Health "facts" that you believe to be myths and why. See if you can change my mind.

[TattyDevine]

Anyone got any? I've got a couple.

First one is this bullshit that you have to drink a certain amount of water a day that isn't dictated by your body's thirst or cues, but by some arbitrary amount.

Why the hell would your body not tell you if it needed water? How have we evolved this far not realising we needed to be drinking double or triple the amount of water we feel we need to? Thirsty, have a drink. Not thirsty, don't. Like food. Hungry, eat. Not hungry? Shouldn't eat. What terrible fate will befall us if we don't drink 2 litres of water a day? And how did we evolve for thousands and thousands of years before this bit of knowledge was bestowed upon us?

2nd one - don't eat at night because you won't burn it and it will be stored as fat, but if you eat the same amount but during the day you will burn it.

Well, surely if you have done the same level of activity in a day and had the same amount of food within that day it will even out? Over a 24 hour period, I've taken in x amount of energy and burned y amount. If I took most of it in at night it makes up for the deficit in the morning. If I take it evenly over the day there was no deficit to make up for but I've still taken in the same amount and burned up the same amount.

3rd one - coffee and tea dehydrates you because it is a mild diuretic. Okay so its a mild diuretic but you are still more hydrated drinking it because it doesn't make you piss out more than what you took in in terms of extra fluid by drinking it in the first place. So it still counts as a drink. (In fact my GP surgery has a poster saying about taking plenty of fluids if you have a cold, and that it doesn't have to be water but a cup of tea or coffee is just as good). When I read that, I was so revived by the no nonsense common sense approach I had to restrain myself from licking the poster with delight.

Yours please, and try and convince me otherwise with non bullshitty science if you think I'm wrong (which I'm happy to be with a proper science-boffiny cut-down)

That certain foods have negative calories - ie you burn more calories in digesting them than you do in eating them.

Isn't that true of celery (negative calories)??

No

You will burn 2 calories digesting a large stalk of celery. A large stalk contains 10 calories.

Thanks for that! Never liked it anyway!

YANBU I agree with everything you said!

I do believe, interrobang that the 'perfect diet' adopted by the very healthy subjects of the China Study, whilst almost entirely plant based, also included very small quantities of meat? And I think whilst some people can be perfectly healthy on a meat free diet for life, it isn't true of everyone - I agree no one needs dairy however

piglet we now know what the connection between damp swampy places and malaria is (mosquitos) - so its wrong - but we know why...whereas we don't really know the reason for the observation that people got a cold after being cold...(except the enclosed places theory - but then why did people 'catch their death of cold' - people who been otherwise in the same environments go on to get seriously ill after being cold ...and others didn't....like I said controversial - definitely caused by a virus but it does seem to effect people who have been cold more than others...more research needed!)

I'm one of those people that if they eat breakfast just eat more during the day ...starving by 11 and then eat exactly the same throughout the day so just have extra breakfast and elevenses calories ...and put weight on...

Smoothies are the work of the devil ...humans can't digest cellulose - all plant cells have walls made up of cellulose. We don't have the necessary enzymes - reason that we don't use our appendix. Also the reason that cows 'chew the cut' keep regurgitating and chewing grass to get the nutrients out. If we don't physically break open the cell walls we can't get inside them to the nutrients -calories. Reason you see whole sweetcorn and peas in your poo.
Calorie counts are calculated by burning things in a lab and measuring the amount of energy released -absolutely nothing really to do with digestion.
Cellulose is just like starch (complex carbohydrates) in that it is made up of long strings of glucose molecules -BUT enzymes in your saliva start breaking down starch molecules...even before it hits your stomach. Although more recently they take off the cellulose/fibre from the carbohydrate energy released -because you can't access that -so slightly more accurate. But still...

So you eat an apple - you have to chew it - to break open the cells, then your stomach and the rest of your digestion system tries its hardest to get the energy (calories out of it) -using up energy and still not getting all the nutrients out...an apple provides a net gain calorie gain to your body less than its determined value. And will produce more indigestible material (fibre) needed to bulk out your poo.
You drink a smoothie - no energy utilised to chew, all the hard work is done by the liquidiser - and the liquidiser does a better job at breaking down the cell walls than your body ever could...An apple in a smoothie provides a net calorie gain much closer to its determined value. And will produce less bulk...
(Celery - net calorie gain - don't know if it will be negative but probably lower than determined' )

I'm convinced that breakfast thing was invented by Kellogg's.

YY to the "if you can get out of bed it isn't flu/if you can open your eyes it isn't a migraine" bollocks. As I've said before, my DS was hospitalised with chicken pox - that doesn't mean that all the happy spotty toddlers off nursery watching CBeebies must have a different virus (and chicken pox, unlike the many variations of flu, is pretty much the exact same virus).

And while I'm sympathetic to the ethical and environmental case for veganism, the "cows milk is food for baby cows not adult humans" stuff is bollocks - as a Northern European I've demonstrably evolved specifically to drink the milk of other mammals. (See also: if I needed to wear factor 50 all the time on my face in the UK my ancestors wouldn't have bothered evolving this skin colour).

I always think if your wee looks ( not tastes , that bit is important ) like pinot grigio then you probably not dehydrated .

Ooo thought of a good one:

"Carrots make you see in the dark"

WWII British propaganda to hide the invention of radar!

I agree on the 'evolved to consume dairy' argument Ladyisabella, but some races and even individuals are more evolved than others in that respect. I'm not anti-dairy but it evidently causes problems for lots of people and I don't think it's a necessary element of a healthy diet, in the way that animal protein can be for some people.

We don't NEED dairy though, Isabella. We are told that we do, but we don't.

And of course COW'S milk is for baby cows! The clue is in the bit where it says COW'S MILK. It is designed for their own babies, not for the adults of another species. That we can consume it doesn't mean we should.

Sitting around in a wet swimsuit will give you womb cancer.

On the dairy debate, I always thought dairy was for calcium. Where do you get your calcium from instead, is it much more expensive, and what's wrong with milk?

sleep, numerous studies show that ALL humans can thrive without meat. No body needs it, if there are a variety of plant-based alternatives available. I will grant that some tribes don't have good access to variety, but we in the West sure do.

Jessica, dairy does more harm than good. www.pcrm.org/health/health-topics/calcium-and-strong-bones

Alternatives (soya milk, if you are talking about milk, as opposed to calcium sources like dark leafy greens) are not expensive, but bottom line, what price good health?

Milk production is devastating our planet, and is cruel to cows and their calves. Calves are unable to drink their mother's milk because the farmer steals it, so the calves are killed off for veal. Or, if they are female, they are fed a crappy substitute until they can join their mothers on the milk-making production line. www.facebook.com/cowspiracymovie?fref=ts

WHat, alpha . That sounds too bizarre even to appear in the daily mail.

saveourbones.com/osteoporosis-milk-myth/

Yes I agree it's probably not necessary for us because we've got loads of other perfectly good food options - I've evolved especially to be able to eat it healthily, but I'm not a hunter gatherer living on the edge of starvation so I don't need dairy if I choose not to have it. I'm only objecting to the "it's not natural" argument which is patently nonsense.

AFAIK there's no good evidence that drinking lots of milk fends of osteoporosis - it would seem obvious that milk => calcium => strong bones but I seem to recall that the actual evidence is lacking and it seems to be more complicated.

The idea of "toxins" and "detoxing".

Where are these mythical toxins, and what do they look like? They're a load of rubbish made up by the spa industry to part otherwise sane people from their money.

"Detoxing" by living off juice for a week will do you no good whatsoever.

Quangle! YES YES YES!

I have always thought that about washing veg - we learned about e-coli at college (professional cookery NVQ level 2) and I raised that when they said about washing veg, a sentence or two after saying what temperatures kill e-coli. Chef sort of stared at me in a stricken fashion and said she'd get back to me. She didn't.

The latest fad of cooking a cake with maple syrup and calling it "sugar free"- surely this is nonsense?

Washing veg ...a good number of years ago my sister worked for a local paper...not sure if they published this or it was just something they came across - but some bloke's 'hobby' was going round supermarkets and picking his nose and wiping it on fruit & veg...I always think of that now...and wash loose packed stuff....
Also for a while she lived somewhere where water was scarce - apparently you could get stuff to add to water to wash fruit in (so used less water) and she was appalled at the muck that it took off eg grapes...
Then again a bit of dirt is good for you...
(And I used to suspect that branded carpet shampoo had something in it that reacted someway so it turned the water black -so you were shocked by how dirty your carpets were and they needed doing more often ...use more shampoo - then I tried using just water in my carpet washer and the water was just as black - yes my carpets are that gross ... but maybe the grape washing water DID have something in it though...)

that daily washing with soap is necessary for healthy skin.

no its not, its bad for your skin, it strips the natural oils, causes dry skin, aggravates eczema and a lot of other things besides.