An article on fats and health

[conuly]

Interesting is about all I can say about it. Can't process it right now.

Comments

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

Looks like bad science to me.

[conuly]

Could be. Of course, filtered through the media, shocking revelations such as "the earth goes round the sun" will come across as bad science too.

When I have a chance, I might actually start looking up information on nutrition so I can work out what's known and what's not.

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

The thing that's catching my attention is that they said the herdsmen changed their diet, but said nothing about any other lifestyle changes such as activity level.

[conuly]

I noticed that too, and suspect that's a big factor in it. But the article is claiming that Mainstream Knowledge (oh-how-scary) did the same thing, looking at one factor and not others.

[griffen.livejournal.com]

The point is, there have never been any studies that confirmed the hypothesis that saturated fat increases heart disease risk. The diet-heart hypothesis has never been rigorously tested, and the tests trying to support it (flawed as they are) have often shown that it is NOT supported. Therefore, it's bad science, and should be tossed in the dustbin with other failed hypotheses like cold fusion and phrenology.

[isabeau.livejournal.com]

Except they're not using that anecdote to deal with diet-as-proof, so much as to disprove the "well, okay, maybe these people have a high-fat diet and low rate of heart problems, BUT that's only because of genetics". Which, if it were the case, would apply even when they switched to a different lifestyle environment.

(The impression I got from the article was less "X is the definitive Why" and more "Y is generally considered the definitive Why, but here are some areas where Y doesn't really work". Disproof rather than proof, which is often easier. If you're stating A-causes-B, you have to show that B happens whenever A does and that A fails to happen whenever B fails to happen and that the two are causally linked and not just coincidence, but if you're stating that A-causes-B /isn't/ true, you just have to show that there are times where A occurs and B doesn't.)

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

Looks like bad science to me.

[conuly]

Could be. Of course, filtered through the media, shocking revelations such as "the earth goes round the sun" will come across as bad science too.

When I have a chance, I might actually start looking up information on nutrition so I can work out what's known and what's not.

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

The thing that's catching my attention is that they said the herdsmen changed their diet, but said nothing about any other lifestyle changes such as activity level.

[conuly]

I noticed that too, and suspect that's a big factor in it. But the article is claiming that Mainstream Knowledge (oh-how-scary) did the same thing, looking at one factor and not others.

[griffen.livejournal.com]

The point is, there have never been any studies that confirmed the hypothesis that saturated fat increases heart disease risk. The diet-heart hypothesis has never been rigorously tested, and the tests trying to support it (flawed as they are) have often shown that it is NOT supported. Therefore, it's bad science, and should be tossed in the dustbin with other failed hypotheses like cold fusion and phrenology.

[isabeau.livejournal.com]

Except they're not using that anecdote to deal with diet-as-proof, so much as to disprove the "well, okay, maybe these people have a high-fat diet and low rate of heart problems, BUT that's only because of genetics". Which, if it were the case, would apply even when they switched to a different lifestyle environment.

(The impression I got from the article was less "X is the definitive Why" and more "Y is generally considered the definitive Why, but here are some areas where Y doesn't really work". Disproof rather than proof, which is often easier. If you're stating A-causes-B, you have to show that B happens whenever A does and that A fails to happen whenever B fails to happen and that the two are causally linked and not just coincidence, but if you're stating that A-causes-B /isn't/ true, you just have to show that there are times where A occurs and B doesn't.)