How the food lobby fights sugar regulation in the EU [pdf]

Post by refurb » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 3:47 PM UTC

dammitcoetzee wrote: post #113

clearlyclear wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm cutting past the corporation talk and going straight to the premise. It's one that we need to reject. The article starts off with the premise that we are currently suffering a health crisis. This is insane. It's an extreme, hyper-negative point of view. We live in the safest times in all of human history. If you're not living in a shanty town without running water and suffering from dysentery, you're doing pretty…

It's practically modern culture to be negative about everything. When there are two equally probable outcomes I've noticed that people tend to lavish on the negative one to exclusion and treat people with positive outlooks as annoying, chipper, ignorant, or immature. It's odd. My theory is that positivity requires some claim of responsibility over the outcome while negatively allows one to divorce themselves from it.

Post by aexaey » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 3:47 PM UTC

hippich wrote: post #134

bhouston wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accord to the movie Sugar Coated (on Netflix here in Canada) and Dr. Lustig there is no meaningful difference between HFCS and normal sugar -- they are equally quite bad for you. Switching from HFCS to cane sugar will achieve nothing I believe if you keep the sugar intake the same. What I believe happened is that at the same time HFCS came on the market there was also a larger push to put sugar into a lot of things i…

weight-wise sugar has only half of fructose, and fructose is main offender. So yes, too much sugar is bad, but if you compare gram to gram, fructose is worse.

Post by tomp » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 4:02 PM UTC

Kenji wrote: post #141

tomp wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, something that is solvable with smart regulation. E.g. some rules apply only for businesses with more than $100k turnover, or $1M or whatever. Alternatively, your customers need to sign a statement that they will pay out of pocket for any medical costs resulting from eating your sugar (similar to "sophisticated investors" and hedge funds). But then again, as I said above, I see business as a privilege, not a r…

Again, something that is solvable with smart regulation. But then again, as I said above, I see business as a privilege, not a right. Wow. Stop considering yourself a libertarian, seriously. This is authoritarian talk. All I see you arguing for is rules, and if somone points out their flaws, more and 'smarter' rules. This is the exact opposite of libertarianism.

Post by tim333 » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 4:13 PM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #21

This also shows the true evil of the TTP and TTIP trade deals: corporations can sue any government if their laws affect the corporation's profits. Pure evil. The article has the example of Mexico being sued for their protective laws.

Post by brudgers » Sat, Jul 30, 2016, 4:24 PM UTC

josinalvo wrote: post #145

brudgers wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Tobacco companies are not moral agents. Such a scenario might well involve individuals engaged in banal evil and because individuals are moral agents, that's where blame and praise may accrue. Anthropomorphizing a tobacco company muddies our thinking. A trade agreement is a document. The consequences of following the ideas in that document may be detrimental. But it is not a moral agent.

Your definition of moral agent is not very useful. For me, a moral agent is not one that can 'feel responsible', but one that I can affect, by changing my own behavior, when it does 'something bad'. The discussion of internal states is less useful. Also, the discussion of morality of people I can't affect is less useful.