I feel like this isn't a surprise at all, but I guess it's good to have empirical evidence of it. It's abundantly clear anecdotally that the people who drink tons of artificial-sweetened stuff are _not_ as healthy as those who consume neither tons of sugar OR artificial sweetener.
Or put differently: everyone who chugs diet soda seems to be weirdly skinny or weirdly fat, so there is clearly some microbiome effect going on.
The existence of a bias doesn't mean the observation is invalid, just that the bias has to be taken into account.
Anyway, it's definitely not true in this case. I notice the very unusual instance of people drinking soda because it's so rare these days (among my extended social circle). In some cases I _hear_ about it before I meet the person ("my bf drinks like a liter of soda a day" or whatever) -- and then meet them and, unsurprisingly, they're weirdly skinny or fat.
Yeah, all valid. I guess the reason it seems obvious to me that the diet soda is directly affecting weight is that so many of the people with weight problems don't seem to think the soda can have anything to do with it. "But it's diet!" says, for instance, my mom.
Because if you were consuming 4000 calories of food and drink before and reduced it down to 3000 by drinking diet soda. It's still a lot, but less. Which is better.
Yes, I'm sure you're a completely unbiased source of whether or not you're an unbiased source and you're not discounting all the times this didn't happen because you didn't bother to note the occurrence.
I don't think I'm unbiased? I just believe I'm taking the bias into consideration. Pointing out an obvious bias isn't a useful counterargument, it's just a way of saying "whatever you think you've noticed in your life, ignore it, you will always be wrong". Intellectually it's a complete non-starter, it's just a way to write off impressions you don't agree with (instead of, say, debating it, offering supporting or counter-evidence, etc). Obviously you are free to ignore the opinions of a random internet commenter, of course. But I like to mention what I've noticed in case it resonates (or anti-resonates) with any other casual readers.
What you are calling evidence is useless. You may believe you are taking the bias into consideration, but you can't actually know if you are or aren't. Your whole bit is the non-starter.
But my "counter-evidence" would simply be me saying "Well, I don't see that". To which you would respond that it was actually I who wasn't being observant. When there is no real way to determine that. And that discussion itself is intellectually bankrupt.
My pointing out that your recollection of casual observations and your self-assessment of how well you "took the bias into consideration" is debate. I'm questioning the source of your statistics.
Because even in this study, it's from 120 people. Total. Who self-reported they had never had artificial sweeteners.
And the other obvious thing is that you are also free to ignore my opinions. I like to mention when someone is offering biased anecdotes in place of substantive discussion. In case it resonates.
I would not respond that you are being unobservant if you disagreed with me. I'd find that interesting, and wait for more data points from other commenters. So far you had just doubted my observations instead of presenting any of your own though.
I'm not claiming you should draw any universal conclusions from my anecdotes! That's absurd. But there has got to be something between 'data is from a study' and 'data is meaningless'.
The one claim I have made that you should believe, though, is that I (and others, evidently) was expecting the surprise to be that science found artificial sweeteners to have no effect, since my prior for it mattering was so high. I was surprised that this result was a surprise to anyone.
You don't have data. Because the thing about biases is that they're often unconscious.
It's also a lot like the "bad toupee" effect. You think you're good at spotting toupees because you always notice when they're bad. But you don't notice when they're good, therefore they don't even factor into your dataset.
Which is why anecdotes are never data. There's no way to control the data coming in. And the filters we have on the data coming in are sometimes unknown.
I've never really seen a study on artificial sweeteners that ever propose an actual mechanism. And without fail, the study is done on rodents or rely on self-reporting to some degree or on very small sample sizes.
I don't have to present my own observations to point out flaws in your own observations. It's not a contest where "most observations" win or whatever.
I have no objection to 'anecdotes aren't data" or "you can't see your unconscious biases" or any of that.. I just think that responding to say "the things you think you have noticed are biased and therefore irrelevant and meaningless" is (a) a dick thing to say and (b) totally unnecessary, since it's both obvious and adds no information or interesting content to the discussion. Its only purpose is to put me down. And for what? To spread cynicism, apparently -- you seemed to think that if had contributed _your_ impression, I would dismiss it out of hand, but no, that's a You Thing. I'm interested in other people's impressions, and plenty of other people are too, even if you personally aren't.
Correlation/causation question there. It is very plausible that people already in categories you consider weird are choosing diet soda because they agree with you and are trying to avoid making the issue more severe.
true. My intuition is that that's not the case though. I should add, I don't know _any_ non-diet soda drinkers, and the diet soda drinkers are the ones with weight issues.
I drank non-diet soda semi-regularly before deciding that I had put on too much weight, so I started a very austere diet. The only reason I've been able to stick to the diet as long as I have is the sweetness of Pepsi Zero Sugar Mango. So that soda, in particular, has helped me lose 23 pounds and counting. Without it, I think I would have series trouble staying on a diet so strict.
So yeah, I have a weight issue, and I'm diet soda drinker, but for me, at least, you had the cause and effect reversed.
Fair enough. I guess the root cause is the need to have sweetness in your diet, though? Which, yeah, might be mostly unchangeable now that you're already in that state (presumably from a long diet of soda).
incidentally as a person who did not grow up drinking soda, it's sickeningly sweet to me. It bothers me a lot, also, that it is actually much sweeter than it tastes due to the carbonation -- if you drink a flat soda you get a better impression of what you're "really" drinking, which is basically just watered-down syrup.
Yeah, I've gone years at a time with no soda, although in my teens I drank so much I'll likely never be able to kick it completely. When I go years without, it does seem super-super-sweet. But also very familiar, and tastes "normal" by the time I finish a single can.
Or put differently: everyone who chugs diet soda seems to be weirdly skinny or weirdly fat, so there is clearly some microbiome effect going on.