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The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

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Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#11

Post by snarf21 »

spidersouris wrote: post #3

Eggs could easily be replaced with salt. Consuming too much salt (more than 2g a day) is heavily discouraged by some because it is said to increase the risks of cardiovascular diseases as well as increase blood pressure to a dangerous level, but others repudiate these claims and assert they are untrue, and that salt has positive health benefits above this limit. Even if we take a group of people, put them in a closed…

Agreed. The thing that irritates me so much in all these studies is how they conflate correlation and causation. Studies to truly isolate just one ingredient would be both time and cost prohibitive. We are better served by just eating as varied and unprocessed a diet as possible.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#12

Post by drdrey »

> Most experts recommend avoiding processed foods as much as possible and sticking with a Mediterranean-like diet because it makes intuitive sense. It is not too restrictive. It is heavy in fruits and vegetables. It has the right kinds of fats and some grains. It includes fish and generally lean proteins.

But that’s the point of the article, who’s to say what the right kind of fats are? Or if grains should be part of your diet, etc?

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#13

Post by faeyanpiraat »

spicymaki wrote: post #6

Industrial egg production is bad for the chickens, especially male chicks. I consume egg alternatives such as Just Egg and use alternatives (e.g. tapioca starch) for baking and no one notices.

Industrial anything production is bad for the thing.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#14

Post by the-dude »

Graffur wrote: post #10

I eat 3 eggs a day - I hadn't heard of that study that more than 2 would kill me! In general I aim for lots of protein, a good bit of fat and less carbs.. with a specific aim to avoid carbs from bread, fries, cakes, chips/crisps

IIRC in the 80s, the Dutch Nutrition board said max 1 egg a week. They just discovered Cholesterol or something.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#15

Post by faeyanpiraat »

sorenn111 wrote: post #4

I'm having deja vu. We had a top story on HN recently where either the article or the consensus of the comments was "you pretty much cannot believe any studies about food or nutrition."

The problem is that humans are incredibly complex and diverse, react to stuff in wildly different ways, and you cannot A/B test on the same individual, as you cannot reseg it to the same starting state, you cannot run two experiments on them, and you cannot get two completely matching people.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#16

Post by caeril »

spidersouris wrote: post #3

Eggs could easily be replaced with salt. Consuming too much salt (more than 2g a day) is heavily discouraged by some because it is said to increase the risks of cardiovascular diseases as well as increase blood pressure to a dangerous level, but others repudiate these claims and assert they are untrue, and that salt has positive health benefits above this limit. Even if we take a group of people, put them in a closed…

I think the issue with salt and eggs is that we talk of humans in the aggregate.

For eggs, there is some small percentage of the population that passes the cholesterol into actual high levels of serum LDL.

For salt, there is some small percentage of the population that reacts to high sodium levels with hypertension.

And these subsets of population studies skew the results to a degree that adversely affects the conclusions for the median case.

For most of us, dumping salt onto a plate filled with eggs is not only fine, but healthy.

Medicine deals in aggregates, averages, and statistical variation, which is to some degree useful. But it does precisely nothing to offer testing to tell you if you are in a reactive or nonreactive group to stimulus X, which would be extremely useful.

We do this with allergies - stick 50 different allergens on a grid pattern into your back to determine your precise reactivity. But with nutrition? Haha, go screw yourself, all humans are the same, eat your 14 servings of grains, regard bacon and eggs as poison, and we'll medicate you for your resultant metabolic syndrome.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#19

Post by Ensorceled »

nedludd wrote: post #8

"Dr. Mehmet Oz even touted it on his television show." Yeah, no.

I remember him initially being sort of balanced and reasonable then he started pushing supplements etc. Then a few years later, he started showing up in infomercials pushing all sorts of crap.

I liked his cookbook, I presume it was ghost written.

Re: The humble egg is an example of what’s wrong with nutrition studies (2019)

#20

Post by jtdev »

spicymaki wrote: post #6

Industrial egg production is bad for the chickens, especially male chicks. I consume egg alternatives such as Just Egg and use alternatives (e.g. tapioca starch) for baking and no one notices.

You can find locally raised free range eggs in almost any city/town in the Americas... Egg alternatives are nutritionally inferior to real eggs.
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