Does it really matter whether he was poisoned by one chemical or another, or simply starved to death? Either way, the cautionary tale of against deciding to go live in the woods without adequate preparation stands.
Well, I think it's worth finding out just for the sake of knowing.
But as a cautionary tale, yeah it still matters. Say you meet some guy planning on taking this same "adventure", you show him Into the Wild, he says "no problem, I've been hunting and trapping for 10 years, no way I'll starve".
People who just think "It's a bad idea in general, I don't need to know exactly how he died" were probably not in any danger of making the same mistake. If you want to convince people on the fence, you need specifics.
Many people view foraging for food in the wilderness to be a perfectly adequate plan for having a food supply. If the theory is correct, he didn't starve to death because of poor planning, he starved to death because he ate something poisonous, which then prevented him from foraging for food.
You seem to be implying that foraging isn't an OK way to feed oneself in the wilderness.
It's kind of how people are scared of dying in plane crashes but not in car crashes - the illusion of control. One easily imagines doing something to avoid a car death but not a plane one.
I think the same applies here: Death by starvation feels easier to avoid to a layman wilderness expert: forage more, hunt effectively, conserve supplies better, etc.
But death via an obscure chemical even while in possession of a book on edible seeds...that's scary and much more likely to give one reservations about their confidence.
FTA: "The death of Chris McCandless should serve as a caveat to other foragers: Even when some parts of a plant are known to be edible, other parts of the same species may contain dangerous concentrations of toxic compounds. Additionally, there may be seasonal, as well as ecotypic, variations in the concentrations of L-canavanine between various communities of H. alpinum."
That different parts of a plant may differ in toxicity is surprising at all given that some of the most common edible food such as tomatoes and potatoes exhibit similar characteristics.
I suppose it doesn't matter if you're never going to encounter the poisonous seeds in your life, but in general it is valuable to know what will kill you and what will not.
