Blueberries are delicious. Isn’t that reason enough to eat them?
It should be pointed out that while antioxidants are important metabolites, it is unclear how much the body can absorb nutritional antioxidants without breaking them down, or what else needs to be absorbed into cells in order to utilize the antioxidants. Epistemological studies on the evidential nutritional studies are very difficult to control to any degree of statistical certainty simply because a natural population of people will eat such a wide variation of diets (and even within individual diets, a wide normal range of nutrients) so isolating a benefit from one specific micronutrient is largely a matter of subjective fitting of the data; a slight change in statistical parameters can alter the significance of results from dramatic benefit to down in the noise.
There is really no question that eating a large proportion of fruits and vegetables, especially in raw or steamed form, contributes to health and longevity. However, despite specific promotions of specific food products, there isn’t any indication of some nutrio-magical food that will make you live forever or poop gold nuggets. Eating a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, in addition to high glycemic index carbohydrates, “healthy” fats and lean protein, and an adequate amount of dietary fiber will, in general, contribute to health and wellness.
Stranger
You know 2 blueberry shrubs lives are in Cecil’s hands? 
If all this promise of blueberries being healthy is hooey then it’s time I get out my axe. 
Well, maybe not. I do love blueberries.
I would be interested in a cite for a study based on rigorous scientific evidence that shows any common food is better than another for healthy individuals who maintain a healthy weight.
Please provide a cite that eating lots of fruit, raw food, dietary fiber, or high GI carbohydrates promote health/wellness/longevity.
On the contrary, I do know of a food that will make you poop gold if you eat it.
And Shagnasty, roses are red, violets are purple, sugar is sweet, and so is maple surple.
Oh, do tell!
- purplehorseshoe, who has had some, ah, vivid encounters with artificial food dye
The birds who visit your yard will be very healthy. Unless you put some kind of netting over the plants, I doubt you’ll get any berries. When we tried this the birds ate the berries before we thought they were ripe enough to pick.
I saw a segment on a news broadcast (one of the major networks) where a study showed blueberries good for breast health. The study supposedly recommended 2 cups of fresh blueberries a day.
IMHO, that’s a HELLUVA lot of blueberries to eat EVERY day!
Now, I love blueberries. And I certainly want my boobs to be healthy. But 2 CUPS every day?
~VOW
Would those be C cups or D cups??
Good to know: while all blueberries are blue berries, not all blue berries are blueberries.
According to Jim Ignatowski. 
I thought it was obvious: Just eat gold.
To figure9:
Left and right.
~VOW
That’s not really a food though. Now Goldschläger on the other hand…
Well, ripe blueberries are a deep bluish-purple with the aforementioned bluish waxy coating. They may be more purple than blue but they are not unbluish.
Presumably huckleberries have the same effect as blueberries. Man, I loves me some huckleberries.
And mulberries! Also very nutrient-dense.
I have a large black mulberry tree in my yard. The birds get most of them however, then leave little dark purple poops all over the outdoor furniture.
OP, lots of foods contain antioxidants - blueberries are apparently an important source of many, but so is tea and coffee.
Certainly. The Clinical Trial Service Unit Geographic Geographic Study of Mortality, Biochemistry, Diet and Lifestyle in Rural China, colloqually known as the “China-Cornell-Oxford Project” is unquestionably the largest comprehensive epidemilogical study of diet, lifestyle, and health, and is known among the epidemological community as the “Grand Slam” or “Gran Prix” of studies. (The link provides a website that has not only the summary but also a comprehensive description of methodology, summary statistics, geospatial data mapping, et cetera.) There are also a number of other broad epidemological studies of note, such as the Okinawa Centenarian Study, the Framingham Heart Study, and many others have included in their major findings that a diet that is largely plant based (especially steamed, grilled, or raw plants), lean meat, and contains substantial amounts of dietary fiber contributes to health and longevity. (BTW, I mis-typed; it is low GI carbohydrates that are desireable.)
I suspect the point that you are attempting to make, if obliquely, is that I have merely replaced one claim–that some particular food, such as blueberries, are responsible for good health–with another more general claim. That argument is aboslutely true; however, it misses the essential point, to wit, that making a very specific claim about one very specific parameter is very, very difficult to produce any credible degree of correlation without excluding the vast array of other potential causitive factors, and even then often only by forcing the data into a model designed to amplify the result. For positive results, such as health, this is almost always an exercise in data mangling. For negative results, such as tobacco consumption, it can sometimes provide an inarguably strrong correlation, but even then methodological differences can bring into question the degree of influence a particular factor has, e.g. how much does cigarette smoking cause cancer and heart disease versus diet, exercise, and genetics.
On the other hand, making a more broad categorical claim about the general composition of diet can more easily be correlated. Even with common errors like self-reporting bias and individual variations, a good methodlogy that accounts for the gross variability in parameters and examines cultural and regional norms can make some very strong epidemological correlations. And when a large number of studies or metastudies demonstrate similar correlations and come to the same findings on the issue of diet or lifestyle, that provides a meta-correlation which strengthens the individual findings.
It is also worthwhile to note that when you hear of some new miracle food that has just been discovered to provide a seemingly valuble benefit albeit with curiously nebulous claims, it generally comes from someone who wants you to buy something. When a study concludes that you should eat a wide variety of readily available foods, there really isn’t an ulterior motive to be found, unless you subscribe to the theory that the Fifth International Vegan Revolutionary is engaging in a terrorist act to secretly trying to deprive you of Col. Sanders Flag Waving Double Fried Chicken. Personally, I find vegans to be sometimes militant but like Spanish Republicans ultimately too devisive between themselves to successfully conspire, but others may have a different conclusion.
Stranger
I don’t think even the epidemiologic evidence from those studies proves definitively that fruit/vegetable consumption, fiber consumption, or raw/steamed food consumption promotes health or longevity (not too sure about the low-GI part). And, as we all know, epidemiologic evidence is suitable for hypothesis-generation only. Such studies cannot prove anything.
Also note that the raw data from the China Study actually disputes many of the claims of Campbell’s book by the same name:
You will note that nowhere in the text of any post in this thread did I use the words “proof” or “proven”. What I stated was:
Eating a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, in addition to [low] glycemic index carbohydrates, “healthy” fats and lean protein, and an adequate amount of dietary fiber will, in general, contribute to health and wellness.
This is a general statement that is in concurrence with the bulk of epidemiological studies on health, wellness, and longevity. It is not proof, in the formal sense, of any specific claim or benefit.
Stranger
This is the issue.
The small number of clinical trials that have been done in an attempt to confirm the epidemiological studies claims show that they do not “contribute to health and wellness”
Clinical trials show have shown that low fat diets, massive doses of vitamin E, Hormone replacement, B vitamins and Omega-3 are not a large factor in cardiovascular health.
They have also shown that Omega-3, fiber and large doses of vitamin E do not reduce the risks of cancer like the epidemiological evidence suggests.
Most likely they show that those who try to live a healthy life listen to nutritional advice, but to claim that their source of caloric energy is causative is pseudoscience.
I am not a nutritional scientist but I do try to follow studies in order to better my own health so if you do have any cites from rigorous scientific studies that show that if a person intakes their other needed nutrients, and maintains a healthy weight, that their source of caloric energy has any effect on their health.
Pop Epidemiological studies claim causality, they do not claim simple correlation.
I am not aware of any science with the exception of the social sciences where this is still acceptable.