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Does 'Supersizing' Supershrink Your Brain?
Rambo Tribble writes "As reported by the BBC, the journal Neurology is set to release the findings of a study in Oregon on diet and brain shrinkage in Alzheimer's victims. The upshot is: a diet rich in vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids is beneficial; trans fat and fast food are detrimental."
so if I start the day with a green smoothie (filled with raw veg and fresh fruits)... and then gorge myself on BBQ and fries for lunch.. I'm okay, right?
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
In short, there is nothing that is not damaging in an excessive amount. A lot of anything will bring bad consequences. This includes anything we consider "good" such as vitamins and minerals and HDL.
Reminded:
Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.
--Redd Foxx
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
The study found that high vitamin levels in the blood correlated with higher mental abilities, while higher levels of trans fats correlated with lower. The study says nothing about fruits, vegetables, or fast foods. There was also no evidence to conclude that this correlation is causative. They did not take people with high levels of trans fats and put them on a fruit-and-vegetable diet. If that were done, and their scores improved, they yes, they would have been justified in making such a recommendation. As things are, they made no effort to even determine where those vitamins and trans fats came from. If you ate hamburgers and too vitamin pills, you'd have high vitamin levels in your blood too. Another possibility is that people with lower mental abilities tend to eat more junk food with trans fats. That would create the same results in the study.
So, repeat after me: correlation does not imply causation. If you don't know this, you have no business being a scientist.
One Cinnabon and you're posting anti-science rants on slashdot. QED.
From TFA:
So they found that certain vitamins are beneficial to memory, but as none of their test subjects had Alzheimers there is no basis for any claim regarding the disease. Although I am curious what's in the actual paper (seriously, couldn't we wait a few days posting this until the actual paper is out?).
There is nothing pleasurable about trans fats. They are cheap and stable fats that make processing and cooking food *cheaper* not better. They are margarine and crisco, both of which are nasty and not nearly as good as their natural alternatives, butter and lard.
I don't go into the woods too often but there's a pretty fat squirrel lounging under our bird feeder in the back yard...
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
Fries and soft drinks... they're insanely profitable even with the free refills and if they're self-serve, there is almost no labor component to them.
I've been out of the restaurant management business for about 5 years, but things couldn't have changed that much. It costs about 3 cents for the cup and about 10 cents on average to fill it (various size cups, not every refill is a full cup, etc). People get their initial fill, most people get one refill, few people get more than one. So, if we just assume everyone gets 2 refills, it costs 23 cents for your beverage, which they sell to you for anywhere from $1.50-$4 depending on the restaurant. That gets you a ~500% profit margin.
Fries also have a good margin, though there is a higher labor component, the cost of cooking them, keeping them frozen, lowered yield (waste, broken fries, etc). In fact, most fryer side orders are pretty profitable (a half dozen mozzarella sticks might sell for around $5, but you can buy a 4.5 pound case for around $11, which will yield about 10 orders).
The sandwiches aren't nearly as profitable, particularly the meat sandwiches, but the sandwiches are what get people in the door. A 1/3rd pound burger costs around 75 cents for the meat, 20 cents for the bun, 15 cents for the cheese, and up to another 25 cents if it is dressed. They need to be refrigerated, you lose yield (overcooked, fell apart, etc) and are relatively labor intensive (especially if you patty them yourself). For that $1.40 investment (not counting labor, yield, etc), you sell it for about $3.
Factor in that somewhere around a third of all of your revenue goes to labor and another 30-40% goes to food costs depending on your model. On top of that, you still have your overhead - mortgage/rent/property taxes, heating/cooling, gas/electric, etc. Profits are pretty thin in the fast food/diner/family restaurant market and without the profitability of the side orders, most of them can't stay in business for long (hell, most of these non-chain restaurants fail in the first year anyway). Upscale/fine dining is a whole different beast.
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
FALSE:
As it turns out, fast food is loaded with nutrients. That's not the problem... hell for the vast majority of Americans they get more then enough 'micro nutrients'. IT's the fat and sugars that are the problem.
But go ahead and believe what the unregulated, low quality controlled, vitamin industry tells you.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Fast food, last I checked, had adequate levels of macro nutrients, but suffers from a lack of micro nutrients (the levels are too low to be considered 'good' enough as the sole source of food).
Here's a study detailing fast food / its lack of micro-nutrients and its effects on rats -> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18718129
Granted, these are lab rats, which ave plenty enough problems as they are, but it does support my argument.
As for the 'vitamin industry,' I can assure you that I am a scientist, and view their claims with less credibility than you do (goes in the same pile as homeopathy or various cures for cancer via Royal Rife machines).
I am John Hurt.