Comment on Making healthier choices
superfes@lemmy.world 5 months ago
TIL that there’s an allowed 20% margin of error in accuracy per the FDA.
That seems way bigger than it needs to be …
For highly processed foods, I agree.
But for relatively unprocessed foods, seems completely reasonable to me at first glance. The relative sugar content of, say, an apple, is dependent on all sorts of parameters (sun, water, soil…). The gluten content of wheat, iron content of vegetables, all of these things are variable. The more “natural” a food is, the higher the variability (as opposed to, say, artificial candy — that should be pretty uniform).
Fun fact: the FDA also has limits on how many rodent hairs, insect parts, mold and so forth can be in food. The limit is not zero.
And that limit wouldn’t be possible to be zero. We don’t live in a sterile vacuum so I’m good with it
We don’t live in a sterile vacuum
Speak for yourself, buddy!
Of course the hippie lives in a sterile environment.
I already knew this stuff, the idea that everything needs to be bleached clean is stupid, even when it comes to food.
Insects are just extra protein! Nom!
Why doesn’t the FDA require companies to put a range instead of an exact number then?
Actual reason? Not sure because I wasn’t around for the comment period.
Likely reason? People are terrible at making decisions based on ranges or anything more complex than a single number. They aren’t even that good at a single number.
Since mixed things like trail mix can have some variety in ration from bag to bag, going with an average and some variance means having some kind of flexibility. Then there are vegetables and other plants that can vary wildly too.
But what about something like gummy bears where the whole thing is very consistent? Can’t have different rules for different foods, because companies will tie the whole thing up in court.
So the end result is a rule that allows flexibility for the things that actually need it that is also applied to everything else for simplicity.
eatCasserole@lemmy.world 5 months ago
We can’t even measure calories accurately, never mind predicting how much your specific body will actually absorb. Maybe we could be more accurate with vitamins and stuff, but I dunno.
joyjoy@lemm.ee 5 months ago
The only way to get an accurate reading on calorie count is to burn it. 1 kilocalorie (nutritional calorie) can increase the temperature of 1kg of water by 1 C°
janNatan@lemmy.ml 5 months ago
But burning isn’t how your body utilizes the calories. Some things burn just fine yet are entirely useless as a (human) food source, like wood. This complicates things.
For instance, we still don’t know if our bodies can actually use ethanol (drinking alcohol) as a fuel source. Is that vodka shot adding to your daily calorie intake?
giantfloppycock@lemm.ee 5 months ago
Vodka’s back on the menu, boys!
StaticFalconar@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Even more reason there is plenty of science to be discovered. Until then, the rough estimate we have is still proven to work (calories consumed minus calories burned).
gibmiser@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Sure, but that is measuring calorie content, not what your body can absorb
eatCasserole@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Exactly, which makes the whole endeavour more of a guessing game than a science.
ramble81@lemm.ee 5 months ago
I mean there’s no way that they’re gonna be able to do metrics for every person since every person is built differently so there has to be a common standard. Or you you saying that certain types of calories are burned the same way for all people?
FluorideMind@lemmy.world 5 months ago
What? Calorie is a perfectly accurate method of measurement. Just because your body might absorb more or less than the next person doesn’t change the amount of calories in a food.
Neato@ttrpg.network 5 months ago
Measuring calories in food is not accurate. Measuring calories by burning fuel is, but that’s not how we use food.
Sethayy@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
Lmao so measuring calories in food isn’t accurate cause you don’t consider it food when measured?
That’s gotta be the funniest counter argument I’ve ever heard