Can ANYONE tell me why Soylent is a bad idea?!?! i mean, just

>>5469413
it's not a bad idea if you know what you're doing
but it's not exactly an item for the common folk

>>5469413

because it's people, it's made out of people

Aside from the fact that soybeans and lentils are the 2 most finicky and thirsty crops which are commonly grown from dirty Monsanto stock and are major components of this formula peddled by some new-age guy with no training or education in human biology and nutrition?

Your stomach and the rest of your digestive system relies and requires solid food items to go through. It makes constant churning motions and contractions in order to process the food and the high acid content is a part of the process.

In WW1, Germany had the bright idea of creating ersatz food out of plant matter flavoured with various coal tar derivatives. The reason why they had to deal with ersatz food and not feed supplement pills to the population was beacuse:

1. Your digestive tracts would be ruined and you would die from inside out if you are permanently placed on a pills-and-liquid diet

2. The human body has numerous mechanisms of detecting delight in the food by smell, taste and texture. Humans grow bored and depressed when they eat the same thing day in day out because it is the body's mechanism of saying "you might be malnutritioned".

The eating of food, especially with others, is a source of mental and social stimulation that honestly cannot be replaced by a table of people gulping down some shake. It's why solitary confinement sucks, and why food is used as a punishment in some cases (nutraloaf). Our psychology is too well geared to seeking variety and social commonality with food to adapt to it, and you will invariably end up with depression.

>>5469441
The Kickstarter fad diet food Soylent doesn't have soybeans or lentils in it

But it did in the book

>>5469441
i want to take everything you said seriously, but your apparent ignorance on the subject is clouding my ability to take your arguments into consideration.

Soylent does not contain soy beans and lentils.

>>5469413
because food isn't just macros and micros to some people

maybe I want to eat a waffle or a steak because it tastes great and gives me an endorphin rush

>>5469457
>>5469465
Where do you think we get the maltodextrin from?

>>5469457
>Soylent
>diet food
kek

Can't you make yourself a homemade soylent type drink?

I'd just use protein powder, oats, honey, healthy fat like peanut butter, and a milk alternative. Supplement with a multivitamin and potassium and that should do it, no?

>>5469497
Or for that matter, the mysterious source of "protein" - if soylent is vegetarian and gluten free as it claims, the protein is going to be in the form of lecithin.

>>5469509
You theoretically can, but part of the restrictions of it is that it is low cost, so you would not be using something like whey-based protein powder, or honey.

This would be something for yourself also - anyone who is allergic to peanuts, for example, cannot have your version of soylent.

>>5469497
corn

>>5469522
The answer is powdered starch from god knows what waste grains, a majority of which happens to be corn due to subsidies.

>guy with no education in nutrition or food chemistry creates a product in his kitchen with kickstarter money that both the supplement and medical industries with bottomless pockets have been trying to do for as long as recorded history and likely before

you know this stuff is bullshit right?

>>5469521
Okay. So the idea behind Soylent is to get a smoothie with your daily nutrition requirements for as low as possible? I'm looking at the price and it's 5 bucks per day. That doesn't seem cheap to me I don't know.

>>5469536
I stand corrected. 10 bucks per day if you order the ready made powder. That's pretty expensive if you ask me.

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>sounds fuckin tasty
>deeleesh
>sign me up

It's never going to replace food because it makes too much sense.

And I mean that as critically as I can. People aren't robots. To rely solely on soylent or a similar product just so you can get the nutrients that food provides would be like if people only had sex with the intention of procreation.

Which I don't think we do. I may be wrong, I don't pay attention.

People don't solely eat food out of necessity unless they're in specific circumstances. I can totally see it being viable if you're really late for work and need a quick fix, if you're emotionless and/or incapable of feeling, or you're a crippled, bed sentenced vegetable, but for the most part there's never going to be a replacement for a well made meal.

I really hope it takes off and gets really popular, and they start making different colors of it, just so they can make a 'soylent green'

liquid diets are awful, soylent can't replace food because it's not solid.

Aside from everything else, imagine the farts.

If its proven to be a proper replacement for a days worth of food, Id keep some around just for days where i don't have time to cook, or days where I'm too sick to cook.

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>>5469595

>>5469413
isn't it true that a human can live solely on human breast milk (even as adults)?

>>5469695
/d/ pls go

>>5469571
Between a full time job and college, I have very little time to relax. I'm not saying I have no time at all, I have time to post here, but not enough to have a hobby. Cooking is a hobby. I greatly enjoy it, I like challenging myself and expanding my skills, and will go back to it when my life isn't so hectic. In the mean time, this frees up precious time out of every day I would spend cooking healthy meals.

Also I need to be on a stricter diet. I don't enjoy cooking as much as I used to since my doctor told me everything I love to make is killing me. And due to my aforementioned lack of free time, lately I find myself getting fast food as often as the average American, which is to say, enough to cause certain death within 6 months. This should help keep me on track until I have the time to spend pondering food choices and putting them together in appetizing ways.

Also I am a huge sci-fi nerd and find a silly romantic appeal in fueling up like an astronaut or an android.

>goybeans

Yes goyim, get manboobs and never find a wife!

If there wasn't the 3 month fucking waiting list I'd buy a week or two right now. I'm gonna wait and see what happens with the company.

nothing wrong with it in principle there just aren't any long-term results for significant consumption yet

i'd totally try it though, it would be interesting to see if i could swear off food for a month

The same reason they tell you you can't live on a diet of Multivitamins

>>5469922
>it would be interesting to see if i could swear off food for a month
Why?

>>5469532
thie

>>5469941
Vitamins are inorganic molecules, you claude.

>>5469951
And what do you think soylent is made from, you chode.

>>5469946

because normally i eat food several times a day?

>>5469946
coz its interesting

>>5469509
Yes, you can. Look up diy soylent, people already have. Recipes are posted there and you can buy the ingredients to make it at home for yourself.

>>5469521
Whey protein is not so expensive that it drives up the cost of the drink considerably. I have it in my soylent, and my daily cost remains ~$5/day.

>>5469536
I'm not sure what kind of budget you have for feeding yourself, but $5/day is cheap if you ask me. When cooking for myself and significant other, we aim for $3-5 per meal.

>>5469914
Buy the ingredients to make your own. Look up diy soylent if you're interested.

>>5469922
I'm sure you can and there are people who have and are doing it right now. I'm on week two of a soylent diet. Not to say I haven't eaten any food since I started, I make food when I feel like it and have time. I feel perfectly fine on those days where I drink nothing but soylent, and I feel fine when I drink nothing but soylent for days in a row.

>>5469951
Do you even know what organic means?

>>5469413
>but the idea is DEFINITELY possible, and is the food of the future, and should be.

Human eat because it's a pleasure, not because they 'need' it. so as long as people will have taste buds they will eat various food of various texture and various taste. Culture > convenience. Also our planet can feed 10 time our population, all we need is less wars and political nuts preventing ressources to be exploited.

Fucking pig disgusting. No.
Go be emotionless dystopian robots somewhere else.

I think it would be neat if science figured out a way to make all food into the same health soylent-like food that is packed with every beneficial thing our bodies need.

Imagine if you could eat any sort of "junk food" and behind the taste had soylent behind it?

>>5470062
Nothing will ever be healthy to pigface the shit out of it like you are describing. Because the behaviour itself is proof of mental issues at the very least.No mater how "good" you make the food, you are still sick.

The fact is liquid is a problem. Mastication is necessary to start some of your digestive process.

>>5469413

Because there's a lot more to healthy eating than getting a set amount of macronutrients and vitamins a day. Scientists are constantly discovering new compounds in the things we eat and we're nowhere near being able to list every nutrient necessary to ensure a long, healthy life, much less isolate them in order to put them in a nutrient shake.

If you just want to live without worrying about food and don't care if you end up with diseases or shortening your life by an unknown amount then yes, you can certainly survive on something like soylent. If you want to be healthy and maximize your lifespan and resistance to various diseases and cancers then you need to eat a balanced diet with lots of fruits and vegetables. Sorry, that's just the way it is. Give it a few more decades and maybe we'll be more capable of making something like this.

If you're dead set on eating soylent then at the very least you'd need to supplement with some fruit and vegetable powder/freeze dried juice blends and probiotic supplements. There's a pretty good variety of these available on amazon.

Additionally, rice protein and canola oil aren't exactly the most ideal protein and fat.

>>5470117
Only retards think a protein shake with macronutrients and vitamins is a healthy diet.

Researchers are isolating health-promoting or otherwise beneficial compounds from plants and mushrooms all the time. Why remove these from your diet?

Millions of years of coevolution with your food vs. some dumbass on a PR blitz with his protein and multivitamin mix. Does it come with a fedora too?

>>5470110

expand on this

>>5469440
/thread.

>>5470144
Not that guy, but eating solid food is pretty key for oral health (and maintaining jaw muscles).

>>5469532
This x1000

Anyone who thinks liquid meal replacements are an epic kawaii goat new invention has got to be no older than 12

>>5469515
Rice. They specify that.

>>5469413
The biggest issue with this is that I enjoy eating food, and this is not food. Why would you come here if you don't enjoy eating?

b-b-but muh new food for an overpopulated future

>>5469441

Basicly what this guy is saying.

Absorbing the nutrients your body needs daily isn't enough, digestion, chewing and solid matter are all important factors.

We're nowhere near the point where we'd need to fall back to this shit.

We have supermarkets where you can buy fresh produce at any time and they never run out of stock. They just throw the stuff away that goes bad.
We have fields that grow corn simply to produce alternative fuel for cars and other engines
We grow roses in Kenya and then ship then in refrigerated containers to flower stores across the world just because they look pretty and smell nice
We use unsustainable agriculture like deforesting the rainforest for fields that last 2-3 years and then just move on.
We have huge unused areas on rooftops that can be used for planting some herbs.
We grow grass, yes, grass, in the Netherlands and then have it delivered to us so we don't need to wait for our lawn to look pretty
We raise and feed horses not for food but to recreationally ride on them.

These things, of which some are completely harmless, happen because there is an abundance of available resources, the "world hunger problem" just comes from distribution. I'll grow potatoes in my bathtub before I force myself to drink this shit because Indians can't stop r?a?p?i?n?g? fucking each other.

>>5469441
>2. The human body has numerous mechanisms of detecting delight in the food by smell, taste and texture. Humans grow bored and depressed when they eat the same thing day in day out because it is the body's mechanism of saying "you might be malnutritioned".
>The eating of food, especially with others, is a source of mental and social stimulation that honestly cannot be replaced by a table of people gulping down some shake. It's why solitary confinement sucks, and why food is used as a punishment in some cases (nutraloaf). Our psychology is too well geared to seeking variety and social commonality with food to adapt to it, and you will invariably end up with depression.

This explains why I'm so bored with my mom's home cooking lately. It's always "simple" with her now. Protein like chicken or fish, salt and pepper...and that's it.

It also explains why I didn't enjoy my meal at a local indian joint when I went by myself because nobody else wanted to try it.

>>5469711
>goyim
>>>/pol/

>>5472016
Obvious yid detected

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Not this fucking shit again

>>5470217
>r?a?p?i?n?g?

How did you get the strikeout or whatever like that?

>>5472995

The post he was replying to was removed.

>>5473022
No, no, that's true for hotlinking posts, but I mean the text, one word specifically was striked:

>Indians can't stop r?a?p?i?n?g? fucking each other.

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A failed "inventor" gets more money from investors. Creates an awful "food" substitute which bullshit "vision" behind it. No overseeing of production by ANY government group. What's in that shit anyway?

Junk for saps.

>>5469413
It's people and GMO soy.

Because food isn't a problem. Nobody has ever said, damn, I hate how tasty this food is, why can't it be a flavorless liquid instead?

If the guy selling this was honest, and said that its advantages are that it's quick and easy to prepare, but at the disadvantage of losing all the pleasurable aspects of food, meaning that it's best suited to people who are either extremely busy or extremely lazy, then I'd be fine with it. My problem is how he's invented a narrative where everyone doesn't like the taste and texture of food, and once they see his product, they will stop eating food and prefer non-food. It's the typical arrogant attitude espoused by futurist types: the idea that they alone know what's best for everyone; that any new product is automatically the best solution for every situation just because it's new; and that anyone who doesn't want to use it is a backwater technophobe.

To repeat: the problem this solves is that food preparation takes a little time and effort. The disadvantage is that you lose out on taste. But what if tomorrow someone invents a 3D printer for food, which can print any meal in a matter of seconds and dissolve the leftovers afterward? It would have all the advantages of this guy's product, without the glaring disadvantage. Would he still be trying to insist that nobody REALLY wants to eat something tasty when they're on their own, that the only legitimate time to enjoy food is when there are other people around you, that we all hate having to enjoy delicious hot meals on our own and we've always secretly wanted to have flavorless liquid meals instead? Of course not. But he just can't admit that his product isn't a perfect solution to everything. He can't sell it as a product that appeals to a certain niche, fits a certain purpose, solves a certain problem - no, it has to be The Solution, the Food Of The Future, what everyone will use forever, unless they're a LUDDITE, of course.

Essentially I hate him because he's an arrogant cunt.

http://www.popsci.com/article/science/what-happens-when-mice-eat-nothing-powdered-food?src=SOC&dom=tw
tl;dr: Scientists think the mere act of chewing may dramatically alter the way your body handles food, so never chewing may have negative consequences.

>>5473228
To elaborate on this, I'll point one thing out. Knowing that food isn't really a problem, why has this guy tried to solve the problem of food preparation by removing all the flavor and texture from his product? Was there no way in which he could have made food more convenient while also retaining its pleasurable aspects? Why make it a flavorless drink? What about looking into ways to create healthier ready meals? What about something which has the texture and taste of food but is nutritionally balanced, like a donut filled with protein and vitamins?

I've spent enough time around this type of person to know why: because a nutritional drink has sci-fi cred. It was in a book set in the future, it seems cool and futuristic, all the future films have people eating Nutrition Paste instead of food. And this guy's intention is not to create a product which satisfies peoples' needs: it's to create a piece of the future he imagines, and then convince everyone that they need to use it and replace whatever they were using previously. He wants to build the future, and it doesn't matter whether people want it or not because that's not how the future works, how it works is that the clever people, the software engineers, build the future and then everyone goes along with it or else they're a dumb backwards luddite. Never mind whether the products created suit their needs or not.

Futurists are the absolute most scummy, arrogant pieces of shit on the planet, believing that they alone have a superior understanding of EVERYTHING, from economics to politics to nutrition to biology to psychology, and that everyone else is just a mindless pleb who needs to do what they say or be forever banished to The Olden Days. If there was one group I'd be happy to see perish, it wouldn't be neo-Nazis or communists or even people who put ketchup on their steak, it would be the fucking futurists. Evil, evil people.

>>5473244
Internet High Five

>>5473277
S-seriously anon?

I just DDG'd "I hate futurists" and got a grand total of three results. I didn't know there were many people who felt like this, other than a few famous ones (Jaron Lanier comes to mind).

>>5473228
>>5473244
dihydrogen monoxide kills everyday

>>5473386
Your point being?

>>5473244
>>5473228

the idea is that the product could be cheaper and more renewable than food. it isn't specifically made not to taste good, it's just designed to be nutritionally balanced. i don't think that this is a futuristic product. futurism implies a moral obligation to embracing newness. the idea is not that everyone *must* drink soylent, it's just that everyone *can*.

yeah i think you're getting way too upity about this.

>>5473397
So when he talks about how he thinks in the future, nobody will eat food except when they're with their friends, that isn't dictating the future and pushing his product as The One True Solution, rather than as a niche product for a certain audience? He doesn't even have the gall to admit that food being tasty isn't a bad thing, instead he tells people that food is the problem - not food preparation, but food itself.

As I said - he COULD have made something with the tastiness of food, but which is quicker to prepare. Or he could have made soylent and then marketed it as being for those who don't have time to cook - either because they're too busy, or because they can't be bothered. Either would be fine. But no, it's pushed as the food of the future, a food replacement, all we hear about is how this is going to replace food and nobody will eat except socially, because that's what we've all wanted all along, right? Not to suffer under the strain of delicious hot dinners, but instead to have a nutritional drink instead?

He's a software engineer, he's from Silicon Valley, he's created a product with some advantages and some disadvantages and yet he's pretending that the disadvantages don't exist and that everyone needs to do what he says and switch to this product right away and live their life as he tells them. He's a futurist, I can guarantee it.

And I'm getting uppity because I'm surrounded by people like this every day and now I can't even relax on 4chan without some cunt coming and saying, "HEY GUYS HAVE YOU HEARD OF THIS? IT'S THE FUTURE, IT'S GOING TO REPLACE EVERYTHING, WHY AREN'T YOU CONSUMING ONLY SOYLENT YET, ARE YOU A LUDDITE OR SOMETHING???". I'm fucking fed up of it. Be honest and sell your product on its own terms and I might be more inclined to listen.

>>5469413
Just drink Ensure.

FFS.

because the guy who made it shamelessly shills his product on 4chan

seriously

he posted on fit in like 2011ish

>>5473412

you're just reading way too much into what he's saying. the suggestion is that products like his are going to be more widely used in the future because food is going to be more scarce. which is probably true. the reality of course is that at the moment most people who want to buy it are tech geeks who were previously living off yerba mate.

>He's a software engineer, he's from Silicon Valley, he's created a product with some advantages and some disadvantages and yet he's pretending that the disadvantages don't exist and that everyone needs to do what he says and switch to this product right away and live their life as he tells them. He's a futurist, I can guarantee it.

no he isn't. chill out.

>As I said - he COULD have made something with the tastiness of food, but which is quicker to prepare.

but the whole point is that he's creating a basic, nutritious product. he's selling a meal replacement powder, not a 'plan'. you're free to make it taste good if you want but he is not selling you something that's supposed to taste of anything - he isn't entering the 'tastes good' market, he's entering the 'nutrition' market.

god you're so damn mad over nothing.

>>5473425
>the suggestion is that products like his are going to be more widely used in the future because food is going to be more scarce

Why? Where do the nutrients in his product come from? Are they not grown? If so, are those particular crops more efficient in terms of yield per area than other crops? If so, then why do we need to consume those crops in the form of a tasteless drink?

>no he isn't. chill out.

He's talked about food being a problem. He's talked about how he thinks that in the future, people will not choose to eat tasty meals when they are on their own, but will only partake in 'social eating', subsisting on nutritional drink the rest of the time. I'm pointing out that this is absolute nonsense, that nobody has ever had a problem with food being tasty, that he simply can't accept that his product is an alternative with its own advantages and disadvantages, not a perfect solution, a puzzle piece to slot into the future that he's decided for everyone.

>but the whole point is that he's creating a basic, nutritious product.

And as I've said, if he was marketing it as that - admitting that it's a sacrifice of taste in exchange for speed of preparation - then I would be fine. But he's not, he's putting it forward as the replacement for food that everyone WILL be using in the future.

>god you're so damn mad over nothing.

I'm mad over authoritarian pricks thinking that their personal opinion, not consumer demand, is the ultimate decider of the value of a product.

>>5473439

>I'm mad over authoritarian pricks thinking that their personal opinion, not consumer demand, is the ultimate decider of the value of a product.

what the fuck are you even talking about?

>Why? Where do the nutrients in his product come from? Are they not grown? If so, are those particular crops more efficient in terms of yield per area than other crops? If so, then why do we need to consume those crops in the form of a tasteless drink?

rather depends on the crops. but yes, manufacturing and transporting nutritional substances in a refined form is often more efficient than doing the same with 'real food'.

>nobody has ever had a problem with food being tasty

nigga this is a huge straw man and you know it.

>he simply can't accept that his product is an alternative with its own advantages and disadvantages

where. where are you getting this from. any interview i have ever read with guy he very explicitly acknowledges the limitations of the product both in its current and perfected future state. it is even implicitly acknowledged by what you pointed out about 'social eating'.

>And as I've said, if he was marketing it as that - admitting that it's a sacrifice of taste in exchange for speed of preparation - then I would be fine. But he's not, he's putting it forward as the replacement for food that everyone WILL be using in the future.

no, he isn't. he's just making money off this formula he came up with. and talking about the market it serves, and speculating that the market will grow. you are reading wayyyyy too much into it.

>>5473453
As I said - I'm objecting to the way the guy is trying to push the idea that food - not food preparation, but food - is somehow a bad thing. And that nobody really wants hot, tasty, appealing food except when they're eating out. He's right that a lot of people don't want to have to cook all the time. But it's the way he preaches that in the future, when everyone realizes his genius, we'll all only want to have nutritional drinks when we're on our own, because the very notion of eating real food without someone watching you is abhorrent and everyone has always secretly hated it, which fucks me off.

Any food item which takes a similarly low amount of preparation, yet which is actually tasty, will win hands down against nutritional paste. Why can't this guy simply admit that the flavorlessness is a drawback, not a feature? Why can't he sell it as a product which will serve a certain niche, rather than trying to paint a future where everyone only eats out and survives on nutrition liquid at home? He's of course trying to get the usual army of gadget-loving futurist retards to go out and guilt everyone, "hurr you're still eating food? go back to the 2000s grandpa, everyone these days knows that flavor and texture are for luddite plebs".

Stop basing your stance around the appeal to novelty fallacy. Admit that each product has its own advantages and disadvantages. Let the customers decide what is the best product by which they choose to buy, rather than telling them what they have to use because that's the fuuutuuure, only hillbillies try to fight progress etc.

If you make a product and some people don't voluntarily use it, it's not because they're too stupid to see your genius, it's because your product doesn't suit their needs. Fucking deal with it.

>>5473439
>not consumer demand, is the ultimate decider of the value of a product.
See here's your problem mate. You assume that people are rational and thinking creatures. They're not. 99% of people are stupid, selfish, and ignorant, yourself included. The most fools like you can hope for is to place your trust in your betters. Soylent is the key, and who the fuck are you, you worthless pleb, to think better.

http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/soylent-no-food-for-30-days

>>5473397
>the idea is that the product could be cheaper and more renewable than food.
How could it be more renewable than food when it is simply processed from food?

>>5473484

>As I said - I'm objecting to the way the guy is trying to push the idea that food - not food preparation, but food - is somehow a bad thing

but he isn't.

>Why can't this guy simply admit that the flavorlessness is a drawback, not a feature?

it isn't wholly a drawback. a product like this should exist, because it gives the consumer freedom to make it taste however they want - they're paying only for the nutritional formula.

> Let the customers decide what is the best product by which they choose to buy, rather than telling them what they have to use

you are completely deluded about this dude. i remember reading some interview with him where he explicitly recommended mixing it with cocoa powder. he doesn't care if you want to make it taste good, he just makes a case for why a product such as his should exist, and that case involves rising food prices.

>>5473513
>How could it be more renewable than food when it is simply processed from food?

because food is a less efficient form of nutrition.

>>5473518

>throwing the remainder out?

there's the problem. you only get the bit you need. the rest is freed up for other purposes. it rather depends on the product.

>>5473517
How is food less efficient? Eat rice and all the associated fibre and phytochemicals or merely isolate the protein and throw the rest out?

>>5473521
>you only get the bit you need.
You are assuming we know exactly what we need from food. We do not.

(I deleted my previous comment because of a grammatical error).

>>5473515
>but he isn't.

His vision for the future is that nobody eats food except when they're with other people. Why would they do this? If all other aspects were equal - so we're just comparing food VS non-food, not taking into account preparation time and so on - who would choose instant, preparation-free nutritional paste over instant, preparation-free delicious hot meal? Not very many people. And yet this is what this guy believes will happen. He's managed to confuse the problem of food preparation with some imaginary problem with food itself. He's become so enamoured with his own genius that he cannot understand the disadvantages of his product.

I'll say it again - if someone invented a 3D printer for food, would this guy have any remaining business? No. Because the problem isn't food, the problem is food preparation.

>it isn't wholly a drawback. a product like this should exist, because it gives the consumer freedom to make it taste however they want - they're paying only for the nutritional formula.

Once more - you have a magic box which can produce for you any meal you want with any nutritional content you want. With this product in existence, what is the purpose of flavorless nutrition paste?

There is none. Because, once more, food being tasty, hot, flavorful, with varied textures and a nice mouthfeel, is not a problem.

>you are completely deluded about this dude.

I just read >>5473512, he's even more irritating and arrogant than I remember.

>>5473524

>You are assuming we know exactly what we need from food. We do not.

well i'm not trying to say that soylent is a perfect product, i have no idea if it's something that would be able to feed a global population effectively let alone efficiently, i'm just saying that's the idea behind it.

Only spoiled urban Americans, who have access to a varied and inexpensive wealth of foods, would think this is a good idea.

It's such a first-world solution to a problem that doesn't exist. It's basically gamer food but with a pseudo-intellectual twist.

>>5473529
I know, but the main flaw is we have not fully elucidated human nutrition and food has more beneficial compounds than macronutrients.

>>5473528

>His vision for the future is that nobody eats food except when they're with other people.

it's rather broader than that. that's an extension of the idea that the distinction between eating for pleasure and eating for health will become more clear. soylent is proposed as a specific solution for the latter.

>I'll say it again - if someone invented a 3D printer for food, would this guy have any remaining business? No.

i don't know what this means. if you mean, a machine that could create any kind of food from raw nutritional materials and make it taste however you wanted, of fucking course that would be more popular than his product, but what bearing has that on anything?

>With this product in existence, what is the purpose of flavorless nutrition paste?
>There is none.

...but... it doesn't exist. what the hell kind of argument is this? should ford not have sold cars because one day we might have teleporters?

>>5473535

>food has more beneficial compounds than macronutrients.

soylent does try to address this.

>>5473543
>it's rather broader than that. that's an extension of the idea that the distinction between eating for pleasure and eating for health will become more clear. soylent is proposed as a specific solution for the latter.
I would never trust soylent to be healthier than a diet based on a variety of whole foods.

There is no argument here. What is he basing his science on? Multivitamin company formulations?

>>5473548

>What is he basing his science on? Multivitamin company formulations?

i don't know, but that's a whole different argument. this isn't about if soylent is any good at what it's trying to do.

>>5473547
>soylent does try to address this.
By adding the major fad supplements (Ginkgo and ginseng)?

They cannot address this. Food is so much more than calories and macrovitamins. People who latched on to soylent are obviously undereducated and too excited by the prospect of being able to spend more time online instead of cooking.

>>5473543
> that's an extension of the idea that the distinction between eating for pleasure and eating for health will become more clear.

And I'm saying that this is an entirely invented dichotomy. Nobody would choose to eat tasteless food over tasty food if all other factors are equal. Tastiness and nutritional value are not opposing concepts, they are entirely separate from one another. The problem with food which this product solves is the preparation time. It does not solve the 'problem' of food being tasty, because that problem does not exist.

>but what bearing has that on anything?

Because I'm demonstrating that people don't 'eat for pleasure' grudgingly, wishing all the time that their food was less pleasurable. That if we had an alternative to nutritional paste which also solved the preparation time issue, but didn't 'solve' the taste 'issue', then nobody would choose the nutritional paste over the tasty food. This is because being tasty is not a problem that needs solving. It's not a problem at all. It's an advantage.

>should ford not have sold cars because one day we might have teleporters?

More analogous is saying that Ford shouldn't have tried to sell cars on the merit of road traffic accidents, trying to convince people that they've solved the awful issue people have in their life of not getting into enough road traffic accidents in their life.

>>5473552

>They cannot address this.

why not?

>>5473554

>Nobody would choose to eat tasteless food over tasty food if all other factors are equal.

well, no, but all other factors aren't equal. he never says all factors are equal. it is honestly starting to sound like you're mad he doesn't add strawberry flavouring or something.

>Because I'm demonstrating that people don't 'eat for pleasure' grudgingly, wishing all the time that their food was less pleasurable.

this is not. what the guy. is saying. it's just not. he is just not trying to make something that tastes good, he's selling a nutritional formula. how many times am i going to have to say this. it is not a war on taste. it is a product that allows you to eat well without paying the time or money that is required to eat gastronomically.

>More analogous is saying that Ford shouldn't have tried to sell cars on the merit of road traffic accidents, trying to convince people that they've solved the awful issue people have in their life of not getting into enough road traffic accidents in their life.

no. that is not more analogous. not more analogous at all.

>>5473562
>well, no, but all other factors aren't equal. he never says all factors are equal.

He does, however, say that people don't want to eat 'for pleasure' except when they're out with friends. I'm saying that this is utter nonsense, that nobody would ever choose tasteless food over tasty food unless there are other factors which outweigh the tastiness of the tasty food.

'Eating for pleasure' is not a real concept. Pleasurable food is objectively better than non-pleasurable food. He spends his time putting down the concept of eating tasty - sorry, pleasurable - food in non-social situations. But this is ridiculous because there is no disadvantage to eating pleasurable food. He's not being honest about the advantages and disadvantages of his product, he's pretending that its drawbacks are actually advantages, because hey, who wants to eat tasty food when there's not someone watching you?

Again, if he pitched this as being a tradeoff, sacrificing taste for convenience, I wouldn't give a fuck. But somehow he can't do that, he can't sell it as a real product, competing against others, serving the interests of some people but not others. All I want is for him to say, you know what, I know it doesn't taste great, but if you don't have time to cook or you can't be bothered, then this is an acceptable substitute. But instead he talks about how in the future, everyone will subsist mainly on tasteless food, because supposedly we all don't really want to eat food that tastes nice, that's just something we've had to put up with.

>no. that is not more analogous. not more analogous at all.

He's pretending a disadvantage of his product is really an advantage. Yes, it's analogous.

>>5473562
>why not?
Because there is not enough research.

I'll stick to millions of years of coevolution instead of unsubstantiated fedora hunch.

As soon as I can get this stuff in Canada I'll buy a box.

I have no intention of never cooking, but I work 11 hour days and cooking/groceries is the last thing I want to do.

If I can substitute soylent for a frozen dinner, cup of soup or fast food trip you fucking bet I'm going to do it.

>>5473587

>I'll stick to millions of years of coevolution

retarded.

>>5473584

>I'm saying that this is utter nonsense, that nobody would ever choose tasteless food over tasty food unless there are other factors which outweigh the tastiness of the tasty food.

nigga he says people don't want to eat for pleasure unless they're out with friends BECAUSE OF THOSE OTHER FACTORS. he quite explicitly says that soylent addresses the issues of cost and effort associated with having a nutritionally complete and satisfying diet.

not to mention the fact that people learn to like all kinds of shit. you know what food product WAS invented to suit the needs of people who wanted to eat without enjoying themselves? fucking breakfast cereal. and everyone loves that shit.

>Again, if he pitched this as being a tradeoff, sacrificing taste for convenience, I wouldn't give a fuck.

he does. fucking. do that. i'd post things where he quite explicitly says that but i doubt you'd even be able to recognise it because you're so committed to the idea that he's a dogmatic asshole. you are accusing him of selling soylent purely on the basis that it tastes of nothing, which is ludicrous and frankly i can't be bothered to go wade through another retarded argument for the truism that tasty food is better than not tasty food in order to find something that i can respond to, so i'm going to stop arguing with you. you win. the guy is a 21st century seventh day adventist who wants everyone to graze on mulch and rejects enjoyment on the grounds that it is wrong and bad. convenience is categorically not a selling point of his product, he just gets off to the idea that we all eat cardboard instead of chicken, all the time. thank you for opening my eyes.

>>5473626
>nigga he says people don't want to eat for pleasure unless they're out with friends BECAUSE OF THOSE OTHER FACTORS

Then why is he so certain of a future where nobody eats except when they're out with friends? If he was honest then he'd admit that some people wouldn't mind cooking meals everyday; others would be prepared to exert just a tiny bit of effort (e.g. assembling pasta and sauce, microwaving a Ready Meal of the Future) in order to get some decent taste; still others would be really busy or too lazy to do even that, and would prefer to consume nutritional paste. It won't be a uniform thing where having nutritional paste for 90% of your meals is the norm, because nutritional paste trades taste for convenience, and anyone who prefers to sacrifice a little convenience for some taste will choose that option instead.

I don't think he wants to wage a war on taste. I think he personally doesn't like cooking, does like sci-fi, and is a self-important twat. And he's invented something of which he is blind to the disadvantages, believing it really is the best solution for everyone's needs, and that everyone wants to live their life the way he thinks they should. He's made up the concept of "eating for pleasure" to try to paint the disadvantage of his product as a good thing. Why, nobody REALLY wants to eat something pleasurable when they're alone, do they? No, all they want is nutrition, flavor is at best meaningless and at worst a disadvantage when you're eating in a non-social situation! (Sorry, last time I say that, I swear.) It's how he markets the product that I take issue with, how he thinks it's a solution to a nonexistent problem. We don't need to 'solve' food. Food is perfectly fine, its 'foodiness' is not a negative aspect of it. He's solved prep time, not food, and I wish he'd stop pretending otherwise.

>>5473652

it just isn't a nonexistent problem dude, i'm telling ya. i can concede that the product mainly appeals to manchildren - because they have really shitty diets as they live off cheap shit they don't have to cook, and the fact that they like the sci fi ramifications is a plus. but this is cheap, and it's good for you (ostensibly). as more and more people need cheap shit they don't have to cook, this product will serve more and more people. it's not the only product that will do so and indeed, the 'food of the future' may very well involve the synthesis of deliciousness but for the time being, living off of powder is probably the lowest maintenance way to serve your metabolism.

>We don't need to 'solve' food.

while it's a grandiose claim that soylent might help to solve it, food IS a global problem. many of us either get sick from it or suffer from too little. taste is the least of our concerns and that's why it doesn't figure into soylent's marketing as a 'solution'.

>>5473677
Right, but all the issues you mentioned are ones other than taste. That's my point, marketing the product as having the advantage of not having a taste, trying to tell people that it's better that way because now you don't need to eat 'for pleasure' except socially, is stupid, as this is not an advantage. Pleasure is a positive aspect of food, no matter the context. Nobody outside of Rob Rhinehart's fantasy world has ever been upset at the idea of having to eat something tasty over something tasteless. Are other factors more important sometimes? Sure. Does that mean taste isn't a factor, or that "eating for pleasure is something that we will just want to do a couple of times a week in a social situation" isn't batshit retarded nonsense? No.

>>5473626
>retarded.
Why? Because I trust what kept every organism going since time immemorial versus some business grad (or whatever) who "knows better"?

Don't even try to get into "hurrr luddite" or "science fucking rules" either, I have the credentials and knowledge to negate any argument you have.

1. Our mouths are adapted to eating solid foods. Dental health would suffer from a liquid diet.

2. There is more to food than protein, macros, and what the current research body agrees are important micronutrients.

3. What exactly is the basis of his research? I am highly suspicious of any claims he makes.

4. What about fibre and other benefits that are associated with "whole foods"? This glorified protein shake does not take this into account.

5. What is wrong with eating good food? This is attempting to solve a non-existent problem.

>>5469677
Or for traveling. How long is the shelf life of the ingredients (and the combined drink)?

>>5470152
So chew gum or snack on something not entirely horrible some other time in the day. Fruits, jerky, etc

>>5469677
>If its proven to be a proper replacement for a days worth of food
Obviously. You can fast for a few days and you'll be fine. As long as you aren't ingesting poison, eating almost anything for a few days is not going to be bad for you.

>>5470050
>Human eat because it's a pleasure, not because they 'need' it

Are you fucking retarded? Tell that a starving African child.

>>5473764
>live off soylent
>do daily jaw exercises to maintain jaw muscles and simulate eating
>chew wax to maintain oral health and simulate eating
>consume additional vitamins and phytochemicals to simulate eating
>consume fiber to stimulate digestive tract to simulate eating

hmmmm maybe I'll just eat like a non-neckbeard.

>>5473772
Eating an apple a day should be enough jaw exercise and fiber to keep you healthy.

File: suicide_booth.gif (72KB, 300x461px) Image search: [Google]

72KB, 300x461px

>>5469413
if this is the food of the future I demand suicide booths

>>5473774
>[citation non-existent]

>>5473774
Jaw size is linked to diet. There is a reason jaws are getting smaller in the developing world (processed food diet).

Enjoy your dainty jaw.

>>5473777
As opposed to the citation you gave?

Also no one is saying to stop eating food and go to a soylent-only diet, just to use it sometimes when you don't have the time to get a meal together.
>>5473779
So you're arguing for Lamarckian evolution.

>>5473781
>So you're arguing for Lamarckian evolution.
Do you consider weight lifting evidence of Lamarckian evolution or are you just trying to sound intelligent?

>>5473781
N. von Cramon-Taubadel. Global human mandibular variation reflects differences in agricultural and hunter-gatherer subsistence strategies. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2011; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1113050108

>>5473784
My jaw isn't going to shrink because I occasionally drink a shake instead of eating for a day. If that were true all Muslims would have tiny jaws from their yearly Ramadanian fasts.
>>5473785
Yeah, if the entire culture went to a 1005 soylent diet, which no one here is arguing for.

>>5473781
Why is this preferable over any other food that takes little/no preparation (fruit, cereal, microwave meal, snack bar, etc)?

>>5473786
We aren't discussing soylent as an occasional supplement. That isn't the point of it.

>>5473789
Because fruit and vegetables don't have the same fedora appeal. You can't drink it in public while wearing your Soylent t-shirt and pray that someone asks you about it or takes the bait for a debate.

>>5473786
>Soylent is a food product (classified as a food, not a supplement, by the FDA) designed for use as a staple meal by all adults. Each serving of Soylent provides maximum nutrition with minimum effort.
>a staple meal

This shit goes for $65 a week? I can spend that money and buy ingredients to make actual edible food if I wanted. This ISN'T going to be the food of the future for the same reason why a guy might choose to eat a burger over a bowl of soup.

>>5473791
>>5473796
Oh, really? Well that is stupid. I'd still buy it as a supplement though, so it's not a completely useless idea.

>>5469413
The purpose of Soylent isn't to replace food.

It's to replace ramen noodles, McDonalds, and all the other shitty stuff you eat when you're poor, hurried, and desperate. The idea is to have something cheap, absurdly quick and convenient, and reasonably edible - which would also be filling and 100% healthy.

It's not supposed to replace steak and well-cooked vegetables and food you eat because you wanted to cook something good. It's supposed to replace the shitty food you eat because you need fuel to maintain your mortal husk.

>>5473810
>I'd still buy it as a supplement though, so it's not a completely useless idea.
You could just buy ensure or make a protein shake or smoothie.

>>5473823
The stated purpose is to be a staple meal.

>>5473806
The idea behind Soylent is that, because it can be manufactured using bulk-supply ingredients, they can make it for waaaay cheaper. This is just the beta-test before they roll it out into mass production.

The idea is for Soylent to eventually be competitive in price with Top Ramen and the other shitty food eaten by the kind of normal people in enough of a hurry to want Soylent.

>>5473838
Yes, and there are totally people for whom Top Ramen is a staple meal. Soylent's for those people. The whole point is to be both healthy and zero-effort.

>>5473838
Eh, ensure tastes chalky. I'd probably just end up making my own, seeing as I'd like to experiment with most of the ingredients in other recipes, and I don't think any of them ever actually spoil.

It's really sad how lazy and pathetic people are getting. As if buying and preparing food from a grocery store is that much of a burden.

I'm glad my dad took me hunting and fishing all the time. It probably help prevent me from turning into an anaemic snowflake who thinks they have better things to do than eat food.

lol

>>5473843
Hint: You are not Soylent's target audience.

Can you seriously say you've never had a time when you've just gone and grabbed something quick and shitty to eat? Did you shop for ingredients and craft decently-prepared meals during Finals Week at college? Have you ever willingly made a meal out of something from a fast-food joint or vending machine?

Why did you do that? It wasn't because you had some kind of philosophical effort to "ugh, so much effort" in cooking food; it's because you were busy just then or had limited access and wanted something cheap and low-effort to refuel your mortal husk.

That's what Soylent's for, for those times. You grabbed something cheap, zero-effort, and absolutely shitty for you because that's what was available. The purpose of Soylent is to be cheap, zero-effort, and good for you, especially for the person poor or busy enough to encounter those kinds of situations regularly.

It's totally failing on the "cheap" side of that right now, though, so it's kind of pointless except for massive nerds unless they fix that.

>>5473855
>That's what Soylent's for, for those times.
Nope, it is marketed as a staple meal.

>>5473855
>What is Ensure and other meal replacement shakes already on the market for decades

>>5473859
That's because it's made by the kinds of batshit workaholic Silicon Valley types who think it's totally normal to eat that kind of shit for every single meal and that sleep is a hindrance.

Also, can you seriously say that "unhealthy cheap crap" is NOT the staple food of most Americans?

>>5473864
Yeah, but this one's different, because it's manufactured by overeager hipsters instead of doctors.

Also, it's supposed to be cheaper than those. It's not, but it's supposed to be.

>>5473027
[s]>not being able to strikethru[/s]

>>5473884
Swing and a miss!

>>5473884
lel/kek

>>5473867
>Also, can you seriously say that "unhealthy cheap crap" is NOT the staple food of most Americans?
We are talking about Soylent, not whether some neckbeards eat ramen all day every day.

>>5473884
w?h?o?o?p?s?

>>5473886
>>5473887
s?o?r?r?y? ?i? ?f?u?c?k?e?d? ?u?p? ?t?h?e? ?b?b?c?o?d?e? ?:?^?)?

>>5473888
Yeah, and those are the people for whom Soylent is meant for.

If you already have enough leisure time to eat recreationally, you don't really need Soylent.

>>5469532
I'm not supporting Soylent, but you seem to be under the 'appealing to authority' mindset. You seem to think that only experts, rich, and well known individuals can make breakthroughs in a field.

>>5473736

> I have the credentials and knowledge to negate any argument you have.

lmao.

the comment about coevolution is hilarious because we're still deriving our nutrition from things which have 'coevolved' and much of the 'coevolution' of what we eat was down to selective agriculture and processing of observed desirables, just like this is. the idea that these business grads are striking some wild new path is hilarious.

>>5473859

the idea that it functions worse as a staple meal than things like rice and beans is pretty dumb, dude.

>>5473806
You can make it yourself for a little less than $3 a day.

It's a bad idea in the sense that you'll probably get depressed if it's all you eat because food is such a big part of our culture.

However the idea isn't bad at all and replacing one or two meals a day with it could be awesome and potentially what happens.

>>5469413
because i'm not a poorfag who doesn't know how to cook.

I don't give two fucks about my nutritional needs. I only eat foods I enjoy the taste of and I imagine most people are the same. This shit will never take off.

Because aside from the fact that nobody truly knows the exact ratio of macro and micro nutrients that your body needs, food is not simply macro and micro nutrients and you can't break it apart and mix and match extracted nutrients and expect them to work the same way they do in nature. We learned this with vitamin supplements years ago.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17327526

Plant foods are made of thousands of compounds that work synergistically. It's not just vitamins and minerals, but plant-specific phytochemicals that offer a host of health benefits, which is why fruits and vegetables have always been considered the groundwork of a healthy diet.

>>5474193
It can't possibly be any worse than the staple diets of most Americans.

>>5469941
Vitamins are micro nutrients, of course you won't survive eating no macros and only micros

>>5474845

Well sure, pretty much anything is better than the SAD. I'm just saying it shouldn't be seen as a real alternative to a proper whole foods diet, let alone the best option for personal health.

The best application I think would to mass produce this stuff for people who are on food stamps. Instead of having them spend all their government money on bacon and corn chips and ice cream, have food stamps only be redeemable for soylent

>>5474971
>I'm just saying it shouldn't be seen as a real alternative to a proper whole foods diet, let alone the best option for personal health.

It's really not supposed to be. It's meant to be a really cheap, zero-effort staple food for the sort of people who'd otherwise be eating the SAD, and as a quick zero-effort food option for people who are busy. There certainly are some Soylent evangelists, but there's just not enough known in nutrition science to claim that any one thing is "the best" diet, let alone some glop mixed up by a programmer.

The hope is that eventually it will be able to be manufactured cheaply enough to actually be cheaper than the SAD.

>>5469955
>what do you think soylent is made from

PEOPLE. IT'S MADE FROM FUCKING PEOPLE

>>5475030

In that case, it'll fail miserably. The people eating the SAD right now aren't just eating it because it's cheap and convenient, but because they like how the food tastes. Nobody's going to stop eating cheetos and fried chicken to drink soylent for breakfast, lunch, and dinner

>>5469441
You don't know what the fuck you're talking about. There's no soy or lentils in Soylent. Liquid diets already exist, and your digestive system doesn't suffer from not having solid food to break down. The stomach turns everything you eat into liquid pretty damn quick anyway.

The creator of Soylent still eats "socially," just like some people only drink/smoke socially.

>>5473920

That isn't what "appeal to authority" means, you oxygen thief.

>>5473920
Describe how Soylent is conducting nutritional research and contributing to the primary literature body.

>>5469413

it's a good idea if you fucking hate food , pleb

>>5469556
>400g carbs
>50g protein

fucking useless

>>5469413
I rather eat a healthy balanced diet than drink this crap, monsanto is probably behind it too.

>>5469556
synthetic vitaminssss AHOOYYYYY

Trying hard to shill their disgusting "meal" on /ck/.

>>5477493

Honestly, the way some media sites seem to be biased towards Soylent can be striking.

Ars Technica seems to have a flat out promotional agenda, given the front page exposure and generally promotional tone of the articles discussing it, there...

But who knows...

There is the supposition that the maltodextrin (one of the primary ingredients) is corn based, which of course, if accurate, would potentially lend credence to your hypothesis...

>>5477618

Just want to throw out there that my only issue with Soylent is that i didn't come up with marketing it, considering i sometimes make utilitarian meals for the weak that focus on nutrition over flavor.

Neutral about it, otherwise, it just seems odd that the suggestions of some dieticians seem to be met with almost "anti-establishment" fueled deconstructions of their arguments with appeals to some "counter-authority", or just the "you can't know anything" sort of nebulous postulating that because nutritional science isn't "exact", that everything not agreeing with how great Soylent is, is just trying to keep it down and out. I'm not appealing to authority, either, here.

Many seem to be turning this into a false dichotomy and becoming emotionally involved in the prospect of "sides", which i guess makes Soylent a very effective money-maker, at least short-term...