Comment by delinka | Hacker News Reader

Comment by delinka | Hacker News Reader

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Oxygen is bad for us. It oxidizes and damages all kinds of organic chemicals in our bodies that are required for use to live. Oxidization, however, is exactly what provides us with the energy that supports life.

Salts are electrolytes. (Electrolytes are salts?) You need them in your body so that your nervous system can conduct signals and keep things going - like your heart.

We live. We grow. We hurt. We heal. We get sick. We recover. We age. We wear out. We die.

Rather that avoiding "omg sugar" or "omg salt" or "omg fat," we should just be eating well-rounded diets. Have some beef today. And some pork tomorrow. And some fish after that. Have some fruit. And veggies. And a bit of dessert. And a spoonful of honey. And some powdered sugar on that syrup'd French toast. Just don't eat large piles of stuff for a meal. And don't eat the same thing every day.

Life's gonna kill you. Just don't clog up your body with excessive amounts of the same thing and you probably won't die early.

That's a nice philosophy that many people take. However, don't you think it would still be a great thing if we understood, at a much deeper leve,l how our bodies really work? It's like we're running around in the Middle Ages seeking enlightenment and the best we can come up with a bunch of large studies over many years.

That's a good way of describing it. I expect that a hundred years from now, this thread will be viewed as people arguing over questions that don't even make sense. This brings to mind Paul Graham's article "What you can't say", but that article focuses on what people can't say due to moral/cultural pressures and taboos. In this case (and many others), it's what people can't say because the underlying framework is missing. Maybe in 100 years, people will wonder why we were even debating whether people should restrict salt or not, because the question won't even make sense as something to ask. Kind of like serious medieval debates over Filioque now seem pointless to most people.

[1] http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html

I really like the general philosophy behind what you are saying. It has a nice ring to it. But saying to eat a well-rounded diet is not advice. Nobody has any good idea what a well rounded diet is.

You must eat fat (to obtain essential fatty acids). You must eat protein (to obtain essential amino acids). There are certain vitamins you must eat. And there are certain elements that you must consume.

The real question is how much of the required nutrients is enough and how much is too much?

What ratio of macronutrients (carbohydrates, protein, and fat) is ideal for maximizing health? Are there trade off for different ratios? For example, carbohydrates are not required for life, but most diets obtain a large portion of daily caloric intake from them. What percent of calories should be from carbohydrates?

Nobody yet knows what a well balanced diet is. In absence of that information, your advice is pretty good. Eat lots of different stuff.

It's pretty good, but not as good as it could be. There's no disputing the fact that we're better off if most of our carb macros don't come from refined flours and sugars, that we shouldn't eat trans-fats, and that we should eat a lot more fresh produce than most people do. I like Michael Pollan's often quoted statment: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

Should have stopped at "Eat food. Not too much." Mostly plants is fine, but so is mostly lean meat and some plants.

Mostly lean meat that hasn't been grown eating it's own filth and food that destroys it's immune system meaning we pump the animal with huge amounts of antibiotics.

More opinion and supposition masquerading as dietary advice. Morals and feelings of "eeeww" do not count as sound scientific nutrition principles.

>>Rather that avoiding "omg sugar" or "omg salt" or "omg fat," we should just be eating well-rounded diets.

Define well-rounded. ;) Isn't that what we're all trying to decide? We even have some people on here claiming McDonald's can be part of a balanced healthy diet.

"Well-rounded diet," n.; a large variety of foods from a large variety of ingredients. --Dictionary of Delinka :-D

Sure, why not? There's basically nothing wrong with a cheeseburger, although the soda is right out.

Sounds good as a philosophy, but let's make it concrete and see where you stand: if you knew for a fact that not eating sugar would allow you to live for 6.35 years longer, would you still eat sugar?

I think this is a bit of a false dichotomy. There's obviously going to be a sliding scale of life expectancy effects, and at some point, people are probably going to be willing to give up a few months of their life to be able to enjoy the time they have more.

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