[HN Gopher] Study disproves the theory that light alcohol consum...
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Study disproves the theory that light alcohol consumption benefits
heart health
Author : hubraumhugo
Score : 39 points
Date : 2022-04-10 18:11 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sciencedaily.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sciencedaily.com)
| l0b0 wrote:
| This is really bad editorializing: the original uses
| "challenges", while this uses "disproves". "Disproves" is not
| appropriate in any empirical setting, doubly so where there are
| constant back-and-forth "no, _your_ results are wrong "
| publications.
| badrabbit wrote:
| Pardon the ignorance but did you mean non-empirical? If one has
| empirical evidence to contradict, is that not disproving?
| smegsicle wrote:
| empirical meaning new statistical data? which is _more_ data,
| but does not 'disprove' the _old_ data, whereas perhaps a
| non-empirical analysis of previous studies could
| theoretically 'disprove' earlier conclusions, by
| demonstrating how these conclusions were erroneously reached.
|
| at least i think that's how those terms are used..
| l0b0 wrote:
| In mathematics or other formal systems you can disprove a
| statement. In empirical studies that's a literally impossible
| bar to meet, indicating infinite certainty.
| webmobdev wrote:
| What I remember reading in the papers long ago is that drinking
| _wine_ occasionally was good for you. Can anybody tell me if this
| study invalidates that too?
| robwwilliams wrote:
| Context needed: an individual's environment, age, genetics, and
| pathogen exposure all needed to make any useful prediction (not
| that we yet have sufficient data to build the predictive
| model). Precision medicine is a mirage on the horizon. The
| population-based recommendations are crude tools.
| ilaksh wrote:
| You mean like, someone else read it for you?
| xboxnolifes wrote:
| There have already been tons of papers that read one way or the
| other on that topic. Pick the one you want to believe.
| mountainriver wrote:
| I have a hard time believing alcohol has any positive health
| effects other than socializing. What it does to your sleep alone
| is highly problematic, and even one drink at happy hour affects
| your sleep.
|
| Nothing is better for your health than sleep.
| hansvm wrote:
| At an extreme, refraining from arsenic and salmonella is better
| for your health than sleep. I have a hard time believing
| there's nothing reasonable in between that's also better than
| sleep.
| jhasse wrote:
| Not so sure about that causation. There's nothing helping me
| more to sleep than being healthy.
| treeman79 wrote:
| It's a cycle. Lose one. You'll lose the other.
| necovek wrote:
| Obviously, white wine helps with white blood cells, and red wine
| helps with red blood cells!
| aaron695 wrote:
| IWantToRelocate wrote:
| Lately any thing that i drink (from beer to wine) increases my
| heart rate to 100bpm. not sure if thats good for my health.
| hubraumhugo wrote:
| This shows some general weaknesses of observation studies:
|
| - Participants couldn't accurately estimate the amount of alcohol
| they drank
|
| - People change their behavior in response to their awareness of
| being observed(Hawthorne effect)
|
| - Moderate drinking correlates with a healthier lifestyle
| MandieD wrote:
| Yeah, I've long thought that the "light drinking is healthy"
| effect was more like "people who regularly drink alcohol but
| stop at one are probably restrained in their other consumption,
| while there are plenty of non-drinkers who have terrible diets
| and have trouble putting down the fork."
| acchow wrote:
| I find observational studies only useful in suggesting what to
| investigate next. It's not helpful to build theories or
| anything resembling science on.
| robwwilliams wrote:
| It is a Mendelian randomization based study of observational
| data. This is much more that JUST observational. See Pearl's
| Book of Why on how causality can be tested by MR.
| mc4ndr3 wrote:
| Beer is one of the pleasures that make life worth living.
| Trasmatta wrote:
| YMMV. I cut out alcohol and my life overall has become better
| and more enjoyable. Alcohol can become a crutch when it's a
| pre-requisite to relaxing or having a good time, and then the
| side effects begin to make other aspects of life much worse.
| It's nice to be able to have fun without needing a drink first.
|
| I think the biggest thing that made me stop drinking was
| learning how much even small amounts of alcohol negatively
| impact sleep quality, and how important sleep is for mental
| health and mood.
| ilaksh wrote:
| A big part of the problem is that the alcohol industry has
| had such a profoundly successful marketing campaign that they
| have actually embedded nonsense beliefs into the culture.
|
| They have convinced society that A) it's almost impossible to
| really enjoy oneself in a social setting without alcohol and
| B) anyone who has multiple negative behavioral incidents
| related to alcohol must by definition be severely genetically
| deficient (rather than the alcohol having any blame for their
| behavior).
| emerged wrote:
| That's true, along with countless other pleasures which aren't
| literal poison. So at some point many of us just stick to the
| healthy pleasures that make life worth living.
| trmonx wrote:
| Figurative, not literal poison. Unless you mean poison as in
| a substance that can cause serious harm under certain
| conditions. But then avoiding all such 'poisons' would
| probably not be that healthy.
| rco8786 wrote:
| Pretty literal IMO. Alcohol poisoning kills thousands of
| people every year.
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