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Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

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Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#111

Post by DanBC »

baby wrote: post #103

I love what Soylent is doing, I have wished for such a meal replacer all my life. I've drank something like 40 bottles of Soylent (which are, so far presumably safe) and they have helped me replace a lot of fast food. Never had problems with them until I started getting nauseous and now I can't drink it anymore. With all these news about people getting sick, I feel a bit silly having beta tested stuff with my own bod…

> I have wished for such a meal replacer all my life.

why aren't any of the very many other products that have existed for years been good enough?

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#112

Post by insaneirish »

jobu wrote: post #12
arkitaip wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's hilarious and scary. Can you imagine the reactions if any other (non Valley?) food business had this approach to food safety?

Really doesn't seem like a huge deal to me. People are complex and sometimes have allergies or reactions to foods that they don't even know or understand. A neighbor of mine has an allergy to MSG and it took him years to realize it. He's still does trial-and-error on new foods to determine which ones contain MSG as part of their "natural flavors" (sometimes with painful results). The difference here is that Soylent i…

> A neighbor of mine has an allergy to MSG and it took him years to realize it.

I'd really like to see him take a double blind test to see if it's actually true. Saying you have an allergy to monosodium glutamate is a lot closer to saying you have an allergy to monosodium chloride (i.e. table salt) than it is to an actual food allergy.

You need glutamate to live [1].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glutamate_(neurotransmitter)

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#113

Post by baby »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #71
Xisiqomelir wrote: post #19

I'm still amazed people pay for this shit when fully-regulated formulated meal replacements have been around for years.

I ask this in every thread when it's brought up and almost never get a real answer. Are there any examples of drinks with a flavorless (or very mild) option, that don't focus on imbalanced amounts of protein and body-building? I like Soylent because it's relatively cheap (if I was just going for cost effectiveness, nothing beats bulk-buying beans and rice), I don't get sick of the taste after having it 3 times in a r…

Queal, Joylent, Jake, ...

I've tried Queal myself and was given a "bad batch" that was making me nauseous. But I forced myself to drink it until a friend told me he received an email from them about the problem (they never contacted me). I complained and got a whole new batch and the taste was completely different, not making me nauseous anymore.

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#114

Post by _23sd »

DINKDINK wrote: post #33
glenda wrote: post #4

Sounds like they have a bug in their "food stack" and this modification is like printf debugging - if no one gets sick then it was the algae, otherwise they will need to continue poking around to figure out what's wrong. What a silly game to play when people's health is at stake.

> if no one gets sick then it was the algae, otherwise they will need to continue poking around to figure out what's wrong. Chemistry and biology doesn't work like this. This is excessively simplistic/reductive. Food is a concoction of elements of chemical composition (naturally and/or synthetically produced). The reaction of one chemicals is _dependent_ on all of the other chemicals present and the quantities of the…

Can you give any examples of reactions between food ingredients making people sick? The usual reasons that foods make people sick are quite specific to an ingredient: digestive issues usually stem from inability to digest a particular sugar, and allergies arise from food-specific antigens. Neither is created or modified when you mix two foods together, or digest one in the presence of the other.

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#115

Post by ConceptJunkie »

freehunter wrote: post #104
conjectures wrote: post #94

Algae? Yeah right. Soylent green is made of people. Seriously though, how can a food supplement (sorry, meal replacement) company expect to prosper with a brand based on a sci-fi movie about cannibalism?

You feel that way because you're on the Internet. I've never seen the movie, it was way before my time, and it exists in the tiniest amount of public consciousness today. The only reason I know what Soylent Green even means is because people on the Internet reference it occasionally. I've talked to quite a few people about Soylent and I've said "you know, like the movie" and most of the time they have no idea what I'…

Besides, it's not called "Soylent Green". Green was the cause of the shock twist in the movie, but there was also Soylent Red and Soylent Yellow in the movie, which were pretty much what Soylent, the product, is trying to become.

The name is appropriate in the context of the movie, although I would have never chosen it.

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#116

Post by [deleted] »

istorical wrote: post #68
Xisiqomelir wrote: post #19

I'm still amazed people pay for this shit when fully-regulated formulated meal replacements have been around for years.

Maybe it's because you're entirely uninformed about the specific ingredients and macronutrient ratios of new products like Soylent vs old school meal replacements. But enjoy your high fructose corn syrup slop Ensure / Jevity.

[deleted]

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#117

Post by tptacek »

pstuart wrote: post #108
glenda wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do stop going to a restaurant once I or someone I know has gotten sick there. Look at Chipotle for instance, they are dealing with similar contamination related problems.

And they've taken active steps to prevent it happening again.

Look at the graph of CMG compared to MCD or DPZ to see how convinced the market is by this. The Chipotle contamination incident was devastating.

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#119

Post by dforrestwilson1 »

pstuart wrote: post #108
glenda wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do stop going to a restaurant once I or someone I know has gotten sick there. Look at Chipotle for instance, they are dealing with similar contamination related problems.

And they've taken active steps to prevent it happening again.

And yet, they are still struggling to fix their reputation and get customers back in the door.

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=http://www.forbe...

Re: Soylent Thinks It Found What Was Making People Sick: Algae

#120

Post by _23sd »

DanBC wrote: post #111
baby wrote: post #103

I love what Soylent is doing, I have wished for such a meal replacer all my life. I've drank something like 40 bottles of Soylent (which are, so far presumably safe) and they have helped me replace a lot of fast food. Never had problems with them until I started getting nauseous and now I can't drink it anymore. With all these news about people getting sick, I feel a bit silly having beta tested stuff with my own bod…

> I have wished for such a meal replacer all my life. why aren't any of the very many other products that have existed for years been good enough?

What products would those be? Most meal replacement shakes marketed in the US are for people trying to lose weight, so they have far less calories and fat than a meal for people just trying to eat healthy.
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