Excellent Critique of Good Calories, Bad Calories page 2

[Molecular Grokologist]

Yeah well clearly it's kind of incomplete and the "carbohydrate hypothesis" isn't quite good enough to stand on its own as the theory of obesity. There have to be multiple factors in place (the SAD, basically) and if you start out on a good foot carbs aren't necessarily going to make you fat, even if it's a large percentage of calories. But in the context of the SAD with downright terrible nutrient intake, polyunsaturate balance, and an influx of non-foods, chemicals, stress, and substance abuse it's a damn good place to start the healing. The vast majority of overweight people are highly insulin resistant by the very virtue that they have excess adipose tissue and they would have other factors contributing to their insulin resistance so to lose weight they should start out on a low carb, moderate protein, high good fat diet because otherwise they're just shooting themselves in the foot and impeding weight loss due to the whole carbs in, insulin explosion, massive de novo lipogenesis which in turn causes leptin resistance and elevated insulin disproportionate to energy available. Then the calories in calories out fervent and chronic exercise dorks will show some studies where they fed people 1200 calories a day for a couple of months and they lost weight and then point their fingers and go "look look calories do matter, the only way to lose weight is to consume less than you burn, etc" but that is a strawman because the idea of low carb is that you can lose tons of weight and become metabolically healthy while doing it instead of starving oneself without addressing the issues. We know that if you starve yourself you lose weight (fat and muscle) but it's stupid to do so without addressing HEALTH primarily.

Most people around here including myself laud Taubes for demolishing the lipid hypothesis and the notion that calories in calories out is the only way to lose weight. He demonstrates that people can do it without cutting calories and if you ask anyone who has tried caloric restriction they will tell you how miserable that kind of thing is. So this guy is a douche who needs to fall out of a window.

I more or less agree with Stabby. I endorse this message.

[SerialSinner]

I just realized I might suffer from some degree of carbo-philic-phobia.
Push the douche.

[Chefgerry]

Maybe the SAD diet causes a brain cloud and people just miraculously get fat without eating in excess like Taubes alludes to......Maybe we need to look at the skinny SAD food eaters and see whats a goin on.....j/k

[JasonBanz]

I am currently on the 6th chapter of GCBC. I am so far impressed with the book. I enjoyed the first part of the book. Looking forward to finishing part 2. There are definitely going to be people debating whether it's correct or not. I'm following the book and am having tremendous results!

[couch handy]

So, I'm confused...I read GCBC a few months ago. (Along with Omnivore's Dilemma, Paleo Diet and Paleo Diet for Athletes) Primal Blueprint cites GCBC as source material. If you can't buy into GCBC thesis, how can you buy into Primal Blueprint? Insulin suppression via low carbs is fundamental to both.

[Grol]

What are you confused about? Taubes reached when he blamed carbs for the obesity epidemic. He included the hfcs issue and he discussed the increase in portions and calories, but had he balanced the 3, well, he would have been more balanced. None of those flaws have one iota to do with the diet recommendations which are probably spot on for 95% of us.

[couch handy]

What are you confused about? Taubes reached when he blamed carbs for the obesity epidemic. He included the hfcs issue and he discussed the increase in portions and calories, but had he balanced the 3, well, he would have been more balanced. None of those flaws have one iota to do with the diet recommendations which are probably spot on for 95% of us.

HFCS replacing sugar in soft drinks correlates chronologically with onset of the obesity epidemic as does the official low fat diet recommendations. My confusion is that the original poster suggested that none of Taubes' assertions were correct, hence Primal Blueprint wouldn't be correct (at least in terms of limiting carbs for fat loss/weight maintenance) Taubes, btw, does discuss genetic predisposition to fatness.

[Chefgerry]

Therefore replacing HFCS with regular sugar would have quelled the current obesity epidemic........plus the consumption of HFCS has reduced since '99 with no effect on the upward trend of obesity currently. Maybe there's something other than carbs that is causing this....maybe it's over consumption; we are eating more as a nation, less activity as a whole, computer seat time for a number of leisurely reasons. Eating real food in moderation and getting regular exercise doesn't sell books, but a good scientific horror story does......and why let a little thing like controlled studies and common sense get in the way.

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/88/6/1716S

http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/content/full/139/6/1219S

[couch handy]

Therefore replacing HFCS with regular sugar would have quelled the current obesity epidemic........plus the consumption of HFCS has reduced since '99 with no effect on the upward trend of obesity currently. Maybe there's something other than carbs that is causing this....maybe it's over consumption; we are eating more as a nation, less activity as a whole, computer seat time for a number of leisurely reasons. Eating real food in moderation and getting regular exercise doesn't sell books, but a good scientific horror story does......and why let a little thing like controlled studies and common sense get in the way.

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/88/6/1716S

http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/content/full/139/6/1219S

Actually soft drink consumption (which uses HFCS primarily) grew by 135% from 1977 to 2001. A large fraction of that growth is due to kids' increased consumption. What is the fastest growing segment of the fattening population? Oh - kids. Really? Amazing. (BTW, fructose whether natural or frankensweet HCFS is very hard on the liver, responsible for elevating circulating LDL and VLDL, fatty liver, etc. Regular sugar doesn't do that.)

In the mid-19th century. Americans were the tallest people on the planet, but relatively underweight. Now we are shorter than Europeans and 66% of us are actually fat while 33% are clinically obese. So while there may be other factors (genetics among them) what we are eating compared to the 1850s certainly has an impact.

Taubes does a good job of presenting controlled work done pre-war that clearly demonstrates high carb association with obesity and the futility of exercise to have an effect on treating the already obese. Even the NHA/ACSM agree that more exercise isn't a cure for fatness. More people are active in the US than ever before, yet obesity still presents a problem.

Mr.Sisson might find it distressing that in your opinion "eating real food in moderation and getting regular exercise" doesn't sell books, but even Primal Blueprint disputes the Calories In Calories Out as a sole explanation for fatness and it certainly embraces the high carb explanation as a major contributor to fatness.

[Chefgerry]

What pre-war controlled studies are you referring to? I wonder what's wrong with current research?