[grzm]

"There are already meal replacement drinks targeted at manly men; muscle milk is one of the more well known brands."

Huh. I've always gotten the impression that Muscle Milk is a protein supplement (though it's got carbs, too), not really a (full nutritional) meal replacement.

[lsc]

that how it is marketed. My assertion is that the difference is largely marketing; that we don't know enough about nutrition to make a realistically complete long-term meal replacement, making them both "something you might drink sometimes instead of eating something, but something you wouldn't want to live off of long-term"

Of course, I'm no doctor (but then, neither is Rob Rhinehart,) and it is possible research has progressed further than I know; but personally? I wouldn't take the word of a software engineer on this.

[enraged_camel]

>>that how it is marketed. My assertion is that the difference is largely marketing

Nope. Here is what the Muscle Milk website says in their FAQ - note the last sentence:

Many people use MUSCLE MILK® Ready to Drink Shakes and Powders as a meal replacement or snack between meals. The ready-to-drink products are especially convenient to use as a meal replacement or snack when you are on-the-go. MUSCLE MILK® Ready to Drink Shakes should always be used in conjunction with whole foods and adequate hydration, and never as a sole source of nutrition.

http://www.musclemilk.com/learn/

[azernik]

That's exactly what lsc was saying - that Soylent in actuality fits those last two sentences, and that the only real difference between the two is the different emphases (and reckless overselling for Soylent).

[webscaleizfun]

Yeah, need to mix whole food in there to keep your bowels functioning well & avoid having the flora in your intestines from dieing off.

[orly_bookz]

It's not that I disagree with you because I think this is probably correct but... I mean do we know that? As a sure thing?

[lsc]

>It's not that I disagree with you because I think this is probably correct but... I mean do we know that? As a sure thing?

My understanding is that we don't know either way, really. Hell, there's still a lot of legitimate controversy about the RDA - and that is just a very short, and certainly incomplete list of micros.

(personally, I'd be more concerned about the missing micros (or that they put in the wrong chemical form of the micros) than I would be about the structure of the food; but I'm no doctor, and certainly chewing is a part of digestion, so maybe that is important, too? I bet you could actually find good studies on that part, though; figuring out if a liquid diet is ok should be easier than figuring out if you have all the micronutrients you need; there are plenty of cases where people are medically tube-fed over the medium to long term.. but I think that even that involves pulped fresh food, and how is that different from food that wasn't recently living? the obvious starting place is the bacteria, but I'm sure there are other differences, too.)

That's the thing, it seems like this would make for interesting medical research but it's instead advertised as a time-saver, without a lot of actual medical supervision.

Again, the 'extraordinary claim' here is just that you can live solely off of the stuff... if they marketed it the way the other meal replacements are marketed, e.g. we tried to make this good for you, but don't let this be the only thing you eat, I think it would be a fine product.