in the day, (or even radiation and coke!) and fatty food now. EDIT: references for claims about cigarettes[0], radiation[1], and coke[2] being said as good for you (though I think I may have exaggerated about doctors recommending coke) [0] http://www.oddee.com/_media/imgs/articles/a171_c5.jpg http://www.oddee.com/_media/imgs/articles/a171_c5.jpg [1] http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/01/Radium_therapy_-_1913.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/01/Radium_therapy... [2] http://www.vrouwen.nl/files/0/0/1/2/00121242.jpg http://www.vrouwen.nl/files/0/0/1/2/00121242.jpg

dragonwriter 12y ago
> And yet, for a while now, the general "scientific consensus" has been "fat is bad for you", No, it hasn't. The general scientific consensus may have been that most Americans are consuming fat in general, and certain varieties of fat in particular, at levels which are unhealthy, and therefore that most Americans would be better off reducing fat intake in general, and certain common varieties of fat intake in particular. It may be that many people have overgeneralized this scientific consensus into a popular misunderstanding of "fat = bad", but that, again, is mistaking popular view (and the mass marketing of "low fat" products) with scientific consensus.
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  And this has been shown to be unproven, right? That was all over this forum a month ago - thousands of studies and no smoking gun. Fat isn't bad; obesity is bad.
  - matthewmacleod 12y ago
    And this has been shown to be unproven, right? I'm pretty sure that's not the case, and that there's a direct link between high saturated fat intake and cholesterol levels, for example.
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    > And this has been shown to be unproven, right? On the specific issue of saturated fat and heart disease (saturated fat isn't the only problem fat -- trans fats are also an issue), its been shown to be more complicated than earlier thought; there's pretty strong evidence that certain high-saturated-fat foodstuffs are associated with higher risk of heart disease, but some large scale studies that seem to indicate that saturated fats overall do not appear to be (and there is some indication that certain saturated fats may actually be beneficial to an extent.)
    - jerf 12y ago
      But you've given away Scott's point. We've been listening to how bad saturated fat is for my entire lifetime pounded into the public with the maximum volume science has available to it at the highest governmental and science authority levels, and now, oops, mea culpa, it's more complicated than we thought, and right now it's not exactly out of the question that "saturated fat" will be entirely removed from the "bad thing" or even "consumed too much by Americans" column in another 10 to 20 years. No matter how upset you get about people being a bit glib about what the consensus said (and frankly I'm not sure I couldn't establish "science said saturated fat is bad, full stop" with just a bit more effort than I'm willing to put in right now), you can't get out of the fact that the pounding was apparently unjustified, and there's a nontrivial chance it was flat-out wrong. Science and scientists shouldn't expect to escape from those decades of being wrong at maximum volume and the corresponding vicious evils inflicted on the world (because after all the US consensus has been exported all over the world), and it would be utterly and completely irrational for me not to update my beliefs based on this evidence.
jellicle 12y ago
Do any of your links have anything to do with science, or just libertarian marketing? (Lie to people, take their money, and retire.)
asynchronous13 12y ago
I have a parent who was a dietician. I can tell you that for at least 35 years the scientific consensus has been that some fats are good for you. Every time a new fad diet rolled through the news headlines I would get a lecture about how stupid the new fad was and how to properly eat a healthy diet. If you believe the headlines, however, you'd never know that the science hasn't changed.

Tombone5 12y ago

Yeah, and for extra points using that same style of misleading headlines for his title. Would it really have been so bad to put a "nutritional" into the title to produce something related to the actual topic?