I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here's How
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I fooled my hubby in to a home "cure" for cold sores that went like this. He could not find any holes in my argument and he remains cured to this day. I shared my "cure" with my (MD) sister and she cried, "unethical!" If I were a doctor maybe, but I made no special claims. Here's my "cure".
Cold sores can be caused by stress. B vitamins are good for stress. I found a B vitamin formulation that had a large label "STRESS" on it. I told hubby how it worked and I stressed it was to reduce his stress. His chronic cold sores cleared up and he continues to take his "STRESS" pill daily.
Can you guess how this worked? What are the flaws in my strategy?
Nice! The cold sores got better of their own accord.
As the saying goes, "Correlation does not equal causation".0 -
I'm glad the OP article got posted.
I came here just now to do the same thing. Ninja'd.
My favourite bit:
"Here’s a dirty little science secret: If you measure a large number of things about a small number of people, you are almost guaranteed to get a “statistically significant” result. Our study included 18 different measurements—weight, cholesterol, sodium, blood protein levels, sleep quality, well-being, etc.—from 15 people. (One subject was dropped.) That study design is a recipe for false positives.
"Think of the measurements as lottery tickets. Each one has a small chance of paying off in the form of a “significant” result that we can spin a story around and sell to the media. The more tickets you buy, the more likely you are to win. We didn’t know exactly what would pan out—the headline could have been that chocolate improves sleep or lowers blood pressure—but we knew our chances of getting at least one “statistically significant” result were pretty good."0 -
mamapeach910 wrote: »Caveat to my own post: it was also about how sad science reporting is.
I'll take that comment as an opportunity to share this article I've shared elsewhere a number of times:
"WARNING: wild extrapolation (a classification system for science news)":
http://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2014/sep/10/wild-extrapolation-classification-system-science-media-scepticism
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pretty wild read. thanks for posting!0
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Iron_Feline wrote: »
Cute. Still stand by my point. All the 'research' in the world isn't gonna fool me into thinking a high calorie sugar snack is supposed to somehow help me lose weight. If people are that easily fooled they deserve to be separated from their money.
lol the point was to fool "the system" and see if they would run with it (publish, promote, etc.)
hence you missing the point. besides that, they didn't eat a "high calorie sugar snack", they ate a 1.5g bar of dark chocolate per day. as long as you feel smart though, right?
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tl;dr maybe it's time to wake up, get back to the basics and realize a couple of simple truths
1) counting calories will always remain king for gaining/losing weight. ALWAYS
2) counting macros of those counted calories influences how healthy you are are while gaining/losing weight
3) there are no miracles. stop fussing about the small details like sodium, antioxidants, some mystical "detoxification" or the always funny "negative-calorie foods" aka "consume these unneeded calories to lose weight!"0 -
tl;dr maybe it's time to wake up, get back to the basics and realize a couple of simple truths
1) counting calories will always remain king for gaining/losing weight. ALWAYS
2) counting macros of those counted calories influences how healthy you are are while gaining/losing weight
3) there are no miracles. stop fussing about the small details like sodium, antioxidants, some mystical "detoxification" or the always funny "negative-calorie foods" aka "consume these unneeded calories to lose weight!"
Gaaaaaaaa!0 -
crazyjerseygirl wrote: »tl;dr maybe it's time to wake up, get back to the basics and realize a couple of simple truths
1) counting calories will always remain king for gaining/losing weight. ALWAYS
2) counting macros of those counted calories influences how healthy you are are while gaining/losing weight
3) there are no miracles. stop fussing about the small details like sodium, antioxidants, some mystical "detoxification" or the always funny "negative-calorie foods" aka "consume these unneeded calories to lose weight!"
Gaaaaaaaa!
I'm making a note to myself to spend extra time on reading comprehension in our school curriculum for next year.
This thread has made it obvious that there's a need for it.
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mamapeach910 wrote: »crazyjerseygirl wrote: »tl;dr maybe it's time to wake up, get back to the basics and realize a couple of simple truths
1) counting calories will always remain king for gaining/losing weight. ALWAYS
2) counting macros of those counted calories influences how healthy you are are while gaining/losing weight
3) there are no miracles. stop fussing about the small details like sodium, antioxidants, some mystical "detoxification" or the always funny "negative-calorie foods" aka "consume these unneeded calories to lose weight!"
Gaaaaaaaa!
I'm making a note to myself to spend extra time on reading comprehension in our school curriculum for next year.
This thread has made it obvious that there's a need for it.
You know I love you right?0 -
aerochic42 wrote: »just act like you know what you are talking about and people will follow. Even if you tell them you making it up. then they think you are either lying or excessively modest. It's scary how many people believe some of the stuff that comes out of my mouth and follow me even when I freely admit that I'm full of poop. Of course my husband will call me on it, but it doesn't matter because people follow him even faster.
ummmmm cough, cough,, jenny macarthy and vacines causing autism cough, cough0 -
aerochic42 wrote: »just act like you know what you are talking about and people will follow. Even if you tell them you making it up. then they think you are either lying or excessively modest. It's scary how many people believe some of the stuff that comes out of my mouth and follow me even when I freely admit that I'm full of poop. Of course my husband will call me on it, but it doesn't matter because people follow him even faster.
ummmmm cough, cough,, jenny macarthy and vacines causing autism cough, cough
I loves you too!0 -
I fooled my hubby in to a home "cure" for cold sores that went like this. He could not find any holes in my argument and he remains cured to this day. I shared my "cure" with my (MD) sister and she cried, "unethical!" If I were a doctor maybe, but I made no special claims. Here's my "cure".
Cold sores can be caused by stress. B vitamins are good for stress. I found a B vitamin formulation that had a large label "STRESS" on it. I told hubby how it worked and I stressed it was to reduce his stress. His chronic cold sores cleared up and he continues to take his "STRESS" pill daily.
Can you guess how this worked? What are the flaws in my strategy?
I approve.
Aren't there studies that placebo can have a significant effect if people believe in it? The difference for me is my husband would never believe anything scientifically related I suggest to him. Also, I keep trying to figure out how I can use the placebo effect to my own advantage but I think since I know it is a placebo and am generally skeptical of things it won't work if I'm the one to initiate it.
At any rate, I think this is way better than doctors who tell their patients to restrict carbs. Some maybe believe in it. Others know if they give their patients restrictive diets they will tend to see some calorie restriction without having to ask their patients to keep food journals or things people don't like to do (MFPers being the exception).0 -
Revisiting because this seems to have spun up again.
Readers need to be aware that peer review is not an imprimatur of guarantee of quality. It's just one step in the process. One peer-reviewed study does not science make. Peer review can stop bad science. It can also enable bad science, and believe me, it can stop good science.0 -
That is a very elaborate story and probably an eye opener for most. Thanks for sharing. You got my interest. I've always been of the opinion that you can find whatever you are looking for on the internet. On a side note: my wife and I have grown to like dark chocolate with almonds. We sometimes have it in the house. We only eat a little bit not even everyday. It's one of those little joys in life. Now, if we sat down and ate the whole bar or bag in one sitting, or if we believed it was the key to staying fit or to us loose weight,... those would be problems... Everyone has to find what make their own body work. It's a real trick. Good luck everyone.0
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TimothyFish wrote: »I'm not saying that the people who published this information shouldn't have been more careful, but given the number of benefits to eating chocolate that people have been discussing for the past decade, saying that it is beneficial to weight loss isn't that farfetched. It would be interesting to see the results of a properly done study that looks at this.
really???? I am gonna start calling you Sheldon cause you apparently don't get sarcasm...
You rang?0 -
This is so great.
Ill be forwarding to a few people i know IRL.0 -
peter56765 wrote: »
The moral of my overly long story is, I get why people ask to see the actual study instead of an article or a blog post about the study and I get why they're so skeptical. And yes, doctors are just as guilty of falling for this nonsense. So even if your doctor tells you something, do your own research!
I wouldn't trust a doctor as far as I could throw them. BTDT and will NEVER do again. They are infallible human idiots that think they're gods.0 -
In some ways it's amazing to see how easy it was to dupe large publications that just want a sensational story. It's also just sad because it's likely that this story will float around for years and we'll be seeing people bring it up randomly and telling us to look at this awesome study.0
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Dammit ....before I even had an account on MFP ..I also used to believe in everything anyone would say. Now I try to research the things for myself. I use the internet and internet also has things like above.
So grateful that I learned about Calories being king otherwise I still wouldn't have lost a single pound and would've been wondering why these miracle foods don't work.
BTW a general claim is Protein powders with Coco or chocolate flavor is better than vanilla or any other flavor because Coco is natural and other flavors are made using artificial sugars. Is that true or false as well? because damn I've missed some very good tasting protein shake.0 -
I do several lectures a year on research for Nursing, PA and Pharmacy students, and am always on the lookout for things like this to share with them. This is totally going into my next rotation...0
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