One thing to remember is that the original food policy guidelines were decidedly not what the industrial food procedures wanted. The policies you’re referring started with a mistake made by a Nixon-era task force responding to what was then seen as an obesity crisis, even though it was notably lower than now.
There’s an especially interesting quote from one of the doctors involved:
> "What are the risks associated with eating less meat, less fat, less saturated fat, less cholesterol, less sugar, less salt and more fruits, vegetables, unsaturated fat - and cereal products - especially whole-grain cereals? There are none that can be identified and important benefits can be expected."
They were wrong on the salt for most people & cholesterol, but in general that’s not especially bad advice. The problem was that they didn’t think about how well people would follow any of this – taking away most of what makes food taste good, especially in the era before white Americans used spices - and especially how the manufactured food industry would take this as a massive growth opportunity and key qualifiers like switching to a higher ratio of complex carbohydrates were largely forgotten.
I've also read that the food pyramid was apt for the time since meat and whatnot was so expensive. They were trying to get enough calories in people.
The food pyramid has its origins not in recommendations for a balanced diet but in food shortages. The USDA released the Basic 7 food guide in 1943 to help U.S. citizens cope with food rationing during World War II.
That was a huge shift indeed - when my grandmother took “Home Economics” it was all about having enough safely-cooked calories for manual laborers (Illinois where she grew up ran to farm and factory workers) and nobody could afford anything like the amount of meat or dairy we now eat. My grandfather used to eat beef a few times per year, when the cousins who had dairy cattle culled the herd.
Tooth decay requires several parameters
1- bacteria
2- bacteria food source
3- acidic environment
4- time
We all have the bacteria but the other ones are somewhat controllable. What many people don’t account for is the 4th parameter of contact time.
It would be better (for your teeth, not overall health) to rapidly drink several sodas than periodically sip one for several hours.
Decay typically only occurs in a pH environment of 5.5 or lower, otherwise the enamel is resistant to the acid. So the longer the pH is lower the more likely you will develop a cavity.
An impossible task. One I also am tempted to try and do.
“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace. What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God's gift to man. I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away. Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, even there was wickedness, and in the place of righteousness, even there was wickedness. I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work. I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return. Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth? So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him?”
Ecclesiastes 3:1-22 ESV
https://bible.com/bible/59/ecc.3.1-22.ESV
I like HN for the fairly diverse things they get posted. I don’t read a lot of the deep techy stuff because I don’t understand any of it. But the discussions are often pretty interesting and it’s a (in my head) better use of browsing time than Reddit.
