What are you eating?
What are you eating? -also know as Science and conscience to resist— is a book on nutrition, dietetics and scientific dissemination written by the Spanish epidemiologist and professor Miguel Ángel Martínez González, under the accompaniment of the Madrid journalist Marisol Guisasola. The work was published by the Planeta publishing house in 2020. This last year was a fundamental year for global medicine due to the Covid 19 pandemic, a topic that is addressed in the text.
What are you eating? is a nutritional reference book, but also critical to a world that is increasingly confused about how to eat a healthy diet.. Thanks to the rise of internet blogs and social media, almost anyone has access to transdisciplinary advice on public health. However, at the same time, these communication channels are dangerous for users and patients alike, given the quality of the information that is disclosed.
Synopsis of What are you eating?
A strictly scientific thought
What are you eating? It begins with an interesting dialectic: “What is true science and what is a lie”. This first chapter begins with an anecdote that occurred in the youth of Miguel Ángel Martínez González, during which he studied with Paco Mora Teruel in the Neurobiology laboratory of the Faculty of Medicine of Granada.
Teacher and pupil experimented with rats, to which they put a hat with a female plug that allowed their electrodes to penetrate beyond the brain of the animal. The result was a brain stimulus in the specimen. Moments later, by "chance", the animal found a lever in his cage.
If the experiment was successful, the vertebrate began to self-stimulate.. Later, the young Michelangelo asked his mentor if the rat was a drug addict. Given this, Paco Mora replied: “Don't talk like that, Miguel. We only know that the animal is receiving positive reinforcement. Nothing more can be said. The addition is mere subjective speculation, and that is not science.
A critique of pseudoscience
One of the most striking and controversial topics of What are you eating? is in its beginnings. In them, The doctor makes a strong criticism of the pharmaceutical industry and the large transnationals of implements for health, in addition to the pseudosciences.
It also makes a severe emphasis on the lack of scientific rigor that drug brands follow.. It also targets some doctors who volunteer to write articles endorsing these products for money.
2020, the year this book was written, coincides with the Covid 19 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic. During that time, the number of medical publications on the Internet grew considerably. Likewise, the total number of supposed miraculous medicines, capable of curing the virus and another series of ailments that afflict human beings, increased. In the vast majority of cases, these products are not accredited by serious epidemiologists, which the author denounces.
How to distinguish between science and pseudoscience?
Miguel Ángel Martínez González affirms that, in order to recognize what is true science, it is necessary to observe the rigidity and prudence with which this branch of knowledge is practiced. “It is about staying only with what is supported by objective scientific data. The rest must be banished”, says the author. Scientific reasoning must be free of biases, and this does not occur in pseudosciences, mostly related to speculations.
Likewise, the doctor assures that epidemiology is the best antidote against pseudoscience. Why?: "Because, in this discipline, any conclusion must always be assessed in light of all the previous available scientific evidence, which requires many months of concentration and work."
Similarly, says that quality nutritional epidemiology cannot be done without knowing medicine. The latter is increasingly occurring in the broad pseudoscientific market.
You need to be careful with ghostwriters
Ghostwriters are authors who are hired to write under the identity of another person. The name of this author remains unknown, hence the epithet ghostwriterThe "ghost writer”. According to Michael Ángel Martínez González, not all people who write about medicine or nutrition are experts in these areas. This leads to a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding being thrown at the target audience.
On this subject, the author indicates that a self-described North American metascientist drew the epidemiological conclusion that regular consumption of nuts decreases heart conditions. This is not necessarily false, but there is no scientific study to prove it.
On the other hand, in addition to criticizing pseudoscience, the doctor offers dietary tools and clear instructions to practice a Mediterranean diet correctly.
About the Author,
Miguel Angel Martinez Gonzalez
Miguel Ángel Martínez González was born in 1957, in Malaga, Spain. He grew up in a family devoted to scientific education and practice. Victoria González, his mother, was a teacher from Malaga, while Manuel Martínez, his father, was a doctor from Almería specialized in the study of diabetes. Miguel Ángel has a doctorate in epidemiology from the University of Navarra. In addition, he teaches classes in Preventive Medicine and Public Health.
Martinez Gonzalez Dr. also works as an adjunct professor of nutrition at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. Over the years he has won several awards for his work as a physician, in addition to his research, postulates, articles, and books on epidemiology and public health. His latest recognition to date is the Gregorio Marañón National Research Award (2022).
Other books by Miguel Ángel Martínez González
- Friendly biostatistics (2014);
- PREDIMED, treat yourself to healthy eating (With Ana Sánchez-Taínta and Beatriz San Julián) (2015);
- Health for sure: tips for a healthy life (without falling into the traps of the industry) (2018);
- Health on fire. An internist and an epidemiologist in the face of the pandemic (written with his brother Dr. Julio Martínez González, internist) (2021);
- Salmon, hormones and screens: The enjoyment of authentic love seen from public health (2023);
- 4S: Simple & Stupid & Stata & Summary (Kindle version).