Food Science
I've been really concerned about what I've been eating lately. Hence, the kinda-sorta-vegetarian diet I'm prescribing too. Recently I've come to be extremely concerned by scientific studies of preservatives, artificial flavors, etc. I very rarely eat pre-packaged food these days; However, I do tend to eat at restaurants (though no fast food ones) probably more than I should, and who knows what they use in their kitchens, so it's still a concern to me. It seems like anytime I do personal research about say--high-fructose corn syrup or MSG it turns out that they're not bad for you in levels of reasonable human daily consumption. So, science is on the side that there is no problem with say TBHQ, aspartame, or any other known human created/derived/processed chemical in our foods. ((This doesn't even include the LOADS of chemicals in the every day items we DON'T consume through food--just saying)) So, we're consuming all these random little harmless quantities of chemicals in our bodies on a very consistent basis. MY problem is that there has been NO studies that I'm aware of that puts all of these human derived chemicals together in a study using an average american diet (who we know consumes quite a big of pre-packaged foods). Is it illogical to try to avoid these foods as much as possible when no such study has been done? I'll admit it's illogical to assume that the rise of cancer and type-II diabetes is caused by these chemicals, but there is correlation, and when there is correlation isn't it appropriate to use caution? I know I annoy my family (mainly just my Dad) when I go home and lecture him for eating so much pre-packaged food with lists upon lists of god-knows-what and trans fat, but is my concern unjustified? Science doesn't really back me up in my, I suppose, paranoia, but not because there is evidence against me per se, there is just no real evidence at all.