Interesting Links for 17-01-2024

[andrewducker]

1. All the Types of Science Fiction

(tags:scifi funny genre tropes )

2. Data collected just before the war in Gaza shows that millions of Palestinians were already unable to afford food and shelter

(tags:palestine israel doom )

3. Abortion clinic protest laws to be watered down by James Cleverly

(tags:abortion uk OhForFucksSake protest )

4. Fujitsu knew from 'very early stage' about flaws in Horizon system

(tags:postoffices software OhForFucksSake )

5. Drinking 100% fruit juice may be linked to weight gain in children

(tags:fruit sugar weight children )

Comments

[channelpenguin]

5. Well, yes, fruit juice has a lot more sugar and less fibre than fruit. Plus I only know about apple juice, but 4-5 apples yield a scant 250ml of juice. So about the size they are talking about. I guess very few kids would eat that many apples (which whole, would as they say, have fibre to slow the digestion).

I do wonder if kids who drink fruit juice daily ALSO drink other sweetened drinks like squash, lemonade etc. (instead of, say, water). So it could also be proxy for other intake too.

Artificial sweeteners are now being looked at for the effect on gut microbiome (not great) and metabolism (sweet taste but no energy might be confusing for the body).

As far as I can tell, for best health, none of us should drink much of anything that's not water, coffee, or tea (or herbal) without sugar, of course (and in my opinion, without milk, but that's an argument I'm not up to having today!(suffice to say milk is also full of its own sugar).

[channelpenguin]

Interestingly, since autumn, I have added about that much of my own apple and pear juice to my diet - to no effect whatsoever on my weight or (as far as I can tell) body fat. But then I'm eating pretty much whole foods almost all of the time, so maybe my appetite adjusts correctly and I eat less instead. And my juice has WAY more fibre than any commercial juice, especially the slow pressed.

[andrewducker]

I wouldn't count tea or coffee as "for best health" either.

Personally, I find that having artificially-sweetened drinks makes me crave sweet things more. But that may be psychological.

[channelpenguin]

There's some nice evidence that teas and even coffee have health benefits (in moderation). Enough that I actually resumed drinking 2 cups of coffee per day, on top of my rather weak green and black tea. I have zero trouble giving it up, and hadn't drunk coffee in years, so it was a deliberate decision. But I'm incredibly insensitive to caffeine, so I don't have any downsides.

I believe there are psychological mechanisms also behind the effect you describe for sweetened things. The sweet taste causes the body to ramp up to receive sugar (as I recall, affecting insulin levels?).

But I think we're in agreement on other sweet drinks. I mean nobody should have them with any regularity, especially kids.

[mountainkiss]

If I understand the evidence correctly, there’s quite a strong case that for those with addictive personalities or limited self-regulation, diet soda is sufficiently better for them than sugar that it may at times be a worthwhile substitute if there isn’t a realistic option of total abstinence. It’s like vaping and smoking in some cases.

[andrewducker]

Oh yes. Definitely vastly better. And as someone who has given up on both sugar and diet drinks many times, definitely better to restart the latter than the former.

[channelpenguin]

Sounds logical - except one thing.

"There isn’t a realistic option of total abstinence" For refined or added sugar, of course there is.

If you mean avoiding sugars in fruit and veg ... Hmm, harder. But you do have these hardcore carnivores kicking around, so, Hmmm.

I think total abstinence is by far the easiest option. (I speak as someone who could not do moderation, but gave up alcohol completely, overnight with no support or programmes with zero trouble. In 20 years, I've never given it a 2nd thought).

[mountainkiss]

And that’s absolutely great and I’m genuinely pleased for you. But I’ve been in many kinds of treatment for disordered eating for over twenty years and never found total abstinence. I couldn’t have worked harder. I wish your assumption were true but unfortunately it isn’t.

[channelpenguin]

Ah. I wasn't clear enough. Or, more correctly, I forgot that you will not have been around my thoughts before.

One cannot be totally abstinent from food. That's a thing I've often said. I think giving up alcohol is super easy by comparison to conquering eating issues. I've been motivated to stick mostly to a few restrictive diets for health reasons (successfully curing my decades-long psoriasis). But even then I've "relapsed" a few times before getting back to success. I've recently gone wholefood plant based (I'm not strictly vegan, I eat local honey I was given). I personally find strict rules and hard lines far less trouble!

I'm sorry you've struggled for so long. I can't suggest anything except don't give up. I failed twice with alcohol before succeeding, and a few times also with other problem behaviours. Take any improvement as a win, especially if it's sustained.

So, to go back more narrowly on topic - I'm guessing the artificial sweeteners are your lesser evil.

[mountainkiss]

This is a thoughtful, nuanced and empathic comment, which I appreciate. But it's unrecognisably different from your apparent previous position: "There isn’t a realistic option of total abstinence" For refined or added sugar, of course there is.

How did you intend the former to be understood, in the light of the latter? Or, which I think is the same question, what does it mean to "be around your thoughts" in this instance?

[anna_wing]

So far, I have found the most sustainable approach to be eating normally, but in slightly smaller quantities, that can decrease naturally as body mass decreases, and be easily maintained once goal weight is reached.

A friend pointed me at the Buddha's advice to King Pasenadi, which was also instructive.

https://suttafriends.org/sutta/sn3-13/

A more detailed version involves the King gradually eating one spoonful less every day (or whatever interval suits), until his initial bucket of rice and curry had been reduced to a normal-sized bowl, along with his size. And of course as he got slimmer, he could return to kingly pursuits such as hunting and martial exercises, which further sped his return to health.

[mountainkiss]

Again I am really pleased for you that you have something that works, but I think it is coming from a very different place from the one that I am talking about.

[magedragonfire]

When they're all you can have besides water when your blood glucose is trending high because your pancreas is broken, you do what you do. There's certainly no insulin production being affected in me. :P

[channelpenguin]

Personally, I would drink water (or black tea / herbal tea). But that's me - I HATE the taste of sweeteners.

[magedragonfire]

I do get you - I don't like the taste of them in anything other than carbonated drinks. There's a weird, over-sweet, bitter chemical taste in pretty much all of them. But I find the carbonation or something masks it.

Herbal tea's okay sometimes. I like a bit of sugar in black tea, though, and plain water is something that I can't convince my squirrel brain to drink in any significant quantity. (To speak nothing of carbonated, unsweetened water, which is the most awful stuff. Yech.)

[channelpenguin]

I suppose I have to try quite hard these days to appreciate why drinks, and cutting sugar are so problematic for others, because I don't really have a sweet tooth. I like fruit, but the sourer end of things, not a fan of bananas, for example. My "poison" was always fatty+salty - ideally also crunchy. Crisps (chips) , Tortilla chips and the like. Abstinence is the only way for me (more than a year now!).

But, after I gave up alcohol (not before) on the occasion that I'd try a slice of cake at a party, or someone at work brought doughnuts and I had one ... I would then often go on to another and another and be the one who finished ALL the leftovers, even though I wasn't actually enjoying it. So better just not to start, especially since sweet stuff doesn't even appeal to me unless I've already had some.

I think that giving up alcohol successfully, and finding life so much better, I'm better equipped to a) realise total abstinence is the only solution (for me) b) that it makes for a better and more enjoyable life (for me) c) that I can do it successfully, and then after the decision, never give it a second thought.

But... I found empathy and forgiveness vital too. Not to stress about it if I do end up somehow with a few chips, gummies or bit of cake in my hand and they then reach my mouth. Just to say to myself "ooops" and not let it start a binge. But that is very seldom a after a long time. Ice cream is my summer holiday/day trip weakness still. But I go for sit down cafés in tourist towns for huge fancy sundaes to get full value from the experience, and have a huge walk afterwards and I *seem* to be ok.

Alcohol NEVER happens in that way (but I'm fine on the rare occasion with sauce or medicine with alcohol in, and it doesn't set off anything ever).

I suspect my metabolism is very bulletproof compared to normal though - I've never been overweight (rather wiry at 62 - 56 kg at 167cm), and only carried any noticeable fat when I still drank (and a bit, though much less when I lived with a heavily-snacking housemate, so we bought lots on shopping trips). Fat is a metabolic ally and hormonally active tissue that can drive all sorts of processes once it's established in any quantities. And we "obey" our hormones (as best we can), whether they are telling us "mate" "eat" "run" "fight" "hide" ... (Or in the case of the lesser-known of the dopamine pathways - "make elaborate long term plans and detailed steps of how to get there"... See the book "the molecule of more"). So I think it's really really hard for people who have a metabolism that's somehow out of kilter to have good control of any behaviour, and I've lucked out in that mine seems really hard to shove very far off course.

[nancylebov]

4. I'm wondering what the Post Office scandal says about how (English) people think about government. Is the cruelty the point?

5. https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/16/health/juice-weight-gain-study-wellness/index.html

"In children, each additional serving per day of 100% fruit juice was associated with a 0.03 higher body mass index, or BMI, change, according to the study."

It's barely perceptible, and I don't think they actually studied blood sugar. By all means, panic about fruit juice.