Comment by wappieslurkz

2 days ago

No. The answer is to stop consuming eggs. Better for yourself, the animals and the planet.

What is nutritionally wrong with eggs?

  • A portion of dietary cholesterol is directly absorbed and increases your serum LDL-c. Especially an issue if you have the Lp-a mutation that increases this turnover.

    Though I think it's more useful to consider what you could replace it with if you did want to do the optimization.

    I've been fiber-maxing and ApoB-minimizing for years and my breakfast lately is usually a large bowl oats + mix-ins, a tofu scramble, or a tempeh dish. According to cronometer, they have similar nutrition and calorie profile of six eggs, except they have fiber and other perks.

    The downside is that it took quite a bit of motivated behavioral change to end up with new dietary staples having grown up in our egg-heavy culture.

  • With “it’s better for yourself” I’m not just referring to nutrition. Animal agriculture is devastating for the world, including the environment around you.

    Also I think for most (dare I say ‘well informed’) people it would be an ethical relieve to stop consuming eggs and other animal products.

    And yes: there are (nutritional) concerns around eggs; for example concerning salmonella, cholesterol and saturated fats. Although I should mention science is not unanimous regarding all of those subjects.

    But science is clear about one thing: bird flu is not to take lightly.

    • Modest egg consumption has a negligible impact on cholesterol. Most blood cholesterol is produced by your liver, impacted far more by other variables. Eggs are also not that high in fat.

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    • I will dig into the meta a bit here, because both it, and one of your points is interesting.

      When I read things like "animal agriculture being devastating for the world including the environment", it rings true, and makes me want to dig further, support this any way I can etc. The conflation with the (IMO hella sus) health arguments makes me question the judgment and intent of the writer, and second-guess my initial agreement.

      I would find it easier to sympathize with the main purpose, if it was left to stand on its own. Trust is an important concept in human interactions.

      *Reading further posts in this thread, I'm going to double down and add my own frustration: I really want to support this cause and perspective, but I hesitate because I consistently get signals that the people who promote it are arguing in bad faith.

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Vegan diets are only OK if very, very well calibrated for macro and micro nutrients.

  • This rhetoric is old. You can thrive on a vegan diet very easily without this careful calibration you speak of. The same could be said for common western diets with poor nutrition.

  • It’s true that you can’t just go plant based by just ditching the animal based components: you have to substitute them. But that’s an increasingly easy thing to do these days.

    From my perspective, your point can be regarded as a myth.

    But even if it wasn’t mostly a myth: I rather spend a little more effort on balanced nutrition than contributing to the immensely violent system that animal agriculture is.

Eggs have obvious health benefits. Land encroachment + emissions is modest, and notwithstanding, that's just something to manage, not avoid altogether. Everything we demand for ourselves encroaches on land.

  • It doesn't take much of a search to find many strong contra arguments to your reply. https://www.peta.org/features/egg-industry-cruelty/

    • Judging from the headline (I'm not going to read PETA), this is about the issues pertaining to the wellbeing of chickens, not the other externalities I actually mentioned.

      Land use for animal agriculture has shrunk over time in the US. Methane is highest for cows, not that high with chickens. With the right practices (admittedly, they aren't migrating the clocks to fertilize land) this could be carbon-neutral, but notwithstanding, methane does not persist in the atmosphere nearly as long as CO2 does.

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    • PETA is full of shit, to the point where you could probably safely take on the opposite of their position on any given issue and presume to be correct, generally.

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