The RDA and nutrient recommendations are the bare minimum so you do not die. Vast literature is ad populum fallacy.
Also consider that genetic background matters in nutritional matters and well...
The populations under study have changed, and that's assuming you have a fairly similar background to a population and not very mixed.
And we are not even getting into how these things go down in practice, with heavy industry lobbying and what not...
TLDR, you are on your own in terms of optimal nutrition but as another commenter said "eat food, not too much, mostly plants"
Yes, I agree with you, the Economist from the 90s was a different animal. If you ask me the above article is just paid shilling for Ozempic et. al. Not directly obviously, but in the mindset and viewpoint it wants to develop in readers
In that case we can just take Ozempic or whatever guys!
Just kidding, no that's not the problem. The problem is processing destroys/alter many molecules we do not even know about or know it's full "purpose"/role in nutrition and digestion. The commonly talked about vitamins and RDA and such are just the bare minimum so a broad population does not get sick, but does not mean optimum health for a given individual.
Cf. eating 10mg of iron in a steak, readily bioavailable vs eating 10mg of iron from cereal. One is bound in easily digestible compounds, the other is iron shavings or rust.
e.g The British Navy discovering that scurvy is fixed by eating fresh food; ensuring to add citrus to sailors diets, then forgetting about how it worked. Then retrying citrus, but cooking it one using copper vessels, which destroy much of the vitamin C content.
I always take "Nobody knows!" "Nobody could have predicted!" as a warning for either something really dumb, biased, or uneducated take is about to follow.
Pretty hard considering Hegel would not even be born a few decades after Leibniz died. Agreed that it is preferable to the "fallen world" starting point of so many other philosophies. Once you think the world is fallen or broken, the only remaining thing is trying (and waiting ;) ) to bring about some kind of Utopia by changing humankind, nature, etc..
Also consider that genetic background matters in nutritional matters and well... The populations under study have changed, and that's assuming you have a fairly similar background to a population and not very mixed.
And we are not even getting into how these things go down in practice, with heavy industry lobbying and what not...
TLDR, you are on your own in terms of optimal nutrition but as another commenter said "eat food, not too much, mostly plants"