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For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

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81–90 of 106 posts

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#81
post #46

I love whole milk. Plain and simple. It's delicious. It's got a ton of good fat and protein in it. My entire family drinks it and always has. We're all of healthy weight (my brother and I are actually pretty skinny, although he has a bit of a gut now that he's 32, I'm still 25 and because of handstands and pull ups you can see my abs a bit). We also eat very healthy in general as a family. Lots of pasta with clam sau…

Sometimes genes are a good bit of it. In my family we have ~150lb people who eat endlessly, thousands of calories a day. 6 ft tall, thin as a rail. Many of them. So that's got to be genes.

Or, you know, behavioral things like activity patterns, which can be quite heavily influenced by culture even at the level of a family, without being genetic. Or gut flora, which, though there are good reasons that they can tend to be quite closely similar in families, are environmental rather than genetic.

"X seems particularly common in family" does not imply "X is genetic".

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#82
post #65
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree. The human body tells you when things are right or wrong. It is about the effects, not whether it is a new stimulus that caused those effects.

I used the sun example because a few years ago scientist had everyone avoiding the sun and now they have realised that sun exposure is important. Scientists literally have no idea what they are doing. Tans look good and the sun feels good. That is what guides me and it is a much more reliable source of knowledge than science.

>a few years ago scientist had everyone avoiding the sun

I'm somewhat doubtful of this claim. If anything scientists would have everyone avoid sunburn since skin cancer and cataracts.

Tans looking good are a recent phenomenon: A couple hundred years ago light skin was a sign of high status since you could afford to stay indoors instead of having to work in the fields, so light skin was deemed to be more beautiful: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_skin_color#Social_status...

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#83
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find humans to be pretty funny. Modern day humans no longer trust the instincts they have developed over millions of years and instead put their faith in shitty science and corporate marketing. They no longer trust themselves to know how long to stay in the sun, how many steps to take, or what kind of foods to eat.

>Modern day humans no longer trust the instincts they have developed over millions of years ... or what kind of foods to eat. Really? This is a naturalistic fallacy. It's out precisely our instincts that cause us to overeat. As has been pointed out our instincts haven't adapted to the abundance and availability of food seen today. In an environment where food is scarce it is evolutionary advantageous to ensure your b…

Yet humans have eyes and can see they are fat. They have the instinct to know what type of body looks healthy or unhealthy. Also every human knows that eating less food will reduce their weight. Whether we have the ability to change our habits is another question but is unrelated to my proposition.

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes genes are a good bit of it. In my family we have ~150lb people who eat endlessly, thousands of calories a day. 6 ft tall, thin as a rail. Many of them. So that's got to be genes.

Or, you know, behavioral things like activity patterns, which can be quite heavily influenced by culture even at the level of a family, without being genetic. Or gut flora, which, though there are good reasons that they can tend to be quite closely similar in families, are environmental rather than genetic. "X seems particularly common in family" does not imply "X is genetic".

Cool; thanks! Didn't consider all that. For us, activity isn't the factor. We were all pretty sedentary as kids. If gut flora is environmental, then that's a no-go since we span 5 states. So in our case, genes is the winner so far.

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#85
post #46

I love whole milk. Plain and simple. It's delicious. It's got a ton of good fat and protein in it. My entire family drinks it and always has. We're all of healthy weight (my brother and I are actually pretty skinny, although he has a bit of a gut now that he's 32, I'm still 25 and because of handstands and pull ups you can see my abs a bit). We also eat very healthy in general as a family. Lots of pasta with clam sau…

It's worth noting that a healthy weight accompanied by healthy exercise doesn't necessarily prevent heart disease. There's this perception that those at risk are overweight, and that isn't necessarily true. If you look at a country like the Philippines (and probably other similar countries) you'll see plenty of people at a healthy weight who live an active lifestyle that are at extremely high risk of heart disease. They appear healthy from the outside, but there's high rates of smoking and probably not the greatest dietary habits.

And, I don't mean to detract away from what you're saying. Eating a healthy balanced diet is the most important way to prevent heart disease.

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#86
post #65
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree. The human body tells you when things are right or wrong. It is about the effects, not whether it is a new stimulus that caused those effects.

I used the sun example because a few years ago scientist had everyone avoiding the sun and now they have realised that sun exposure is important. Scientists literally have no idea what they are doing. Tans look good and the sun feels good. That is what guides me and it is a much more reliable source of knowledge than science.

Err no. There were specific campaigns that said tans were unhealthy. You still seem to believe this and think that tanned skin only seems attractive due to cultural factors. Are you also going to say that big boobs are only attractive because of cultural factors?

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, you know, behavioral things like activity patterns, which can be quite heavily influenced by culture even at the level of a family, without being genetic. Or gut flora, which, though there are good reasons that they can tend to be quite closely similar in families, are environmental rather than genetic. "X seems particularly common in family" does not imply "X is genetic".

Cool; thanks! Didn't consider all that. For us, activity isn't the factor. We were all pretty sedentary as kids. If gut flora is environmental, then that's a no-go since we span 5 states. So in our case, genes is the winner so far.

> If gut flora is environmental, then that's a no-go since we span 5 states.

Its environmental, but one of the key environments for transferring them is mother-to-child, particularly at birth.

A lot of things that are environmental rather than genetic are shaped particularly strongly by the early (prenatal, perinatal, or early childhood) environment, which can confound efforts to intuit the degree to which a feature is genetic vs. environmental based on unstructured observations of the degree to which it seems to be associated with families.

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#88
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is only anecdotal but in Europe I never had trouble digesting milk. The milk they sell in the US makes me feel bloated. It also tastes differently. Obviously that's not a scientific study but for me it's good enough to conclude that something is different.

Sure, but why conclude that the relevant "something" that is different is homogenization?

I didn't conclude that. It seems the major difference is pasteurization and homogenization so I guess it's one of them or both.

I should add that my observations are mainly about fresh milk from a farm. But even the ultrapasteurized milk they sell in tetra paks is better digestible for me.

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#89
post #61
post #2

According to a front page article this week, milk contains a progenitor to NAD. There may be no causation, but it's an intriguing correlation.

NAD?

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/dec/20/anti-ageing-h...

Re: For decades, government steered millions away from whole milk. Was that wrong?

#90

Drinking the milk from another species designed to grow that species babies is wrong. Would you even drink human milk designed for human babies as a grown adult?

> Would you even drink human milk designed for human babies as a grown adult?

Well, no, but I wouldn't eat human muscle either... but I'll eat a cow's.

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