Nutrition “Science” is so bad we may have no idea of a “healthy diet” – even though each day brings stories telling us to “eat healthy”. And the recommendations generally fit the politics du jour – take the 2025 USDA Dietary Guidelines – which read like a climate change manifesto.
Many think nutrition “science” is not very useful – from the poor-quality studies, inability to replicate study findings, to the dueling experts problem (one says meat good, one says meat bad, last week coffee bad, this week coffee good).
- Why everything you know about nutrition is wrong | New Scientist
- I asked 8 researchers why the science of nutrition is so messy. Here’s what they said. | Vox
- Is Nutrition Science Mostly Junk? | American Council on Science and Health
- Is Nutrition Science Not Really Science? – The New York Times
- I’m Completely Fed Up with Nutrition Science. You Should Be, Too. | RealClearScience
- Are we doing diet and nutrition research wrong? | Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center
- The Science of Nutrition is Failing Us
- History of modern nutrition science—implications for current research, dietary guidelines, and food policy – PMC
Seems the best thing is to probably eat as humans have for hundreds of years – a mix of foods from beans, rice, grain, vegetables, fruits and meats.
What happened: The nutrition science historians point to major “wins” in the early 20th century (and even earlier), dealing with scurvy, rickets and other common diseases – via nutrition. After WW2, many thought perhaps many diseases could be correlated with food intake. By the late 1950s and in the 1960s, we had the “heart attack epidemic” when it seemed as if there was a huge upswing in heart attacks – must be due to food inputs, they thought. (The heart attack epidemic was mostly due to improved diagnosis – in the old days, people died of “natural causes” – a cause that largely no longer exists.)
The government responded, eventually, with the USDA dietary guidelines – saying we needed to eliminate all fats from our diets (amazingly, sugar consumption was okay) based on Ancil Key’s assertion that dietary fat was the cause of heart attacks.
Every 5 years, the guidelines are updated – suggesting what we thought we knew five years ago was not so certain. Since the first guidelines were released, we created an obesity epidemic. Fast forward to 2025 and the latest guidelines say we drastically cut meat consumption – which for many can lead to serious, life-threatening vitamin B-12 deficiency (that happened to me). We need to eat more fresh fruit and vegetables – year-round! – which means a global transportation system to deliver these goods in the middle of winter.
Read the links above – much of nutrition science is contradictory, inconsistent and incoherent. It’s to the point you need a spreadsheet or an app on your phone to track your nutrients – seriously, there are ads appearing on FB that “make it easy” to follow the “How Not to Diet” book assertions – which include everything from a tracking app to prepared foods.
We have evolved, as a species, to where we require an app or spreadsheet just to eat food. This doesn’t seem right.
