I find this incredibly fascinating. Especially the ability to save hours every day from not needing to eat. If the guy doesn’t die after a year or so, I’m definitely trying this out.
When I looked at his blog last, he was eating out socially (understandable). So we onlookers won’t get to enjoy his discovery of any new micro-nutrient deficiency syndromes.
I wasn’t especially impressed by his approach. Maybe he’ll get some good advice from others, but I didn’t think he was anyone to listen to.
It’s not impressive as a medical experiment, but it’s pretty impressive for actually-getting-something-done.
If it turns out that he can survive comfortably on his concoction plus highly irregular meals at restaurants, that’s useful information. Just not as useful as the results of a more thorough experiment.
He actually spent the first two months on a Soylent-only diet, and only recently added social eating. I think he said something in his three month blog post about a week he spent eating normal food, and he ended up feeling way crappier.
Sure. But 2 months is not long enough. Some unaccounted-for vitamin with a long half-life or a low requirement could give deficiency symptoms after 4 months but not 2.
Also, people on restrictive diets post all the time about how crappy they feel when they reintroduce something. For him to slide comfortably into the explanation “thus my product makes me feel better than restaurant food” is typical of such dieters’ enthusiasm.
Although bad restaurant food does exist, much of the digestive upset people experience when going out to eat is simply down to overeating, late eating, or alcohol.
That was also a week he spent travelling. Sleeping away from home, long plane/car rides, irregular schedule, and all the other attendant discomforts are quite enough to throw me off my game, even without dietary shifts.
I would be more surprised if, by only eating when you’re socially required to, you happened to get the exact essential nutrients the diet would otherwise leave you without.
some of that stuff might have a long half-life in the body
and be needed only in small (catalytic?) amounts.
so that
you wouldn’t know about them if you just studied basic nutrition textbooks (or perhaps nobody knows about them)
if your social eating is frequent enough, you’d never lack them.
so, ideally, people following some soylent-type practice strictly will develop some interesting symptoms, and we’ll discover some new stuff. but if they cheat, we don’t learn as much.
i admit there’s a good possibility that we already know about all the vitamin-like stuff there is. after soylenters start showing better 10-year mortality, i’ll gladly join them.
I find this incredibly fascinating. Especially the ability to save hours every day from not needing to eat. If the guy doesn’t die after a year or so, I’m definitely trying this out.
When I looked at his blog last, he was eating out socially (understandable). So we onlookers won’t get to enjoy his discovery of any new micro-nutrient deficiency syndromes.
I wasn’t especially impressed by his approach. Maybe he’ll get some good advice from others, but I didn’t think he was anyone to listen to.
It’s not impressive as a medical experiment, but it’s pretty impressive for actually-getting-something-done.
If it turns out that he can survive comfortably on his concoction plus highly irregular meals at restaurants, that’s useful information. Just not as useful as the results of a more thorough experiment.
He actually spent the first two months on a Soylent-only diet, and only recently added social eating. I think he said something in his three month blog post about a week he spent eating normal food, and he ended up feeling way crappier.
Sure. But 2 months is not long enough. Some unaccounted-for vitamin with a long half-life or a low requirement could give deficiency symptoms after 4 months but not 2.
Also, people on restrictive diets post all the time about how crappy they feel when they reintroduce something. For him to slide comfortably into the explanation “thus my product makes me feel better than restaurant food” is typical of such dieters’ enthusiasm.
Although bad restaurant food does exist, much of the digestive upset people experience when going out to eat is simply down to overeating, late eating, or alcohol.
That was also a week he spent travelling. Sleeping away from home, long plane/car rides, irregular schedule, and all the other attendant discomforts are quite enough to throw me off my game, even without dietary shifts.
Could also be a temporary effect. Your gut flora adjusts to what you’re eating, and a sudden shift in composition can cause digestive distress.
I would be more surprised if, by only eating when you’re socially required to, you happened to get the exact essential nutrients the diet would otherwise leave you without.
here’s what i was thinking:
“real food” has plenty of vitamins and stuff
some of that stuff might have a long half-life in the body
and be needed only in small (catalytic?) amounts.
so that
you wouldn’t know about them if you just studied basic nutrition textbooks (or perhaps nobody knows about them)
if your social eating is frequent enough, you’d never lack them.
so, ideally, people following some soylent-type practice strictly will develop some interesting symptoms, and we’ll discover some new stuff. but if they cheat, we don’t learn as much.
i admit there’s a good possibility that we already know about all the vitamin-like stuff there is. after soylenters start showing better 10-year mortality, i’ll gladly join them.