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View Full Version : O.K. Maybe Low Carb doesn't stress babies


Viking Dan
04-07-2006, 09:49 AM
Nutrient during pregnancy 'super-charges' brain


http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4771
banshee
04-07-2006, 11:34 AM
I think this and the previous study you posted are good indicators of the "tree/forest" methodology of science. I don't think you can isolate nutritional factors from each other. Studying the effect of one nutrient doesn't take into account a lot of the synergistic effects of combining nutrients. Also, I think studying a single "result" has similar problems. Saying that a particular nutrient approach causes a specific end result without studying the whole doesn't take a lot of different things into account. The cortisol study doesn't take into account other possible factors other than diet, and doesn't take into account the overall health of the person. Are the higher cortisol levels significant when other health factors are taken into account? Is it possible the people just have a more sensitive system that pumps out more cortisol in response to stress, but also down-regulates the cortisol faster than the people with lower cortisol responses?

I know that studying nutritional approaches is important, but I just think that isolating specific causal relationships is rather ridiculous. We're not straight input/output machines. The complexity of the human system has to be taken into account.
Viking Dan
04-07-2006, 11:53 AM
Its sometimes insane how much conflicting data there is. I suppose one can chalk it up to genetic diversity. There's always some mutant out there just waiting to ruin your hypothesis.
James L
04-08-2006, 12:37 PM
I know that studying nutritional approaches is important, but I just think that isolating specific causal relationships is rather ridiculous.

It's also useful to remember that "correlation does not imply causality." That's a principle well known in economics. Namely, just because two or more things/events/observations happened together (are correlated) does not necessarily mean that one caused the other.
Viking Dan
04-08-2006, 01:21 PM
It's also useful to remember that "correlation does not imply causality." That's a principle well known in economics. Namely, just because two or more things/events/observations happened together (are correlated) does not necessarily mean that one caused the other.

Aha! So babies cause ketosis! :p