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Qiaochu_Yuan comments on Group Rationality Diary, April 5-14 - Less Wrong Discussion
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I learned some scary stuff about sugar recently (see e.g. Lustig's Sugar: The Bitter Truth and this Mother Jones piece). I got the same feeling as when I read about the history of de Beers: like something that felt like just a background fact about reality (sugar is okay for you, diamonds are how you show someone you love them) was actually carefully constructed by a corporation to make money. Seems like I should trust everything else that feels like a background fact about reality slightly less in response.
I'm wondering about the Mother Jones piece. The increase in sugar consumption is 10%-- from 120 pounds/year to 132 pounds/year. I grant that not everything in biology (or the rest of science) is linear, but does it seem likely that there are such huge effects from a relatively small change in sugar consumption, or might something else be going on?
Still, increasing your doubt about background facts seems reasonable.