Soylent Guy is Crazy People

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IGNORE ME
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby IGNORE ME » Mon Aug 17, 2015 1:48 pm

Eh. The basic idea of Soylent is something we've probably all considered at some point. Really it's just Ensure for healthy people. Calling it that name was either marketing genius or really inadvisable, it's hard to say even in retrospect.

I don't think Soylent is going to survive this PR attack even if there isn't anything actually wrong with it. People still have too many questions about it, and "IT'S FULL OF LEAD!" is enough to be a satisfactory conclusion for most folks. But I wouldn't be too surprised if there was a very similar, but much more subtly branded and marketed product on the radar very soon.

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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 1:59 pm

Brentai wrote:Eh. The basic idea of Soylent is something we've probably all considered at some point.


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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mothra » Mon Aug 17, 2015 2:58 pm

I feel like they'll eventually get it to the point where it's just this flavored nutrition bomb you could eat while hiking or dieting. I could see it being used for rations in the military, too.

Really not seeing the "no flavor" part sticking around, but then again, I saw this lady on the train just straight bite into an onion like an apple a while back, so, what do I know about food.

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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Sharkey » Mon Aug 17, 2015 3:16 pm

Mongrel wrote:
Brentai wrote:Eh. The basic idea of Soylent is something we've probably all considered at some point.


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You mean you haven't? As much as I actually enjoy cooking and eating, I've given it some thought occasionally. Though usually as something for MREs/hiking food/space travel/starving people/some other circumstance where low-cost high-nutrition goo might be practical. Except I always imagined something more like peanut butter&rice with some added supplements. Or maybe just algae that tastes like bacon.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 3:56 pm

Sharkey wrote:You mean you haven't?


Not accompanied by the thought that that's something I would want or enjoy.

Just imagine a ridiculous caricature of a Frenchman looking up from his five-course picnic (six, if you count the booze) to gasp in horror at the mere suggestion. Sacre bleu, mais non non non!
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 3:59 pm

I cannot believe that there is a human alive who after not eating all day at like 2 am when they're throwing half a banana between two piece of bread with peanut butter on it hasn't thought "this shit would be a lot easier if someone would just come up with one breakfast, lunch and dinner I could eat for the rest of my life."
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:00 pm

And this is coming from someone who loves to cook so much there is a hotplate at my computer desk.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:04 pm

I am pretty sure the only time I may have ever considered the human consumption of nutrient slurry, it's while considering some horrific post-apocalyptic or otherwise dismal future, a la Tastee Wheat or actual 70's era Charlton Heston Soylent.

I don't know, I guess I just don't value time like that. If I'm gargling flavoured sludge, that speaks to me of some awful and dire necessity and no way for a normal person to live. Even meal replacement shakes and such seem like crazytown to me, a product for someone whose priorities are all fucked up.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:08 pm

Yeah, but the 'basic idea' of the product isn't 'nutrient slurry', its one meal you can eat for all your meals that will provide you with all the nutrients you need. Slurry, for better or for worse, is just this one's delivery mechanism.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby pacobird » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:17 pm

have you guys seriously never heard of Ensure
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby pacobird » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:20 pm

Brentai wrote:I... yeah, actually, I can totally see how he might have gone Mad Hatter from ingesting too much of his own product.

Though for a minute I thought you were implying that lead poisoning could turn you into Boltman.


one of my favorite theories i see popping up from time to time is that the crime wave in American cities through the 60s, 70s, and 80s was largely caused by sustained exposure to leaded gasoline fumes
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:20 pm

Well, I did refer to meal replacement shakes.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:24 pm

I'm pretty sure you also can't live off of ensure. I have genuinely considered paying a dietitian to formulate like seven meals that I could mix and match for three meals a day for the rest of my life, though.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby pacobird » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:26 pm

i guess the most baffling thing to me about soylent is that people celebrated this as a Brand New Thing and not at all just slimfast

i kind of wanted it to succeed as an alternative to the established products because they all have a shitload of sugar which kind of defeats the purpose, higher fat content in soylent could resolve the hunger problems, and i kind of agree with scott in that i like food and cooking generally but the Paralysis of Modern Western Food Choices is definitely a thing and viable meal replacements could provide a way out for the very, very large number of people who find themselves in the taco bell drive-through at lunch for a bunch of complicated reasons they can't fully unpack
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 4:58 pm

Well, to be fair, my workaround for that when I was working in offices was to spend a disproportionate amount of my income on food. And my quest for different foods often had me pushing the boundaries of acceptable lunch hours.

But it's food you know? I'm okay with spending a lot on my primary material survival intake. And spending a much larger share of income (and time) on food used to be the norm anyway.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 5:32 pm

Yeah well you live in a country that doesn't think 7.25 is an acceptable wage for full time employees.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 5:55 pm

The solution to a culture that has its citizens living on factory-produced survival rations is not to switch to an even less-palatable factory-produced survival ration.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Joxam » Mon Aug 17, 2015 5:56 pm

No, but "I just solved it by spending more on food" isn't exactly ideal when you make almost no money to begin with, is all I'm saying.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby Mongrel » Mon Aug 17, 2015 6:03 pm

Right. And I'm saying that solving it by exchanging one misery for another isn't ideal either.

It helps if you remember that I also think people should be throwing a lot more bricks than they are.
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Re: Soylent Guy is Crazy People

Postby nosimpleway » Mon Aug 17, 2015 6:22 pm

pacobird wrote: they all have a shitload of sugar which kind of defeats the purpose,


You need calories to live and nutrient supplements taste like shit, two birds with one stone here.

I'm pretty sure it is possible to live on water plus the supplements we give patients at the eating disorder clinic where I work. (Some patients probably do live on the stuff because they don't eat any real food at all.)

360 calories per eight ounces (14g protein 14g fat 45g carbs, 22g of which are sugar) and the nutrients list includes trace demands like chromium and molybdenium. It's called Boost Plus, packaged by Nestle, and probably isn't available in stores.

Still tastes like shit though.

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