Live data from Hacker News

Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

ucsf.edu

231–240 of 537 posts

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#231
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>That is what I came to believe as well. If sugar alone was the problem, vegans would be fat. If fat alone was the problem, ketogenic and carnivore diets wouldn't help people lose weight. This logic is faulty because both vegans and keto/carnivore people are selected for adherence to diets. If you can stick to either dietary restrictions, you can probably also not pig out on pop tarts or whatever.

That is incorrect, actually. I find it relatively easy to adhere to keto diet. But the moment I try to introduce more "diverse" foods, I gain weight. Because processed food diet is IMPOSSIBLE to adhere to without gaining weight. Caloric restriction simply doesn't work - your body wants nutrients, not just calories. Which is to say, your willpower will fail sooner or later, unless you find a way of satisfying nutritio…

>That is incorrect, actually. I find it relatively easy to adhere to keto diet. But the moment I try to introduce more "diverse" foods, I gain weight.

Keto diets might be easier to stick to than calorie counting or whatever, but the fact that you bothered with a diet at all means you're selecting for people who care about their health.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#232
post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US FDA requires that schools not serve whole milk or any products containing normal and natural saturated fats, and instead serve “low fat” versions which literally remove the fats and replace them with sugar. You say nobody is doing this, but all the subsidized meals for my kids do this.

Skim/lowfat milk just... takes the cream out. The same rule changes tightened the rules on added sugar.

Taking the cream out is (by some diet theories) bad. The fat in whole milk slows down the absorption of lactose, leading to a slower rise in blood glucose compared to skim milk. Whole milk is more satiating as well, because of the fat.

If you are trying to have some reasonable balance of fat, protein, and carbs in your diet, pushing kids from whole to skim milk is going to move the diet towards consuming more sugar/carbs, even if you have a seperate rule trying to tighten sugar consumption.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you do the opposite of whatever Kennedy recommends, you probably wouldn’t be too far off doing the right thing.

Eating nothing but processed foods, sugar, and heavily processed grains? That sounds like the opposite of what Kennedy recommends, which is a recipe for obesity and type 2 diabetes. He’s got his problems, many of them, but eating real food without a bunch of processing seems like a fairly common sense thing.

Is this with or without the increase in saturated fat he recommends? Or more red meat?

Health policy decisions would ideally be based on some sort of evidence, not the quackery he spouts.

Yes, some of his changes are an improvement. Most aren’t.

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5675784-kennedy-satura... https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rfk-jr-upsets-foo...

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll find many people claiming almost the exact opposite, just as confidently. Plant fats are generally seen as much healthier, especially olive oil and similar fats. This idea that the combination of macronutrients that a food contains also seems highly suspect - generally people tend to think that macronutrients work independently of each other. The reality is, of course, that we just don't know. Nutrition "scien…

"generally people tend to think that macronutrients work independently of each other" Well, that is obviously the wrong idea. Even basic logic speaks against it: people lose weight on keto diet, people lose weight on vegan diet... so neither protein, fat nor carbs can be causing obesity. But what do foods that we know are obesogenic have in common? 1) They are highly processed and/or 2) they combine fats and carbs in…

The big question with such foods is are they worse for you just in and of themselves, or do they tend to promote obesity through inducing people to eat more? For the most part, research seems to suggest that as far as weight gain is concerned, calorie is a calorie (whether from fat, carbs, or protein), but some foods seem to induce people to eat more in general, compared to others. (highly processed and high-sugar food seeming to be some of the worst in this regard, but it's not clear exactly what it is about highly processed food that promotes this).

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#235
post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Skim/lowfat milk just... takes the cream out. The same rule changes tightened the rules on added sugar.

Taking the cream out is (by some diet theories) bad. The fat in whole milk slows down the absorption of lactose, leading to a slower rise in blood glucose compared to skim milk. Whole milk is more satiating as well, because of the fat. If you are trying to have some reasonable balance of fat, protein, and carbs in your diet, pushing kids from whole to skim milk is going to move the diet towards consuming more sugar/c…

None of that makes "remove the fats and replace them with sugar" in the post upthread accurate.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#236

Here’s a gift link to a NYT article that was posted a few minutes ago: Kennedy Flips Food Pyramid to Emphasize Red Meat and Whole Milk https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/well/rfk-jr-food-pyramid-...

The food pyramid was published by the department of agriculture, it’s always been propaganda.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll find many people claiming almost the exact opposite, just as confidently. Plant fats are generally seen as much healthier, especially olive oil and similar fats. This idea that the combination of macronutrients that a food contains also seems highly suspect - generally people tend to think that macronutrients work independently of each other. The reality is, of course, that we just don't know. Nutrition "scien…

"generally people tend to think that macronutrients work independently of each other" Well, that is obviously the wrong idea. Even basic logic speaks against it: people lose weight on keto diet, people lose weight on vegan diet... so neither protein, fat nor carbs can be causing obesity. But what do foods that we know are obesogenic have in common? 1) They are highly processed and/or 2) they combine fats and carbs in…

People lose weight, temporarily, on all sorts of diets, restricted or not. It is the nature of specific diets that they tend to reduce appetite, and simply following a diet tends to reduce snacking - by virtue of selection bias, mostly (that is, people who are successfully following a diet are by definition people who aren't overeating).

Very traditional diets also tended to include lots of foods that are both highly processed and contain both sugars and fats, like cheese or sweet nut cakes. Paleo diets are a modern invention, and have little in common with the concept of what our ancestors ate. They often have deeply anachronistic ideas, like favoring raw foods, when the use of fire has been a core part of our ancestors consumption since way before Homo Sapiens existed.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#238

It seems one should not always "trust the science"

[flagged]

Science isn't always "science". If it's not clear by now it never will be that there is a massive amount of fraud in the "scientific" community as a whole.

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the greatest travesty of modern science is that fraud is not illegal. in every other industry that i can imagine, purposely committing fraud has been made illegal. this is not the case in modern science, and in my opinion the primary driver of things like the replication crisis and the root of all the other problems plaguing academia at the moment.

It's not legal, but intentional misconduct can be tough to prove. https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/professor-charged-op... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Poehlman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Reuben > in every other industry that i can imagine Our own industry (tech) is rife with unpunished fraud.

> intentional misconduct can be tough to prove

It's hard to prove when it isn't investigated. How many of the debunked psychology professors took federal funding? How many have been criminally investigated?

Re: Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)

#240

The new dietary guidelines are much more sensible IMO, compared to the food pyramid or MyPlate. https://cdn.realfood.gov/DGA.pdf

> To Make America Healthy Again, we must return to the basics. Who knows, these guidelines might indeed be sensible, but anything labeled “Make America Healthy Again” has no scientific credibility.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN