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Comment by ballenarosada | Hacker News Reader

I think the study shows precisely that it's not a public health danger to tell people that.

What exactly is a whole food? Or a non-processed food? Is honey a natural, healthy food? Are nuts and oily seeds better for your weigh than industrial potato chips? Is cold pressed sesame oil not a high calorie food?

It's a clear public safety danger to imply the above are healthier than their processed counterparts, and my main beef is with the sensationalist title, that aims right at the "calories are a myth" bandwagon. The study itself is good, if it works, it works.

Obviously there are degrees of processing, but it's not hard to see that an apple or a carrot or even a steak are fundamentally less processed and more "natural" than a packet of chips, a bar of chocolate or a TV dinner. They are also much healthier.

This is a good example of prejudice. A TV dinner can be healthy if it contains suficient legumes and low fat meat. And depending on exactly what steak you are proposing and the manner of preparation, it can be significantly more calorie dense and packed with cholesterol and saturated fat.

Freezing and preservatives don't significantly alter nutritional value, and there exist low calorie frozen meals specifically formulated for dieters. Highly processed, but much healthier than some very natural wholesome steaks.

You're asking questions which go against the bias, and cannot be answered without exposing deficiencies in the appeal to nature the "whole foods are best" ideology is founded on. It's disconcerting to see a fallacy being eaten whole by so many.

This page:

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFalla...

has this sentence:

> There are many natural things that are better than unnatural, but they must be evaluated based on other criteria besides the “naturalness”.

which sums up the whole thing nicely.

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