Coffee is good for U

[Overaged]

Yes, quite true. And for those anti-science folk out there, scientific studies have demonstrated that consumption of sugar produces a craving for more. I know that to be true in my own experience. Eating protein slows that craving down.

The "scientific studies have demonstrated" idea is really overworked and over estimated.

[phkrause]

Thanks Richard for your java testimony. Fruit juices can be quite addictive, most likely because of their concentrated sugars. Even a complete, healthful food can be eaten to excess. This could apply to apples, oranges, grapes, watermelon, etc.

If we desire a clear mind, we'll need to be temperate in all things. Moderation with real food, abstention from the rest.

Coffee and alcohol both seem to have a debalancing effect upon people I know.

I for one don't disagree that anything can become a habit, but the items you mention don't call us back as do the items that Richard is talking about. And definitely agree that all things in moderation, absolutely.

[Overaged]

Not to mention that coffee is a drug; fruit juice is not. Wow. The things people will come up with to make poison a health food

[fccool]

Any substance, when over-consumed can be poisonous... even water or a fruit juice.

Coffee is not a drug, unless we are going to get into a broader definition of what can be considered "drug", in which case we can throw sugar and salt and many other substances in the same category.

You can make an argument that caffeine is a drug, and perhaps that most of the people drink coffee for its effects.

I would suggest you constructing your argument by first showing how moderate amount of coffee can cause substantial disruption or damage to someone's health. There would be plenty of studies that disagree with you.

But, if you are going to apply the abstinence mentality based on the idea that extracted caffeine is toxic, then perhaps you should refer to my original statement:

Any substance, when over-consumed can be poisonous... even water or a fruit juice.

See water-intoxication.

[Overaged]

Thats a real stretch if ever I heard one.

How many people screw themselves up with water as compared to coffee?

If they were like my dog and drank toilet water; I could see your point just a bit.

[Gordon1]

I wonder if a starving to death kosher foods conservative champion ...

Jesus Christ was that man. He too was mocked but would not turn stones to bread.

[fccool]

I don't think the point of the story was kosher food.

[fccool]

Quote:

Thats a real stretch if ever I heard one.

How many people screw themselves up with water as compared to coffee?

If they were like my dog and drank toilet water; I could see your point just a bit.

In large quantities water is lethal, so I'm merely pointing out that you are a proponent of MODERATE water intake.

See my point?

[Overaged]

Quote:

Thats a real stretch if ever I heard one.

How many people screw themselves up with water as compared to coffee?

If they were like my dog and drank toilet water; I could see your point just a bit.

In large quantities water is lethal, so I'm merely pointing out that you are a proponent of MODERATE water intake.

See my point?

No body drinks that much water. Like I said; the application you make is a real stretch. Why don't you provide us with some credible evidence about the many thousands who come into hospital emergency rooms each year with water over doses?

[Overaged]

It is not just "moderation" that is at stake here:

Quote:

640. Drugs, Beverages as Purveyors of

Source: Robert S. Carroll, What Price Alcohol? p. 22. Copyright 1941 by The Macmillan Company, New York. Used by permission.

The habit of artificial assistance—artificial, mark the word—begins with many in response to a sense of need for an early morning change in feeling. It is coffee, stronger and stronger, more and more frequently, with some; multiplied cups of tea with others; caffeinized drinks at the soda fountain or easily available in the home refrigerator; and the rapidly growing resort to nicotine. Let us look straightway at the penalty of all this. The coffee, the tea, the caffeinated drink, the cigarette, or other form of tobacco—each is a drug purveyor. Each, so far as it changes the body-sensation from discomfort to any degree of tranquility, is artificial, and each carries its penalty.

The Seventh-day Adventist Bible Students' Source Book; The Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary, Volume 9. 1962; 2002 (354). Review and Herald Publishing Association.

[phkrause]

No body drinks that much water. Like I said; the application you make is a real stretch. Why don't you provide us with some credible evidence about the many thousands who come into hospital emergency rooms each year with water over doses?

I can see the point that fccool is making, but I can only think of 1 case in the last year or so. In my life time I can't think of anymore.

[Guest]

No body drinks that much water. Like I said; the application you make is a real stretch. Why don't you provide us with some credible evidence about the many thousands who come into hospital emergency rooms each year with water over doses?

[Overaged]

Some seem to enjoy "proving" Adventists "wrong" on this point, so lest anyone get the idea that this is "an Adventist thing;" lets look at this short historical account:

Quote:

In 1821 Bates gave up the drinking of ardent spirits. The following year he resolved to drink no wine, and soon after gave up smoking and chewing tobacco, as well as the use of profane language. Before 1838 he had abandoned the use of tea and coffee, and in 1843 he discontinued the use of flesh foods. Previously he had stopped using butter, grease, cheese, pies, rich cakes, and spices. Thus, before Seventh-day Adventists were organized into a religious group, Joseph Bates was an enthusiastic supporter of the health principles that this body eventually came to embrace.

The Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia. 2002. Review and Herald Publishing Association.

[Guest]

Coffee is not a drug, unless we are going to get into a broader definition of what can be considered "drug"

Huh?

__________________________________________

Caffeine and Nicotine

Caffeine and nicotine belong to the stimulant family of drugs. They increase heart rate and speed up other bodily functions, and have the potential to cause overdose or be habit-forming. Despite the risks associated with these substances, both caffeine and nicotine are legal to purchase and consume in the United States.

Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/91383-caffeine-nicotine/#ixzz1QL4zyY9q

_________________________________________

What Is Caffeine?

Caffeine is a drug that is naturally produced in the leaves and seeds of many plants. It's also produced artificially and added to certain foods.

http://kidshealth.org/teen/drug_alcohol/drugs/caffeine.html#

______________________________________

Are caffeine cocaine and amphetamines stimulants?

Answer: Yes

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Are_caffeine_cocaine_and_amphetamines_stimulants

[fccool]

Quote:

I can see the point that fccool is making, but I can only think of 1 case in the last year or so. In my life time I can't think of anymore.

Why is my point so difficult to grasp? The rarity of the poisoning is irrelevant when considering that it will happen if you drink too much water.

The other side of the story is that there is a safe amount of coffee that can be maintained without getting any negative side-effect that are associated with drinking too much.

Generally 2 cups per day is not considered harmful by any respectable health professional.

Most of the people drink for it stimulating qualities.

[Overaged]

Quote:

I can see the point that fccool is making, but I can only think of 1 case in the last year or so. In my life time I can't think of anymore.

Why is my point so difficult to grasp? The rarity of the poisoning is irrelevant when considering that it will happen if you drink too much water.

This comment would not pass the test of science. Who on earth drinks too much water, and ends up in emerg with acute H2O shock trauma?

[fccool]

What test of science? There are plenty of cases of water intoxication. It's not uncommon. While severe cases end up reported in the hospitals, there are less severe ones that do cause problems but go unreported.

You don't see too many people in hospitals for coffee overdoses either. It does not mean that argument against overuse is "not scientific".

There are plenty of people who drink too much water that can potentially dilute their blood electrolytes and cause brain swelling.

Being an former athlete, I know what it's like. That's why our water was mixed with some minerals. Among many cases there are marathon runners, kids, adults who undergo urine tests. For some it does not take much as outline in a case below. I drink more than that a day, and it caused these people severe trauma or death.

http://doctor.ndtv.com/storypage/ndtv/id/001088/type/news/Water_intoxication_can_be_fatal.html

http://www.livescience.com/1627-endurance-athletes-risk-deadly-water-intoxication.html

Quote:

A flight attendant from San Mateo County in California had to take a urine test at her job in San Francisco International Airport. She clammed up, or, as the doctors would say, she experienced a condition known as paruresis, "an inability to void in a crowded or noisy location" (apparently about 30% of men and 25% of women suffer from this).

She was encouraged to drink as much water as she needed and guzzled three litres in three hours. Still she couldn't pee. Hours later, the 40-year-old woman staggered into Peninsula Hospital in Burlingame, her speech slurred, her thinking fuzzy, unable to perform simple multiplication. At first it was thought she was having a stroke; but a battery of tests revealed water intoxication as the cause. She was placed in a quiet, dark room where she voided three litres. Her brain functions returned to normal in 24 hours. She was the first drug-test taker known to suffer from this, according to Burlingame doctors David Klonoff and Andrew H. Jurow reporting in the Journal of the American Medical Association (2 Jan 1991).

The point being that some people do drink too much water, and it does end up hurting them. Some people drink too much coffee and it ends up hurting them.

[Guest]

You should start a new thread, and call it "The Evils of Drinking Water".

[Bravus]

'The Evils of Excess' might be a better title, since that's the underlying concept of which water intoxication is only an illustration.

I think we're all agreed that:

1. Excess in anything, even good things, can be bad.

2. Moderation in good things is good (just another way of saying Point 1).

3. Some things should be avoided entirely: dioxins, where a tiny grain will kill you, would be one good example.

(In general these have no good effects although, for example, strychnine in small doses can be used in some medical treatments.)

The question in this thread is basically about whether coffee fits under Point 2 or Point 3. The scientific evidence does show some threats but it also shows some benefits. Those who choose to abstain avoid the ill-effects but miss out on the benefits.

So perhaps a related question is 'are there things of which too little is a problem?' Certainly food, water and sleep would fall into that category. Exercise, too. Looks like there are quite a few things where abstemiousness is unhealthy.

Vegans who don't take any supplements can end up with deficiency diseases, for example.

So, given that large amounts of coffee show some harms (but worse for some kinds of coffee than for others and worse for some people than for others), but small amounts of coffee show net benefits for health, it could be that a couple of cups a day is the 'sweet spot' for maximising health.

RLH has testified that this is impossible for him: fair enough. He should abstain, exactly the same as an alcoholic should abstain from alcohol. Arguably, there are people who take exercise to an extreme that damages their bodies (or, less arguably, crash dieting): perhaps those people should abstain.

Based on all the evidence gathered in this long and interesting thread, though, I think it's incumbent on those promoting complete abstinence from coffee to either:

1. Make a much, much stronger case than we've seen so far for the notion that the harms of moderate use outweigh the benefits or,

2. As John317 has done, state that their position is based on EGW rather than on the scientific evidence available.

[ClubV12]

I'm surprised no one yet has come up with an EGW quote about drinking a cup of coffee on a boat and feeling better as a result. Or, maybe that's just a rumor...

[phkrause]

Club you know that ain't gonna happen, because that would've been posted right off. I do agree with fccool up to a certain point. Having never gotten into drinking coffee, only had one gulp and have never understood all the hoopla. Coffee, in my opinion, has no redeeming qualities. I don't see the attraction to drink it. The only reason that I recall working as a medic in the USArmy was to stay awake at night. I myself worked from 3pm to 7 am 5 five nights a week and every other weekend for 9 months or so and never needed a drop of anything to stay awake. The other thing I've noticed is not one thread defending the use of water, but threads defending coffee, and alcohol. Just curious as to why that is?

[Gordon1]

Generally 2 cups per day is not considered harmful by any respectable health professional.

Most 'respectable health professionals' are in the drug business.

God's people have a higher standard.

[Guest]

Originally Posted By: fccool

Generally 2 cups per day is not considered harmful by any respectable health professional.

Most 'respectable health professionals' are in the drug business.

God's people have a higher standard.

You hit that nail right on the head Gordon, Amen! They ARE in the drug business. And we have been given light that they know nothing about.

[Bravus]

Quote:

The other thing I've noticed is not one thread defending the use of water, but threads defending coffee, and alcohol. Just curious as to why that is?

I think if you look a bit more closely within those threads that I have *several* times loudly advocated the benefits of fresh air, water, sunlight, sleep, exercise, good food and so on.

Probably no specific threads devoted to it because it's a bit of a 'well, duh?' issue: everyone already agrees, so any discussion is going to have three posts...

[Overaged]

I'm surprised no one yet has come up with an EGW quote about drinking a cup of coffee on a boat and feeling better as a result. Or, maybe that's just a rumor...

Ha ha; I could come up with one for tea if you like.