Comment by ipython

Lots of parents probably follow similar lines of thinking about the effect of sugar on their kids' behaviour, and I think it's worth deferring to experts on that.

I'm not telling you to personally change your belief. What I was trying to say is that you're propping up the value of your individual opinion as if it should rival experts to the reader.

> [...] claiming that anyone who has a lived experience is stupid (aka, falling for a logical fallacy) is just accelerating the distrust of "authority" at a time when we need it most.

I'm saying that you making a mountain out of a belief does directly translate to a distrust in experts, in a way that telling somebody they might just be wrong/it was a coincidence/whatever couldn't do.

At the end of the day most people just see what the want or expect to see, when there isn't a strong enough correlation in another direction. That's why, a reader, one should not value any anecdote too highly.

> curious about your first sentence: what makes you against unnecessary food additives? Is it a double blind study?

The question reads like a gotcha, but I'll answer anyway: The fact that there aren't enough studies about many such ingredients, and that I don't have time to check which are definitely vs. lack data.

> What can the actual experts tell me about my child

That's the exact sort of distrust in authorities you purport yourself to be against.