My wife studied food science in college (though she hasn't worked in the industry for many years). She provided some perspective on your "food scientists think they're noble when they actually ruin everything" take.
Basically, food scientists are taught nothing about the nutritional implications of their products. They are just taught which substances have which properties. Then, when they try and formulate new products, they just work with the properties they know about and throw stuff together until it works.
They might get directions from their C-suite about what costs they should try to bring down, etc. But there is no education whatsoever about what the implications of their products might be on the human body. That's viewed as the nutritionists' jobs. And, like quality control and production, the two are at odds with each other.
Overall, it seems that the situation is not all that different from medical education over-emphasizing pharmaceutical remedies and med students not receiving any education about nutrition.
I suppose this is the ugly side of specialization: everyone is so focused on their specialty that no one has the context or desire to pause, look around, and ask how what they’re doing fits into the grander picture.
It’s the Ian Malcolm meme from Jurassic Park (“_____ are so preoccupied with whether they could that they didn’t stop to think about if they should”).
I think that also leads to people really guarding their respective scientific turf and that's when you get to "trust the experts, trust the science". A lot of researchers seem to be especially scared of engineers.
What's funny is that economics is a lot like nutrition/biology in that sense. You can't just drop a minimum wage from the leaning tower and see if it hits the ground first.
Physicists think they're cool because their science is "hard" but it's actually just "easy."
3 body problem? Cute. We have 7 billion bodies and they're all conscious.
I'm surprised the book didn't go straight into something I've always thought - that our urge to overeat might be driven by the disconnect between taste and nutrition.
Like if you eat "whole" "real" foods, your taste buds and body will be in alignment about getting the nutrients you need. "I need riboflavin, and I've eaten something that contains riboflavin. Done eating."
But processed food gives you the nutrients you need without the signal that it has actually done so. So you don't get the signal that you're missing the nutrient (various diseases you mentioned), but your mouth says you aren't getting it.
It makes intuitive sense this would lead to overeating. One signal says "eat more", the other says "no problem here", and there's no circuit breaker of actually missing anything.
Yea that's totally what the book gets into. Maybe I didn't bring that across well :)
But what you're saying actually make sense, maybe I didn't grok that for the mechanism or maybe the book doesn't explain it well. That would explain why "moar vitamin" == "moar eating."
I've discussed vit B and fattening pigs with o3. copying both replies below:
me: do we know why adding vitamin Bs to pig's feed make them fatten up quicker?
o3
Why extra B-vitamins can make pigs grow faster
What a B-vitamin does in the cell What you see in a growing pig
Riboflavin (B₂), niacin (B₃), pantothenic acid (B₅) → FAD, NAD, Co-A → keep the mitochondria turning carbs & fat into ATP Better feed-conversion: the same kg of feed yields more usable energy, so average-daily-gain (ADG) rises 3–10 %.
Vitamin B₁₂ + folate (B₉) → run the methionine / one-carbon cycle, make S-adenosyl-methionine for protein & DNA synthesis Faster lean-tissue deposition, higher litter weight in sows; B₁₂-deficient pigs show stunting and anaemia.
Pyridoxine (B₆) → co-factor for transaminases Improves amino-acid utilisation; some trials show thicker back-fat when mega-dosed (extra calories stored)
---
The working model (what most swine-nutrition scientists agree on)
1. Eliminate “hidden” deficiencies
Modern corn/soy diets can fall short of riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, and B₁₂. Top-up doses (2–4× NRC minimums) restore the co-enzyme pool, so the pig’s metabolism stops idling.
2. Raise cellular energy budget
More FAD/NAD/Co-A → higher oxidative phosphorylation capacity → pigs stay warmer, move more feed along the gut, and grow instead of wasting calories on heat stress.
3. Improve feed efficiency
Trials that corrected B-vitamin shortfalls cut the feed-to-gain ratio by 3–8 % and added 50–80 g/day to ADG—effects large enough to make premix supplementation standard practice in commercial rations .
4. Support gut health
Some B-vitamins (especially B₆, pantothenate) appear to tighten gut junctions and modulate microbiota, reducing post-weaning diarrhoea and letting piglets keep eating .
---
Evidence base & consensus
Evidence type What it shows
Classic deficiency-repletion trials (1950-1990) Removing riboflavin, niacin or pantothenate from corn-soy diets slowed growth 20–40 %; restoring them normalised weight gains.
Modern meta-analyses Supplemental B-complex above NRC baseline gives a small but significant lift in ADG (+3–5 %) and feed efficiency in wean-to-finish pigs, especially under heat or disease challenge .
High-dose studies Mega-dosing (≥8× NRC) rarely boosts gain further; sometimes increases back-fat, suggesting energy is stored not leaned out .
Mechanistic work Molecular assays confirm up-regulated mitochondrial enzymes and better methyl-group status when vitamin levels are elevated (B₁₂/folate) — consistent with faster protein synthesis.
Overall there is broad consensus among animal-nutrition researchers:
Adding B-vitamin premixes to standard (plant-based) pig feed improves growth rate and feed efficiency — until nutrient requirements are already fully met. Beyond that point returns flatten.
---
Remaining questions / limits
Issue Status
Exact “optimal” dose in modern high-lysine, high-energy diets Still debated; some integrators find 2–3× NRC is cost-effective, others stop at 1× plus safety margin.
Interaction with antibiotics and zinc oxide Under study: removing in-feed antibiotics makes gut health more dependent on vitamin status.
Environmental pushback Excess B-vitamins themselves are low-pollution, but higher feed intake means more N & P manure; carbon-positive only if gain:feed improves enough.
---
Take-home
Why it works: B-vitamins are metabolic spark-plugs; pigs on grain diets sit near the deficiency edge, so topping up lets mitochondria and methylation cycles run at full speed.
How strong is the evidence? Decades of feeding trials show consistent, moderate gains in weight and feed efficiency—widely accepted by nutritionists.
How controversial? Not very. The debate is mainly how much is enough versus expensive over-supplementation, not whether the effect is real.
me again:
does it work in other animals? in humans?
o3:
Other farm species
Species What extra B-vitamins do Typical dose vs. baseline Evidence of faster growth / feed efficiency
Broiler chickens Riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid and B 6 all raise carcass weight and breast-meat yield, especially under heat stress or coccidiosis challenge. 2 – 3 × NRC requirement in the premix Meta-analysis of 24 trials: +3–6 % average-daily-gain (ADG); –2–4 % feed-conversion-ratio (FCR).
Feed-lot cattle Rumen bacteria make many Bs, but rumen-protected niacin and B₁₂ improve fibre digestion and stabilize rumen pH → higher dry-matter intake. 3–6 g niacin, 10 mg rumen-protected B₁₂ per head per day Repeated trials show +4–5 % live-weight gain and better marbling scores.
Tilapia & salmon Added riboflavin, niacin, B₅ shorten time to market size; folate/B 12 improve spawning output. 2–5 × NRC in extruded feed 10–15 % higher specific-growth-rate (SGR) when diet was previously marginal.
Rabbits, mink Extra biotin + B₅ cuts fur breakage and raises pelt weight. 0.3–0.5 mg biotin /kg feed Up to 8 % heavier pelts; negligible effect on body-fat.
Bottom line: across livestock the story is almost the same as pigs—if the base diet is a little short, topping up the B-complex tightens FCR and adds a modest but very profitable bump in weight.
---
Humans: much murkier
Scenario What studies show Why the result differs from livestock
Correcting deficiency (e.g., B₁₂ or riboflavin deficiency in vegetarians, elderly) Yes, weight & lean mass often improve, but only up to the normal BMI range. Restores appetite, haemoglobin and energy metabolism just like in animals.
Routine supplementation when diet is already adequate Large RCTs (Physicians’ Health Study, WHI, UK Biobank) find no consistent weight gain from multivitamins or isolated B-vitamins. Humans eat mixed diets → usually not deficient; extra Bs are excreted.
Fortification era correlational data (US 1970-1990) Some epidemiologists note rising obesity paralleled mandatory grain fortification with folic acid & riboflavin. Causality unproven and contradicted by controlled trials.
Mega-dose niacin (3–6 g/day) for dyslipidaemia Actually causes weight loss in some patients due to flushing and reduced appetite. Pharmacological doses change metabolism, not feed efficiency.
Energy drinks “B-vitamin loaded” Any weight gain is from sugar, not the vitamins.
Key reasons animals ≠ humans
1. Animals are on tightly formulated but marginal diets; small % change in nutrient density shows up immediately in feed efficiency.
2. Human energy intake is self-regulated by palatability, social cues, not fixed daily rations. Any small uptick in mitochondrial efficiency tends to be offset by eating a bit less or moving a bit more.
3. Water-soluble Bs have no storage depot—once enzymes are saturated, the excess is urinated out.
---
Consensus snapshot
Statement Agreement level
“Adding extra B-vitamins to livestock feed is a cost-effective way to improve growth when base diet is marginal.” High – widely adopted practice backed by many trials.
“Supplementing B-vitamins above the RDA makes healthy humans gain extra weight or muscle.” Low – no convincing RCT evidence; corrections of real deficiency do improve growth in children and frail elderly, but not beyond normal.
So, yes, the ‘fattening’ effect is real and widely exploited in farm species, but it does not translate to routine supplementation in humans who already eat a balanced diet.
1. If the "hidden deficiencies" model is correct, presumably that means that we evolutionarily almost never got enough vitamins? In a sense this is the "thrifty gene" theory just for vitamins, right? Poor hunter gatherers were always hidden-deficient in something and that's why they were healthy, if they'd gotten all their (B) vitamins they would've become obese as well on the same carolies?
2. In the "helps the mitochondria metabolize substrate" model, what happens to unmetabolized substrate? Excess glucose should make you diabetic or get stored as fat, same for AAs. Fat would directly get stored as fat. That way, you'd think mechanistically that the B vitamin deficiency would make you obese/diabetic, not the opposite?
3. Feed efficiency: Yea, this is clearly happening. The question is why :) "Feed efficiency" just means "obesity."
What I'm wondering reading about the lab animals and the random reward lever: Is there a way to fix this? Are you at some point just doomed to repeat an endless starve-binge cycle?
So one common counter example is that this doesn't seem to work (as well?) in rats that aren't confined alone in cages.
If you put them in a more social (=other rats) environment, they exhibit way less addictive behavior.
Similar in humans, there are tons of humans who take pretty serious narcotics regularly but are highly functioning with good jobs, families, etc. Wall St is apparently full of cocaine users. I know people who worked at Apple in the 70s-90s and they claim everybody was doing cocaine all day long. It was just a hip party drug then, not a big deal.
Were they "addicted?"
How this relates to "food addiction" I don't know though. We are also a much more lonely society than we were a generation ago. There's that book "Bowling alone" or something.
My wife studied food science in college (though she hasn't worked in the industry for many years). She provided some perspective on your "food scientists think they're noble when they actually ruin everything" take.
Basically, food scientists are taught nothing about the nutritional implications of their products. They are just taught which substances have which properties. Then, when they try and formulate new products, they just work with the properties they know about and throw stuff together until it works.
They might get directions from their C-suite about what costs they should try to bring down, etc. But there is no education whatsoever about what the implications of their products might be on the human body. That's viewed as the nutritionists' jobs. And, like quality control and production, the two are at odds with each other.
Overall, it seems that the situation is not all that different from medical education over-emphasizing pharmaceutical remedies and med students not receiving any education about nutrition.
That explains a lot. Siloing, "not my problem"..
I suppose this is the ugly side of specialization: everyone is so focused on their specialty that no one has the context or desire to pause, look around, and ask how what they’re doing fits into the grander picture.
It’s the Ian Malcolm meme from Jurassic Park (“_____ are so preoccupied with whether they could that they didn’t stop to think about if they should”).
I think that also leads to people really guarding their respective scientific turf and that's when you get to "trust the experts, trust the science". A lot of researchers seem to be especially scared of engineers.
Agreed! The problem with Science™ is that it's actually sociology, not science.
What's funny is that economics is a lot like nutrition/biology in that sense. You can't just drop a minimum wage from the leaning tower and see if it hits the ground first.
Physicists think they're cool because their science is "hard" but it's actually just "easy."
3 body problem? Cute. We have 7 billion bodies and they're all conscious.
Yes, there's the famous quote by Feynman: "Imagine how much harder physics would be if electrons had feelings."
I'm surprised the book didn't go straight into something I've always thought - that our urge to overeat might be driven by the disconnect between taste and nutrition.
Like if you eat "whole" "real" foods, your taste buds and body will be in alignment about getting the nutrients you need. "I need riboflavin, and I've eaten something that contains riboflavin. Done eating."
But processed food gives you the nutrients you need without the signal that it has actually done so. So you don't get the signal that you're missing the nutrient (various diseases you mentioned), but your mouth says you aren't getting it.
It makes intuitive sense this would lead to overeating. One signal says "eat more", the other says "no problem here", and there's no circuit breaker of actually missing anything.
Yea that's totally what the book gets into. Maybe I didn't bring that across well :)
But what you're saying actually make sense, maybe I didn't grok that for the mechanism or maybe the book doesn't explain it well. That would explain why "moar vitamin" == "moar eating."
> man reads book, remembers why he hates authors
Many such cases. Better you you than me.
I've discussed vit B and fattening pigs with o3. copying both replies below:
me: do we know why adding vitamin Bs to pig's feed make them fatten up quicker?
o3
Why extra B-vitamins can make pigs grow faster
What a B-vitamin does in the cell What you see in a growing pig
Riboflavin (B₂), niacin (B₃), pantothenic acid (B₅) → FAD, NAD, Co-A → keep the mitochondria turning carbs & fat into ATP Better feed-conversion: the same kg of feed yields more usable energy, so average-daily-gain (ADG) rises 3–10 %.
Vitamin B₁₂ + folate (B₉) → run the methionine / one-carbon cycle, make S-adenosyl-methionine for protein & DNA synthesis Faster lean-tissue deposition, higher litter weight in sows; B₁₂-deficient pigs show stunting and anaemia.
Pyridoxine (B₆) → co-factor for transaminases Improves amino-acid utilisation; some trials show thicker back-fat when mega-dosed (extra calories stored)
---
The working model (what most swine-nutrition scientists agree on)
1. Eliminate “hidden” deficiencies
Modern corn/soy diets can fall short of riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, and B₁₂. Top-up doses (2–4× NRC minimums) restore the co-enzyme pool, so the pig’s metabolism stops idling.
2. Raise cellular energy budget
More FAD/NAD/Co-A → higher oxidative phosphorylation capacity → pigs stay warmer, move more feed along the gut, and grow instead of wasting calories on heat stress.
3. Improve feed efficiency
Trials that corrected B-vitamin shortfalls cut the feed-to-gain ratio by 3–8 % and added 50–80 g/day to ADG—effects large enough to make premix supplementation standard practice in commercial rations .
4. Support gut health
Some B-vitamins (especially B₆, pantothenate) appear to tighten gut junctions and modulate microbiota, reducing post-weaning diarrhoea and letting piglets keep eating .
---
Evidence base & consensus
Evidence type What it shows
Classic deficiency-repletion trials (1950-1990) Removing riboflavin, niacin or pantothenate from corn-soy diets slowed growth 20–40 %; restoring them normalised weight gains.
Modern meta-analyses Supplemental B-complex above NRC baseline gives a small but significant lift in ADG (+3–5 %) and feed efficiency in wean-to-finish pigs, especially under heat or disease challenge .
High-dose studies Mega-dosing (≥8× NRC) rarely boosts gain further; sometimes increases back-fat, suggesting energy is stored not leaned out .
Mechanistic work Molecular assays confirm up-regulated mitochondrial enzymes and better methyl-group status when vitamin levels are elevated (B₁₂/folate) — consistent with faster protein synthesis.
Overall there is broad consensus among animal-nutrition researchers:
Adding B-vitamin premixes to standard (plant-based) pig feed improves growth rate and feed efficiency — until nutrient requirements are already fully met. Beyond that point returns flatten.
---
Remaining questions / limits
Issue Status
Exact “optimal” dose in modern high-lysine, high-energy diets Still debated; some integrators find 2–3× NRC is cost-effective, others stop at 1× plus safety margin.
Interaction with antibiotics and zinc oxide Under study: removing in-feed antibiotics makes gut health more dependent on vitamin status.
Environmental pushback Excess B-vitamins themselves are low-pollution, but higher feed intake means more N & P manure; carbon-positive only if gain:feed improves enough.
---
Take-home
Why it works: B-vitamins are metabolic spark-plugs; pigs on grain diets sit near the deficiency edge, so topping up lets mitochondria and methylation cycles run at full speed.
How strong is the evidence? Decades of feeding trials show consistent, moderate gains in weight and feed efficiency—widely accepted by nutritionists.
How controversial? Not very. The debate is mainly how much is enough versus expensive over-supplementation, not whether the effect is real.
me again:
does it work in other animals? in humans?
o3:
Other farm species
Species What extra B-vitamins do Typical dose vs. baseline Evidence of faster growth / feed efficiency
Broiler chickens Riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid and B 6 all raise carcass weight and breast-meat yield, especially under heat stress or coccidiosis challenge. 2 – 3 × NRC requirement in the premix Meta-analysis of 24 trials: +3–6 % average-daily-gain (ADG); –2–4 % feed-conversion-ratio (FCR).
Feed-lot cattle Rumen bacteria make many Bs, but rumen-protected niacin and B₁₂ improve fibre digestion and stabilize rumen pH → higher dry-matter intake. 3–6 g niacin, 10 mg rumen-protected B₁₂ per head per day Repeated trials show +4–5 % live-weight gain and better marbling scores.
Tilapia & salmon Added riboflavin, niacin, B₅ shorten time to market size; folate/B 12 improve spawning output. 2–5 × NRC in extruded feed 10–15 % higher specific-growth-rate (SGR) when diet was previously marginal.
Rabbits, mink Extra biotin + B₅ cuts fur breakage and raises pelt weight. 0.3–0.5 mg biotin /kg feed Up to 8 % heavier pelts; negligible effect on body-fat.
Bottom line: across livestock the story is almost the same as pigs—if the base diet is a little short, topping up the B-complex tightens FCR and adds a modest but very profitable bump in weight.
---
Humans: much murkier
Scenario What studies show Why the result differs from livestock
Correcting deficiency (e.g., B₁₂ or riboflavin deficiency in vegetarians, elderly) Yes, weight & lean mass often improve, but only up to the normal BMI range. Restores appetite, haemoglobin and energy metabolism just like in animals.
Routine supplementation when diet is already adequate Large RCTs (Physicians’ Health Study, WHI, UK Biobank) find no consistent weight gain from multivitamins or isolated B-vitamins. Humans eat mixed diets → usually not deficient; extra Bs are excreted.
Fortification era correlational data (US 1970-1990) Some epidemiologists note rising obesity paralleled mandatory grain fortification with folic acid & riboflavin. Causality unproven and contradicted by controlled trials.
Mega-dose niacin (3–6 g/day) for dyslipidaemia Actually causes weight loss in some patients due to flushing and reduced appetite. Pharmacological doses change metabolism, not feed efficiency.
Energy drinks “B-vitamin loaded” Any weight gain is from sugar, not the vitamins.
Key reasons animals ≠ humans
1. Animals are on tightly formulated but marginal diets; small % change in nutrient density shows up immediately in feed efficiency.
2. Human energy intake is self-regulated by palatability, social cues, not fixed daily rations. Any small uptick in mitochondrial efficiency tends to be offset by eating a bit less or moving a bit more.
3. Water-soluble Bs have no storage depot—once enzymes are saturated, the excess is urinated out.
---
Consensus snapshot
Statement Agreement level
“Adding extra B-vitamins to livestock feed is a cost-effective way to improve growth when base diet is marginal.” High – widely adopted practice backed by many trials.
“Supplementing B-vitamins above the RDA makes healthy humans gain extra weight or muscle.” Low – no convincing RCT evidence; corrections of real deficiency do improve growth in children and frail elderly, but not beyond normal.
So, yes, the ‘fattening’ effect is real and widely exploited in farm species, but it does not translate to routine supplementation in humans who already eat a balanced diet.
Haha didn't read all of it but some thoughts.
1. If the "hidden deficiencies" model is correct, presumably that means that we evolutionarily almost never got enough vitamins? In a sense this is the "thrifty gene" theory just for vitamins, right? Poor hunter gatherers were always hidden-deficient in something and that's why they were healthy, if they'd gotten all their (B) vitamins they would've become obese as well on the same carolies?
2. In the "helps the mitochondria metabolize substrate" model, what happens to unmetabolized substrate? Excess glucose should make you diabetic or get stored as fat, same for AAs. Fat would directly get stored as fat. That way, you'd think mechanistically that the B vitamin deficiency would make you obese/diabetic, not the opposite?
3. Feed efficiency: Yea, this is clearly happening. The question is why :) "Feed efficiency" just means "obesity."
A. they only say deficiencies about pigs etc. fed unnatural diets, not humans.
B. their view on humans is "we don't know", "low evidence" rather than "we tested that it wouldn't fatten humans"
Oh, gotcha. Yea, testing anything in humans is pretty difficult, unfortunately :(
What I'm wondering reading about the lab animals and the random reward lever: Is there a way to fix this? Are you at some point just doomed to repeat an endless starve-binge cycle?
So one common counter example is that this doesn't seem to work (as well?) in rats that aren't confined alone in cages.
If you put them in a more social (=other rats) environment, they exhibit way less addictive behavior.
Similar in humans, there are tons of humans who take pretty serious narcotics regularly but are highly functioning with good jobs, families, etc. Wall St is apparently full of cocaine users. I know people who worked at Apple in the 70s-90s and they claim everybody was doing cocaine all day long. It was just a hip party drug then, not a big deal.
Were they "addicted?"
How this relates to "food addiction" I don't know though. We are also a much more lonely society than we were a generation ago. There's that book "Bowling alone" or something.