False dichotomies: moderation.

Feel like you're walking a tightrope? I sang this at Open Mic night on Wednesday, including the orchestration!


There's another internet "punch-up" over moderation in what people eat. Apparently, there are only two options:-

Everything in moderation,

Image from http://www.deltadentalarblog.com/2013/07/ditch-the-junk-help-your-kids-eat-better/

or Nothing in moderation.

As always, it's a case of "It all depends". If, when you're at home, you keep raiding the chocolates from the box or sweets/candies from the tin and you don't want to, don't have them in the house. However, if when you're not at home, someone offers you a chocolate or a small sweet/candy, unless you're so desperate that you'll steal some more or go to a shop and buy some more, eat the chocolate or small sweet/candy. Five grams of sugar won't harm you, even if you're diabetic.

If you have Coeliac Disease and mustn't eat any significant gluten, moderation isn't an option. Ditto, if you have impaired gut integrity and you feel better avoiding gluten. If consuming stuff doesn't cause you medical problems or make you desperate to consume even more, moderation is fine.

EDIT: Sometimes, I ramble in a way that makes it hard for people to understand what I'm talking about. I've emphasised the word "Apparently", as this post is about a perceived false dichotomy (perceived by the "Nothing in moderation" group).

False dichotomies: Good or Bad?

The false dichotomy a.k.a. false dilemma is an example of black and white thinking i.e. everything is either "good" or "bad" with no shades of grey in-between.

On a popular body-building forum that I post on, I often see posts titled "Is *insert name of food here* good or bad?" I would like to grab the poster by the collar and give him/her a good shake, except that they are almost certainly bigger & stronger than I am and would "Smash me in" (an in-joke on that forum).

I've noticed the same effect elsewhere on the internet where certain things are deemed to be good (e.g. meat from grass-fed animals) or bad (e.g. omega-6 pufas). With man-made trans-fats, there's little doubt. They're bad!

Consider the following curve.


Just about everything food-related follows a J-curve, with amount on the horizontal axis and harm on the vertical axis.

Too little results in starvation/deficiency and too much results in obesity/toxicity. Even dietary carbohydrate can follow a J-curve. See Dangers of Zero-Carb Diets, I: Can There Be a Carbohydrate Deficiency? and Dangers of Zero-Carb Diets, II: Mucus Deficiency and Gastrointestinal Cancers.

The other problem with "good" & "bad" is down to human nature. People think that if "healthy fats" are good, then eating 10 times as much "healthy fats" is better. They also think that if too much sun exposure is bad, then zero sun exposure is better.

Like Goldilocks' porridge, there is a "just right" for everything. See Hormesis.