I received a PM from a member who was wondering about coconut oil because she'd heard it was good for you.
I've been wondering about it too, as I see it promoted more and more in the health food section at my grocery store. Assuming that some of you might be curious as well, I figured I'd post a thread about it.
I did some research (and talked to some chicks I really trust) on it, and this is what I've found: basically, we know for sure that there is saturated fat in coconut (and other tropical) oil. Saturated fat is bad for us, and we need to limit it.
Supposedly, some of the properties of coconut oil are beneficial. However, nothing has shown a benefit strong enough to negate the bad side effects of the saturated fat.
Lots of websites talk about how great it is, but you'll find that all of them are ones that sell the product, so they aren't reliable sources. There's a lot of information out there, but this site is a really great one for summing it all up:
http://www.drweil.com/drw/u/id/QAA316479