Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even freshly baked croissants were once an odd novelty.
I encourage you to research what a croissant is and then find and devour one. This comment makes me feel like you're missing out on that.
[deleted]
Soylent Month Three
81–90 of 207 posts
Re: Soylent Month Three
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indeed. To sum up some of the basic issues with his research so far: Sample size is 1. He's still eating, just much less often. Some nutrients are only required in very small amounts, which he may still be getting from his occasional meal. Three months is a very short time frame on which to evaluate a diet. Even something as simple and well-understood as scurvy can take three months to develop. In other words, he cou…
>Sample size is 1. No. He has a group of volunteers who are testing it with him, see the second post: http://robrhinehart.com/?p=474 Not to mention the community that's sprung up around it, on http://discourse.soylent.me and elsewhere
I haven't followed very closely because I don't really have interest in it (I like food, cooking, etc.) but I have to ask, if he's pushing this as a product after such low levels of reliability does he garner any liability should it prove to be damaging long term?
Re: Soylent Month Three
#83"surely we can make food that is tastier, cheaper, and more nutritious than anything that exists naturally." This premise assumes we understand, with no uncertainty, how the human body functions and utilizes nutrients. Since this is still a huge mystery to science (and much of what we "know" currently is just guesswork) any 100% simulated food diet will only prove to be "better" by a stroke of luck. We've seen his po…
> if he's created something that is truly capable of sustaining health for the lifetime of a person he should be rewarded Why? The world isn't short of food. Food is just poorly distributed, or contaminated, or with insufficient micronutrients. None of those problems are solved by this type of feed. Sometimes there's a need for crisis feeding of a population - during a famine or feeding lots of people in a evacuee ca…
"Reward" was the best term I could conjure up while writing. I'm not much of a word-smith. My thoughts are more of the idea that if he does this, and it is a great food replacement then he deserves any praise, fame or riches that come his way. He's taking a huge risk making himself the guinea pig for this experiment and if it pays off that's cool!
If I recall correctly though is motivation is that he's simply not a "food person". He has no interests in the finer parts of dining and sparking the palette of the human taste. I'm not one to judge him because I'm quite the opposite. But for people like him who's to say such a goal is wrong? Something simple, quick, and effective marketed well would be a huge success. I just don't want to see innocent people swept up in the moment and getting hurt.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, he's making something people want; I'm an existence proof, as are a few other commenters on this thread.
Will this be any different from Ensure or other meal replacement shakes but marketed differently? Is what he's doing any different from what's been done before?
I was looking into ensure after a few people mentioned it on this thread. Something ensure promotes is that it's good for in between meals but doesn't say outright that it is an entire meal replacement that I could see. I think the difference is Soylent is meant to be a complete diet replacement where Ensure is focused on being a supplement to your diet.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#85At the risk of stating the obvious - this is all good and the experiment he's running is very interesting, but - no. I really like eating tasty food. Not for the nutrients, but for the experience. Similarly to how I really like sleeping in a comfortable bed and taking a hot shower daily even though, technically, I can rest as well on a bare floor and shower once a week. To each his own, but some things are just too u…
"This automobile business is all good and interesting, but - no. I really like riding in a horse buggy. Not for the speed, but for the experience. Similarly to how I really like candle light and wearing a top hat even though, technically, I could do as well with a baseball cap. To each his own, but some things are just too unorthodox."
mm, i don't think that's an apt comparison. cuisine doesn't develop in the same way that mechanical conveyance does. there's no objective basis for saying one example of food is superior wrt that basis than another, at least not one that isn't trivial. with a car you can say you can go this many miles per hour, or this many miles per dollar, that you require only this area to house the car, that its emissions are relatively benign compared to horse shit, etc. what people look for in food is the subjective, aesthetic experience. even when someone's eating for utilitarian reasons, they'll still make aesthetic choices, like the article about the north korean refugee who described the variety of foods made mostly from rice that you could buy at the market in a time of mass starvation, where all eating was utilitarian.
you know what'll happen if this catches on (which i don't think it will but anyway)? people will tinker with it, trying to make it more palatable, making different varieties for different occasions, or moods, or just for the sake of variety. this idea for replacing food will just become new kind of cuisine, at best. a style of cooking that seeks to provide all or most of the nutrients a body needs would be cool, but markedly different to the shift from horse drawn carriages and automobiles.
when automobiles came along, they replaced horse buggys rather than becoming a new kind of horse buggy.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
The main problem with SlimFast, as opposed to soylent, is that almost all of its carbs are sugars. On the other hand, it probably has a slightly better Omega-3:Omega-6 ratio.
> The main problem with SlimFast, as opposed to soylent, is that almost all of its carbs are sugars Does that actually matter? (I know nothing, genuinely curious.)
The main problem with sugars is that they have a high glycemic index, which means that they break down quickly and rapidly release glucose into your bloodstream. That's bad for several reasons. One is that it causes a strong insulin response, which can increase insulin resistance over time, leading to diabetes. Another is that it will give you a burst of energy initially, which will then fall off, leaving you feeling tired. Carbs with a lower GI will keep your blood sugar at a steady level.
But actually, looking again at the soylent recipe, he seems to be preferring maltodextrin as his carb source. He was probably mislead by the fact that it's a "complex carbohydrate", but in fact, the GI of maltodextrin is higher than cane sugar. In fact, it has basically the same glycemic index as pure glucose.
So I retract my previous statement. Unless you replace carb source in soylent, SlimFast is basically just a better option.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#87I get lost in my work/play quite a bit and often forget about meals. I'd definitely be interested in trying soylent simply as a meal replacement, especially if ingestion/preparation of it is quick enough not to break my workflow.
There are a bunch of different liquid feeds available. Well known brands include Ensure and Fortisip. ( https://www.nutricia.co.uk/fortisip// ) ( http://ensure.com/ ) These have the advantage of careful preparation and high standards of QA.
Those things aren't bad, but full of sugar and flavorings to make them palatable to the general public.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
>This premise assumes we understand, with no uncertainty, how the human body functions and utilizes nutrients [but] this is still a huge mystery to science If "no uncertainty" was the golden standard, we'd never do anything new (except perhaps mathematics). Yes, there is uncertainty in what he's doing, as there is always when trying something truly novel. But I'm sure glad someone is making the attempt. Nutrients are…
If you set yourself on fire, your flesh will burn and you will eventually die horribly. It is less clear what happens if you expose yourself to repeated small amounts of radiation. See the problem with your logic?
You are more or less describing the process with which we discovered x-rays.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#89"surely we can make food that is tastier, cheaper, and more nutritious than anything that exists naturally." This premise assumes we understand, with no uncertainty, how the human body functions and utilizes nutrients. Since this is still a huge mystery to science (and much of what we "know" currently is just guesswork) any 100% simulated food diet will only prove to be "better" by a stroke of luck. We've seen his po…
Indeed. To sum up some of the basic issues with his research so far: Sample size is 1. He's still eating, just much less often. Some nutrients are only required in very small amounts, which he may still be getting from his occasional meal. Three months is a very short time frame on which to evaluate a diet. Even something as simple and well-understood as scurvy can take three months to develop. In other words, he cou…
If you read the article you'd see he did miss something important, sulfur, which he has corrected. He's tweaking the formula as he goes, carefully monitoring his health and vital statistics (at a level I might add that seems way more involved than just about any "health nut" I've ever heard of), and doing research on various health and nutritional studies that are ongoing. Give him another year and a reasonable selection of volunteers to help test a wider audience with and I'm convinced he'll have something that will blow every other "diet" or nutrition shake out of the water.
Re: Soylent Month Three
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Sample size is 1. No. He has a group of volunteers who are testing it with him, see the second post: http://robrhinehart.com/?p=474 Not to mention the community that's sprung up around it, on http://discourse.soylent.me and elsewhere
I haven't followed very closely because I don't really have interest in it (I like food, cooking, etc.) but I have to ask, if he's pushing this as a product after such low levels of reliability does he garner any liability should it prove to be damaging long term?
He isn't pushing it as a product, he asked for volunteers to help test its suitability as a food substitute. This is research, not marketing.