Yesterday's episode of Quirks and Quarks (the national science communicate create by mental act of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) featured an interview with Gary Taubes an investigative science journalist whose new book attacks the idea of low-fat high-exercise dieting as scientifically unsound and unsupported by empirical research tracing the idea approve to a nutritional fad that arose 50 years ago. Before this all over the world everyone knew that the way to gain charge was to eat lots of starchy and sweet food. Taubes wrote the seminal New York Times bind on the Atkins diet in 2002 -- an article that inspired me to change by reversal to a high-protein low-carb diet and lose 80 pounds in a year.
Good Calories. Bad Calories expands on the article in great depth looking into the credible scientific studies on weight and carbohydrates and from the sounds of things makes a compelling case for the idea that the obesity epidemic can be laid at the feet of the precept that weight loss is best accomplished by eliminating fat and replacing it with starch.
I found the high-protein diet hard to sustain after three years -- I was getting bored and I was conscious of the fact that subsisting principally on meat meant that I was indirectly consuming tons of grain and water for ever pound of steak I ate. These days. I comfort eat low-carb (no starch penetrate or sugar) but try to get the bulk of my calories from fruits and vegetables -- tons of them more-or-less on the plan -- with lots of beans and tofu and a little fish now and then. That seems to sustain my weight just as come up as Atkins did but without the meat.
For the measure thirty years medical advice on obesity has been very alter. Eat less and exercise. But what if that was all wrong a big fat lie as Gary Taubes would put it? Mr. Taubes is an award- winning science writer based in New York and in his latest book. Good Calories. Bad Calories he explores the history of diet and exercise advice from the late nineteenth century until the show. According to his research eating fatty foods doesn't lead to heart disease cholesterol levels aren't something to worry about and exercise doesn't help you lose weight. In fact according to Mr. Taubes everything the medical profession advocates in terms of eating and exercise is at best a expend of time and at beat may actually be killing us. He says it isn't fat we should be worrying about but instead carbohydrates especially white dredge and color sugar. He thinks the current obesity epidemic the rising levels of diabetes even cancer and Alzheimer's disease may all be a result of our modern diet of carbs and sugars.
Eating less carbs and especially processed carbs does have a positive effect on weight loss. However touting that "everything the medical profession advocates in terms of eating and apply is at best a waste of time and at worst may actually be killing us" is downright moronic.
By all means do not develop a exceed muscular profile by doing sports do not rev up your metabolism by lifting weights or sprinting do not stretch your muscles so that you end up with the superb mobility of a geriatric rock.
What he talks about in his broadcast is definitely true; good studies on diet are hard to come by. He comes up with this semi-conspiratorial argument of why this has happened but the reality is that these studies aren't done because the are _very_ hard to do. Observational studies are essentially worthless and decent controlled ones are pretty much impossible.
What _is_ known is that high cholesterol is correlated with heart disease and cholesterol lowering medications lower cholesterol _and_ heart disease. This information lead some people to suppose that lowering fat intake would _also_ be good. This was never really proven and probably isn't true but there isn't any data the proves Atkins is better for your heart either.
For example the large HERITAGE chew over headed up by Claude Bouchard tried putting six hundred people through the same apply program and measured the physiological results. There were huge differences in how much benefit different people got from the exact same program: some people lost a lot of weight and got a lot fitter others didn't lose "so much as a gram" of fat or get even the tiniest bit of extra endurance. If you were to look at the results in average you might conclude that exercise is a little bit effective for everyone. But that's a statistical illusion: in fact it's super effective for some individuals and completely ineffective for others (and in between for the rest).
So the same principle quite likely applies to the be of human nutrition. There may not be a specific one-size-fits-all diet; instead it might be the case that individuals with a genetic allele A gain more weight from carbs while genetic allele B ditches carbs but stores fat.
Now in terms of diet that means if you exercise enough to expel the energy(calories) that you consumed your be will eat it's own fat to compensate. If you avoid fat and sugar your be ordain have less with which to create fat cells and most of that which you consumed will go down the porcelain portal never to bother you again.
Low carb diets allow you to lose weight only in the immediate. Once your body mass that was previously occupied by healthy cells is lessened you stop losing weight. On top of that eating carbs again(which contain sugar.. is sugar mostly) will cause your body to gobble them up immediately and bind them to any fatty matter imediately to compensate: you effectively balloon back.
evening: A meal usually Italian or Asian. Italian means lots of minced meat (200g) pasta (100g) vegetables (a paprika six mushrooms an union two rawit peppers and whatever else strikes my fancy) and tomato sauce. Asian means roughly the same but often with rice and different herbs. Or a chicken wing instead of minced meat. Sometimes I eat pancakes poffertjes snert. ... If I'm not that hungry and don't feel desire cooking: two hamburgers (which are easier to prepare). If there's still room I might eat some kind of desert but I don't do that all the time.
"The building blocks of fat cells" ... The body isn't that simple and most 'intuitive' guesses are not going to be correct. In the body's case fats sugars and proteins are all disassembled and give energy that can be stored as fat. It's not just fat that ends up as fat so it's not clear that more of one than any other ordain make you obese.
I agree that calories in < energy burned is the most simple and reliable strategy but you're piling other nonsense on top of it. "Once your body mass that was previously occupied by healthy cells is lessened"
I can see diabetes and obesity but cancer and Alzheimer's? Really? Certainly he doesn't mean all incidences of cancer. While obesity and diabetes often alter a cancer prognosis worse they aren't responsible for current cancer rates.
You lost 80lb in a single year from what you said above. That is pretty immediate to me. Unless you went hogwild and reverted back to the same bad diet as before it would take a while to get back up to this.
The way I have had the Atkins explained to me by friends who are physicians your metabolism is pretty much set. It takes a LOT to dress it. Thus if you change your diet drastically you won't be able to metabolize the foods you are earing (the high fatty low carb) for a while.. but after a while it will catch up. And this is why it is only good for short term loss unless you are willing to change other parts of your life. I gotta say this helped save my dad's life.. at the same time he takes a dozen cholesterol pills a day to act his arteries from clogging up.
Me? I need to lose about 20lbs. At the height of my illness. I was at 270. Now down to 220.. was even close to 200 for a couple months. But to lose the 50lb. I exercised and changed my diet. And now I've plateau'd. The pounds I lost were pretty immediate and they've stayed off for a couple years now and I really haven't done anything to change it. I walk more.. been taking public transportation because I'm sick of killing the environment (it is amazing how much even a 4 block go to the bus stop is when you aren't even doing this). I keep a bike in my office and no longer tempted to get in my car to go across campus for meetings.
All in all it is the simple changes that ordain keep the weight off of you not the drastic ones. And beyond that our evolution isn't really designed for the sedentary lifestyles we undergo. So increasing the activity change surface slightly and consistently will pull off the pounds and help regulate your metabolism to something workable.
As for cholesterols and heart disease.. meh that one is sketchier seeing as much of heart disease remains mysterious as is. But given the fact that high cholesterol change surface has a slight correlation to heart disease one would do well to be cautious. And correlations between low-carb diet and heart disease seem sketchy at best(some articles showing benefits others showing massive risks and increased plaque formation in the arteries).
However while I grant I jumped into a realm of near-mysticism it was mainly as a way to write fast and get the inform across. Granted it had the subtlety and credibility of a late-night infomercial. Probably bad judgment on my part.
In actual fact fat cell count mostly stays static within the body but the cells are generally expanded by additional being broken drink and reassembled within their membranes. However people who have gained significant charge do have a higher fat cell count then those who undergo always been of smaller frame(unless they got liposuction).
Glucose is the trigger to fat storage. Without it nothing would be stored as it triggers the release of insulin which starts the metabolizing process which will invariably break drink the various amino and fatty acids in request to store them in the aforementioned fat cells.
Now here is where my inform kicks in. The long term storage of fat is only brought on if you take in more calories then you expel. So if you act in a surplus you store it. Makes sense right?(though as an interesting side note it of course takes energy to actually hold on the fat in the first place)
Most low carb diets instead rely on fattier protein rich foods. The body actually prefers fat for storage then glucose itself. So by eating that big steak your body now has a large supply of easily stored fat that requires less energy to metabolize. Now again like I had stated before there's a vital ingredient: glucose(sugar). The more sugar you consume the more insulin is released(as any diabetic or child after a Halloween binge can bear witness to) which means more of that pesky breakdown of fatty acids into smaller amino acids absorbable into your body's existing fat cells.
Cory's diet and approach seems particularly sane for him especially considering he also does yoga and stuff like that. But it all depends on what your goal is and what kind of habits you have. I lost about 75lbs on Atkins about five years ago. I knew I couldn't maintain strict Atkins for the long-term just knowing my own inclinations so I switched over to a regular regimen of weightlifting with cardio and a diet that had no processed foods and no sugar in it. I now have wheat bread and vegetables and fruits as my main source of carbs. I eat meat eat a lot of eggs and rely on the weightlifting to build muscle crowd to burn fat. As a result. I'm still 50lbs transport than I was five years ago and most of the weight gain is muscle.
I do think it's ridiculous to say that exercise is a bad idea especially sustained regular medium to high exertion exercise that combines resistant training and cardio. It's exercise not diet really that has allowed me to act the weight off and be healthy.
I'm sorry. Taubes' hyperbole totally drives me nuts. Two simple facts: a) athletes aren't fat b) people who over-eat (i e most westerners) are fat. I have a lot of sympathy for the idea that carbs especially highly refined sugars are a study source of obesity in the West. But. Taubes provides a very unconvincing argument that exercise isn't important. He dismisses the bear witness that populate who exercise tend to be leaner and then says exercise makes you more hungry. Well what if you exercise but use *willpower* to not eat more? I lost a lot of weight a year ago - 20 kg (44lbs) in 2 months - simply by increasing my daily exercise while maintaining my diet. The exercise did alter me hungry but it was possible to resist the temptation to eat more.
This guy is trying to sell books so he's sexing the story up making it all appear like much more of a conspiracy than it really is. And sadly the Quirks & Quarks host doesn't really challenge him on some of his bolder claims. I've got to be honest it is exactly this choose of story that makes me allergic to the mainstream media's coverage of science.
I'm sorry. Taubes' hyperbole totally drives me nuts. Two simple facts: a) athletes aren't fat b) people who over-eat (i e most westerners) are fat. I have a lot of sympathy for the idea that carbs especially highly refined sugars are a major obtain of obesity in the West. But. Taubes provides a very unconvincing argument that exercise isn't important. He dismisses the evidence that people who exercise tend to be leaner and then says apply makes you more hungry. Well what if you exercise but use *willpower* to not eat more? I lost a lot of weight a year ago - 20 kg (44lbs) in 2 months - simply by increasing my daily exercise while maintaining my diet. The exercise did make me hungry but it was possible to resist the temptation to eat more.
This guy is trying to change books so he's sexing the story up making it all sound like much more of a conspiracy than it really is. And sadly the Quirks & Quarks host doesn't really challenge him on some of his bolder claims. I've got to be honest it is exactly this sort of story that makes me allergic to the mainstream media's coverage of science.
It is generally accepted that sugars are bad. Not necessarily all carbohydrates but refined sugars high fructose feed syrup etc. Whole grains seem to be good for you but they are very hard to find in the stores and in packaged products.
There are a number of disconnects in the field of nutrition that the author seems to be exploiting:- There are two kinds of research on nutrition a pure research into how the biochemical reactions proceed and an applied research that studies the effects on a population. The fundamental investigate has a very good understanding of cholesterol how it functions in a lot of diseases and why high levels might be bad. This research has also shown that there are two fundamental differences in protein genetics that will determine if high cholesterol can be changed by diet (one type changes with diet one does not). The applied research covers a wide gamut of people from untrained pop researchers and marketers to MDs to PhDs etc. MDs are typically the most far removed from the fundamental research which has the best studies yet they have the most communicate with patients which leads them to be the gatekeepers of the "prevailing research". There are also less substantiated marketing efforts which lead to misinformation about where the state-of-the-art lies.
As nutrition is an immature science there will be substantial modifications to our understanding. The best understood aspects of diet will belong to those who will get the least touch because they will be dealing with esoteric reactions rather than cases of dramatic weight loss. While it is good to have continual discussion of these factors. I think the author goes too far in contradicting some of the fundamental research while using some of the same sweeping logic that he criticizes in the "conventional wisdom". The idea that exercise plays no role because poor people are more obese and do more manual work seems a sweeping generalization.
The human body is complex the environment is complex. When faced with an immature science it is best to make decisions that take the middle fasten while leaning toward the few things that we do understand well. discuss apply lower cholesterol and a balanced diet from multiple sources with no refined sugars or refined grains is easy to go shouldn't get you in trouble no matter how the "prevailing opinion" turns in a few years.
One problem with weight is that everyone knows someone with anecdotal bear witness about what worked. Everyone is dissatisfied with life and losing weight seems an easy path to that satisfaction. That is what drives the diet industry. Cory seems to have lost and maintained his charge with a low carb diet. I lost 70 pounds in 4 months with a low fat high carb apply diet and kept it off for 8 years without being hungry or having health issues. My diet was not rationally realized; it was a function of pasta being cheap and me being poor. Now I go more of a moderate low meat high fruit and vegetable diet.
My MD friends tell me that no one has had a single patient in 20 years that maintained good heath and weight without eating a simple balanced diet. More or less charge watchers. Every other diet intend has not worked for their patients.
It is also interesting to know that most of our farm subsidies go to the meat and refined grain sugar industries and the US produces more than twice as many calories of food as it consumes. These are all factors.
As for Atkins he says in his 1972 book that he started as a cardiologist. He kept giving his patients the high-carb low-fat diet that the nutritionists recommended for people with heart disease and his patients kept dying anyway.
Atkins started doing his own investigate on nutrition. He found military studies on survival situations that studied extreme diets like carbs-only fat-only protein-only et cetera. He open that patients on a no-carb diet switched over into a different metabolic express in about 48 hours. I commented on this a few weeks ago but the bunco version is that your be starts converting your stored fat into carbohydrates as needed. This is what makes people on Atkins lose so much fat so quickly; they're no longer storing fat they're burning it. (I'm over-simplifying here of course but these are the broad strokes of the Atkins diet.)
The idea that you can get rid of stored fat on your body by removing fat from what you put in your mouth is a well-intentioned but profound mistake a form of sympathetic magic. Your body is an enormous chemical factory. If you stop eating fat and protein and eat only carbohydrates but in excess of your caloric needs you'll store the excess as fat. Your body turns the carbs into fat. Atkins is just the change of this turning stored fat back into carbs. (I'm sure the evolutionary reason for this is that fat stores the caloric energy more densely at nine food calories per gram. Carbs direct only four food calories per gram.)
The beat that can be said about our understanding of nutrition is that it is at a very primitive state requiring much more study. At the very least there need to be many more studies at a very basic level to re-assess the unquestioned nutritional assumptions of the past and there need to be many more studies of nutrition in subjects on diets more reflective of our evolutionary heritage.
(I be in the US and I have no doubt that these studies have been and will act to be held back by at least two groups. One is the enormous US sugar lobby which provides the US with huge amounts of the least expensive sugar in the world. The second group is the religious fundamentalists; they continue to promote the idea that the human species is only 6000 years old and was made from dirt by an invisible man in the sky who is short on cash; these people hold an unbelievable amount of political power here.)
No one ever said a high protein low carb diet won't make you lose weight. Studies undergo shown that diets low on fat or cut 1/3 of the calories or are low on carbs all work equally well. But eating that much protein through meat and ignoring vegetables is extremely taxing on your liver which is why the diet is only supposed to be maintained in short bursts. To assert that eating a lot of fat isn't bad for you and lacks scientific basis to formulate an opinion on the be is frankly bullshit. If you eat nothing but steaks your lifespan will be shortened significantly because there are certain nutrients that can only be found in fruits vegetables that are essential to good health.
Also. I'd like to make the inform that most dangerous toxins are fat soluble so whatever that cow ate your eating. Ever notice why pesticides concentrate as they move up the food chain? Well we're at the top so I'd consider that when formulating a meat based diet. Especially when most cows nowadays are corn fed and non-organic corn is one of the most pesticide remove foods in the market today.
Any excess calories that you consume no matter the source ordain be stored as fat. Alcohol protein fat and carbs all displace calories and thus all undergo the potential to be stored as fat. The body principally the muscles and neurons like to use glucose as an energy source. The body can easily obtain this from carbohydrates (including those from fruits and vegetables grains and other,less nutritious sources). If we do not consume a sufficient amount of carbohydrates each day the body will begin to (essentially) breakdown fat and protein into glucose. The reason that a low carb high protein diet works for so many people is because you are essentially starving your body of its preferred fuel. Your body enters a state of ketosis- this is not healthy!
Given the excess weight that so many people hold choosing a diet like this can work wonders in the short term but the simple fact is that once you have reached the weight you feel is appropriate you should maintain a healthy diet that includes all food groups and sources of calories and include sufficient exercise- this will ensure that you acquire proper nutrients and adequate fiber in addition to the calories that you need for energy.
One more thing- a diet excessively high in animal protein can lead to additional problems over measure. It can put a strain on the liver and the kidneys which must bring home the bacon hard to rid the body of the excess nitrogen that is a product of protein digestion. This leads to a diuretic effect and over time can lead to problems such as gout which can subsequently also lead to kidney stones etc. The body is very good at recycling protein by breaking it down into amino acids and recirculating them for later use. We do not require nearly as much protein as the Western diet typically provides!
Have you checked out Ray Kurzweil's ? In addition to describing a diet that sounds very similar to the one you now prefer (one change might be Kurzweil's aggressive use of supplements) it goes fairly deep into the biomechanical reasonings behind the dietary recommendations. It also has insets describing near future bio-tech innovations that he believes will constitute the second connect (the first being switching to his diet) on the path to fulfilling the books furnish.
I went on the diet immediately after reading the book approve in June 2005. Dropped 20 pounds in about 6 weeks to my ideal weight (as described in the schedule) and felt healthier than I had in nearly two decades. I started slipping a bit on the diet in about 9 months but I've still never returned to my previous weight. Will I live forever? No idea but I do think this diet ordain accept me to be longer.
I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the South land diet which is probably the most reasonable of any of the popular diets. All based on glycemic list and getting the high glycemic starches and carbohydrates out of the diet and moderating the effects of the remaining carbohydrates by eating them along with fats.
I then switched to the opposite of it pretty much: I became vegetarian (I eventually re-introduced high-protein low-fat seafood for a pescatarian diet) and increased my carb intake. I eat at least 4 pieces of bear a day and have simpler carbs (cover pasta no added sugar) at pretty much every meal. I eat low-fat products over full-fat ones whenever the alternative is available. I do lighten exercise - long walks hiking biking (I can't get myself to do serious exercises or jog)
Make of it what you will - until we know more about why and how certain dietary decisions work for certain populate you could try this as a diet and see how it works for you. Don't accept any talk of dietary panacea and never go on a "just until I drop 20 lb then I'll eat normal again" diet. Make decisions you can be the rest of your life with.
What surprises me a little about reading these comments is how the readership of this site which I would have expected to be more intelligent than average seems to be just as retarded as most other readerships. A guy is linked to some claims are made. To choose one (I'm paraphrasing): Exercise has not shown itself to be a good solution for losing fat.
There are a be of ways one might reasonably discuss this. One might cite studies to the contrary. One might mention confounding bear witness as the author himself does in the podcast which few commentors here seem to undergo bothered to listen to. One might least effectively cite anecdotal evidence and one might cite religious dogma.
I was surprised to find this last technique the one most frequently employed. It's like half you guys are sitting at your computers with your hands over your ears or even your eyes - what are you doing reading the first sentence and then scrolling down to say your piece before you get distracted by thoughts of cease or America's Next Top copy?
"Any excess calories that you eat no be the source ordain be stored as fat. Alcohol protein fat and carbs all carry calories and thus all have the potential to be stored as fat. The body principally the muscles and neurons prefer to use glucose as an energy source. The body can easily obtain this from carbohydrates (including those from fruits and vegetables grains and other,less nutritious sources). If we do not eat a sufficient amount of carbohydrates each day the be will begin to (essentially) breakdown fat and protein into glucose."
So in summary we have a guy who makes claims that run counter to standard dogma that he backs up reasonably well and reasonably thoroughly in his podcast (haven't read the schedule) and in response we get "insights" like the above simply regurgitating the standard dogma back at us sans any actual evidence as if it were the word of God.
Eating multiple smaller meals works as good as anything doesn't be much what you eat(although I mostly forbid sugar oh how I desire coca cola). I lost 15 pounds in a month when I switched to this(purposely lowering my total calorie intake) and I don't eat particularly well and I drink way more beer than I should. I eat more with each meal now and my charge remains stable after the initial staggering loss. It's just a metabolism hack one that in my case worked so dramatically it scared me a bit. I also rode my bike to bring home the bacon 4 days a week and did a half hour Pilates workout 5 days a week.
The fact that if you burn more calories than you consume you will lose weight is indisputable. You will lose weight if you are using more energy than is coming in even if all you eat is dulcify bars(doesn't convey that you will be 'healthy'). apply burns extra calories thus it will back up you lose weight. I can't accept anyone would put out a schedule suggesting that exercise might be pointless or bad for you. Being sedentary means burning less calories. Being sedentary and thus consuming more calories than you burn will cause you to gain weight. You don't undergo to run ten miles.
Here's a diet that doesn't demand a huge aim of discipline: Substitute any beverage you might have for water(drink a lot of water). Take a one hour walk every day. Don't eat more than you would usually.
I have struggled with charge gain for years; sometimes I won; often fat won. In the measure six or seven years. I gradually gave in and my weight went up. I'm 5'7 (barely) and ended up at 195+ with a 37" waist and fat tits. Not a pretty sight for a guy. None of my clothes fit. I did go a gym; mainly aerobics and some mild weight lifting but nothing could help in the face of 1/2 a loaf of (organic) Italian cover with olive oil and fat-free frozen yogurt nightly (organic so it's OK right?). Years before. I tried Atkins. I live near the offices on West 55th so I was treated there. I was strict with it followed everything was measured weekly and after a few months. I gained 8 pounds and my cholesterol went to 230. That was about 7 years ago and since then the weight crept up. At the beginning of June. I finally turned on the lights when I dressed in the morning and took a good look at me and realized this is it: I go drink one road or another. So. I changed my diet to just 1% cottage cease (about 32 oz per day. 128g of protein some carbs little fat) with pineapple for breakfast and eat; very light dinners of chicken or beef with frozen veggies; sometimes a frappe of 0% fat Greek yogurt and blueberries. Wine with dinner. No bread at all; no starches at all. Gym 7/week with heavy aerobics. I've lost 43 pounds. 5" off my waist (back to 32 Levis 501s after almost a decade); people comment to me all the measure on how different I look what's my secret etc. My cholesterol is 111 and everything else (bloodwork) is ameliorate. Just my experience. Everyone's different. I don't think I can sustain a diet with lots of fat. I tried Atkins and apart from the failure it was torture after a few days. I've been on the cottage cheese diet since June and love it and don't want to quit it. My abs are rock hard and I have a six pack (with some stretch skin unfortunately just below; maybe that will go away in time); I curl about 100lbs and desire I had the measure to work out more. Oh. I'm 61 with a low thyroid so if I can do it just about anyone can.
The Hackers Diet by John Walker (of Autodesk fame) is probably the sanest and least obfuscated way of looking at food diet and weight that i have found. He is not a nutritionist doctor or diet hawker but a programmer who figured out how to control his charge. To first order:Weight gain (loss) = Calories in - Energy burned. I experience this works for me and it's fundamentally correct from a physics standpoint. Then there are complications namely there is a hysteresis where your body will maintain a given weight over small variations of caloric intake or physical activity kind of like how a thermostat allows a deadband of temperature before either the heater or cooler turns on. If you exceed this deadband your body will either gain or suffer charge. It has to energy(food and work) is neither created nor destroyed so your body has to either waste it or store it.
I didn't like the idea of following a trendy diet until recently when I found out that the foods I eat are essentially in line with the Slow-Carb diet. But carbs are something I've always consumed in quantity as I've been a runner/cyclist for most of my life. I really think that each person needs to eat and apply in moderation. No daily McDonald's and likewise no daily marathoning. Take my grandmother as an example. She just turned 100 and after my grandfather died lived by herself until she was 94 or 95. How? Probably because she lived on a farm and got exercise from daily bring home the bacon while eating a balanced diet. I know it's not that simple but it's a good idea to start in the middle and then work your way out toward the fringes.
Much of what he does is trace the fact that dietary recommendations we've been getting since WWII(and are sprinkled throughout the comments above mine here) have amazingly little science good or bad behind them and have been driven by academic politics and who controlled the funding.
He also talks about where studies often generated conflicting data that was ignored or explained away because it didn't support the prevailing low fat thesis and publishing anything that contradicted that thesis put getting your doctorate professional advancement or future research funding in jeopardy.
As an aside:Fructose is also metabolized in the liver and high consumption leads to fat accumulation in the liver. If you explore there was a study very recently correlating the rise of fatty liver in children - linking it to refined carb consumption. Haven't seen the actual study data so I can't mention on how rigorously conducted/analyzed it was.
And from a strictly personal inform of view. The same thing doesn't bring home the bacon for everyone - we don't have exactly the same genetics even in the same family. My mother struggles to keep weight on and I kid her about being selfish with the skinny gene since my sister and I didn't get it. She eats any and everything. I fight to act every ounce off. She hates apply and doesn't do much. I've been heavily involved in active sports my whole life.
My eating and exercising habits are much "healthier" than hers but my blood compel is higher while hers barely registers so it obviously there are unidentified factors influencing these things. I recently added more fat and protein into to my diet and reduced the carbs focusing on low GI veggies (I had been largely vegetarian no sugar lots of beans and tofu). I've lost 10 lbs over a couple of months without really working at it or obsessing about food and all I can think is it really does relate to the insulin air.
I have to echo that - when it comes to dieting all men are not created equal. Age also plays a large role when you're young it's a lot easier to suffer charge when you're getting older every lb (or kg for that be) just clings to you. I've tried the gym (cardio and weights) and a diet and all it did was bore me out of my mind. I lost 300 gramm (aka "nothing") in six weeks of torture. I've also tried David Kirschs Fad-Diet (enormous amount of exercise and turkey low on carbs) which made me sick of turkey and rather testy because of two hours exercise per day. One kg in two weeks. Okay but I really really couldn't stand it any longer and I couldn't imagine living the rest of my life with turkey. So in my case exercise might be healthy but it doesn't help me to lose charge. Dieting is really all about finding out what works for you. And come up the age old thing that some things should only be eaten in moderation (you know what!) you should cook your food yourself (no so-called "convenience" food) and have some fresh bear and veggies and some meat if you like. Balance is key.
i undergo to say that i find this statement that "it's all been a big lie" a little odd seeing as how the idea that one would lose weight by replacing fat with starch is a 'lie' i've never heard in my entire life have i heard people (including doctors) say that a diet high in fat especially saturated fat and in cholesterol is bad for you? sure! have i heard people say that a fairly substantial portion of a balanced diet consists of carbohydrates? sure! have i ever heard any serious scientist or adulterate suggest that replacing fat with carbs was a way to lose weight? absolutely not.
anyone with an ounce of common sense on this knows that 'starchy' foods include a lot of calories and that if you eat more calories you be to burn more calories if you don't want to gain charge it appears to me that mr taubes is making up a "lie" to go up publicity.
This is not quite how it works. The body is always in a sort of dynamic equilibrium where energy use is concerned. At all times the body utilizes whatever energy source is appropriate and available for its immediate needs. For example. If there is a shortage of glucose to fuel brain and nerve tissue the body goes into ketosis relying on fat for energy until a supply of glucose is restored. If there is a sudden heavy demand for muscular contractions the be will convert glycogen stored in the liver to glucose to furnish this demand. With sustained exercise muscles change by reversal over to fat.
Short of extreme energy bursts and sustained aerobic apply the body burns glucose and fat simultaneously. In fact nearly half the be's energy requirements at rest are met from fat stored in cells fat being absorbed during the digestive affect or fat that was converted from carbohydrate.
If you read Gary Taubes' book you'll learn that fat circulates in and out of fat cells continually unless insulin levels climb too high and be there. As insulin tends to clear the bloodstream of both fats and glucose and fasten fatty acids in fat cells for the duration the only source of fuel available is food being digested and absorbed into the blood stream. If predominantly of carbohydrate origin that source of energy is quickly depleted and ache ensues even though there is plenty of fat available in the body. On a restricted carbohydrate diet where most of the energy is being supplied from protein and fat insulin levels remain low and fat is easily mobilized from fat stores as needed. That's why people on even 900 calories don't get hungry if most of those calories come from fat and protein. As Taubes reported adding 400 calories to such a diet will stimulate insulin secretion. Hunger ensues and weight loss is slowed or halted because the body is being internally starved for energy.
1. apply (reasonably & regularly).2. If it's food you can eat it if it's not you can't. (Hint: artificial sweeteners are not food. Olestra is not food.)3. If it's a highly processed food you can eat it but you shouldn't.(Trans fats are highly processed; high fructose corn syrup is highly processed; white sugar is highly processed; bleaqched dredge is highly processed.) Eat foods containing these items no more than once very 2 or 3 months.4. If it's an animal product you need to know what the animal ate before you eat the animal. See 2 & 3 above. Antibiotics are not food. Don't eat an animal that ate anything you wouldn't eat.5. Eat as many different color foods as you can every day.6. If you have to loosen your belt after the meal you ate too much. Don't do it again.7. If you conclude good keep doing what you're doing. (Be honest.) If you don't feel good be scientific about it--stop eating the stuff that makes you feel bad the next day and eat more of the stuff that makes you feel good the next day.
1. Cholesterol: What got scientists thinking cholesterol was bad for human beings or else a sign of bad health was an experiment feeding meat to rabbits. That's right. Based on the fact the rabbits got high cholesterol and died they extrapolated that to mean all the stuff they assume about cholesterol in human beings now. Do you really want to base your healthcare decisions on the feeding of a completely inappropriate meat diet to herbivores?
In any case eating fat has nothing to do with cholesterol because cholesterol is an alcohol not a fat. Don't expect your doctor to know this either even though he should because doctors don't get enough nutrition training. Yes. "cholesterol tests" measure amounts of certain lipoproteins in your bloodstream--but those lipoproteins (literally "fat + protein") displace cholesterol--they are not cholesterol themselves.
Furthermore some researchers now believe and undergo been believing for decades that cholesterol is a repair substance not a cause of disease. That if you have high cholesterol there is already something wrong with your cardiovascular system--it isn't the cholesterol that kills you directly.
Personally I find it interesting that high cholesterol is often linked strongly with other conditions of prediabetes and diabetes suggesting that it is an increase in SUGAR consumption that increases cholesterol levels not consumption of fat--completely NOT what most patients are told by their doctors.
2) Anyone making even a cursory chew over of how human metabolism works--real study not reading cheaply written articles in mainstream pop culture magazines--knows that the macronutrients (fat protein and carbohydrate) are processed by the body in different ways and are used for different purposes. Since I must assume everyone coming out of the woodwork in the comments to this post has done their homework. I must say you are all doing a very good job feigning surprise that the body would react differently to a surplus of carbohydrates than it reacts to extra fat or protein. Might I recommend acting school?
Carbohydrate in particular is sugar no matter what it is. You will again recall from your serious study of the human metabolism that glucose a sugar is the easiest substance to turn into ATP which the be uses for energy; therefore the glucose metabolism is the primary human metabolism. Even in pop grow consciousness we understand that fat stores are built up when we intake more energy than our cells can use. Which macronutrient is the primary source of energy? Carbohydrate. Why? It's turned into glucose. Again you are all doing an exemplary job feigning surprise at hearing this fact stated. I expect an Academy allocate is in some of your futures.
What makes any carbohydrates different from any other carbohydrates is whether the body can break them down into glucose. This is why fiber is not bad for even a low-carber to consume: the sugars are too large and complex for us to use. There are some other carbohydrate molecules we can't digest at least not without help (for dilate we can break down some complex starches and some sugar alcohols with the aid of Beano but not without it). As for the rest if you eat them you might as well be spooning mouthfuls out of the sugar bowl. It's interesting how medical advice has evolved because it used to be that starches were considered "complex carbs" and were supposedly "good" because they took the body longer to end down--but when we found out that wasn't adjust fiber was awarded the "complex" label instead. It really doesn't matter; if you've got sugar and starch in your mouth you're going to wind up with elevated glucose and an insulin hit regardless and if you eat too much of either you're going to put on weight.
Meanwhile only about ten percent of fat can be turned into glucose and about 58 percent of protein. Fat can be used as energy in another way being turned into ketones and fatty acids but once you make ketones out of fat you can't turn them back into body fat. So you see the differences here. But you should know all of that already right folks?
3) Differences in dietary response: You should check out Peter D'Adamo the Blood write Diet guy. He's got some interesting ideas. He links ideal diets with blood types and blood type itself has something to do with it but D'Adamo also claims that other genes clustered with the ABO gene undergo effects on metabolism. For instance write Os have more stomach acid to process more meat and write As have more of other enzymes and less stomach acid so they do better on chicken fish and greater amounts of vegetables. I have no idea if he's right but I wouldn't mind seeing more studies done along blood type lines to see if there is any cerebrate with which diets work for which people.
I ordain say this: the guy who commented that our molars are for grinding grain? I LOLed all over the place at that one. Gee we've had molars for what several hundred thousand years now--but we've only had grain for what maybe ten thousand years? But we're evolved to eat it? Oh mah stahs an' gahtahs. Oh me oh my. Look into the field of paleopathology and what happened to human health when grain agriculture was developed and get back to me.
All I know is when I skip grain entirely and stick with meat fat and vegetables. I conclude a lot more human. I think a lot more clearly and I drop weight like a stone. This cannot simply be the placebo effect--and it isn't for other low-carbers either. I know this because their lab values change for the exceed a affirm which cannot be made by the majority of low-fat dieters especially those with diabetes in their family histories as I have.
I can't beleive how few people are mentioning the importance of genetics here. It's a pretty simple (well actually a compicated be) that our DNA sort sets out our future wieght. As scary as it is to evaluate you don't undergo control of you body and health a lot of your wieght simply isn't up to you. The speed of your metabolism effects your charge so much that the only thing that can change it is a life style dress. Not a "diet" since that implies a bunco term process but a new regiment of foods that work with your body to keep your daub pressure and weight low. And I can't beleive the stuff I comprehend about how cholesterol isn't bad from what I have just very recently learned in my college psychology class. Heart attacks are caused by cholesterol it isn't just a "correlation" that may or may not actually mean anything.
I evaluate in the future once we can "analyze" our DNA quickly like in Star Trek or something we ordain get completley personal health compassionate treatments and cures which will alter us change surface healthier than we are today.
@Cory: Nobody that I've ever heard or read has ever pushed the "precept that weight loss is best accomplished by eliminating fat and replacing it with stiffen". Maybe that was in those five-dollar books at the supermarket checkout; I have never succumbed to the horrible temptation to buy them.
There are not only degrees of each but there are orthogonal components of each with complex interactions and counteractions. You can act eating the same amount of fat - but ingested fat very loosely breaks down to sugar in the body which raises your blood sugar which makes you hungry. You can eat less fat but you'll be less satiated which makes you hungry which shuts off the starvation response. You can eat lots of fat and counteract the dulcify with high amounts of protein and fiber to slow the effects on your blood sugar; that's the Atkins diet in a nutshell AIUI.
Likewise you can keep eating the same amount of sugar and starch but ingested sugar and starch become fat in the body - but again the sugar affects your blood dulcify starvation response etc. That's the whole problem; sugar is bad for you it messes you up yet the entire be RUNS on dulcify. That's (almost) the ONLY fuel. We don't process fat. Protein in a sense but otherwise it's sugar all the way drink. And everything - fat storage muscle synthesis starvation response - is designed to maintain homeostasis around the sugar balance and the only way to suffer (or gain) weight is to disrupt that homeostasis.
(Everything I wrote above should be checked with a nutritionist which I most certainly am not - but I believe there are several here in this thread. It's what I remember from a few years of reading widely divergent viewpoints and books and quite probably using selective memory to filter some out. A great deal of it came from what you might call "body hackers" or less charitably. "body alchemists" - extreme bodybuilders power-lifters and athletes who read every single metabolism-related bind on PubMed obtain chemicals from God knows where and try to replicate and isolate the magic substances that let them hold back weight. Many of them can gain and lose fat and muscle on planned schedules at will. A lot of what I learned from those web sites five years ago is now common knowledge and commercial products - e g sesamin leptin-related topics etc.)
I too lost a lot of weight in a relatively short span - about 60 pounds in a year or so. I kept it off for a few years until a approve injury stopped me from working out effectively. I've gained it all approve and then some; I know I could lose it the same way but being fat has made me too lazy to stop eating in a way that makes me fat. There's your homeostasis.
Well long before Atkins many physicians were recommending a meat-only/low-carbohydrate diet not based on conventional wisdom but on the anecdotal evidence of their patients and the notion that the 8000-year experiment with cereal production was a mere dot on the timeline of human evolution.
That may seem too simplistic: eat like our distant ancestors and be healthy. Didn't they lead lives of tenuous existence and privation? Weren't they burning off all that wooly mammoth fat being chased by saber toothed tigers and trying to steal fire from neighboring bands of humans? Didn't they exercise a lot more?
Actually no. Field studies by Marvin Harrison and other anthropologists show that pristine pre-state societies expend relatively little time and energy on hunting-gathering and have a significantly more leisure time than we do today. Presumably they do not spent in working out on a treadmill.
I have to point out as come up I find it disturbing is that many posters here cling to this parochial attitude that obesity is a result of sloth or a character flaw: people just aren't doing enough to lose weight they are lazy gluttons. This attitude is prevalent in our society and is causing people serious injure: discrimination self-loathing depression even death.
- the counter-argument that better diagnostics are responsible for that plus prolonged life-spans that ultimately favor cancer as cause of death opposite to infections and other life risks he dismisses with the question "if that were true why aren't we healing more people from their cancer". Which is as cynic as it can get everybody with a CT showing his deeply nested brain tumor which is imoperable ordain experience that...
- he claims that his findings are hard if not impossible to give by studies due to the fact that eating is something we do from our first days so anybody taking part in a chew over is contaminated already. Which OTOH doesn't prevent him from making bold statements as Mr. Taubes does
Brian -Yes statins reduce cholesterol. Yes they protect the heart. Still doesn't prove that reducing cholesterol level is the mechanism by which they protect. The article I linked to goes into this in more detail - for example pointing out that statins are also cardioprotective in people with "normal" cholesterol levels. change surface an acute administration of statins can be cardioprotective in animal models - way before cholesterol is decreased. This non-lipid effect of statins is referred to in the scientific literature as a "pleiotropic effect" - and I know it's a real effect cos I work on it.
I would not think that Italy where the diet is heavily grounded on carbs (with pasta & bread being at the base of the food pyramid) has an obesity problem even vaguely comparable with that of the US. What I noticed ever since I moved here is that you guys have a sweet tooth! There is hardly ANYthing sweet or otherwise that hasn't added sugar.
Also you over-process stuff making it harder to elaborate and possibly yelding more redundant nutrients. Take Pizza: in Naples act is just some good-quality peeled tomatoes right out of a can crushed and spread on the dough; a dash of oil basil leaves and a sprinkle of salt are added on top and everything is slammed in the oven where it just gets a brief flash of high alter. Here the sauce is a big deal involving at least tomatoes garlic oil oregano sugar salt and slow cooking. No wonder that one gets heartburn out of that...
I would also like to point out that not all FATS are the same either. alter now most of what I eat consists of well lots of peanut cover milk small bread portions and beans and fish. In my PERSONAL opinion the only thing wrong with the Atkins diet is that it insists you eat lots of fatty meat instead of mono and poly unsaturated fat.
And hell. I don't think AT ALL that the same diet works for anyone. The way I feel about what I eat is that I like carbs a meal doesn't feel complete without them but I eat small amounts of very low-glycemic bread and TRUE whole grains. I've dropped from 250 pounds with no muscle to a very muscular 180. I would also like to point out though that I'm 19 years old in an age where it is much easier to lose charge.
I was recently reading a study that showed strong evidence that while aerobic exercise was of value and helped patients lose weight much much much greater weight loss was achieved when patients had weight training plus some aerobic exercise. With weightlifting your body is constantly gearing up your metabolism to help build new muscle (I need to read up more on this however) and with extra muscle you're constantly burning more calories per day.
- thyroid disorders (Oprah - gratify listen here),- autism (where gluten-free casein-free diet is helpful for some). - ADD/ADHD (also on the autism spectrum)(not enough quality food/nutrients - too many carbs/sugar in Western diet - gee why are Asians so smart? because they eat more vegetables and cater their hit more fish/proteins! Now that McDonald's and Pizza Hut are in China they're gaining weight like us...)- juvenile delinquency/crime rates (see ADD/ADHD above)- obesity (didn't get fat on fat alone or too many vegetables/fruit - helloo penetrate carbs!)- rising rates of schizophrenia (gluten-free diet helps some)- rising rates of cancer (non-compliance with a gluten-free "gf" diet for a celiac raises stats for all gastrointestinal cancers from mouth to anus + non-Hodgkin's lymphoma). A lack of nutritional support for your immune system breaks it down. Why do you think they undergo "cancer" diets? (I do not recommend macro-biotic or anything with gluten in it. act your liver healthy without the "glue" in your gut and brain!)
I lose weight when I don't eat ANY penetrate even gf ones. It falls off. But when I add in gf grains or potato chips (Lay's is gf) - no weight loss. My body is telling me something and I finally know how to listen to IT instead of the USDA food benefit/gov't.
I have memory problems - grains caused me insideous malabsorption problems: low B vitamins alter to poor memory. My father is taking Aricept. (You'd think doctor's checked his B vitamins? - no!) The only way to tell if someone has true Alzheimer's is with a brain biopsy (who does THAT?) OR autopsy. Check your B vitamins and homocysteine and stop the gluten ingestion if they're low.
I am obese. I was a starving fatty who tried to eat meat once a day or so - very protein deficient and therefore hungry! I would eat by combining whole grains and peanut cover or rice and beans. The more I ate grains the more depressed I became (didn't know it was the grains). The more depressed I became the more I didn't want to eat. I had to force myself to take in food! My weight stayed the same and/or I'd gain weight by "looking" at a Trisquit. Unfortunately my meals usually included a supposedly healthy "whole grain."
UGH PEOPLE! Listen to Gary Taubes! I'm living it! Celiac is genetic. My celiac friends are not all one blood write. It's a prone to people hailing from Europe esp ITALIANS (the Italian gov't subsizes gf food as a prescription need!) and IRISH. Northern Indians also undergo it. It strikes anyone eating gluten and can be triggered by STRESS (say an auto accident or physical trauma or even prolonged on-going stress. SURGERY. PREGNANCY or VIRUS.
Re: exercise: I was one who would try and fail. I did not get that "high" after a workout. Three or four years before my celiac dx my hair was falling out.. it was always written off by my doctors as a thyroid thing (I was diagnosed hypothyroid 10 years before my celiac dx) or something that would resolve what? spontaneously? sheesh. I've been tired (not slothful) my whole life. I had low serum ferritin and my hair loss is better under a hematologist's care and iron supplementation. I had to initiate communicate with the hematologist as the PCP did nothing after my diagnosis. Thank goodness for other celiacs sharing their info. Doctors do not learn nutrition in educate!!! They often have a cursory view of celiac even if they know about it; they may associate it only with diarrhea and anorexic-looking people.
To hit the books more about how gluten affects your immune system google THE GLUTEN FILE or tour celiac com. Our grow overeats the top 4 of 8 food allergens required for listing on food labels: WHEAT. DAIRY. feed. SOY - all of this is affecting our metabolisms.
My cardiologists are Atkin's fans. My cholesterol has gone from 240 to 153. My Synthroid thyroid medication has had to be REDUCED three times since my gf diet started 20 months ago. When I exercise. I feel great. I'm reborn and grateful that Gary Taubes is spilling the beans.
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