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Comment by aurora72 | Hacker News Reader

This article sucks really. Aaron E. Carroll says that he's read many books and articles on the topic but he hasn't read 2 books by David Perlmutter and Davis Williams it looks like otherwise he wouldn't recommend 'whole grains over refined grains' in #1.

He hasn't watched Mark Hyman's videos on Youtube either, otherwise he wouldn't recommend 'butter' in #3.

The #2 conflicts with #4. They may be combined into one simple line: All the restaurants are either unhealty or wallet blowing.

#5 is missing some detail, such as the one that no alcohol but red wine should be taken. #6 should be modified to read: Treat all beverages with total negligence.

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Since there are probably contrasting point of views on most of the points you list, how do you propose to choose the one to reccommend as "correct" ?

Well, both Perlmutter and Davis say to avoid all kinds of grains at all costs and Hyman says to avoid all kinds of dairy products (butter, yoghurt, milk) with a possible exception of white cheese and they are all based on science. So I propose based on science. My claims about the restaurants and beverages are based on economic/profitability, restaurants and supermarkets offer decent priced and good tasting meal at the expense of health. If I'm able to get cheap and good tasting chicken at a fried chicken restaurant, I do it at the expense of health, need no science to see that.

It's definitely not settled science that you should never eat grains. Yes, some experts say you shouldn't, but if you're rejecting one expert because he disagrees with two others, it's definitely not sufficient to say it's "based on science".

As for dairy, while he mentioned using butter without paranoia about fat, he didn't seem to advocate for dairy. Eating dairy might be bad, but "don't eat dairy" is bad (or ineffective) advice because _people won't follow it_. Don't make perfect the enemy of better. (If it makes you feel any better about him, Dr. Carroll regularly rails against "the milk industrial complex"[0][1][2][3].)

[0] http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/finally-someone-...

[1] http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/another-blow-aga...

[2] http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/yet-another-blow...

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzyFZcuHmeI

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