Perhaps. But my friends aren't ... ahem ... very polite. If it wasn't better, I'd hear about it.

However, now that you've mentioned it, Occam's Razor could also suggest that many of my friends are on semaglutide (we are of that group) and that would have a big impact.

So, I guess I only have my own personal anecdata to go on. Oh, well.

For a site chock full of logic-worshippers, we do seem to forget Occam's Razor too frequently.

the tech bro demographic is terrible at self reflection or solving problems that involve their own biases

very smart people can rationalize themselves into or out of anything position

That's true of any human. It's just particularly bad for tech bros because they base their entire personality on their supposed hyper-rationalism.

Maybe that's the reason but the cook also ate less and should be able to compare the taste.

Yes because people are famously good a judging their own work accurately

Well, I can't cook very well but I can assess if I like more what I cook, what I buy at the store, what I have at a restaurant. It's usually restaurant > me > supermarket. Packaged food is the worst.

> Yes because people are famously good a judging their own work accurately

Sorry, not going to let that slide. Just because Dunning–Kruger exists does NOT exclude the fact that people are good at judging some things.

This is especially true for something like food which people have lots of direct experience with. Now, someone may not have the skill to make something taste a certain way, but that does not mean that they cannot identify that something doesn't taste "good" or "right".

And, that, in fact, was what sent me down the ranch dip rabbit hole. Something tasted wrong the last time I used the pre-made packets. And no matter what I did, it kept coming up wrong. So, I sat down, interpolated a couple of recipes, and eventually settled on a flavor profile that seemed "correct" again.

Side note: the error I was tasting seems like they did something with the glutamate quantity (either via MSG or via ingredients like onions). There was a nasty aftertaste that I even got when I did it myself (although not as strong) originally. I had to replace onions with chives to avoid it.

> Just because Dunning–Kruger exists does NOT exclude the fact that people are good at judging some things.

I dont think this is about Dunning-Kruger, i think this is about the emotional attachment you build to something you created and how it clouds your judgement.

for example, if i recall correctly people liked their ikea furniture more, even tho its more work and of lesser quality, because they build it themselves and thus feel better about it. Same thing probably extends to most things you can do yourself: Cooking, Growing plants, building a dirt hut in Minecraft