> let's tell everyone carbohydrates are the most important staple to eat and let's put corn and sugar in everything
Seems to be conflating two parties here. The USDA guidelines are written by government nutritionists and there are sound scientific reasons for recommending the base of any diet be grains. Though being a free country, whether or not the private sector decides to put corn syrup in everything is their own prerogative and unrelated to government guidelines.
> At least Soylent is trying to harness this machine for good.
Soylent is a private company, not an aid organization. Barring them irresponsibly marketing their product as a "total food replacement" I wouldn't call what they are doing good or bad.
The USDA has two conflicting missions: (1) promote US agricultural products, and (2) advise the public about healthy food choices.
This dual mandate results in significant food industry influence on the advice the USDA gives the public.
Unsurprisingly, guidance about what foods are unhealthy has been softened or eliminated. Changing guidance on proteins and grains are heavily influenced by the economic interests of entrenched agricultural corporations.
Humans have only eaten grains for the last 10,000 years or so. For the millions of years before that, we evolved on a diet that didn't include grain. Of courses those assertions don't prove anything but they do make me question the wisdom of basing the human diet on grain.
I think your assertion that havesting grain led to civilization is the most likely hypothesis but, I'm not convinced we started harvesting grain for food. We've discovered cups with trace amounts of beer that pedate plates with trace amounts of bread by 3,000 years. Again, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence but the theory that we brewed beer before we baked bread is well supported. But, just because we may have invented civilization around beer does not make it the cornerstone of a healthy diet.
Note that civilization can work out pretty well for itself even if its highly non-optimal for the individuals inside it. I'm certain that two people living two sickly lives and dying at 40 of diabetes is vastly economically superior in terms of revenue over one dude living a healthy 80 years.
Grains not good for anything except acting as an "energy drink" to fatten up livestock animals. Grains are good food for our good food, at most.
Since all the science points toward grains being bad for humans, present me with any scientific evidence our bodies evolved to eat grains. We don't chew our cud like cows, we have a carnivorous physique and body type...
There is an evolutionary aspect to it that nothing fattens up then kills americans like grain consumption; you guys go right on gulping that stuff down; eventually you'll go extinct because of it, then the rest of us won't have to listen to sick people claiming a grain based diet is healthy.
And we don't need to in order to fully digest cereal grains.
>"we have a carnivorous physique and body type"
Humans, like all omnivorous apes, are an odd mix of carnivore and herbivore. We have the abbreviated lumen, but lack the aggressive gastric chemistry of a carnivore. Our dentition is distinctly herbivorous in shape, but the mass of our teeth is insufficient to chew cellulosic material, and we lack the gut to digest it anyway.
The rational conclusion is that we have evolved to eat carefully prepared high-energy easily digestible foods. Which describes domesticated cereal grains very well.
>"There is an evolutionary aspect to it that nothing fattens up then kills americans like grain consumption"
The obesity epidemic certainly owes its spread to the glycemic profligacy of overly-processed grain. It's a bit of a stretch to sum it up by simply saying "grain kills".
> Grains not good for anything except acting as an "energy drink" to fatten up livestock animals. Grains are good food for our good food, at most.
This is so absurd, I'm not even sure how to respond. Most of the global human population gets their daily calories from staple cereals. A diet based on energy and time efficient calories from cereals is what allowed civilization to flourish.
As has already been stated by other commentors, the USDA has frequently been shown to have many conflicts of interests (ranging from their own stated goals to the appointment of many industry insiders -- much like the military industrial complex revolving doors).
> Though being a free country, whether or not the private sector decides to put corn syrup in everything is their own prerogative and unrelated to government guidelines.
Through subsidization of crops (namely corn), the government has created an economic environment where it is not always feasible to create a competitive product that doesn't use certain ingredients. Through the government's vilification of fat, they have created a marketing environment where it is hard to sell high-fat low-sugar foods. If HFCS is significantly cheaper than other ingredients, and if you are pressured to provide foods with low fat, then by using alternative ingredients you could price yourself out of the mainstream. Note: this does not mean you can't make the product, it just means that it will be more expensive and you have to explain to your customer WHY its more expensive. We of course see this in the more expensive "niche" health products. The sad result of this is often the more affluent members of society who can afford such niche products get healthier alternatives, while the poor of society get the unhealthy foods, through a combination of lack of education and lack of funds.
Seems to be conflating two parties here. The USDA guidelines are written by government nutritionists and there are sound scientific reasons for recommending the base of any diet be grains. Though being a free country, whether or not the private sector decides to put corn syrup in everything is their own prerogative and unrelated to government guidelines.
> At least Soylent is trying to harness this machine for good.
Soylent is a private company, not an aid organization. Barring them irresponsibly marketing their product as a "total food replacement" I wouldn't call what they are doing good or bad.