Slashdot Mirror
Stanford Study Flawed: Organic Produce May Be More Nutritious After All
assertation writes "A few weeks ago an article was posted to Slashdot referring to a Stanford Study stating that organic produce, contrary to popular belief is not more nutritious. According to Mark Bitman of The New York times the Stanford study was flawed. A spelling error skewed the results as well as the study ignoring several types of nutrients."
I just won the argument over this with my vegan vegetarian girlfriend. Now this! Damn it, Well, I won't being getting any for awhile. good thing the .XXX search is up.
I ain't gonna even look at these damn articles anymore. I'm gonna stick with cigarettes and chocolate cake.
And coffee.
And bacon. mmmmmm bacon.
"Elizabeth...I'm coming to join ya!"
just not covered in nasty pesticides and such. If it is tastier that would be a plus but I'd settle for not likely to introduce dna altering substances into my system.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
They both grow in dirt (organic and conventional), they are the same plant, they don't, on balance, have more or less of anything than the rest of the fruits and vegetables. Bottom line if you want to pay 3X as much for your food buy organic. If you just want to eat and get the most nutrition for your $$, buy conventional. And don't forget, we can't feed the world's population organically. Can't be done!
And organic produce is easier to digest than inorganic.
This sig is intentionally blank
Second, this is not a scientific article. It is an editorial. Yes, I suppose Mister Bittman has a valid opinion, even some good supporting information to demonstrate that he has some understanding of the subject under discussion. Nonetheless, I don't think Mr. Bittman is even remotely what would be considered an expert in the areas of horticulture, agriculture, food production, nutrition, animal husbandry or any of at least a dozen other disciplines which might make his opinion any more informed than my own.
Not to criticize Mr. Bittman - he is an editorial author providing articles for a major news outlet. He has written a well thought-out, interesting editorial - but that's all. He doesn't have direct evidence to refute the findings of the Stanford Study - he doesn't even have any direct criticisms of the methodology employed by the Stanford group (which he should have, IMHO). What he has is an editorial opinion - well expressed, thoughtful, but at the end of the day still just his opinion.
This rebuttal is exactly why news reporting is so poor. This author has no scientific training, and his specific claims of the study being flawed betray that lack. To make his point he has to redefine the definition of nutritious from "more nutrients" to "lacking pesticides". This is why scientists are needed to peer review results - not some John or Jane Doe off the streets, or a certain New York Times journalist in an opinion piece.
The study is very clear - for a certain set of nutrients, organic produce does not have more than regularly grown produce. At no point does the author of this rebuttal ever attempt to show otherwise. The fact that the study didn't test everything doesn't make it flawed. The interpretation of the results - that organic produce is no more nutritious than regular produce - may be flawed. If the study contained the most important nutrients, then the interpretation is correct. Personally I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt to the Stanford scientist over the journalist until some serious peer review comes in. Frankly, there's nothing to see here but some journalist with an overblown sense of his own abilities.
Remember, you can't look dignified when your having fun! Don't take life too seriously, you'll never get out of it alive
Lets look at the meat of the article
In fact, the Stanford study — actually a meta-study, an analysis of more than 200 existing studies — does say that “consumption of organic foods may reduce exposure to pesticide residues and antibiotic-resistant bacteria.”
Since that’s largely why people eat organic foods, what’s the big deal? Especially if we refer to common definitions of “nutritious” and point out that, in general, nutritious food promotes health and good condition. How can something that reduces your exposure to pesticides and antibiotic-resistant bacteria not be “more nutritious” than food that doesn’t?
Because the study narrowly defines “nutritious” as containing more vitamins.
So his problem is the authors were dishonest because they didn't adhere to his incorrect definition of nutritious.
And near the end
Like too many studies, the Stanford study dangerously isolates a finding from its larger context
That's a feature, not a bug. The role of a research paper isn't to make some broad sweeping conclusion, it's to carefully explore a narrow question, were the organics more nutritious, and on that question the answer was no.
I stole this Sig
I dunno, the end result of the digestion process is the stuff coming out the other end. Well McDonalds and Taco Bell are really REALLY efficient at passing through your system as quickly as possible.
Gotta count for something nutritiously, even if they are inorganic.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!
You do realize that Nitrites and Nitrates are different things, right? In the cycle, first stage bacteria break down Ammonias (poisonous) to Nitrites (still poisonous) and second stage bacteria break down Nitrites into Nitrates (mostly harmless below 60-100ppm). It's up to your kidneys to flush what they can into your urine.
Well, not necessarily. Inorganic compounds can still contain carbon. For example, diamond and graphite are considered inorganic. So, you can have a big old bowl of graphite/diamond stew and it's inorganic, but still has more carbon than pretty much any organic food.
It's not only about nutrients but the trace pesticides heavy metals, manipulated genes and what else is good to degrade your health.
Not even talking about taste - compare an organic and not-so apple.
I always thought that the secret ingredient in Organic produce was copious amounts of horse shit.
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
In some areas of the country, bull shit is more readily available.
paintball
Next time he's getting some oral favors, he should scream, "OH MY GOD YOU'RE EATING MEAT!"
He'll have to dump her after that, but sometimes there's a price for victory.
paintball
- Animals are typically better treated (yes organic doesn't mean free range, but in practice they tend to go hand in hand)
- Less toxic residues (pesticides, fertilizers, other mystery chemicals which haven't succeeding in killing us off dramatically YET)
- More Nutrition (grass fed beef vs cornfed) ---- this is the ONE item the meta-study researched
- Better for the environment (see previous lack of toxic pesticides, fertilizers, etc)
- Organic is usually produced by the smaller growers in the market
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
Brandt wondered how the Stanford team, led by faculty from the School of Medicine and Center for Health Policy, could have found no difference in total flavanols between organic and conventional foods when her own results showed organics carried far more of the heart-healthy nutrient. Upon further inspection, she noticed that the team had actually calculated the difference in total flavonols, a different nutrient, and reported the result with the swap of an "o" for an "a".
From an article ad The Huffington Post
Technically it's a spelling mistake which in practice meant the equivalent of searching for apples but counting the number of oranges instead, then writing up a paper on the astonishing lack of apples found.
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I call bullshit. Nitrates add to oxidative stress and the link between them and cancer is pretty well studied.
http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?hl=en&q=cancer+nitrates&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=
Need Mercedes parts ?
This article is so incredibly biased that it's hard to discover what's actually wrong with the Stanford research. This one reads like a raving lunatic jumping up and down because "the study didn't account for pesticides!" Well, it was a study that compared nutrition based on the nutrient content of the different production methods of food. Imagine that - they studied a bunch of numbers and totaled up their findings. Note that they did not study "which is worse for the environment", or "which food contains more residual agricultural chemicals", or "which tomato tastes better", or "which food contains more antibiotic resistant bacteria", yet those were the arguments he continually raised. That was not what this study studied!
Then he blames the study because “[t]he researchers started with a narrow set of assumptions and arrived at entirely predictable conclusions." Again with the "not really surprised" response. What did he think they were supposed to do, poll the newspaper food editors and ask them which variables to study? If they don't start with a specific set of assumptions and control for as many variables as possible, the results will be meaningless. So he's outraged because they didn't pick his particular variables? Get over it.
Now, could someone study the amount of residual pesticides in ordinary produce versus organically grown produce? Of course. Could someone study the human health effects of those doses of residual chemicals? Sure.
I, too, would like to see the study go even further. I'd ask the researchers to add just a few more data points and have it become meaningful not just to outraged food writers but to all Americans. They should compare the nutrition value per dollar spent in the grocery store, instead of nutrition values per gram. Then the food writers can publish that right next to the unemployment and poverty statistics, and maybe they can write another article about "how low-income people are ruining the ecology of this country because they don't buy as much organically grown food as gainfully employed newspaper food editors." Then we'd could measure his reaction to having both organically grown and genetically modified tomatoes being thrown at him.
John
If we're making chemistry based jokes, my favorite is organic salt
My Dad, a member of the London Royal Society of Chemistry, noticed this about 10 years ago. Being a very scientific family*, it caused lots of double-takes and polite WTFs around the dinner table. After a little research on the subject, turned out it's the harvesting process that's organic:
"Organic salt cannot be 'organically grown' because it is a mineral not a plant. When salt is certified organic the certification refers to the process of collection of sea salt. The saltworks must be located in a nature reserve, without risk of pollution to the water, the salt must be produced by hand, without purifying the salt or including any additives, and it must fulfil the high standards in chemical analysis." (Quoted: http://www.organicfooddirectory.com.au/organic-food/herbs-zzt-spices/organic-salt.html)
*Dad: Industrial Chemist. Mum: Chemist/Biologist/Lab Tech. Sister: Chemist/Physicist/Physiotherapist. Brother: Chemist/Computer Scientist. Me: Physicist/Computer Scientist. Cat: Psychologist/NLP Practitioner
1. Roundup kills plants, and is full of phosphates. Your kidneys would be in a very very bad state.
2. Natural fungicides are available, and most grain is tested for this sort of thing. Nobody uses antibiotics on plants crops, and the only regular bacterial infections from "organic" food come from e.coli infections due to the use of uncomposted manures, any responsible farmer uses dried and if possible composted manure.
3. They're only more energy intensive if you ignore the energy expended in the creation of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, it is a bit more land intensive, but seeing as a good part of US arable land is unused (farmers paid not to grow corn for example) it's not a huge issue, labor yes... large animals are not required, you can grow organically without the use of any manures, or manure from smaller animals like goats, rabbits, ducks, or chickens.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
Brandt wondered how the Stanford team, led by faculty from the School of Medicine and Center for Health Policy, could have found no difference in total flavanols between organic and conventional foods when her own results showed organics carried far more of the heart-healthy nutrient. Upon further inspection, she noticed that the team had actually calculated the difference in total flavonols, a different nutrient, and reported the result with the swap of an "o" for an "a".
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
She's a pretty valuable research colleague - easily distracted and a bit of prima donna, but she does provide her own lab test animals and she's immune to prosecution for ethics violations.
We have a dog too. He doesn't get credit.
Your conspiratorial side should notice that this NYT author is not a scientist. This NYT article IS the sensationalist crap that's getting printed just to sway the opinions of the masses.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
The New York Times gets a lot of (often well-deserved) criticism for its science reporting—but in this case, this isn't science reporting at all. It's written by Mark Bittman, and according to his website, Wikipedia, and various other sources, the author is a food writer and editor with a degree in psychology whose background mainly consists of writing and editing cookbooks and cooking magazines (and driving a cab).
Yes, pedigree doesn't mean everything and good science can come from people who aren't scientists. But still, consider the source and take it with whatever size grain of salt you feel is warranted.
Building Better Software
no, a well publicized Stanford study by people working outside of their fields of expertise is found to have obvious mistakes and draws sweeping conclusions from a curiously limited examination. Those conclusions also contradict other published studies.
But you know, calling organic food "snake oil" is certainly a tip that your opinion has solidified regardless of any actual research.
It breaks my pluginses, my precious!
I don't think the organic food is snake oil, but the salesmanship of it has that taint. The writer of the article clearly isn't unbiased: he makes his money selling books of dubious merit touting inflated benefits of eating it. And I think the ARE good reasons for eating it as opposed to typical crops -- it has less pesticides on it and may be less likely to cause problems -- toxicity, long term risk of cancer, immune problems, etc. But SHOW ME don't just claim it's more nutritious.
The specific claim these authors are debunking regards only nutrient content and specific health benefits. The authors stated that their research doesn't address all possible questions about the possible harm that may come from eating non-organically grown foods -- only the ones they specifically investigated. They shouldn't even HAVE to say that. Everybody should already know that but they know they're speaking to a world of ignoramuses and hucksters.
As for the authors working "outside their area of expertise" they include 4 MDs, an expert in mathematical modeling of disease, various graduate researchers working under their direction and some various experts in statistical and health issues. I don't see how they could be more qualified to judge the health effects of anything.
And even if you DID have a group of scientists who were working outside their area of expertise, they'd at least be armed with the statistical tools to evaluate original research and make valid conclusions regarding it, based on sound methods.