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Comment by contextual | Hacker News Reader

Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry.

It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together.

Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying. Studies show that families that dine together stay together [1]. Their children are healthier and get better grades. It also lowers the risk of weight problems and alcohol and substance abuse.[2]

Eating real food persisted throughout human history because it's more than about eating.

[1] http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/03/24/family-... [2] http://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/features/family-dinners-a...

EDIT: I'm glad to see so many people disagree with me. It means I'm on the right track.

View on HN

> I'm glad to see so many people disagree with me. It means I'm on the right track.

Does anyone else find this "first they ignore you" style of belief-reinforcement to be vaguely troubling? Don't get me wrong, you shouldn't just believe your critics without further inquiry, but the presence of critics shouldn't be used as supporting evidence in and of itself. You risk creating a kind of insular belief system where any threat can be transformed into reinforcement.

It's a form of self-delusion whereby you start from a place of supreme self-assurance and the existence of critics only serves to further your confidence.

I mean, make no mistake: the parent not only has no idea what he's talking about, his thinking also suffers from multiple logical fallacies. Let's go through a few of them.

1. Eating together civilizes people. It's emotionally and socially edifying.

Sure. Who said you need to consume your Soylent all by yourself? I told one of my coworkers that I ordered a week's worth, and guess what: she asked me if she could try it with me.

2. Eating real food persisted throughout human history because it's more than about eating.

No, eating "real food" (whatever that means) persisted throughout human history because we did not have any alternatives. It's kind of like aging: because it kinda just happens, we have accepted it as a normal thing. But that doesn't mean it is normal, or should be accepted as such.

>Who said you need to consume your Soylent all by yourself?

Well, no one. But, you know, if you're kind of in a "I want the convenience of eating my food from a pre-mixed sack" mode, it's not illogical that you may be less social with your mealtimes. "Hey, bring your sack over to my place and we'll gulp them down in 5 minutes together!"

>It's kind of like aging: because it kinda just happens, we have accepted it as a normal thing. But that doesn't mean it is normal

I am trying to think of something that "kinda just happens" 100% of the time with no effort, but that's not normal. Isn't that the definition of normal?

Very true. You can't use the fact that someone has something bad to say about you to actually improve your perceived value. It's strictly[1] more probable that you're worse if there is criticism than if there isn't.

[1] EDIT: as pasquinelli noted, I didn't actually mean "strictly" here, I meant >=. Also, pasquinelli, you've been hellbanned.

Many HN readers like to rationalize-away inconvenient truths as if it were a game. When I see that kind of weaksauce response, I'm on the right track.

I think the related but slightly more general claim is that you cannot update your beliefs in the same direction for both of two exhaustive and exclusive outcomes. In this case, if people disagreeing with you reinforces your beliefs, then it should be the case that everyone agreeing with you makes you question those beliefs. (This might be reasonable if you are e.g. in a mental asylum.)

Not really. Smart people are just as susceptible to logical fallacies as average people. Perhaps more so since they can 'reason out' the fallacies they make. I find I need to constantly double check myself to see I'm not missing something.

But this is not a new phenomenon.

heh, humblebrag much? :P

Yes, it is totally inaccurate. It is like the people who performed witch hunts: "If she doesn't admit to being a witch, she must be lying. If she admits to being a witch, then obviously she is because why would anyone admit to that?" If either outcome of a test -- criticism, ~criticsm -- increases your prior belief estimate, you need to have another look at Bayes' theorem.

Does anyone else find this "first they ignore you" style of belief-reinforcement to be vaguely troubling?

I vote that we colloquially dub this the "fight makes right" fallacy. And yes, I find it more than vaguely troubling.

Except liquid meal replacements already exist (Ensure etc.), and the entire world isn't Valley geeks.

You could eat cheap fast calories everyday but gourmet restaurants still thrive. Not everyone is obsessed with food practicality.

Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies.

In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger consumer market). If (and it's a big if) Soylent satisfies the requirements of a high-intensity training program, then it could take off there. People who are obsessed with performance nutrition tend to place less emphasis on food-as-experience and more emphasis on food as fuel. That's the Soylent psychographic sweet spot.

Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars. I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale.

"Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars"

Correct, which is why military branches are deep-pocketed potential buyers.

"I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale."

In a military context it's not a meal replacement, per se. More of an emergency MRE or HDR replacement, provided it's more shelf stable and can compete on nutritional factors. (Big ifs, of course.) I don't disagree that morale is a concern, though. MREs are nasty, but they're at least attempting to be palatable within the confines of their purpose.

Indeed. Military organizations have learned over several millennia that serving unappealing food to heavily armed and lethally trained people is bound to lead to suboptimal outcomes.

> Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies.

Last I heard, the main focus of new food efforts for the military is long-shelf-life food that does a better job of emulating "normal" food. Because it makes a pretty big difference to morale.

> In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger consumer market).

A market that's highly saturated with well-established nutritional supplements and meal substitute powders, shakes, etc. The one space where Soylent has an advantage over established market players is in marketing to Valley geeks that are insulated from the other markets for this kind of product (some of which is of the "this product is a good fit for you" type, and some of which is "this product is a solution to all kinds of other things for which there are not currently solutions" type, but both of those are marketing messages for Soylent that are mostly successful with the same demographic.)

You are counting out lazy people. There are lots of lazy people who find it even a burden to grocery shop, unpack and microwave food.

Jeez, where are we heading to?

I would consider 'microwave food' as lazy. Food is the at most basic necessity of your body, with air, water, shelter and clothes.

Are people really so busy that you can't get off your keyboard to eat something? I am not sure if that is the case merely using Soylent is going to fix any of your problems.

I love good food. But I fall in the amateur athlete category, and for me getting the right nutrition mix is a massive chore on a day to day basis. I would never go to just Soylent, but I'd love to experiment with substituting a number of meals with it.

as an amateur athlete, it's time you learn about sports supplements. if you had, you'll come to realize there are many meal replacement products that can easily satisfy your needs and that has been around for decades. EAS myoplex is the first that comes to mind that not only has a lot of important nutrients, but actually tastes pretty good in my opinion.

The condescending tone is unwarranted and distasteful.

Especially when you so totally miss the point of Soylent vs. sports supplements like Myoplex: The latter are not in any way trying to provide the same. They generally aim for roughly a certain mix of proteins, carbs and fats + various mixes of other ingredients that often seem to be chosen mostly to be buzzword complete.

In fact, here's some sales copy regarding Myoplex:

"EAS recommends supplementing your diet with 2-3 high quality Myoplex nutrition shakes along with 3-4 whole food meals a day to ensure that any nutritional "gaps" are filled. "

I use a lot of supplements - for my protein intake I use or have used a variety of shakes, bars, muffins (yes...), cookies, to complement my high protein "real foods". To date I have never found a sports supplement that tastes nice without being way too high calorie for my use, but I can tolerate that for the convenience.

But more importantly: most sport supplements are very limited in their overall nutritional profile. For a reason - for protein heavy products people tend to focus on whey and to a lesser extent casein, and most products aim to minimize other ingredients unless that are products for specific other purposes, such as weight gainers etc. They're supplements for occasional meal replacement. They are not intended to replace food in general.

And exactly what appeals to me about Soylent is that it might provide a good alternative to fill those "nutritional gaps" mentioned in the Myoplex sales copy, which are pretty much inevitable if you were to stick with only regular sports supplements. As I said: I'm not interested in replacing food entirely, but having something available that I can have reasonable confidence is reasonably complete, that I know the calorie content of by volume, so it's easy to measure and keep track, and that is quick and convenient for when I don't have the time or want the hassle of sorting out a proper meal would be great.

Maybe they should be a Herbalife and do multi-level marketing.

What this really means is Ensure and the like just need an image overall. Rebrand something like that and they're probably on equal footing again.

Where would you rather eat on the go? Mcdonalds? Or a Soylent vending machine?

I've had enough Mcdonalds for this lifetime. Bring on the Soylent vending machines!

Hmm, delicious cheeseburger or tasteless goop in a can? That's a tough one.

Maybe my sarcasm detector is off but I don't see how this is a real question.

Because there's nothing I love more than factory farmed animal protein and excessive, unneeded carbohydrates.

Delicious cheeseburger? Have you even eaten at a McDonalds?

McDonalds is fucking delicious.

I'd still much rather put bland goop into my body considering how terrible the contents of a Big 'n' Tasty combo meal is for my health.

I'm pretty darn sure the bland goop eaten in the same quantity is as equally dangerous.

Ever heard of the term 'balanced diet'?

What's unbalanced about Soylent?

Let's recognize the fact that McDonald's food actually tastes good to a large portion of the population, for better or worse. To do otherwise is, IMO, harmful to the discussion of improving what we eat as a society.

Let's also recognize that the American public fails in an epic fashion at nutritional choices:

http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html [More than one-third of U.S. adults (35.7%) are obese.]

http://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/statistics.htm [Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States.]

Millions of people eat at McDonalds and like it. Most people would choose the McDonalds burger. The people that give a shit about factory farming and nutrition are in the minority.

That's what YOU want. Compare that to the status quo and it's hard to argue against the fatty, grease filled cheeseburger.

Delicious unhealthy cheeseburger or a tasteless but healthy goop in a can? I guess you're right, it's a no-brainer either for people with self-discipline and for those without.

> Delicious unhealthy cheeseburger or a tasteless but healthy goop in a can?

I choose -- false dichotomy. Plenty of healthy and not tasteless quick meal replacements that already exist.

Such option was not presented in the hypothetical scenario. It'd be trivial anyway to make the tasteless goop tasty with some flavorings.

If you think it is "trivial" to make a bland substance taste good without substantially changing the nutritional makeup of that substance, there are a lot of diet food companies who would like to have a chat with you and make you fabulously rich. Jamba Juice would like to know the secret, too.

Most things that innately taste good -- stuff that you could drop in a blender and drink and it'd still be agreeable -- are fatty, salty, starchy, sugary, or some mix of all these. Healthy and good-tasting food requires pleasant textures and careful composition that allows a small amount of fat, salt, starch, etc. to enhance the flavor of the whole meal.

I guess I should have said it would be trivial to make it tastier for my own non-demanding taste buds. I could just add a few drops of stevia and I'd be good to go, but I see how it could be a challenge to make something that pleases most people.

"Fatty" is not a synonym for unhealthy by the way. A lot of people consider high fat/low carb diets to be healthier than the reverse.

OP here. I'm currently on the keto diet; fat, in moderation, fat is definitely not unhealthy.

The problem is, McDonalds meals are not healthy, full stop:

Mcdonald's - Big Mac Meal With Fries and Coke With No Onions

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/calories/mcdonalds-big-mac-...

1130 Calories, and 67 grams of sugar. Call me when McDonalds modifies their meals to consist primarily of protein/fat calories.

Don't get fries. Don't get a drink with sugar added. Definitely don't get a milkshake or cookies.

The burger itself is fine. You wouldn't go to Subway for a nice sandwich and drink a liter of Coke afterwards and a bag of chips and complain about how unhealthy it is.

Here you can get some nice fresh crispy raw carrots instead of fries.

> Such option was not presented in the hypothetical scenario.

Right...that's why I called the scenario a false dichotomy.

Where did you get the idea that it's "tasteless"?

Hahah, delicious?

This is one of the more obscure "internet things that irk me", but particularly on HN I keep seeing the word "delicious" applied to any food that is minimally palatable.

The word itself is starting to grate on me, as "lecker" in German already does thanks to its overuse.

In my mind, I think of Soylent as "food for people who don't like food". In the same way I think of Nickelback or American Idol as "music for people who don't like music". There are millions of these people worldwide. But yes, obviously this doesn't apply to 100% of all people.

I personally see food in two lights a necessity and a luxury. Most of the time it is simply a necessity and Soylent will do. The rest of the time it is a luxury and I'll go cook a nice meal or go to a restaurant.

Actually I like food a lot, it's just that health is more important to me than taste. After all, the pleasure we get from tasty food only lasts a moment, while the pleasure we get from having a healthy body and mind lasts a lifetime.

I agree with your main point that long-term health is very important, but I'm hoping you're not saying that healthy food and tasty food are mutually exclusive.

Is every single meal a social event for you?

I eat out at least a few times a week with friends. But if I'm stuck at the office working late or home alone one night, I don't cook. I order off seamless, and a lot of it is garbage. Sure, I should learn to like cooking, but I've failed to do that and that's unlikely to change.

So in my mind, replacing the shitty delivery meals with something optimally nutritious would be great. And then on the weekends or when I have time, I'd still of course eat out with friends and family.

Soylent is not aiming to replace every meal. But as a replacement for grabbing a slice of pizza on the way home from work by yourself, what's the problem?

Given you're at a computer using HN, then at any off time a good meal is no meal. You can safely say stuffing more food into you is not needed.

So the only real reason you eat in these off periods is enjoyment of food, stopping feeling hungry and habit.

This is not what Soylent is for as far as I can see.

    Given you're at a computer using HN, then at any 
    off time a good meal is no meal

I don't quite follow, are you saying because one sits behind a computer one doesn't use any energy at all?

    You can safely say stuffing more food into you 
    is not needed.

Food gives energy and mental exhaustion, believe it or not, does actually take up a lot of energy, heck, even just resting takes up energy (it's not like your body stops functioning..).

I have to say that I very much follow what the parent is saying. I love eating with people and all, but, I'm not always with someone, and more often than not am too lazy to cook (or I've just forgotten to shop groceries).

Correlation/causation - dining together doesn't cause all those benefits, it is simply correlated with them. There is probably a common factor which causes all of those behaviours, probably something to do with education and wealth (although working out exactly what is a bit too much science for a back-of-envelope estimate).

Nonetheless, your fundamental criticism of Soylent is probably still valid (even if the target market isn't families.)

> I'm glad to see so many people disagree with me. It means I'm on the right track.

What? No it doesn't. The rest of your post was thought-provoking, but this "teenage forum troll with a wounded ego" act drags the whole thing down. I don't recommend repeating it if you want people to take you seriously.

I cook breakfast for my kids every morning. We eat together every night. For lunch, I'm at work and I typically microwave some junk and get on with more important things. For me, it'd be nice to have another solution for the mid-day meal. So, I've bought in for a trial. I'm not expecting it to be a 100% replacement for regular food. My hunch is that most people will not replace 100% of their food with soylent.

Why don't you just buy Ensure or Carnation Instant Breakfast? They already exist and are well known, that you can buy anywhere. Or make yourself a bowl of oatmeal. Or eat leftovers from the night before.

I think that the only reason that anyone's interested in Soylent is the current startup/crowdfunding bubble hype, not because it's actually anything particularly new. Soylent is to Ensure as Groupon is to coupons. Before the hype, on select groups (people who were too sick to eat, middle-aged housewives) would be into each of them, but once you add the startup/crowdfunding/Internet angle, all of a sudden a bunch of 20 somethings take a fascination in something that they otherwise would have sneered at.

Can you really compare products like Ensure or Carnation Instant Breakfast to Soylent? Pick up any of those products in a store and you'll see that half of the ingredients have nothing to do with nutritional value and are about making the product taste better. I'm holding a bottle of Nestle's "Boost" meal replacement drink right now and here are the main ingredients:

> Water, Sugar, Corn Syrup Solids, Modified Milk Ingredients, Cocoa, High Oleic Sunflower Oil, Corn Oil, Salt, Artificial Flavour, Soy Oil

Just because something is "well known" doesn't make it better. Nestle is not a company with an outstanding global reputation and if given the choice between trusting them or a company like Soylent, I'm going to choose Soylent.

Like others here, I view Soylent as an interesting experiment. I enjoy a nice meal as much as the next person but I also appreciate the value of something fast, simple and nutritionally complete that can be used from time to time as supplementation when you don't feel the need to sit down for an actual meal.

I'm not sure flavorlessness will make Soylent more popular. Most people like to have at least some flavor.

My point is that there already are a lot of products out there that are "fast, simple, and nutritionally complete that can be used from time to time as supplementation when you don't feel the need to sit down for an actual meal," but I don't see everyone who's so excited about Soylent already using them on a regular basis. OK, perhaps you would prefer to have something without sugar in it (I'm not sure why you would object to the other ingredients, fats and salts are essential parts of your diet), but I would think that if Soylent were going to be as popular as people make it out to be, there would already be lots of people replacing meals with existing meal replacements. All Soylent offers over the others is that it's bland, as far as I can tell.

I'm not saying the existing, well known ones are better. Just that they haven't revolutionized food or replaced traditional meals on a large scale or anything.

There are plenty of people who do already replace occasional meals with these existing meal replacers, along with energy bars and the like. So, Soylent will be one more out of a large number of choices in this field, produced by people with no particular food industry experience, and more bland than the rest. Is that supposed to get me excited about "the future of food"?

I can imagine people who already do use existing meal replacers, but having some particular problem with them that Soylent solves, might go for this. And then there's the Silicon Valley hype bubble, where a bunch of people will buy it and drink it for lunch for a month or two before getting bored and excited by the next big new thing (Twitter to your shoes! Personal Instagram quadcopter follow bot! Distributed decentralized FarmVille/GTA hybrid!)

The reason I'm so baffled by this is that it's hard to imagine why so many people would get excited about yet another product in an already crowded marketplace that's fairly niche (well, fairly niche for people who use them as their primary nutrition; relatively large for people who use it to replace an occasional meal). I don't see anything revolutionary about Soylent; it's yet another meal replacer.

Ensure tastes like shit. If Soylent tastes reasonably OK, and has stronger guarantees that it can be a true meal replacement than supplements like Ensure, then sign me up.

I was replying to a comment that suggested he was interested in using it merely as a supplement (replacing only lunch). Ensure is perfectly capable of doing that. I'm not sure what "stronger guarantees" Soylent would have. Ensure has been used to replace meals for tons of sick people for 40 years; why do you think that a few computer geeks will be able to suddenly do better than 40 years of industrial research?

As far as the taste, it's too soon to tell. Indications are that it's pretty flavorless http://gawker.com/we-drank-soylent-the-weird-food-of-the-fut... (outside of joking reactions like "It was great and I love it. I don't want to eat anymore.") Given that they aren't particularly focusing on trying to make it taste good ("I'm not trying to make something delicious; there are already a lot of delicious things. It's all about efficiency, it's about cost and convenience."), I doubt it will wind up tasting much better than Ensure.

I just don't get all of the excitement over Soylent. It seems like a solution in search of a problem. It's pretty damn easy to get a healthy diet for cheap and extremely low effort, as long as you don't care about flavor and variety. Rice, beans, and grated cheese covers pretty much all of your nutritional needs (maybe toss in a multivitamin per day to be on the safe side), takes about 5 minutes of work and 15 minutes of waiting for it to simmer, you can prepare a week's worth in advance and reheat it over the course of the week, and it will cost you less than $5 per day in the US. How is Soylent supposed to be so much better than that that it will "disrupt the world food system"?

You have to chew rice and beans. It's still easier and faster to gulp down some slop.

Given how much of a problem some people here seem to have with normal food (though it only seems to have happened after seeing the Soylent marketing materials, I didn't know anyone who complained about how much trouble eating was before the Soylent hype), it's hard to tell if you're being sarcastic or serious. I suppose I've just run up against the Silicon Valley Hype Machine version of Poe's Law.

Given how bad the hype has become (Soylent appears to me to be about as useful and likely to be successful as Pets.com), I think it's time to start shoring a bunch of Silicon Valley stock; we appear to have hit the next bubble. The problem is that outside of Twitter and Facebook, no one has really gone public recently, so it's a lot harder to actually short these silly companies.

I've been complaining about how much trouble eating was since I realized I was underweight maybe 6-7 years ago. I've narrowed it down to some kind of mental problem that makes me chew 3-5x longer than other people. I therefore get full 3-5x sooner and it's hard to eat enough calories.

I've tried supplements and eating very dense foods (lots of grease and carbs) with lukewarm results but if Soylent works as promised, it'll basically change my life.

That said, my comment was meant to be humourous and I totally understand how people who don't have problems with normal food might view Soylent. It's the ultimate first-world problem.

If you try Soylent, and dislike it, there are other products that are calorie dense that may help. (This is not medical advice, see a doctor, etc etc).

I know of Ensure Plus because I know lots of people with anorexia, and it's used during refeeding programs. (Sometimes as a drink, and sometimes through an NG tube).

OK, so it was a mix of sarcastic and serious. Good to know.

Sure, there may be some people in specialized circumstances that have problems with normal food, though there are a lot of options already (smoothies, existing meal replacements like Ensure, possibly even bodybuilding focused meal replacements as they tend to focus on being high-calorie, soups, etc). And yeah, Soylent does seem like the ultimate first-world-problem food.

Anyhow, good luck with trying to get more calories in your diet, and if Soylent helps you with that, all the better!

I'm commuting 2+ hours twice a week for school, and I don't have time to actually eat (real) food in between work and school. Having a decent meal replacement for that is helpful, so that I don't end up eating garbage.

> Ensure tastes like shit.

What, all different flavours of Ensure? All different styles of Ensure?

> supplements like Ensure,

Ensure is a sole source of nutrition. Your ignorance about the product speaks volumes.

I drank ensure pretty much every day for about 15 years due to health issues. Every flavor tasted terrible, and it was always presented as a supplement by my doctor. Maybe it's better now this was 10-15 years ago

Main comments in the original video about taste were that it was pretty nasty. Also smells bad.

https://twitter.com/rosalabs/status/396327848010477568

(@rosalabs is the company behind Soylent.)

No one eats every meal with their family, and people who switch to Soylent for every meal are doing so for the interesting story and proof that Soylent, at least in the short term, is not harmful and is complete. The fact that eating together with friends or family is great has very little to do with Soylent.

People keeping bringing this up. What is so difficult about the concept that not everyone wants to, or even can, cook meals that are nutritionally suitable, healthy or even intended to be consumed collectively - all the time?

Because on the internet, and especially in internet comments, the world only exists in black and white. Something is either 100% true for everyone everywhere at all times without exception, or it is 100% false. There is no middle ground, and no shades of gray. Ever.

And definitely not 50 of them. </sarcasm>

Imagine people said that you could save time and money by replacing friends with Facebook. Or you could stop walking a buy a segway.

Soylent appeals to exactly those people. If we wanted to live like this we'd just buy a bag of rice and a box of vitamins. We all understand that it's technically possible to use soylent, just that like replacing all your friends with Facebook, or riding a segway, it's social suicide.

>Imagine people said that you could save time and money by replacing friends with Facebook. Or you could stop walking a buy a segway.

or, and hold on, not everyone lives with other people (like, say, students etc) and cooking a meal just for yourself is time consuming and requires you have the energy to do so.

That says nothing about your social life whatever, but, replacing friends on with facebook does. Soylent is in no way social suicide. Even if I wanted to replace my diet 100% with Soylent, that'd have little implication on my already thriving social life, because, you know, I don't only socialize over dinner, there are actual other things to do...

>it's social suicide

Unless your social life is at a deeper level than simply putting food in your mouth around certain people. Either way, I don't think many people would _replace_ food with Soylent so much as they would drink it instead of eating some meals. I'd love to just drink a glass of liquid instead of preparing and eating a lunch.

Why don't you have a case of Ensure already then?

> Because Soylent robs families and loved ones of the ritual and ceremony of eating together.

And frees them up to participate in other rituals together?

Just think how many other activities could be correlated with "families that stay together." It's almost a given, since the alternative would be a family that was divorced or estranged from each other... yet still came together for meals.

> a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together.

The Vice writer mentions his compromise with his girlfriend: Every time they would have shared a meal... they do something else together instead. My family eats dinner together nearly every night. But it takes a long time (at least for the slow eating kids). Part of me thinks it would be nice if dinner only took 5 minutes (prep & consumption) and we spent the next hour playing a board game together or reading. Replace one ritual with another.

> Soylent will likely become a billion dollar global enterprise, and even "disrupt" the food industry.

Have my doubts on this though. One of the things that contribute most to software startups being successful, and the cause for most hugely successful startups having a software component in them, is network effects. You use that software and not another one because, even if there are alternatives, you have vested interests in the shape of user accounts, files, photos, friends... Even hardware startups have software that backs them and creates those vital network effects.

Soylent is not software, nor it has a software component in it. Its formula might be a secret (as compiled programs "are"). Yes, it can build a brand, but how long till Nestle and/or Kraft Foods, with all their marketing muscle, release their own Soylent?

Might be better to sell Soylent for half that billion to one of them :)

Soylent's recipe is supposed to be open.

http://blog.soylent.me/post/65760097009/as-mentioned-in-the-...

I don't think Soylent has to stop families from eating together, and if it does, the reason those families aren't eating together probably isn't entirely due to Soylent.

Rob himself mentions in his blog many times that he imagines most people won't do what he's done and quit eating real food altogether. It's more of a "fast food" replacement than anything. When you're busy with work or something and the act of cooking is a distraction, you'll often just grab a bag of chips from the pantry or -- if you can take the time -- you might run out to the nearest McDonald's to sate your hunger. You don't want food because it's good, or because you're spending time with your family -- you want it because you're hungry. Rob wants to provide a quick and healthy meal for times like that.

Will I use Soylent? I dunno, probably not. But I can see where the niche exists.

You don't have to eat it all the time. There's no contract, really.

Family that spends time together, stays together. It has nothing to with eating. It's just that eating is a simple way to make it happen in a consistent fashion that's not overly forced.

Haven't similar products existed for a while now? I wonder how Soylent compares to a product like Ensure, or other meal-replacement powders / shakes that have been on the market for years already. Is Soylent significantly cheaper, and/or is it better nutritionally?

I think for Soylent to really explode in sales, they should find a way to market it as a cheap weight loss solution or something similar. The mass market loves weight loss products.

I've read on the Soylent message board and various related sub-reddits that Ensure and similar products are indeed not as nutritionally optimal. Specifically, many of them are loaded with sugar so that they taste good. Which may be okay for 1 meal, but bad if you are using it regularly. Also, they probably are more expensive.

That said, Ensure is usually the product I hear has too much sugar. I'd be curious if anyone with more knowledge has looked into this issue more, or compared the nutritional components of the major players in that market.

Fail: the whole point of soylent is to replace convenience meals, not meals of love with your family.

Nice to see a critic who obviously hasn't even read the basics of the idea...

Your comment reads like you're living in the 60s. I don't think that modern families have the kind of "ritualistic" meals you're describing.

Anecdote: My family ate together at the dinner table nearly every evening. I look back on our engaging discussions with fondness.

I grew up in the '90s.

I have two kids (10 and 8). Yes, some nights we do not eat together because of schedules, but those nights are few and far between. My wife and I find it quite important that our family can share a meal at least once a day. We know lots of other "modern" families who do the same thing.

Food production and eating are not problems to be solved[0]. If you don't enjoy sitting down to a good meal, well, that's okay by me. Personally, I think you're missing out on something, but that's just my opinion. But please don't act as if giving up on sharing a meal with friends or family is a step forward for humanity.

[0] Famine and food shortages notwithstanding. I could see the benefits of Soylent in areas where there are food shortages and people suffer malnutrion.

> It will also ultimately be a failure and frowned upon in modern society. Why? Because a Soylent-saturated world would rob families and loved ones of the ritual and benefits of eating together.

I'm curious how even eating Soylent for 90% of one's meals would perform this "rob[bing]" of which you speak.

An low focus activity that you do together achieves the same thing as a meal together. Going for walks, etc.

But people are not going to just replace all family dinners with the foods they love with a meal replacement shake.

http://xkcd.com/1289/

You have a funny definition of "likely". Possible, sure, but likely?

false dichotomy

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