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This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

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Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#181

Post by epmatsw »

baak wrote: post #113
zanny wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How else would you suggest he gets qualified to try something new? Because saying you need a masters in biology is short sighted like you can onyl develop the necessary skills in a singular environment. Reading is the most effective information transfer methodology we have besides hands on engagement learning, and I don't see many circumstances where you can get hands on experience brewing nutrient sludge.

Read the claims he's making on his blog and tell me they're not sensationalist. We're expected to believe he's become some sort of a super human because of a 900 calorie liquid synthetic diet that he invented with no formal training what-so-ever. http://robrhinehart.com/?p=298 Under Results -> Qualitative. And yes, reading is effective learning. I'll put it in perspective though: A biologist who dabbles in comp sci d…

The difference being that basic computer science algorithms are very very well studied and understood, while human nutrition is not at all. In your example, computer scientists would argue against the conclusion based on knowledge, while biologists are arguing against this based on not knowing what will happen and assuming (likely correctly) that the results will be harmful. It's a far less powerful position to be in.

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#182

Post by saidajigumi »

JPKab wrote: post #106
saidajigumi wrote: post #75

> a 24-year-old software engineer > ... > Soylent contains all of the nutritive components of a balanced diet What utter bollocks. We're (as in, scientists studying nutrition and how utterly wrong food industry has gotten that in the 20th and early 21st century) finally starting to get our collective heads around the benefits of whole foods vs. highly processed foods, and just how badly our bodies deal with the latte…

Agreed. You said it all. One fair point (in defense of the Scrawny Pale Guy Diet he is advocating) is that the food industry in general devotes a large majority of its funding to making foods that TASTE really really good. If that gets in the way of nutrition, taste wins every time. But you are correct in the fact that this is crazy. Hell, I drank and smoked a lot when I was 24, and still looked healthier than this g…

> If that gets in the way of nutrition, taste wins every time.

It's actually worse than that. A major current research thread is on the low-level mechanisms of "food reward" and the interaction of the brain and obesity. For example, Stephan Guyenet at the University of Washinton researches this area[1]. Even if nutrition is fine, hyper-palatable foods[2] can have a negative impact on health for a variety of reasons. In good part, they basically make it impossible to avoid overconsumption, but there are other implications being studied. Check out Guyenet's blog and twitter feed for references on this developing area. (N.B.: The work that Guyenet does and references isn't always the most accessible or easily interpretable in some cases. He's emphatically not a top source if you're just looking to learn a high level approach towards improving your diet.)

[1] example blog post: http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2013/02/food-reward-fr...

[2] The idea of "hyper-palatability" refers to engineered button-pressing of the human brain by modern processed foods and food ingredients. It doesn't mean "food that tastes good", of which there's a world's variety that this moniker doesn't apply to.

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#183

Post by VLM »

randomchars wrote: post #101
zck wrote: post #25

>Soylent contains all of the nutritive components of a balanced diet, but with just a third of the calories... This worries me. It's not a misquote, either. From his blog^0 : >...I get all the nutrition and energy I need with about 1/3 the calories the average American consumes... The average American consumes 2,757 calories^2 . There's a term called the Basal Metabolic Rate. It is the amount of calories your body ne…

His "What's In Soylet" [0] article provides a little insight. Carbohydrates (200g) 200 * 4 kcal = 800 kcal Protein (50g) 50 * 4 kcal = 200 kcal Fat (65g) 65 * 9 kcal = 585 kcal That's a total of 1585 calories. [0]: http://robrhinehart.com/?p=424

"That's a total of 1585 calories."

That fits with the reported claim of being 1/3 of an american diet. That also explains why he's the only person at walmart taller than he is wide.

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#184

Post by therandomguy »

I don't know how effective his particular recipe is, but this is a pretty important concept (and not a new one). He nails it when he says that eating is a social activity like going to the movies, but you might not want to do it 3 times a day. People are resisting it now because it doesn't sound "natural" but it will definitely be the new normal.

If we do end up developing a meal substitute it could also provide a solution to world hunger. I remember reading about a gel that is distributed to Africa in cans which was helping the food problem there (can't find it via Google now).

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#185

Post by criley »

Shorel wrote: post #164
criley wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't, I have a BS in Biology and these kind of disruptive ideas are exciting to me. After spending years studying biochemistry and nutrition, I realize that a lot of evidence is out there is crap. Nutrition isn't some old-guard field with a hundred years of solid decided science weighing it down. In my opinion it's like genetics, a fast moving, exciting field full of interesting ideas and disruptive possibility. Q…

The common wisdom of 100-150 years ago is not as bad as common wisdom from 1980. Anna Karenina, Part Two, chapter 19: "He had no need to be strict with himself, as he had very quickly been brought down to the required light weight; but still he had to avoid gaining flesh, and so he eschewed farinaceous and sweet dishes."

I can pull out quotes of Greek philosophers or Egyptians extolling the virtues of lifelong exercise and moderation in food... that's not quite the common wisdom I'm thinking of!

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#186

Post by acqq »

criley wrote: post #172
saidajigumi wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You sound like an industry-insider explaining why a new startup will fail. I certainly don't want to rain on some new visionary's parade, but I spend a lot of time tracking folks who I consider to be the real visionaries in this field. As in we are currently in the midst of the greatest revolution in human health of our lives, and this guy is running in the wrong direction. We're seeing astonishing results with die…

> "Extraordinary claims, extraordinary proof, or GTFO." > "I see this guy's protocol as nothing but poisonous in the long run." You place a burden of evidence on him that you yourself in this very post violated on a number of occasions. You CANNOT call his diet poisonous simply because you disagree with it. You admitted it yourself: > "Current research is showing that we are only just beginning to gain understanding…

Please read this to understand: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5370816

If nobody has a right nutrition model today(1), including exeprts doing this whole life, somebody who just read a few books has no chance to cover everything that has to be covered long term. Or in other words, don't you think that military with practically infinite funds wouldn't already use his drink or equivalent for all extreme circumstances, if something like that were enough?

(1) Because biology is darn complicated, like in "we still don't even know all the bacteria that live in our bodies." Not to mention organic chemistry 3-d effects like in http://folding.stanford.edu/

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#187

Post by VLM »

locopati wrote: post #11

Let's see how well he's doing after a year of living off the stuff. There's probably more complexity to food than breaking it up into vitamins, minerals, and calories.

"There's probably more complexity to food than breaking it up into vitamins, minerals, and calories."

A picture perfect display of modern belief in vitalism theory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitalism

A fairly stereotypical way to being an organic chemistry class is to start out with traditional vitalism and pivot into the historical first complete synthesis of urea, of all things...

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#188

Post by Jtsummers »

baak wrote: post #113
zanny wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How else would you suggest he gets qualified to try something new? Because saying you need a masters in biology is short sighted like you can onyl develop the necessary skills in a singular environment. Reading is the most effective information transfer methodology we have besides hands on engagement learning, and I don't see many circumstances where you can get hands on experience brewing nutrient sludge.

Read the claims he's making on his blog and tell me they're not sensationalist. We're expected to believe he's become some sort of a super human because of a 900 calorie liquid synthetic diet that he invented with no formal training what-so-ever. http://robrhinehart.com/?p=298 Under Results -> Qualitative. And yes, reading is effective learning. I'll put it in perspective though: A biologist who dabbles in comp sci d…

  But on day 3 I noticed my heart was racing and my energy 
  level was suddenly dropping. Hemoglobin! I think, my 
  heart is having trouble getting enough oxygen to all my 
  organs. I check my formula and realize iron is 
  completely absent.
That part strikes me as odd. I'm prone to iron deficient anemia, but a few fasting days doesn't cause any major issues for me. Something else was going on that day, or he has some other health issue. But yes, very sensationalized story telling.

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#189

Post by colept »

kafkaesque wrote: post #152

When consuming all vitamins and minerals together, some cancel each other out. I tried Googling some articles to back up what I'm saying. Unfortunately, there is nothing presented in a pretty pre-packaged form. So go with this. e.g.: CTRL + F "vitamin C supplements can destroy dietary vitamin B12" and "Potassium" here: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/926.html He may not be absorbing all the nutrie…

While I too have heard that nutrients absorb better when isolated, it makes me wonder if his body is going to adapt to the shakes and start absorbing the nutrients it needs first until saturated. While the reaction you mentioned above may happen, maybe the adaptation will absorb the specific nutrients and neutralize the already saturated nutrients.

Re: This Man Thinks He Never Has to Eat Again

#190

Post by DanBC »

saidajigumi wrote: post #157
criley wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound like an industry-insider explaining why a new startup will fail. "They're too young!" "They don't have the experience" "We've devoted our LIVES to figuring this out, one kid in his basement didn't do it in a few weeks!" Etc etc No offense but we've heard the exact same thing about every successful idea. And what's more: People look at the human GI totally wrong anyway. They think, what can I put in to get t…

> You sound like an industry-insider explaining why a new startup will fail. I certainly don't want to rain on some new visionary's parade, but I spend a lot of time tracking folks who I consider to be the real visionaries in this field. As in we are currently in the midst of the greatest revolution in human health of our lives, and this guy is running in the wrong direction. We're seeing astonishing results with die…

> Dr. Terry Wahls, "Minding Your Mitochondria":

She needs some reputation management, because at the moment there's a bunch of flags that make her sound less than reputable.

1) "Mitochondra" - unless this is a peer reviewed respected journal most people using htis word are cranks.

2) TEDx - Sadly, now tainted as home of cranks.

3) Cured MS through diet - ridiculous claim

etc etc.

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