Talk:Forks Over Knives/Archive1

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I watched

I watched this documentary in class thanks to crackpot teacher, but I barely know where to start it's so wrong. Somebody made a really good blog post refuting it though. I think this is a good start to anyone looking for a really, really in depth review. Also possible cite-able material. ±KnightOfTL;DR^{just shut up already} 00:23, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Hey, go to it if you want! No need to wait for me. Add a section for ===Claims=== and another for ===Criticisms=== and add material you think should be in there.--^talk 00:33, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Of course, if citing the blog of an undergrad majoring in English is good enough for establishing general credibility in discussing the film and the validity of its claims, then any blog will do, and is worth examining so long as it is on-topic and in-depth -- maybe this one, which is also framed as a reply to Minger's review: [1] 24.30.46.230 (talk) 03:52, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

"The possibility that there were simply fewer Norwegians, after the depredations of the Nazis, is not addressed."

This is nonsense. The death rates in image you linked are for 10,000 ppl. You can randomly kill off half of the population, and assuming that the age structure did not change (btw, combatants tend to be young/middle aged and healthier) it will not influence mortality /10k. Also keep in mind that not just meat and butter was in short supply, but most likely sugar & white flour.

I am not sure I understand your complaint. If an occupying force and a military conflict result in the deaths of a lot of men, aged 18 and above, then it seems very likely that it will significantly reduce the rate of circulatory disease fatalities. In this case, that rate plunged from about 31 people per 10,000 to about 25 people per 10,000. Considering how Norway had a population of about 3 million, that works out to something like 10,000 annual deaths dropping to 7,500 deaths. Norway's losses during the war were approximately 9,500. Simultaneously, adult men are enormously more likely to die from circulatory disease than women or children; likewise, a majority of Norwegians killed in combat or resistance are going to be men. I am not going to look for relevant local statistics from the time period, but that seems uncontroversial.

Thus, you have a drop in the male population that coincides with a drop in a male-dominated disease bracket, and all with proportionate numbers. To attribute that drop in disease not in the unrelated deaths of possible sufferers, but to their diets... well, that's a big claim that would need a lot more proof.--^talk 20:38, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

"Well, that's a big claim that would need a lot more proof" Not really. The main basis for criticizing the film's reference is this alternative hypothesis, here, that the dropping death count from heart attacks was heavily confounded by a similarly sized increase in deaths from war against the incoming occupation. This loses a lot of plausibility immediately if you just reflect on it for a little bit. It's hard to seriously say that the ~9000 war casualties in Norway were almost entirely from people who were almost certain to die from heart disease within five years or so. Yes, war casualties are predominantly male and there is some confounding because males generally have greater exposure to the risks of heart disease, but the people putting forth this well-honed criticism are failing to hone their hypothesis against an important confounder. As the anonymous comment implied, young males near 18 years of age can be expected to be very different from old males in this context. Older Norwegian men were much more likely to die of heart disease over the short term, while younger Norwegian men were much more likely to die as soldiers. This severely limits the degree to which war fatalities could likely offset the lower death from heart disease during this period. Shirtsleeves (talk) 21:24, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Lower heart disease rates were found in all countries that lived under rationing in WWII. Norway is just one example. Dusty1952 (talk) 21:34, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Rationing of sugar and flour as well as meat and butter: the diet advocated in the film excludes sugar and flour, neither of which is a whole food. Dusty1952 (talk) 21:38, 22 November 2014 (UTC)