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Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

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Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#141

Post by stephenbez »

marze wrote: post #84
alphaoverlord wrote: post #9

I'm all for people having the freedom to eat whatever they want and I really like the quantified self aspect of seeing how diet affects how they feel and metrics of health, but I have to say the author grossly does not understand the medical tests he had done and misinterprets the data. I'm not going to comment on the drink, but rather on his misunderstanding of medicine. First, EGFR is not "Epidermal Growth Factor R…

Nice job missing the forest but spotting a few trees. I see some promising initial signs given the short duration of the trial. Imagine if there was a new drug that gave the mental benefits the guy reported after two weeks of use and saved you money too. It would be front page news. The guy doesn't claim to be a medical expert, he just did his best to report the results of a bunch of miscellaneous tests that were sug…

From this NYTimes article (http://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/07/business/the-ever-fatter-b...): "The Government forced all liquid protein products off the market after they were implicated in 59 deaths."

The article doesn't give many details, but it looks like changes in diet can be dangerous.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#142

Post by samstave »

jacques_chester wrote: post #51
w1ntermute wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the best parts about this whole Soylent debacle is getting to watch well-known people make complete fools of themselves by commenting on things that they clearly know absolutely nothing about, but still feel like they have the right to make authoritative statements on.

Funnily enough, that's the whole pitch for Soylent. "I'm just a smart guy with a fresh pair of eyes who spent a few weekends reading undergrad textbooks and skimming pubmed". Not: "we're a large company with deeply-interested professionals who've made this their life's work, our own multi-million dollar labs and decades of accumulated experience in the development, testing, validation and manufacture of temporary foo…

While I have no ability to judge the veracity of the claims of Soylent.me -- let me tell you the only reason I am hopeful it works is for the same reason Jobs only wore black turtle-necks and jeans: simplicity.

I want to be able to take a good fuel for my body and indulge in great food whenever I want.

I want to be able to back-pack for a week with only a 4-pound food supply.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#143

Post by marze »

obstacle1 wrote: post #140
marze wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice job missing the forest but spotting a few trees. I see some promising initial signs given the short duration of the trial. Imagine if there was a new drug that gave the mental benefits the guy reported after two weeks of use and saved you money too. It would be front page news. The guy doesn't claim to be a medical expert, he just did his best to report the results of a bunch of miscellaneous tests that were sug…

>Imagine if there was a new drug that gave the mental benefits the guy reported after two weeks of use and saved you money too. I found this drug that makes me feel way relaxed and totally content with the world. I don't do anything while on the drug, 'cause life's great just sitting here on the couch. As a consequence of sitting on my couch enjoying my great life, I don't spend any money, so I'm totally saving compa…

"recommending we throw out any pretensions of objectivity or science or knowledge in favor of "do what you feel"."

Not so. Mental agility, weight, blood pressure are all easy and inexpensive to track.

A person's perception of how well they slept, overall feeling of well being, etc., can also be tracked if they are careful to quantify and record them.

I think you underestimate the power of carefully recorded data, which is at the core of the quantified self movement.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#144

Post by __--__ »

deathanatos wrote: post #79

Has anyone considered the cultural implications of something like this? Meals, to me, are not just about eating — they offer a valuable break in the day to interact with people. I'm not sure that'll be the same if we're all eating grey goo. (Just stick a needle in me then…) The meal can often be a source of conversation — at least, if it isn't the same thing, every day. I'm thinking co-workers, and going to lunch: wi…

they offer a valuable break in the day to interact with people.

I laughed when I read this. I'm an introvert, so meals offer me a valuable break in the day to NOT interact with people. :)

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#145

Post by obstacle1 »

jurassic wrote: post #59
cup wrote: post #6

Soylent aside, im amazed at how terrible his traditional normal days meal is? I mean hes eating a processed breakfast subsitute in the morning, take away mexican food with a soft drink for lunch and more take away for dinner. You don't need to be a nutritionist to know thats going to have a terrible impact on his life later down the track. Postnote: Now that Ive read the whole article, I wonder if all the benefits he…

What's the big deal? What this guy is eating already is definitely above average in quality. A Chipotle burrito bol (fresh whole ingredients, sans tortilla) is a legit meal. Other than dental impacts from the carbonation, health hysteria about diet soda and aspartame has been debunked. I don't know about the take-out Thai, but at least it's real food and not some preservative-laden packaged food product from the groc…

One burrito bowl can contain something like 75% of your daily sodium intake. The calorie:vitamin ratio is also terrible.

Go play around with their nutrition calculator [1]. It's fast food.

[1] - http://www.chipotle.com/en-us/menu/nutrition_calculator/nutr...

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#146

Post by ovoxo »

jurassic wrote: post #59
cup wrote: post #6

Soylent aside, im amazed at how terrible his traditional normal days meal is? I mean hes eating a processed breakfast subsitute in the morning, take away mexican food with a soft drink for lunch and more take away for dinner. You don't need to be a nutritionist to know thats going to have a terrible impact on his life later down the track. Postnote: Now that Ive read the whole article, I wonder if all the benefits he…

What's the big deal? What this guy is eating already is definitely above average in quality. A Chipotle burrito bol (fresh whole ingredients, sans tortilla) is a legit meal. Other than dental impacts from the carbonation, health hysteria about diet soda and aspartame has been debunked. I don't know about the take-out Thai, but at least it's real food and not some preservative-laden packaged food product from the groc…

"Not everybody has 5 hours a day or a stay-at-home wife to cook their Whole Foods organic produce into a masterpiece of nutrition." ... you sir must live in the same age that your username implies.

Also, your argument here is silly. This guy's diet is not "above average" in quality by any means and a Chipotle Burito Bol is not a "legit meal" based on what one would consider to be a healthy lifestyle. The amount of sodium alone in those things is enough to make me and some of your organs cringe - literally.

Go to the grocery store. Pick up some raw foods. Cook them on a Sunday night. Put them in the fridge. Pat yourself on the back. You've just managed to prep your lunch/dinner for the week and you did it all without having to find a stay-at-home wife.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#147

Post by SomeCallMeTim »

nonchalance wrote: post #119
marze wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Self experimentation might be useful, but only if you understand the metrics you measure and whether its stochastic noise or meaningful results." I feel you miss the whole point of self experimentation. If your aim is for improved mental function, more energy, less health problems, etc., you don't need to know how to interpret any obscure tests. You'll know. A low-risk food product (such as this) can simply be trial…

> If your aim is for improved mental function, more energy, less health problems, etc., you don't need to know how to interpret any obscure tests. You'll know. Perception is different from reality, as exemplified by an Apple anecdote: http://www.asktog.com/TOI/toi06KeyboardVMouse1.html We’ve done a cool $50 million of R & D on the Apple Human Interface. We discovered, among other things, two pertinent facts: - Test s…

>This contradiction between user-experience and reality apparently forms the basis for many user/developers’ belief that the keyboard is faster.

Interesting article. I'm sure the $50M in studies were of non-power users, though, and so irrelevant for developers with sufficiently powerful keyboard shortcuts.

I can guarantee it doesn't take me 2 seconds for my top 20 keyboard shortcuts, any more than it takes 2 seconds for me to hit "return" at the end of a line, or to move around with arrow keys. That said, I frequently use the mouse as well, and always prefer to work in a GUI instead of a text-mode editor.

What I found most revealing, though, was the admission that part of the problem was the awkward location of the command key. Whenever I'm on a Mac I end up remapping it so that I can hit Control (in the corner of the keyboard) -- Control-ZXCV are all easier to hit than Command-ZXCV.

Which just goes to prove that most studies are wrong [1], or at least can't always be generalized.

[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182327/

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#148

Post by jacques_chester »

nbouscal wrote: post #126
jacques_chester wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Soylent is a fantastic alternative. This is where you lose me. Extending my analogy, you're replacing sex thrice daily with anorgasmic sex, thrice daily. I'm not seeing the upside.

Not at all. Say, for example, that I'm replacing fast food. In that scenario Soylent costs less money, takes less time (don't have to go to the fast food place, less time actually eating), is almost certainly healthier, and won't make me feel like crap afterwards. At this point I can't think of any way to continue extending the sex analogy that doesn't get a bit too off-color.

Apart from being calorically dense and salty, fast food is still food. Ordinary food, even fast food, contains an abundance of complex nutrients, some of which are only poorly understood.

Companies with actual dietitians and biologists and millions of dollars and labs and decades of lead time haven't been able to create a total replacement for food. There are too many variations in what different people need, too many as-yet unknown conditionally-essential nutrients. That's why all the existing replacement formulae are marketed as being for temporary use only.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#149

Post by jacques_chester »

samstave wrote: post #142
jacques_chester wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funnily enough, that's the whole pitch for Soylent. "I'm just a smart guy with a fresh pair of eyes who spent a few weekends reading undergrad textbooks and skimming pubmed". Not: "we're a large company with deeply-interested professionals who've made this their life's work, our own multi-million dollar labs and decades of accumulated experience in the development, testing, validation and manufacture of temporary foo…

While I have no ability to judge the veracity of the claims of Soylent.me -- let me tell you the only reason I am hopeful it works is for the same reason Jobs only wore black turtle-necks and jeans: simplicity. I want to be able to take a good fuel for my body and indulge in great food whenever I want. I want to be able to back-pack for a week with only a 4-pound food supply.

> I want to be able to take a good fuel for my body and indulge in great food whenever I want.

Then eat some meat and some vegetables.

> I want to be able to back-pack for a week with only a 4-pound food supply.

Then take trail mix.

Re: Soylent: What Happened When I Stopped Eating For 2 Weeks

#150

Post by graeme »

icelancer wrote: post #133
graeme wrote: post #2

I just posted this to Tim's Blog: --------------------- It seems probable that soylent is better than much of the manufactured food on the market. It also seems unlikely that soylent is better than quality whole food. I take Nassim Taleb's approach. We don’t know what we don’t know about food. I’d like to address two of Shane’s points. I'm listing the objections Shane raises, then his reply: Shane's first point: Obje…

>One additional problem of soylent: the designers assume we need a steady inejection of the same macronutrients every time we eat. We know positively that this is false. Bodybuilders have long known that carbohydrates are more effective after a workout. As with increased protein after a workout. We don't "know" this. There is strong anecdotal evidence showing that it MIGHT be true. But Alan Aragon, Lyle McDonald, and…

You're right. I hesitated with that line, and should have said "we suspect" rather than we know.

Constant macronutrient ratios treat the body as a linear system. I doubt the body does best on a constant injection of the same nutrients. But I don't actually know that.

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