That said, I'd like to see him compare two months of Soylent to two months of eating solid meals with a similar nutritional profile. Most of the benefits he has experienced are probably just a result of extremely well-balanced diet, not anything specifically related to Soylent.
That's rather the point of Soylent, to deliver a well balanced diet.
> not anything specifically related to Soylent.
This statement makes little sense, he merely claimed Soylent was a way to achieve good nutrition, not that it was magic.
Comparing a well-balanced diet with Soylent is not a waste of time: if nothing else, it's evidence for the debate about whether all the micronutrients and random stuff in 'real' food is subjectively noticeable in the short-term or whether you really can get away with just macronutrients and a few other chemicals.
gnaritas objects.
gwern supports m_d.
gnaritas has an opportunity to qualify his objection, but chooses not to.
(fwiw, I'm also extremely interested in all manner of "are there valuable yet-to-be-identified substances in real food" experiments.)
Nutritionally, being equivalent to a well-balanced diet meets his goals.