Busting Nutrition Myths with Jessica Knurick

Summary

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StarTalk Radio – "Busting Nutrition Myths with Jessica Knurick"

Host: Neil deGrasse Tyson
Guests: Jessica Knurick, PhD (Nutritionist, Science Communicator), Gary O’Reilly, Paul Mercurio
Date: April 17, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this special edition of StarTalk, Neil deGrasse Tyson is joined by nutrition scientist and influencer Dr. Jessica Knurick for a myth-busting deep dive into the modern landscape of nutrition. With comic co-hosts Gary O’Reilly and Paul Mercurio, the panel explores everything from the lure of miracle diets and weight loss drugs to the ever-shifting dietary guidelines, the demonization of seed oils, faddish obsessions with protein, and why Americans are still confused—despite all the available science. With humor and rigor, this episode tackles the science, the fads, and the politics behind what we eat.

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Key Topics & Insights

1. The State of Nutrition in America

• Are We Healthier Now?

  • Life Expectancy & Chronic Disease: While Americans live longer and have reduced rates of infectious disease, the majority still face lifestyle-related chronic issues like diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
  • Jessica Knurick [04:12]:
    “The vast majority of Americans have at least one chronic health condition…a lot of that is related to lifestyle.”

• Advances vs. Lifestyle

  • Despite medical progress, unhealthy behaviors outpace them.
  • Paul Mercurio [05:47]:
    “I would think...given how sophisticated we are scientifically, especially when it comes to nutrition, that we would sort of be able to stem that tide a little bit.”

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2. The Quick Fix Culture: Weight Loss Drugs and Miracle Diets

• Ozempic & GLP1 Drugs

  • Originally developed for diabetes, widely used for weight loss—but long-term human data is limited.
  • Neil deGrasse Tyson [07:14]:
    “They haven’t been around for 20 years. How can we know the long-term effects of a miracle drug...?”
  • Safety is assessed via clinical trials and animal models, but human outcomes are still being evaluated.

• Prevention vs. Treatment

  • Drugs can help manage disease and extend lifespan, but lifestyle (diet, stress, sleep, activity) is vital for prevention.

• Will These Drugs Change Eating Habits?

  • Some anecdotal evidence suggests they encourage healthier choices but primarily work by suppressing appetite.
  • Jessica Knurick [11:00]:
    “Probably the most important thing is the amount of food that someone eats...it is addressing one of the more important things.”

• The Eternal Search for the Easy Solution

  • America’s obsession with the “quick fix” leads to booming supplement markets and questionable solutions.
  • Neil deGrasse Tyson [12:39]:
    “People are always looking for the quick fix...it’s endemic within us.”

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3. Ultra-Processed Foods: What’s the Harm?

• Definitions & Misconceptions

  • Ultra-processed foods range from Doritos to high-protein yogurt; not all are nutritionally equal.
  • Jessica Knurick [18:16]:
    “The idea that all ultra-processed foods are bad…is more of a moral argument. It’s like you’re moralizing food at that point.”

• Practical Advice

  • Focus on nutrient quality: look for high protein/fiber, low added sugar.
  • Jessica Knurick [19:38]:
    “Look for foods that are higher in protein, higher in fiber, lower in added sugar…you can make better choices.”

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4. Protein Obsession & Fad Diets

• The "Protein Craze"

  • Most Americans already consume adequate protein—if anything, sometimes too much, particularly from red meat. The current protein boom is fueled by social media, the "manosphere" and marketing.
  • Jessica Knurick [22:47]:
    “What we’re seeing is a fad with protein. If you look at all the data sets...most Americans on average are getting adequate amounts of protein.”
  • Exceptions include older adults, those recovering from injury, and under-informed vegetarians.

• What Happens If You Overdo Protein?

  • Excess generally leads to surplus calories, not bigger muscles, unless combined with rigorous resistance training.
  • Jessica Knurick [24:09]:
    “If you’re consuming, over-consuming anything, it can be detrimental. But most people aren’t over-consuming protein.”

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5. The Food Pyramid & Dietary Guidelines—Science or Lobbying?

• Shifting Icons: Pyramid to Plate and Back

  • The food pyramid (early 1990s), “MyPlate” (2011), and now a new “reverse pyramid” (2026)—each shift has involved changes not just in visualization but in implied priorities, often influenced by industry.
  • Jessica Knurick [29:09]:
    “The new pyramid really only shows animal proteins…animal proteins are very visible at the very top.”

• Industry Influence

  • Conflicts of interest, especially from the beef and dairy industries, remain significant in shaping U.S. dietary guidelines.
  • Jessica Knurick [30:19]:
    “Many of the people who worked on these dietary guidelines have conflicts of interest with the beef or dairy industry…”

• Science vs. Policy

  • The initial scientific report is meant to be objective, but policy and visual representation are often changed or “watered down” by lobbying.
  • This results in guidelines that are confusing or even contradictory (e.g., promoting high animal protein while recommending limits on saturated fat).
  • Jessica Knurick [33:08]:
    “The visual representation is very confusing because...even as a nutrition professional, [it’s hard] to devise a diet that actually follows all of these things.”

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6. Nutrition “Villains” — Seed Oils, Food Dyes, and Fancy Salts

• Seed Oils

  • Social media has villainized polyunsaturated oils like sunflower, canola, and safflower—despite robust global evidence of their safety and benefits for heart health.
  • Misinfo is often based on lab mechanisms that do not apply at the population level.
  • Jessica Knurick [39:30]:
    “Misinformation spreads really quickly...they take a mechanism of action and then say that’s going to happen in a human model…which we know is not the case.”
  • The demonization feeds into anti-science sentiment and is often based on “guilt by association” (small quantities in nutritious diets vs. large quantities in junk food).

• Food Dyes

  • Widely claimed online that synthetic food dyes are banned abroad—Knurick corrects this; they are approved in the U.S., EU, Canada, and Australia.

• Pink Himalayan vs. Table Salt

  • Chemically, salt is salt. The only real difference is trace minerals—which are insignificant in terms of health.

• Raw Milk

  • The belief that “natural is better” ignores proven advances like pasteurization, which makes milk safer with no meaningful nutritional loss.
  • Jessica Knurick [47:38]:
    “Pasteurization is literally just heating milk…It kills pathogens and makes your milk safer, and doesn’t meaningfully change the nutritional content.”

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7. How Nutrition Misinformation Spreads (and What To Do About It)

• Why Is Nutrition So Fad-Driven?

  • Food is part of daily life and culture, making us vulnerable to claims, clickbait, and influencers.
  • Jessica Knurick [21:07]:
    “Because we all eat at least three times a day…it’s very susceptible to these fads.”

• The Lure of “Natural”

  • Knurick describes the “naturalistic fallacy”—many “healthy” trends are based on belief, not science.

• Public Confusion & Scientific Consensus

  • With conflicting celebrity experts, influencers, and online “pedigree,” many arrive at Knurick’s page confused.
  • She emphasizes the concept of “scientific consensus”—not cherry-picking single studies, but reviewing all available evidence.
  • Jessica Knurick [51:06]:
    “A study can come out…and say something completely different than what the consensus says. But that’s a single study…we have to look at everything together and that’s what consensus does.”

• How To Stay Informed?

  • Seek info from major global medical/scientific organizations (AAP, ACOG, etc.).
  • Be wary of anyone making dramatic claims or immediately selling supplements.
  • Jessica Knurick [56:56]:
    “If a video starts and says ‘Are you poisoning your kids?’ That person is not going to be good [for information].”

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Memorable Quotes

• Neil deGrasse Tyson [11:33]:
  “If a diet book were written by a physicist, it would be one sentence long: Consume food at a lower calorie rate than you burn it.”
• Jessica Knurick [13:12]:
  “What we don’t have is people actually adopting those behaviors. It’s difficult to get people to adopt…healthful eating and to get eight hours of sleep.”
• Paul Mercurio [54:02]:
  “If you take a 30,000 foot view...it’s: let’s go back to the old days. Let’s do red meat and raw milk and not processed foods. Well, the old days, you died at 42...maybe we rethink that.”
• Jessica Knurick [41:56]:
  “As scientists, we’ve been failing that. We’ve been losing that war, so to speak, because we haven’t been going to...where people are to bring them information.”

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Practical Nutrition Takeaways

• Healthy Eating:

  • Center your diet on plants: fruits, vegetables, whole grains.
  • Get a variety of protein, from both animal and plant sources.
  • Favor high-nutrient, minimally processed foods.
  • Limit low-nutrient, ultra-processed foods (but don’t moralize food).
  • Be skeptical of sensational claims, especially those paired with product links.

• Guidelines Change, Core Science Doesn’t:

  • Despite shifting dietary symbols, the basics of a healthy diet are steady and well-supported.

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Notable Segments & Timestamps

• [03:49] – Are we healthier than in the past?
• [06:47] – “Quick fix” medicine/drug solutions for chronic diseases
• [11:33] – DeGrasse Tyson’s “Physicist's Diet Book”
• [17:32] – What are ultra-processed foods and why are they stigmatized?
• [21:07] – Why is nutrition so susceptible to fads?
• [22:47] – The myth of widespread protein deficiency
• [29:07] – New reverse food pyramid and conflicts of interest
• [37:03] – The seed oil debate and scientific evidence
• [45:18] – Pink salt, food dyes, and raw milk debunked
• [51:06] – How (and why) to trust scientific consensus
• [56:41] – Simple, science-based nutrition advice

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Final Words

Jessica Knurick cuts through confusion:

• Focus on plants, diversify your plate, and limit low-nutrient processed foods—but don’t fall for food fear-mongering.
• Don’t chase fads; beware moralizing food, viral quick fixes, and anyone who sells solutions paired with sensationalist advice.
• Rely on the slow, steady foundation of consensus science—and don’t forget, good nutrition is, as Neil says, sometimes a “little boring.”
• And don’t worry: it’s fine to enjoy a crookie—especially if you’ve never heard of one—now you have.

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Find Dr. Jessica Knurick:

• Instagram
• Substack (book to come in early 2027)

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Host signoff:
Neil deGrasse Tyson: “Keep looking up.”

Transcript

[Jessica Nurik]

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[Jessica Nurik]

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[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Gary, you got another good one lined up? We do on our nutrition. Not only the good, the bad, but also the ugly.

[Gary O'Reilly]

I guarantee by the time we finish this, you're gonna be hungry.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Are you gonna start eating kale after this?

[Paul Mercurio]

You put hot fudge on it.

[Jessica Nurik]

I will.

[Paul Mercurio]

A little whipped cream, lot of whipped cream.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Coming right up. StarTalk Nutrition Edition. Welcome to StarTalk, your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide. StarTalk begins. This is StarTalk Special Edition. Neil Degrasse Tyson here, your personal astrophysicist. And when you hear special edition, you know who's to my right.

[Jessica Nurik]

Hello, hello.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Gary O'Reilly.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Hey, Neil.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I got with us Paul Mercurio.

[Paul Mercurio]

What's up? Good to see you again.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Fresh off the Daily Show.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. In the late show and all that good stuff.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Daily show and the Late Show. Yeah, Late Show. Counting down the minutes.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, yeah, we're counting down.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. Counting down.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So what have you cooked up today?

[Gary O'Reilly]

Okay, that's on the food scene. That's your fault. All right, so America has long been struggling with its health and especially nutrition. But now it feels like it's even harder to navigate with viral fruit food trends. Ozempic. It's never felt more complicated to make healthy choices. We're going to discuss, yes, we are popular health myths and how to deal with those in power and how they are pushing misinformation. So Neil, if you would introduce our guests.

[Jessica Nurik]

Ooh.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. So you know what you need for that? You need a nutritionist.

[Gary O'Reilly]

What a good idea.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And over here, we value PhDs.

[Gary O'Reilly]

We do.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We got a PhD nutritionist.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Even better.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What do you think of that? We've Got with us, Jessica Nurik. Jessica, welcome to StarTalk.

[Jessica Nurik]

Thank you. Happy to be here.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yes. So you're a professional nutritionist and you have a huge online following. Very important. So that makes you, I guess, an influencer.

[Jessica Nurik]

I suppose so, yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because you are sharing your expertise with people who not only seek it because they don't know, they might seek it because they wonder if they're doing the right thing or not. And there's so many people in that situation, of course, not only domestically, but surely around the world. It can't just be American folks who want to be healthy. So we're here to pick your brain and find out what we're doing right, what we're doing wrong. So Gary led off by saying, you know, America, we're kind of in nutrition doldrums. But that baits the question. Was there ever a time when we were healthier? I mean, I look at old ads for food and I look at things people were eating and movies and TV shows, none of that looks good. I think we have made some progress, haven't we?

[Gary O'Reilly]

Yeah.

[Jessica Nurik]

I mean, I guess it depends on what we mean by healthier. Right? Because if we're talking about life expectancy, we're certainly doing as good as we've ever done. If you're talking about infectious diseases, we're doing as good as we've ever done without the last year. Maybe. But if you're talking about, you're talking

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

about the effort to combat infectious diseases based on knowledge we've gleaned in recent years.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes, thank you. Not like not getting infectious diseases. Right. Combating infectious diseases, but if you look at lifestyle related chronic disease, we're certainly in a place where the vast majority of Americans have at least one chronic health condition, something like type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cardiometabolic disease. And a lot of that, again, is related to lifestyle. So things like your diet, your physical activity, your stress levels, your sleep levels. And so that's where we are kind of missing the mark in this country. And we could be doing better.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Use the term cardio metabolic. What would that be?

[Jessica Nurik]

Those are things like cardiovascular disease. So people having heart attacks, type 2 diabetes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Right, so we heard that. But then you use cardiometabolic. What does that mean?

[Jessica Nurik]

I was just using the all encompassing term for what I had already said.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, okay, okay, got it, got it. Because we know cardiovascular.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, you're smart and you need to keep up.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

She's showing off these words.

[Jessica Nurik]

I'm just trying to like things that have to do with your heart and Your metabolism.

[Paul Mercurio]

Thank you for dumbing it down for me.

[Gary O'Reilly]

So when you talk about we're in a better place when you look at the numbers, our population is that much larger than it was 50 years ago. Do the statistics, the percentages stack up equivalently or have we moved in a better direction?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, it's relative. So the percentages are higher now. So people who have type 2 diabetes significantly higher. People who have cardiovascular disease. But you know, as I mentioned, we're living a lot longer now. And so part of chronic disease is it takes quite a few decades to see chronic disease on average. And so the longer someone lives, the more likely they are to get.

[Paul Mercurio]

What seems strange to me is that the advances in medical science and researchers have been in the last 50, 100 years. Incredible. And yet our lifestyle outpaces that. Right. Like, yet still we have type 2 diabetes in these issues, it seems a little counterintuitive to me. I would think that given how sophisticated we are scientifically, especially when it comes to nutrition, that we would sort of be able to sort of stem that tide a little bit.

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, I mean, we have great medical advancements in medical technology that help people live longer with those conditions.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, but yeah, I want to, I want to eat bad and just have medicine save me.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And that checks out.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Okay, so there we are. What you've landed on is the quick fix solution, which is our GLP1. So all I do, I pay, I find some money, I get my once, whatever it is, take a shot, Take a shot, take the tablet. When was the last time the quick fix was the solution? Or are we just kicking this can down the road?

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, it depends on what you mean by the solution. If the solution is to live longer, a lot of these medications help us do that, help people to live longer, and so they are effective in that way. You know, if we're talking about prevention, we're looking at more lifestyle related things, things like your diet, things like your activity, your sleep, your stress. And that's where we would look at preventing these chronic diseases or at least mitigating them so that you wait 10 more years until you get some sort of chronic health condition.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So these sort of weight loss drugs that I guess came to us from diabetes treatment. Diabetes, yeah. Very fascinating secondary utility of those medicines. We have some benefit of track record for their use in the diabetic community, but now it's widespread for people just simply want to lose weight, but they haven't been around for 20 years. How can we know the long term effects of A miracle drug over a period longer than the time the drug has been around.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I mean in humans we don't have great long term data, obviously. Cause it hasn't been out. So you have to look at animal models that kind of can accelerate long term trials.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh. Cause mice don't live that long. So you get multiple generations out of them and see.

[Jessica Nurik]

Exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay, so what have we found? Do they grow three heads?

[Paul Mercurio]

They have a crazy lifestyle. They party a lot. They party a lot of drugs.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What happens to the GLP mice?

[Paul Mercurio]

A lot of smokers.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Smoking, Smoking mice.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's very stressful to be a mice.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What happens to them, you know, over the long term effects on humans? I guess we have to infer that, like you said from these other animals. What have we learned?

[Jessica Nurik]

In order for a drug to come to market, it has to pass many different stages of clinical trial. It's very difficult. Over 90% of drugs fail in clinical trials. And so in order for it to come to market, we know that it has proven its safety. Right. It's shown its safety in these drugs

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

within some acceptable limits.

[Jessica Nurik]

Within some acceptable limits. And I'm not, I'm not well versed in what those limits are or those trials, but that's how it came to market. And so there's a good estimate by scientists or a good assessment that it's safe long term. And there's obviously follow up studies as well. And so they'll be testing this and they'll be monitoring as time goes on.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And also today we're testing on all kinds of people. I mean there's a day they only tested on men or on, you know, or white men or black men, whatever. But now can we feel better that the testing regimens better represent people of all types?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, just in general. Yeah, I think we're getting there. I think you're right. For a long time testing was just done in men on many things and they just assumed that women were small men.

[Paul Mercurio]

Wait, they're not?

[Gary O'Reilly]

Exactly.

[Paul Mercurio]

Come on, why is people not. Why are people keeping up on this stuff? I do have a question about nutrition in the context of these drugs. So is it quantity versus quality? In other words, you're losing weight, but does it address diet quality in the context of those drugs? Are people getting the right amounts of protein and fiber, et cetera, and nutrients, or does that fall off the charts or not addressed in the context of using these drugs?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I mean, what the drug really does is it helps people to eat less. Right. Because it kind of suppresses appetite. A bit for people. And so there's nothing inherent in that that says you have to choose high quality foods now, when you choose what foods to eat. But there is some understanding, I think when I have just, and this is just anecdotal, when I've talked to people on these drugs, it gets them into the mindset of eating more healthfully. And so that's what they do. They'll opt for more healthfully.

[Paul Mercurio]

That was my next question. Is, does it or do we not have enough evidence yet? Does it rewire the brain if I get off that drug, am I rewired going forward? Because it seems to me, okay, it doesn't make me want to eat more, but it's not sort of affecting the quality of what I'm eating. So it isn't addressing the elephant in the room, which is the quality of our diet. And so isn't this sort of a panacea in some way or a false hope that, like, I'll take this, I'll be fine, I'll get off it, and I'll continue to be fine, but that's not the case.

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, I would argue that probably the most important thing, if I had to choose the most important thing is the amount of food that someone eats. And so I think that it is addressing.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's your pie hole.

[Jessica Nurik]

One of the most.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, what does she know? What are you, a nutritionist? Oh, wait, okay, sorry. I guess you're right.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, it is addressing that aspect of it, which I think is probably one of the more important aspects. And so if you, if someone can be on it and then they kind of get a sense of what that feels like to be eating that amount of food and also trying to. Obviously, we always want people to improve their diet quality, but it is addressing kind of one of the more important things.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I tweeted some years ago, I said if a diet book were written by a physicist, it would be one sentence long. Okay, Consume food at a lower calorie rate than you burn it. That's it. That's it, that's it. And then everyone responds, no, it's more complicated than that. No, it's not.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, exactly.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If that happens, you will lose.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's a basic math equation.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And so now we have a drug that fulfills the one sentence. Physicist, diet book.

[Gary O'Reilly]

But is it the too good to be true.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So let's get back to that. So I remember when I was in seventh grade, I wrote a paper on Ponce de Leon, and he was an explorer, I think he was Spanish, who came to the New world looking for the fountain of youth.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Yep.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I remember thinking, I'm 12 years old and I say, was he an idiot? You think he'd just drink from some gush of water from the ground, and then you live forever? He's gotta be an idiot. What's going on here? And then I got older and I realized people are always looking for the quick fix.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And it's something endemic within us. And no, I'm blaming him less for this urge now that I see it prevalent in our society and. Advertisement this is the miracle kale. This is the miracle thing.

[Paul Mercurio]

The miracle is drinking to grow more hair. Literally.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. So are we just so lazy we will not accept the possibility that to be healthy requires a little more work than one magic solution? So could you just address people's urges to have instant fixes?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I think that it really speaks to this idea that we see the wellness industry flourishing right now. And supplements. Right. Because people are just. They want something that is flashy, exciting, but also kind of easy to do. Right. Taking a supplement, taking a medication is pretty easy. I think it's one of the more difficult things. You know, when I got into this field, I started really trying to understand what can we do to reduce risk of chronic disease. That was really my goal when I first started graduate school. And what I realized really quickly was we have actually a lot of great data on how to prevent and reduce risk of chronic disease. What we don't have is people actually adopting those behaviors. And so I think one of the things has to do with. It's difficult to get people to adopt. You know, it's a difficult thing to do and to adopt. Healthful eating and to get eight hours of sleep a night. And all of the things that we would say reduced risk of disease. But also more than that, you kind of have to look at the systems in our country, because we have to look at are a system set up for more people to succeed or for more people to fail. And a lot of times people are kind of swimming upstream trying to make these healthful decisions. And so I think that plays into it too.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So against forces operating against their desires.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes, exactly.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Advertising.

[Paul Mercurio]

And the issue is, in the food science world, can you work on having kale taste like fried chicken? Because if you can, then I think we're going to solve a lot. I think my job is done here.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Get the scientists on it right now.

[Jessica Nurik]

But they probably are.

[Paul Mercurio]

But in all seriousness, that's part of the quick fix. Right. Like, it is work not just in Terms of physical work, exercise. But, like, you literally have to sort of turn away from. They make a crookie, which is a croissant and a cookie combined. Right.

[Gary O'Reilly]

That's evil.

[Paul Mercurio]

It's amazing, though. What? Yes, it's called a crookie.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Oh, you're making this up.

[Paul Mercurio]

No, there's a French. Yeah. In the architecture.

[Jessica Nurik]

Oh, now you want one.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

She lives in Colorado. It hasn't crossed the Mississippi into the mountain time zone yet.

[Paul Mercurio]

There's a French pastry shop in my neighborhood across.

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[Paul Mercurio]

Okay.

[Jessica Nurik]

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[Paul Mercurio]

I'm Nicholas Costella and I'm a Proud

[Jessica Nurik]

supporter of StarTalk on Patreon.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

This is Startalk with Neil Degrasse Tyson. Let's unpack this and get into specific. There's a lot of bad press on what's called ultra processed foods. Right. And I'm trying to understand. I've yet to hear anyone explain to me why ultra processed foods would be bad for you. It's just declared. And even if it is bad for you, why is it bad for you? I'd like to know that, please.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Because I like a lot of different kinds of ultra processed foods.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So ultra processed food. That definition. First of all, we don't have a regulatory definition of what that means. So I think the FDA is trying to establish some sort of definition. But in the science world, we do have a definition. It comes from the Nova classification, which is a research group out of Brazil. And so if you ever see like research studies talking about ultra processed food, it's most likely using that definition. And so it categorizes foods into four different foods. So there's unprocessed, minimally processed, processed, and ultra processed. And the definition of ultra processed is just simply it includes an ingredient or a processing method that you don't have access to, so you can't really cook it in your kitchen.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So what?

[Jessica Nurik]

So that's a huge variability of food, right? So that could be a Dorito chip or that could be a yogurt, right? That's got a lot of protein and good nutrients in it. And so there's a lot of different foods within that category that nutritionally we would say some are much better than others. Right. Some are gonna be really high in fat and salt and sugar, which makes a food really satiating and hyper palatable and low in fiber. And so it's gonna be really easy to overeat those. But others are going to be very nutrient dense within that category. And a lot of times just adding a preservative that we don't have access to would make something ultra processed in the scientific definition. And so the idea that all ultra processed foods are bad for us is kind of more of like a moral argument. It's like you're moralizing food at that point.

[Paul Mercurio]

But that is part of the problem is that for the average consumer who doesn't have time to drill down on this because they have family and work and six kids and blah, blah, blah, it's like it's become muddied in a way for people. Right. And so almost that term is like a, it's like a villainous term. Now with your bread, fiber, fiber enriched bread is not necessarily bad for you, but would fall into the category of ultra processed, right? So how do you get the average consumer to differentiate between the very bad ultra processed food and the not very bad ultra processed food?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I mean, I always try to just talk about like the nutrient quality of the food, right? So look for foods that are higher in protein, higher in fiber, lower in added sugar. Right? So looking at those types of foods that you can make better choices because a lot of the reason, the reason we have so many ultra processed foods is because we have a food environment that relies on these prepackaged foods that have to travel far, that have to sit on shelves. And so, you know, we've gotten away in this country from, like, local foods quite a bit. And so that's why, you know, up to, by some estimates, 70% of our food environment are these ultra processed foods. And so now if you're telling people you shouldn't eat any ultra processed foods, it just loses kind of the nutritional benefit. It's sort of like this.

[Paul Mercurio]

Like there are people. If it's natural, it's healthy. Well, arsenic is natural, right? No one's going, bro, you gotta try this organic arsenic, right?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's organic arsenic.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes. Or. Yeah. Oh, please. You don't wanna go just regular arsenic.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Stepping back from the arsenic for a moment.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, for a moment.

[Gary O'Reilly]

You go online, there is protein. Protein must have raw meat. This, this, that. Why all of a sudden has protein

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Feels very faddish, actually.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Yeah, yeah. Is what's driven that.

[Jessica Nurik]

Is there fad and nutrition? That never happens.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Oh, exactly. So is there. Is there strength behind this or is this just. It's the next fashion statement. I'm wearing a suit made of prime rib.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. And why. Why is your field so fad. Susceptible?

[Jessica Nurik]

I think because we all eat at least three times a day, and so it's always on our mind. Right. Like, not everyone's thinking about astrophysics, but people are always thinking, excuse me, excuse me.

[Paul Mercurio]

Wow. I mean, five minutes in and she's slamming the host blood drawn. This is great.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, she's right. She's right.

[Paul Mercurio]

I mean, you know what? You need a crookie. That was awesome.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Cause what I heard was that people who were on the GLP1, it diminishes the food fog that we might live in, where you always think about, when is my next meal, what am I gonna have? And what. And so I agree.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Diminishes appetite.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. Just the total immersion. Especially in this country where there's no shortage of food everywhere, that it's just people probably, I will concede, think more about food than about astrophysics. Okay, so pick it up from there. Go ahead.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So I mean, if you're constantly thinking about it, and food, by the way, is not just nutrition. That's how I think about it as a nutrition scientist. But, you know, it's also culture and it's also how people show love. And it also, it's integrated in our lives. And so people are constantly thinking about it. And so I think it's very susceptible to these fads because particularly with social media, people, like, kind of scary claims, you Know things that are gonna be very eye catching and so people. Clickbait. So people will do that on social media and it's very of interest to. Because they're thinking about food and they want to be healthier. And so I think that that's why it's so susceptible.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Pick up the protein angle now.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, in terms of that, studies show most people are getting adequate amounts of protein from red meat. And isn't this sort of more of a marketing story than anything else?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I think right now what we're seeing is a fad with protein. I think if you look at all of the data sets, you know, from NHANES and other data sets, it shows that most Americans on average are getting adequate amounts of protein.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Some demographics from red meat or anywhere else. Yeah, that's not the sole source of

[Jessica Nurik]

protein from anywhere else. And probably over consuming red meat, to be honest. If we're.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Is this driven by the manosphere and the bros who just want to bulk up, make the muscle happy?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I think a large part of it on social media is certainly driven by, you know, this like, carnivore movement and yes, the manosphere, as you say. I think also you have to think about, in terms of protein, what types of protein you're getting. And so. And there's certain demographics that are maybe a bit deficient in protein. You know, older adults we tend to see, could use a bit more protein. People recovering from injuries or surgery could use a bit more protein.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And under informed vegetarians too.

[Jessica Nurik]

Under informed, like, yes, because if you're gonna follow like a vegan diet, you certainly can get enough protein and adequate protein, but it takes a bit more like, knowledge in terms of what sources you're getting that food from. And so those specific demographics we're looking at. But on average, Americans get adequate protein.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So then the question, touching the manosphere, if necessary, there's what the nutritionist would say is the right amount of protein. If I give myself more than that, what happens to my body?

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, it depends how much. Obviously anything. If you're consuming, over consuming anything, it can be detrimental. But most people aren't over consuming protein and could probably, you know, they just raised the, like, recommended amount of protein in the latest dietary guidelines. And that falls in line with research. Like, there's not a huge, like, concern there for the average American, but it is a bit higher than what we'd recommend.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If you get more, does that make my muscles bigger? I mean, what are people getting out of exceeding the recommended dose of protein in a day? What Are they getting out of it?

[Jessica Nurik]

It depends on the rest of your diet. But they're just over consuming calories at that point, so they're not.

[Gary O'Reilly]

There's a limit if you're doing resistance training.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

If I do resistance training, the protein and my muscles have to rebuild. I need more protein than your normal amount in order to bulk up. Is that correct?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. If you're physically active and you're doing a lot of weightlifting, you are probably gonna want a bit more protein.

[Paul Mercurio]

Just physically active, picking up a remote control. I'm just curious.

[Gary O'Reilly]

It can be.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It can be.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Depends how many times you pick it up.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It depends on how much your remote control weighs.

[Jessica Nurik]

That would probably not necessitate more protein,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

though, if you glued your remote control to the barbell. Yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

Which I have.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Makes sense.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Going back into something you just said a little while ago about the layers of different processed and ultra processed foods. Are we into that food pyramid? Because I thought, like the Pharaohs, we'd got rid of that some time ago, but it's back. What sort of is it in?

[Paul Mercurio]

Has been flipped.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Wait, the pharaohs had a food pyramid? I didn't know. Or these just had pyramids. There you go.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I heard someone call the new pyramid a food tornado. Cause it's pyramid. Okay.

[Gary O'Reilly]

So they flipped it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I grew up. There was no food pyramid. That's how old I am. Then they put in a food pyramid. And I found it confusing because the top of a pyramid, that's the pinnacle, right? And there was, like, red meat at the top of their pyramid and at the bottom. I don't care about the bottom of a pyramid. That was oats and grains and things. So the message to me felt a little weird.

[Gary O'Reilly]

It was sponsored by the cattle farmers,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

by how I look at a pyramid, that food pyramid versus how I think about pyramids. So there's a new pyramid today. When did that come out? Nobody told me.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, so it's the dietary guidelines. So the pyramid is the visual representation of the guidelines. So the first food pyramid came out in the early 90s. Which is funny that you say that, because I was in elementary school when the food pyramid was out. And so that makes sense to me as a pyramid, that the smallest amount means eat sparingly. Because that's how I learned.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's like the most cherished amount right at the top. I have a completely different sense of it.

[Paul Mercurio]

And he dresses as a pharaoh when he eats, which is a totally weird thing when you go out to dinner with him. It's very awkward.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Walk like an Egyptian. Ah.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Oh, no. You did the dance.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah, I had to do it. I had to do it.

[Paul Mercurio]

He does it in every restaurant.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So we have dietary guidelines that come out every five years. That's mandated. It's a group of scientists that get together, they work on a scientific report for two years, and then they present it to the USDA and hhs, and then we have new dietary guidelines that come out.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

U.S. department of Agriculture and Health and Human Services.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes. So those two departments kind of work on it together. And there's always a visual representation of the dietary guidelines. The original one was the food pyramid. In 2005, that changed to something called my pyramid that no one knows about. But it's. It was a very confusing pyramid. Even more confusing than the first one. And then in 2011, under the Obama administration, we got MyPlate. And so that was a plate that had half your plate, fruits and vegetables, a grains group, a protein group, and then milk. Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So that kind of feels very doable.

[Jessica Nurik]

It feels intuitive. Because that's how you eat. Exactly, yes. And as someone who taught me, it's a pie chart. It's easy to teach, except it's not a piece of.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's just a chart. Yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

Don't say pie.

[Jessica Nurik]

Fruits and vegetables.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Fruits and vegetable. Pie chart.

[Jessica Nurik]

So Brussels sprouts pie sounds delicious.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, man.

[Jessica Nurik]

So we've had that since 2011.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And that seems like a sensible graphic.

[Jessica Nurik]

It was quite sensible.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And what was that? Tell me, how were those angles?

[Jessica Nurik]

It was half fruits and vegetables and then a quarter grains, a quarter protein, and then dairy and then a fork. That was the visual representation. So we had.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That dairy was separate from the circle.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, it was like a cup of milk.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

A cup of milk.

[Jessica Nurik]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That just kind of showed dairy lobby got in there.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes, it did. And so, again, this is a visual representation of the Dietary guidelines.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So you have Dietary Guidelines and feels very easily interpretable.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes. And as someone who taught nutrition, it was easy to teach. Right. To kind of show you a plate. It was intuitive for people. So in 2026, the new dietary Guidelines came out, and they changed that, so we no longer use MyPlate this year, and now we have a reverse pyramid. So the top is the biggest part and the bottom is the smallest part.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Okay.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And what's happening there?

[Jessica Nurik]

And so what they did. It's very interesting if you go and you read the dietary Guidelines, the actual guidelines themselves aren't all that different than our previous version of the Dietary Guidelines, which had my plate as the visual. And so they say to Get a variety of proteins from plant and animal sources. They keep saturated fat to less than 10% of calories. They say to limit added sugar. So a lot of very similar things, but the visual representation is very different. Right. And so if you compare like MyPlate to the new pyramid, the new pyramid really only shows animal proteins. I mean, they have like, if you look at it, they have a couple of beans, I think, on the. It's just kind of a bunch of foods on the pyramid. And animal proteins are very visible at the very top and then also vegetables at the top.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's the top of an inverted pyramid.

[Jessica Nurik]

It's the top of the pyramid.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So now you're talking about the widest part of the pyramid.

[Paul Mercurio]

But they're promoting much more animal protein over plant based. And it sort of. It almost makes it feel like what they're telling you is that just go with natural anti processing. Because nothing says healthy like steak and butter every day. Right. Like. So that's where the confusion comes in.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So many of the people who worked on these dietary guidelines have conflicts of interest with the beef or dairy industry, which is true.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Wouldn't that have been true before?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So if you look before, this is kind of a narrative that has kind of always been present, like conflicts of interest with different industries. Many different industries. But if you look at the previous scientific committee who worked on the dietary guidelines, they actually had very few conflicts of interest.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So I have a question. Who selects the scientists who are on these committees who make these recommendations?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So usually it's the current administration and again it's the USDA and HHS who kind of work on this together. So a committee of it's about 20 scientists are usually chosen and they're like,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

why don't scientists choose themselves? Why is it connected into government agencies?

[Jessica Nurik]

Because they're government guidelines that will come out. And so it's an independent group that that's chosen. And then they work again for like two years on a report on a scientific report. So they look at all global nutrition science and then they formulate kind of the scientific report that is meant to inform the dietary guidelines.

[Paul Mercurio]

And those people on that panel are all roided up guys who only eat meat.

[Jessica Nurik]

No, not traditionally.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. But any bias among those scientists becomes a bias in the final recommendations. Correct?

[Jessica Nurik]

I mean, I suppose if there is bias, the idea is that it's independent, that they're just looking at the science,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

that they're coming out with science going forward.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So the scientific report is usually pretty unbiased. That comes Out. But then when it has to become policy, then it has to become policy, then it has to become the actual guidelines.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay, so what's happened lately?

[Jessica Nurik]

So between. Well, this is traditionally how it's always worked. So the scientific committee will submit the reports, and then there's this period of time, usually like a year, where they will take the scientific report and then they will create the dietary guidelines. And in between those two things happening, there's usually a lot of lobbying that happens by the beef and dairy industry and the corporate food industry. And so they sometimes will water down language. I don't think there's a lot of examples where they actually completely change the guidelines. Previously. It's more like the foods that they tell you to eat, they'll talk in our language that we speak, like foods. And then the foods they tell you not to eat, they'll change it to, like, nutrients that we don't really think about. Right. So, like, eat less saturated fat instead of eat less meat, those types of things. So some of that can happen, but

[Paul Mercurio]

then it's promoting foods that are high in saturated fat. So now this is where like, it puts a lot of focus on what to avoid, but not much clarity on what to prioritize, which is great, because nothing helps people eat better than being stressed out about what you eat. You just end up standing over the sink, stress eating. Because I'm not sure if this. I should be. I need a crookie. Like, you know.

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, in these guidelines. The problem with these guidelines right now is that, as you say, meat is very present on the visual representation and in the lexicon and how we're talking about it. And when you look at the actual guidelines, they actually keep the recommendation to keep saturated fat less than 10%. And it's virtually impossible to eat most of your protein from animal meats and keep saturated fat less than 10%. So the visual representation is very confusing because it's very difficult, even as a nutrition professional, to devise a diet that actually follows all of these things.

[Paul Mercurio]

That confusion is intentional.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Yeah, it's a misdirection almost.

[Paul Mercurio]

So what is going on there? Why would they intentionally want to confuse people on that issue?

[Jessica Nurik]

I mean, I can only hypothesize that it's because if you look at the scientific evidence, you look at global nutrition research, there's no scientific rationale for increasing to recommend more saturated fat. The recommendation of less than 10% is globally recommended, and that's in line with scientific evidence.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Just to be clear, it's 10% of

[Jessica Nurik]

your calories, 10% of total calories. But they want to be promoting more meat. Right. I mean, some of the people leading our agencies have identified as carnivore people. And so that. It's kind of an ideology. So it's ideology overriding scientific evidence, essentially. And they're classified.

[Paul Mercurio]

And maybe the strength of the lobby is strength.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So I think now that you mentioned, I have seen this inverted pyramid, and I didn't know what to make of it. I mean, it looked like just shells.

[Paul Mercurio]

Didn't you try to eat it? Cause you thought it was a piece of pie.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, it just looked like shelving. Right. And it looks like a picture with food on shelves.

[Jessica Nurik]

Well, that was the original pyramid. The original pyramid.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

The inverted one. I feel the same way.

[Jessica Nurik]

The inverted one is just a bunch of foods thrown on. Like on clip art.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. Oh, this?

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Clip art.

[Jessica Nurik]

Triangle. Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's clip art.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So I don't, you know, I can't.

[Gary O'Reilly]

They've invested so much time and effort in that, haven't they? Just clip art.

[Jessica Nurik]

I was so confused because it really looks like 1990s clip art.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, God. I like the pie plate. Even though it's not a pie. Only because there's still a little bit of math in there. Because you're communicating angular fractions on a circle.

[Jessica Nurik]

It's true.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Whereas just clip art pastiched onto a surface.

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[Jessica Nurik]

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[Gary O'Reilly]

We've discussed what can and cannot and maybe the biases and the carnivores that are ruling the earth. What about the. The police lineup and the villains? Who's in this lineup? I'll start you off with seed oils and we'll kind of go from there.

[Paul Mercurio]

Oh, don't get me going about seed oils.

[Gary O'Reilly]

There we Go. Knew that would be a trigger.

[Paul Mercurio]

Hold me back.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So if we just get specific here, that'd be fun to know what the latest thinking is on all of this.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, seed oils are quite villainized right now.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

What's an example of a seed oil?

[Jessica Nurik]

A seed oil are oils that come from seeds. Sunflower oil, safflower oil, canola. Canola oil, which is rapeseed oil. Those types of oils are polyunsaturated fatty acids.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Sesame oil.

[Jessica Nurik]

Mm. Sesame oil.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Like toasted sesame oil, which I put on my fried rice, I can't use. So what's wrong with that?

[Jessica Nurik]

There's nothing.

[Paul Mercurio]

You put toasted sesame oil.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, you have to. As a last. As a last dressing.

[Paul Mercurio]

Bring some in.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So tell me, those are seed oils. What has been the thinking about seed oils?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, yeah. So in nutrition science, the thinking has been that they're polyunsaturated fatty acids and they're healthful oils to include in your diet. So there's three different types of fatty acids that we eat. So you have saturated fats. If you let bacon grease sit, it hardens. Right. Because usually animal fats are saturated fats. So they're hard at room temperature.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So that's saturated fat.

[Jessica Nurik]

Then you have monounsaturated fats. Those are things like avocados, avocado oil, olive oil. Those are monounsaturated fats. And then you have polyunsaturated fats. And that chemically just means there's multiple places where you're missing a bond for a hydrogen bond.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. And what's an example of that?

[Jessica Nurik]

Polyunsaturated would be seed oils.

[Paul Mercurio]

So regarding the seed oil, what is sort of the knock on it? And is there data that backs that up?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So in nutrition science, we have pretty strong data to show, again, global nutrition science data to show that diets that are relatively high in polyunsaturated fatty acids to saturated fats. So you're eating more monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids. And less saturated fats are heart healthy, are more healthful dietary patterns. We see this in longitudinal epidemiological studies.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So longitudinal is across populations.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So when you're looking. Well, when you're looking at populations, like large populations over time, and you're looking at their dietary eating patterns, and then you're looking at health outcomes. That's what we tend to see. We see this in studies that replace saturated fats with polyunsaturated fats or monounsaturated fats. We see that Improvement in health outcomes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Everything you said sounds positive. So why would there be a resistance to seed oils?

[Jessica Nurik]

There tends to be this thing in nutrition where. And the way that misinformation spreads really quickly is they take a mechanism of action and then they say that that's going to happen in a human model, which we know that that's not really the case. Most mechanisms, most hypotheses based off of mechanisms don't actually end up doing what we think they're going to do.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So these are people who say that these are bad for you.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So what's a list of what's bad for you that they would claim?

[Jessica Nurik]

So seed oils are rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids, linoleic acid, alpha linolenic acid. Linoleic acid converts to something called arachidonic acid. And arachidonic acid can be inflammatory, they can have pro inflammatory markers. And so this is where this comes from. But the problem is that when you look at the conversion of linoleic acid to arachidonic acid, it doesn't convert effectively at all in the human body. It's less than 1%, usually closer to 0.1% conversion. And so if you're just looking at that conversion and saying, well, this can convert to this and this can cause inflammation, that's where that comes from. And it sounds sciency and it sounds like they know what they're talking about. Except for when you actually look at it in a human, it doesn't pan out. And we actually see the exact opposite, which happens all the time in science.

[Paul Mercurio]

But what is the most motivation for doing that, for taking that leap to push people to think a certain way about something when the data shows otherwise? And I know I'm asking you to sort of read tea leaves here, but you're the expert.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I mean, I think that it has to do with this anti science movement that we're living in right now. I think it speaks to this idea of like, oh, the scientists are wrong, the government is wrong, they're lying to us. Because seed oils have been recommended because they're polyunsaturated fats. And the science shows that they're quite healthful.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

But it means you have counterparts online who would also be judged as influencers, who people are listening to in this regard. So I now know nothing about anything. And I see you over here and yeah.

[Paul Mercurio]

Cause if you got a ring light, then you know everything.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And the inflammation people over here, how am I gonna decide?

[Jessica Nurik]

It's a good question. And I think as scientists We've been failing that. We've been losing that war, so to speak, because we haven't been going to spaces where people are to bring them information. You know, for a long time it's been quite frowned upon to go to social media or spaces where people are. And if you're an academic or if you're a scientist.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Right, right.

[Jessica Nurik]

And you know, I think that's changing now because we're seeing how important it is, but I think we need more of it. And so we need more people to go and kind of explain the science. Because I'll be honest, even I, when I first got into this field, because this has been a narrative for a very long time that like seed oils are unhealthy. And so I just assumed they were. I was like, yeah, seed oils are unhealthy. And then I learned kind of the science behind it and what the evidence actually shows, and I changed my mind and realized that they're not actually unhealthy. But a part of that comes from this idea that seed oils are cheap and they're flavorless relatively. And so they're in a lot of these low nutrient, ultra processed foods. That's the oil that these food companies are using to put into all of these foods. And so we do tend to over consume these oils.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

There's some guilt by association there a little bit.

[Jessica Nurik]

I believe so. Because it's very easy to kind of villainize them because they're in all of these foods that we would recommend people to consume less of. Right. Which is a very different way to consume, consume them than if you're just doing what my mother in law does, who's from Romania, who just uses, you know, corn oil or seed oils in her stir fries. Right. Or whatever food she's cooking, which we would argue is a healthful way to use those oils.

[Paul Mercurio]

But you know, you could lead a horse to water. Right. In terms of we make the argument here, educate people, but do they want to be educated on some level? Have they shut down? Because there's a movement out there like canola oil is like uranium. Meanwhile these same people are eating deep fried cheeseburgers wrapped in donuts. And I know, cause I had to put them on the way here, but you know what I mean? Like it becomes a larger question, I guess, beyond your expertise of just anybody's. It's like what's going on in our society where people are just shutting down on full explanations on things.

[Jessica Nurik]

I think that we have all, we all kind of understand that we have an issue in our country with chronic disease, that we see chronic disease rates increasing, and we see more than half the country having some sort of chronic disease. And so we all kind of understand the issue. And I think when you can point to something like seed oils, then I think that that's easy for people to kind of understand. And they're like, yes, let's get the seed oils out. And it's an easy swap. Right. So if you tell somebody, we can switch seed oils out and put beef tallow in, and you can still eat fast food french fries and be fine. That's an easier sell for people than saying, hey, we should probably eat less french fries, and it doesn't really matter the fat.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Is this the same thing with food dyes? They're not really creating chronic disease. There's other things that are doing that, but there's a war on. On food dyes. I mean, probably not a great idea to give your child lots of bright, colorful candy and because as a parent, you're probably not going to like the results. But I just think, are the attacks on certain food groups or supplements just misguided when there should be other areas that need to be focused upon?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I think food dyes is a really good other example. So these synthetic food dyes that we have, we have five of them that are really prevalent in the food supply. So red 40, blue 1, blue 2, yellow 5, and yellow 6. Those are the 5. They've all been deemed safe by the FDA. They've all been deemed safe By EFSA in the European Union. They've all been deemed safe in Australia. They've all been deemed safe in Canada. I think that's a big misconception. And that might come as a surprise to some people because there's a lot of narrative out on social media that other countries have banned them.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

There are other foods that are touted. And as a scientist, I tilt my head and I say, huh, Nowadays, you know you're earning too much money when on your shelf you have four different kinds of salt. Okay, so what does the nutritionist say about the various kinds of salt that are available? Because, you know, if a chemist would say it's sodium chloride, but a nutritionist would have to say something about the color and the Himalayan air in which it was crystallized.

[Paul Mercurio]

Brought down a mountain by sheep.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yes. Yes.

[Paul Mercurio]

Two in the morning.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Or alpacas.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I don't know if there's sheep in the Himalayas.

[Paul Mercurio]

Just play along, buddy. You can't just play along.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Species of animal. Right from the part of the World.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, salt is salt. Right. So salt is going to enact the same things in your body as any kind of salt. So pink Himalayan sea salt or sodium chloride, the white iodized salt. I think where a lot of these, like, new salts come from is this idea because we fortify salt in our country with iodine and to help, you know, reduce risk of goiters, which has been extremely effective and extremely effective public health kind of movement.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So there's some health kick movements that are just based on belief systems rather than on scientific evidence.

[Paul Mercurio]

It sounds many.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. Many on social media are based on belief systems.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Many.

[Jessica Nurik]

Or fallacies. Like the naturalistic fallacy.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Right.

[Gary O'Reilly]

That'd be like raw milk or something like that.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yeah. What about the raw movement? Tell me about raw milk.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I think this, again, kind of is this idea that natural is better. Right. So milk comes naturally raw, coming out

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

of the udder, I would suspect.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yes.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

It's processed by mammary glands.

[Jessica Nurik]

Correct. I also learned that there's a misconception. It's cool to have this social media following that I have because I can interact with a lot of people. And so I found that there was a big misconception of what pasteurization is. Many people thought that we were adding chemicals to milk in the pasteurization process, and they didn't realize that it's literally just heating milk.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

These are people who didn't pay attention in middle school when you learn about this.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah. I can't imagine why they would get bored by pasteurization at the age of 12. But. Stop.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So that's interesting. They thought it was an additive.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. So I made a video about how it's just, you know, there's a couple types of pasteurizing, but the most common one is heating milk to about 165 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 seconds and then rapidly cooling it. And that's it. And it's.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And that's the temperature of most people's morning coffee.

[Jessica Nurik]

Right. Not even boiling.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Not even. Not even.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. And it kills pathogens and it makes your milk safer, and it doesn't meaningfully change the nutritional content of the milk. And so I think when people learned this, some people were more accepting of pasteurization. So, again, knowledge is power. Right.

[Paul Mercurio]

So when they're advocating raw milk is more natural, are they really saying they're accepting a higher risk of known pathogens for the benefit that hasn't been clearly done demonstrated in data yet?

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I think that's correct. That's correct. Fact true. Fact. True dat. True dat.

[Paul Mercurio]

And how do you.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I gotta hear you say that. Say true dat.

[Jessica Nurik]

True dat.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That was good.

[Jessica Nurik]

That was awesome.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That was. You said that before. That was not a Colorado. True dat. My girl's been up in the hood a few times.

[Paul Mercurio]

She's another side to her.

[Gary O'Reilly]

So if they believe in this raw milk thing, it just sounds like a herd looking. Looking for a shepherd.

[Paul Mercurio]

Exactly. That's exactly right. I mean, they say it's ruining milk. Yeah, well, I mean, but there are pathogens. It's ruining milk. Like the way, you know, 19th century tradition of dying from E. Coli got ruined. Like that's what you want. You want to sort of eliminate those problems, right?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. I mean, this is kind of a larger issue of what we're seeing right now in terms of, like, attacks on public health interventions that we know have worked. And we forget the years before the public health interventions were implemented.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Is it because it's so effective? It's a victim of its own success.

[Jessica Nurik]

It's a victim of its own success. Just like vaccines, just like food fortification, just like pasteurization.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay, so what do we do about this? Because there are people who turn to government for their guidance more than they might turn to scientists. Or even so there might be people who turn to online scientists who are either charlatans or are lone wolves in their view relative to scientific consensus. In your attempts, efforts to reach people, are they responsive when you say this is the scientific consensus? Because I know some people say it's not the consensus. Is this one person who says the consensus is wrong? They must be right. Because if you interact with your followers, where are they before they arrive at your corner of the block?

[Jessica Nurik]

I think a lot of people arrive confused because they hear one person saying one thing, another person saying another.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Even with pedigree, that person might even have pedigree.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah. Which makes it more insidious and more dangerous because then, you know, they have that perceived authority. And so what I've tried to do and what I've realized is a lot of people don't know what scientific consensus means. And so trying to explain the difference between just me telling you, don't listen to me because I'm telling you, and I have a PhD, like, I'm gonna give you information and then you go look if that's actually accurate, and I'll give you the places to go look and understanding what scientific consensus is. So in nutrition especially. Cause nutrition science is like a baby science. And so, you know, relative to other sciences, out There. And so a study can come out and it can say something completely different than what the consensus says. But that's a single study. And so if you just cherry pick that study. Right. Which people. That's a big thing, cherry picking studies. You take that one study, especially if

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

it resonates with a pre existing bias, if it can confirm a bias, yes.

[Jessica Nurik]

Then you're like, that study says this, but what do the 72 other studies say that have also looked at this question and are kind of going in this direction? That's an outlier study. Right. So we have to look at everything together and that's what consensus does. So when you look at some of these medical organizations or these scientific organizations, that's what they're looking at. They're looking at the thousand studies that have been published in this area, not just one. And then one new study may be published and it may be very interesting and it may lead us down another path. But that one study is not going to refute consensus unless we build upon that and we see more and more studies come out.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Are you finding that this guided discovery approach for an audience is better than. You're wrong?

[Jessica Nurik]

Oh yes. Yeah. I don't think that people respond well to your wrong. Just traditionally.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So I posted a little explainer video attempting, however feebly, to guide people how, when and where they can find objectively true information on the Internet or they have the highest chance of it being objectively true. And one of them was websites that are either academic so edu or dot org, provided it's not a lobbying group, tend to have more reliable information than just somebody's fly by night blog, blog. And at the time this was like days before things changed. I said gov sites tend to be honest and accurate. And then like a week later the CDC changed their vaccine guidelines on their website and it was like, damn. And so what's a person to do at this point?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Other than just tune into you, maybe that's all they should do.

[Paul Mercurio]

That's it, that's it, that's it.

[Jessica Nurik]

Just follow me.

[Paul Mercurio]

I'm gonna make.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Landed there. Landed there.

[Paul Mercurio]

I'm gonna make a motion that we get rid of the CDC and replace it with you.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, don't do that. But yeah, I think we're living in a really tough time right now when we're seeing medical organizations combat what the CDC is saying, which never happens.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Never ever.

[Jessica Nurik]

Like, I think people need to really understand how unprecedented that is. And so what I would recommend is kind of look at global scientific consensus. So look at Kind of these global organizations. Look at these medical organizations like the aap, which is the American Academy of Pediatrics, or acog, which is for gynecology, gynecologists and obstetrics. Look at these different medical organizations, see what they're putting out, which is difficult when you're just one person to kind of like go to all these different areas. So I understand that it's not the greatest kind of solution at this time,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

but we are seeing there may be no other path.

[Jessica Nurik]

We are seeing misinformation coming out of our government websites right now.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Someone wanting a quick fix, they want a one stop shop. Give me all the solutions I care about. Well, and that's how people are preying on it.

[Paul Mercurio]

The simplicity of it is dangerous. Right. If you take a 30,000 foot view of the nutrition discussion, it's, let's go back to the old days. Let's do red meat and raw milk and not processed foods. Well, you know, the old days, you died at 42, so maybe we rethink that a little bit. Right. And that's where people sort of miss that step.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I think I kind of felt the same way about the Paleo diet. You know, let's eat the way cavemen did. Right? Yeah. And diet 30, you know.

[Paul Mercurio]

Right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Really?

[Paul Mercurio]

With a spear in your back, doing bad art on a wall. You know, that's not good art. It's a guy who's a caveman who drew something and it's not good.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Can I share with you my own nutrition guideline?

[Jessica Nurik]

Sure.

[Paul Mercurio]

Here we go.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I eat whatever the hell I want and I exercise for health. And if I judge that my vitamins were not quite complete that day, I'll take a vitamin supplement. That's how I live. Cause I like food.

[Paul Mercurio]

How do you judge if your vitamin.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

No, I know vitamin Contents of all the foods. Oh, okay. I'm very knowledgeable.

[Gary O'Reilly]

He's a sc.

[Paul Mercurio]

You literally read it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And I read nutritional labels. You know, protein, carbohydrates, fat. And I know how my metabolism does it. But I eat for pleasure and I exercise for health. And which of these two? I know you'll probably say both, but I know when I'm exercising. Oh my gosh, I'm king of the world. I never feel that way after I eat kale.

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah,

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

I'm being honest with you.

[Paul Mercurio]

But you do after Cheetos.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Come on.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Oh, Cheetos.

[Paul Mercurio]

The Cheeto High. Nothing like it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

So. No, whatever I just told you notwithstanding, what's your advice going forward here?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, I mean, exercise is great. So keep exercising. I think that it's really important to understand in nutrition science that the basis of nutrition science, like the basis of what we would explain to you as a healthful dietary eating pattern, is pretty unchanged over the last many decades. And so for how much we always are like, oh, nutrition's so confusing. It's always changing. It's actually not just the discourse about it is constantly changing because people are trying to manipulate the narrative. And so, you know, if you're thinking about a healthy dietary eating pattern, center your diet on plants, right? Fruits, vegetables, whole grains. Get a variety of protein from animal and plant based sources. Eat as many kind of like whole nutrient dense foods as possible, and limit kind of these low nutrient ultra processed foods. But again, there's some variability in that definition. And so that's why I kind of say low nutrient, ultra processed foods and kind of, you know, understand that there's not a lot, all the sensational claims about nutrition. It's usually someone who's trying to sell you something on the back end of those sensational claims. And so if you can kind of avoid getting down that path. So like, if a video starts and says, are you poisoning your kids? That's not going to be good information. That person is not going to be good.

[Paul Mercurio]

I'm selling liver enhancement pills on my website.

[Jessica Nurik]

There is going to be a list of supplements to sell you in the link in the bio. Almost certainly. Right. And so just kind of like look for those, look for those things that people are doing on social media to kind of get your attention and then sell you something on the back end. And understand that from a nutrition perspective, it's pretty boring. It's pretty, like, not that complex of what we would say is a healthful dietary eating pattern.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And how do we find you online?

[Jessica Nurik]

I'm on Instagram.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Is that your biggest exposure to your following?

[Jessica Nurik]

Yeah, Instagram, yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And you have a substack.

[Jessica Nurik]

And I have a substack that I publish.

[Paul Mercurio]

And I don't know if you. I feel like we've bonded. Could I get a free nutrition plan from you? Like, I don't want to be charged, but I need a whole drink.

[Jessica Nurik]

Eat more fruits and vegetables.

[Paul Mercurio]

There it is.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

There it is.

[Paul Mercurio]

All right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And it's free?

[Paul Mercurio]

Pretty much it.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

You got what you paid for. So when is your substack becoming a book?

[Jessica Nurik]

It's a ways out yet. So the Hope is early 2027.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Okay. My gosh. All right, we'll look for you and maybe get you back. Yeah, we'll talk about the book.

[Jessica Nurik]

That'd be great. Yeah.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

All right.

[Paul Mercurio]

Maybe bring a little food next time. Just a little snack for us.

[Jessica Nurik]

Didn't you tell me I brought Twinkies? You started this with me.

[Gary O'Reilly]

You're sounding bitter now after your free food plan.

[Paul Mercurio]

Well, I got my free nutrition plan.

[Jessica Nurik]

And a pizza. A pepperoni pizza.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yeah, right.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Me and pepperoni go way back to the same. So thank you for joining us here on StarTalk.

[Jessica Nurik]

Thank you so much for having me

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

and enlightening our StarTalk special edition audience. Gary, always good to have you.

[Gary O'Reilly]

Pleasure.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

And Paul, always good to have you. And you have the title Baron.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes, I was knighted in this room.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Yes. We have to work on that.

[Paul Mercurio]

Yes, please.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

We'll get that going.

[Paul Mercurio]

I don't see a red carpet anywhere. It's very upsetting.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

That's fine. All right. This has been StarTalk Special Edition, the nutrition edition.

[Jessica Nurik]

Ooh, ooh.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

See what I did there? Yeah, that was clever.

[Paul Mercurio]

Rolls right off the tongue.

[Neil deGrasse Tyson]

Until next time, Neil Degrasse Tyson here. Keep looking up.

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