It's great that beans look kind of gross because otherwise people would learn they taste really good and are healthy at the same time.
When people talk about eating more beans, or when people talk about using it as an ingredient, it usually only mean dry beans.
Some humans have methanogens in their gut and these people exhale methane (gut->bloodstream->lungs) and they can emit quite a lot, at least enough to completely fuck up our lab work. Our lead scientist is such a person, and the effect is so bad that he exhales into a bin liner when setting up an experiment.
Or he did: this was so inconvenient that we automated all our instruments, valves, etc so we could run experiments from the kitchen or even at home (lots of RPis which I wouldn’t normally use for anything important). Fortunately this also automated all the data collection.
But now I have to run a trial to see if my diet modulates anal CH4 emissions. Thanks HN!
Cow “farts” (actually rumen belches) are something else entirely.
Getting your fiber from whole food products is definitely the way to go.
Just something I randomly found in a search.
Every 10g per day is correlated with a 10% reduction in all cause mortality (up to 30g). Mostly from a reduction in cardiac and cancer deaths.
Use a conventional search not an ai-generated summary as that will have influencer slop mixed in. Though oddly, I’ve never seen an anti-fibre influencer, but have seen lots of pro-fibre influencer posts!
FWIW, the evidence demonstrating that fibre is protective against colon cancer is limited, and when studies try to adjust for behavioural differences, the colon cancer reduction disappears.
Actual RCTs that randomly assigned subjects found no difference in polyp rates between high and low fibre diets.
For decades it was indeed widely observed that the people who ate a lot of fibre tended to have a lower incident rate. But the sort of person who has a high fibre diet almost always has a lot of other protective habits and norms: They're less likely to smoke, less likely to drink to excess, they tend to eat less red meat, they eat less sugar and UPFs, and so on.
As is often the case, these habits don't tend to happen in isolation, and this is where observational studies fail. So if you take someone with a lot of bad habits and supplement fibre, they'll have better cholesterol control, glycemic benefits, and of course regularity benefits, but it won't measurably move the needle on colon cancer rates.
This is all just conversational, but the current consensus is that fibre, or lack thereof, is not a contributor behind the rise in colon cancer among younger subjects. There are many suspected causes, all moving the needle enough that incidence rates jump.
As far as I know the only RCT that fits that description is one looking at people who had already developed adenomas and then tested for reoccurrence.
An RCT actually designed to answer the question would need to last decades and just isn’t feasible.
There are a large multitude of studies that show a negative correlation between CRC and fiber intake even when adjusting for diet, exercise, BMI, income, alcohol consumption etc…
> but the current consensus is that fibre, or lack thereof, is not a contributor behind the rise in colon cancer among younger subjects.
There’s not good evidence to say it’s the sole or primary factor, but saying there’s consensus that is not a contributor is way too strong.
In most cause hypotheses, fibre just doesn't rank at all. I mean, of course everyone should eat more fibre so that's good, but it isn't a credible cause for the rise of colon cancer rates.
Most destructive to the fibre hypothesis is that fibre intake has actually increased over the past few decades, at the same time that youth colon cancer rates crept up[1]. I don't know what notion people have about common Western food practices decades ago, but in the 1980s, for instance, fibre was basically non-existent in the common diet: No one ate multigrain anything. Everything was loaded with sugar, trans fats and simple carbs (we literally considered that healthy, with hilarious products like Snackwells).
[1] Twice as many young people, per capita, are facing colon cancer now than in the 80s. Overall colon cancer rates are down significantly now, however this is most certainly due to the massive reduction in smoking and other behavioural issues that catch up to you after many decades, but kids today are in no way eating less fibre than kids in the 1980s.
> There are a large multitude of studies that show a negative correlation between CRC and fiber intake even when adjusting for diet, exercise, BMI, income, alcohol consumption etc…
Not really. Take any behaviour or practice that is common among the healthier cohort and it's easy meat for bullshit study results. It's why the nutrition field in particular is full of contradictory studies because "adjusting for" is carrying a lot of unmerited credibility.
I think eating hard-to-digest, crappy proteins(like all the protein added to shakes, bars, etc)... paired with fermentable bulk fiber... is actually the recipe for inflammation, irritation and colon cancer.
I once did the calculation for my daily fiber intake and it was well beyond the daily recommended minimum.
What are people eating (or not eating) that leads to a fiber deficiency?
the FDA allows it to be called fiber, but it acts differently in the body to the soluble and insoluble fiber that most people are familiar with
IMO, it's a mistake to treat fiber as a single, fungible food component, rather than as a family of different substances with different health effects
if you're looking for "easy fiber intake", there is much more and stronger evidence for psyllium-based soluble fiber, widely available in cheap and convenient drinks like metamucil (I prefer formulations without the dye and maltodextrin, but that's getting into the weeds)
So basically toss a shovel of potato starch into your protein shake and be done with it. It's flavored so strongly to make whey protein palatable that you won't even notice.
Stop substituting and finding short cuts. Just eat a balanced meal with vegetables.
I wouldn't sweat it - just focus on eating unprocessed food fiber or not
A single bowl of oatmeal with chia seeds gets you about halfway there. 2-3 tbsp of chia seeds has ~10-15g of fiber, mostly soluble fiber. Soluble is what you want for lowering cholesterol because it binds to bile acid, which means your liver has to use cholesterol from your body to make more bile. The oatmeal adds another ~4-5g and is largely soluble too.
After that you don't have far to go. Besides lentils and many beans, whole grains are really fiber dense, e.g., having wheat bread on a sandwich can get you another +6 just from the bread. Brown rice instead of white gets you 3-4 more. Weird grains like barley and bulgur have a bunch and go well in things like casseroles, chilis, etc. You'll also get at least some from whatever fruits/veggies you were going to eat anyway.
It is a lot compared to what most people take, but it’s not hard. Banana, orange, some broccoli, and you are close. Lentils, beans (lupini is great because it also has protein) here and there, oats, an extra fruit (pear is nice), berries, avocado, so many options.
But you need to be conscious. Most people need less starch and sugar and fat.
I poop 2-4 times a day. I know some people have a real problem going to the bathroom once a day… just eat more fiber folks.
presumably is what you allude to?
Not true? It becomes fat if you are above your caloric intake.
Fiber on the other is just undigestible, so you always expel it, though I agree that too much fiber will cause issues.
Uh what? No. LOL.
Compare the human digestive system of a human being to a wolf (carnivore), a pig (omnivore) and a gorilla (herbivorous hindgut fermenter). The human gut by proportions sits somewhere between wolf and pig.
Look up the actual studies on fiber rather than pop science articles, and examine them critically. They'll do things like assume that pooping more often and having a greater volume of poop is healthier, with no basis. Things like how easy it is to poop or feelings of being bloated are harder to quantify, so they're typically ignored.
Or you get the extrapolating cancer risk based on some vaguely understood biomarker, which is one step below "in mice" as far as science goes.
If you're feeling good, looking healthy and your body does what you need it to then I'd have to agree that whatever you're doing is working for you, numbers or theory be damned.
I know people are big on the whole fiber fad, but the bulk of benefits which come from eating more fiber are from eating fewer calories. If you're eating high fiber you physically cannot shovel as many calories into your belly. It is a viable strategy since most americans eat way too much every day, but fiber simply isn't essential to health or weight loss. If you like, explain to me a theory on why fiber is somehow essential.
The main reason protein is highly sought after is that it's an ego/prestige thing associated with excessive self care.
Our diets are very heavily connected to our social status. Being able to consume that level of protein is all about excessive self care.
Fiber is cheap and viewed as a poor person thing. Nobody is holding up their expensive grass fed fiber to brag about the environmental toll it takes, like folks do with their meat and whatnot.
A lot of the protein fad can be traced back to dairy farmers pushing whey into every product they can.