Thursday, December 17, 2015

Rentseekers Don't Want To Do Maintenance

Continuing on from the last post, I am reminded of a different field- nutrition. There have been many studies on low carb diets with rats and chow that is often about 35% carbohydrate. Then these results are used to say various things about low carb diets in humans.

First, we aren't rats. The metabolism is quite different.

Second, the rat chow isn't low carb. At 35% carbohydrate, insulin will happen, the use of fat will stop, and nothing whatsoever shall be achieved by the study, except the researchers are likely to extract more rent in a field dominated by low carb haters.

Meanwhile, keto diets are suddenly the rage among the SF tech crowd, if Tim Ferriss is anything to go by. So, what's going to happen? I don't know. Maybe they just fiddle around and hack their own bodies- maybe they decide to put their money into knocking the dominant narrative in the nutritional field over. Maybe they just make a lot of money while the "professionals" bleat on. I new this stuff last decade.

Now, to this mystery. What mystery? Why is the rat chow often still 35% carbs? Stupid? Evil? Locked in a vicious ideology that interprets all dissent as 'hate'?

As the title alludes, I also think they arrive at their professional status, and then they don't want to be bothered. This is despite the possibility of actually discovering new things, or answering a question definitively. There is a perverse incentive to keep the debate and invective going, just like there is in politics, because their funding ultimately comes from politicians.

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