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[maximum360]

Diet soda, in theory, shouldn't do a damn thing. It contains no calories.

I mean, it's not a health food, but I've yet to see a compelling argument against drinking it (obviously in addition to copious water).

The problem is that some of the non-calorie sweeteners are not as inert in our digestive system as we were led to believe. For some people they cause blood sugar spikes even when fasting and having a beverage sweetened with sucralose and other sweeteners. [I don't believe there's evidence for the same effect with Stevia]. Also Some of these non-caloric sweeteners have long term determental effects on gut bacteria which are also a factor in weight gain and longer term poorer health. I will choose a diet soda over a regular soda but even then I don't choose the soda option very much at at all to begin with.

Sugar's fucking evil.

I've been low carbing on and off for a while now, and just the effect that sugar has on my appetite is ridiculous. Eating sugar begets eating sugar. When just low-carbing, I have no trouble with craving or bingeing. But one slip and a "cheat meal" makes it so much harder.
It returns that want to eat without actual hunger.

The faster we can return the fat to processed foods, and remove the sugar, the better all society will be.

Oh, and as a long-time vegetable hater, throw any vegetables (and ideally some mushrooms) in a pan with enough butter (Like, many spoonfuls) and you've got yourself a delicious meal.

This. If I give in and indulge it's like opening the floodgates.

 

[Psychotext]

I guess I'm lucky. I can eat sweet foods without feeling like I need to go mad on them. Have (fairly high quality) chocolate pretty much every day with no issues.

As a cyclist I eat massive amounts of (simple) carbs too.

 

[borghe]

How about natural fructose? Should we not be eating fruit?

the amount of sugar in fruit is surprisingly low (relatively) thanks to the water and (in many cases) fiber in the fruit. If you tried hitting 60g of sugar from (non-dried) fruit you would probably be full before you actually hit it. a pound of strawberries is about 21g of sugar. so you'd have to eat 3 pounds to hit your cap. Likewise you'd have to eat 2 pounds of watermelon just to hit 54g of sugar.

 

[UnemployedVillain]

Sugar is essentially an addictive substance/drug isn't it? Everything from the the brain's chemical (dopamine) reaction to it, the withdrawal like symptoms a person feels when they abstain from it...The only thing separating it is that it's less apparently deadly and actually has some useful nutritional value (energy)

 

[7DollarHagane]

No. anyone who gets too bent out of shape on sugar and CHO forgets that CHO is 60 % of a healthy diet. Its only bad if you go too refined and do not find complex CHO sources.....and only if you dont exercise...everything doesnt revolve around nutrition in a bubble...its the balance of calories that is key...Nutrition matters less than the fear mongering ideas in this thread might suggest, as long as you eat a lot of vegetables and fibre and water, the odd sweet treat is no big deal. If you are an athlete and exercise a lot like me, you can barely look at a thread like this and not feel sorry for people that dont exercise.....and as such are forced to worry about what they eat so much.

A note to the conspiracy aspect.....there are those of us who have studied science our whole lives and whom ignored mass media and sugary cereal on saturday am cartoons since we were 5 years old in 1977. This is kind of old news to me and my family and I have just taken it as a given my whole life not to get sucked in by profiteering companies. This is easier said than done when the whole premise of our society still regrettably revolves around fooling others into buying things they do not need, or even want most of the time.

Notwithstanding, I never really did well with the whole co-op food club stuff either. I have had to temper my distaste for mass marketing owing to the fact that price and ease of access is worth something, if not everything.


That;s easy to tell someone like me from the pacific Northwest (and the Canada side to boot where the water supply is fed by glaciers)...after visiting Florida I almost puked on the water that came out of the tap there. Its not like there arent a few other places getting close to FLint quality Im sure.

Our tap water is absurdly hard and has radium content. Unfortunately the law doesn't allow us to take from the lake which is probably 40 miles away, so we're stuck with the shitty wells that were dug too deep and are getting radium water.

I use bottled and distilled almost exclusively.

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

The problem is that some of the non-calorie sweeteners are not as inert in our digestive system as we were led to believe. For some people they cause blood sugar spikes even when fasting and having a beverage sweetened with sucralose and other sweeteners. [I don't believe there's evidence for the same effect with Stevia]. Also Some of these non-caloric sweeteners have long term determental effects on gut bacteria which are also a factor in weight gain and longer term poorer health. I will choose a diet soda over a regular soda but even then I don't choose the soda option very much at at all to begin with.

"Artificial sweeteners may promote diabetes, claim scientists," reports The Guardian. But before you go clearing your fridge of diet colas, the research in question – extensive as it was – was mainly in mice.

The researchers' experiments suggest artificial sweeteners, particularly saccharin, change the bacteria that normally live in the gut and help to digest nutrients.
These changes could reduce the body's ability to deal with sugar, leading to glucose intolerance, which can be an early warning sign of type 2 diabetes.

Assessments in human volunteers suggested the findings might also apply to people. But human studies so far are limited.

The researchers only directly tested the effect of saccharin in an uncontrolled study on just seven healthy adults over the course of a week. It is far too early to claim with any confidence that artificial sweeteners could be contributing to the diabetes "epidemic".

http://www.nhs.uk/news/2014/09September/Pages/Do-artificial-sweeteners-raise-diabetes-risk.aspx

In regards to weight loss, a systematic review provided evidence for its use in weight control, summarized in this excellent article on Science Based Medicine.

https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/low-energy-sweeteners-and-weight-control/


Gut microbiome science is still in its infancy. it's rather hard to find studies and evidence that isn't preliminary. So it's better to take those with a dose of skepticism.

 

[Glass Shark]

It's funny how quickly our society turned from "HFCS is terrible, only eat real sugar" to "all sugar is poison."

 

[maximum360]

A lot of fruit isn't bad either.

Actually, a lot of fruit is better. Anyone who says to stay away from fruit should not be giving nutritional advice [unless there is a specific medical condition].

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Actually, a lot of fruit is better. Anyone who says to stay away from fruit should not be giving nutritional advice [unless there is a specific medical condition].

Better than what? Candy, soda, and juice? Sure it is.

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

Actually, a lot of fruit is better. Anyone who says to stay away from fruit should not be giving nutritional advice [unless there is a specific medical condition].

There are many anti fruit crusaders, some on this board. Really weird.

Through selective breeding, we have increased sweetness of fruits, so it's a valid concern to diabetics and other such conditions.

Although, a fruit only diet is unhealthy. For example the frutarian diet of Steve Jobs as noted by Ashton Kutcher who got sick trying to follow it for the biopic he was in.

 

[PartlyCloudlike]

This. If I give in and indulge it's like opening the floodgates.

Same. Sometimes my friends and family don't understand and they keep trying to convince me to eat sweets. "A little won't harm you." They don't understand that my will power in avoiding sugar is tenuous, and once I eat some it's a struggle for me to resist reverting to my old, sugar eating ways the next day. My mind and body crave it so much that it takes a few days to "cycle" it out of my system. That's if I'm lucky and don't fall off the wagon completely.

 

[Kitsunebaby]

Sugar and starch are probably my biggest weaknesses currently. I work at a coffee shop and I'm surrounded by tons of pastries. They're not even good pastries, but at the end of a stressful shift when I have to throw tons of them away it's hard not to indulge a bit.

On days I'm off I eat pretty well most of the time. I focus on savory foods, high in protein, and I only eat when I'm absolutely sure I'm hungry. Even if I have the occasional sweet it's not much and I make sure that I don't go over my daily caloric limit. The temptation to stress-eat is just too much at work. Hoping that I can get a desk job that'll allow me to go back to my old eating habits.

 

[appaws]

These threads are fascinating. I think people react to anyone challenging received wisdom about diet similarly to discussing religion. I guess it makes sense considering that it is so intertwined with culture, etc.

As for the actual topic...I've never seen a refutation of the work of Taubes that did anything but fall back on the very wrong mantras he utterly discredits. Frankly, I don't believe any of the detractors here have read his work, and I don't believe it is possible to read it with an open mind and come away believing that it is not at least somewhat compelling.

 

[PartlyCloudlike]

Sugar and starch are probably my biggest weaknesses currently. I work at a coffee shop and I'm surrounded by tons of pastries. They're not even good pastries, but at the end of a stressful shift when I have to throw tons of them away it's hard not to indulge a bit.

On days I'm off I eat pretty well most of the time. I focus on savory foods, high in protein, and I only eat when I'm absolutely sure I'm hungry. Even if I have the occasional sweet it's not much and I make sure that I don't go over my daily caloric limit. The temptation to stress-eat is just too much at work. Hoping that I can get a desk job that'll allow me to go back to my old eating habits.

I know the feeling. Stress eating does help me in the short term. I no longer have to manage the stress of both diet and work in that moment. After I've scarfed down a few packaged sweets, I can solely focus my attention on work. The sugar boost feels nice too. But after I feel like shit. My stomach aches, I start regretting eating those Entenmanns glazed donut holes, and I'll even consider induced vomitting. I never do it though!

 

[Psychotext]

As for the actual topic...I've never seen a refutation of the work of Taubes that did anything but fall back on the very wrong mantras he utterly discredits. Frankly, I don't believe any of the detractors here have read his work, and I don't believe it is possible to read it with an open mind and come away believing that it is not at least somewhat compelling.

You could give this a go:

http://anthonycolpo.com/sweet-stupi...truth-about-robert-lustigs-anti-sugar-claims/

Very long, the the guy is unquestionably an arsehole, but he raises valid points.

Alan Aragorn has a long and interesting argument with the man directly too (Lustig does not come off well): http://www.alanaragonblog.com/2010/02/19/a-retrospective-of-the-fructose-alarmism-debate/

 

[Iorv3th]

the amount of sugar in fruit is surprisingly low (relatively) thanks to the water and (in many cases) fiber in the fruit. If you tried hitting 60g of sugar from (non-dried) fruit you would probably be full before you actually hit it. a pound of strawberries is about 21g of sugar. so you'd have to eat 3 pounds to hit your cap. Likewise you'd have to eat 2 pounds of watermelon just to hit 54g of sugar.

That sounds way way off. If that were the case I would eat strawberries all the time, but they have much more than that, I know from how it effects my blood sugar.

 

[Psychotext]

That sounds way way off. If that were the case I would eat strawberries all the time, but they have much more than that, I know from how it effects my blood sugar.

He's right. Strawberries have 4.9g of sugar per 100g (variety dependant obviously).

 

[yonder]

That sounds way way off. If that were the case I would eat strawberries all the time, but they have much more than that, I know from how it effects my blood sugar.

Nope, those numbers are true. Are you having anything else with them? And how do you know exactly how your blood sugar is impacted?

 

[Deleted member 17706]

You could give this a go:

http://anthonycolpo.com/sweet-stupi...truth-about-robert-lustigs-anti-sugar-claims/

Very long, the the guy is unquestionably an arsehole, but he raises valid points.

Alan Aragorn has a long and interesting argument with the man directly too (Lustig does not come off well): http://www.alanaragonblog.com/2010/02/19/a-retrospective-of-the-fructose-alarmism-debate/

Do you know if the entirety of the live debate got recorded? I remember being very excited for that last year, but I can't seem to find anything but summary videos by people who claimed to be there.

 

[appaws]

You could give this a go:

http://anthonycolpo.com/sweet-stupi...truth-about-robert-lustigs-anti-sugar-claims/

Very long, the the guy is unquestionably an arsehole, but he raises valid points.

Alan Aragorn has a long and interesting argument with the man directly too (Lustig does not come off well): http://www.alanaragonblog.com/2010/02/19/a-retrospective-of-the-fructose-alarmism-debate/

Interesting pieces worth reading I guess...but mostly about fructose and this Lustig guy. I don't know anything really about the fructose thing.

I am more familiar with the work of Gary Taubes in GC,BC and the role of macronutrients in the accumulation and dissipation of fat stores. Nothing is above challenge, that's part of science...but I think Taubes' survey of the research presents some pretty strong evidence.

Also, this Colpo guy loves ad hominem attacks. I've met Taubes once and seen tons of his pics. He's not fat.

 

[IceCold]

To the people who think sugar (with a focus on fructose) isn't bad for you, just watch this 20min video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E57cFhjpxgw

Fruits aren't bad for you, but you shouldn't go crazy with eating them. Historically, humans only ate fruits when they were in season. Nowadays we have access to fruits that are much sweeter and have access to them all year round, so eating a lot of fruits can cause issues. Thankfully, they are high in fiber so it's hard to over eat them, but personally I prefer to eat veggies over fruits since I get all the vitamins minus the issues related to carbs.

 

[Psychotext]

Edit - Yeah, my mistake. Lustig and Taubes obviously different people. I can't read.

Also, this Colpo guy loves ad hominem attacks. I've met Taubes once and seen tons of his pics. He's not fat.

Colpo is talking about Lustig no? And Lustig (at least in everything I've seen him do) is pretty obviously overweight.

Do you know if the entirety of the live debate got recorded? I remember being very excited for that last year, but I can't seem to find anything but summary videos by people who claimed to be there.

I stopped paying attention to it a while back I'm afraid.

 

[SapientWolf]

To the people who think sugar (with a focus on fructose) isn't bad for you, just watch this 20min video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E57cFhjpxgw

Fruits aren't bad for you, but you shouldn't go crazy with eating them. Historically, humans only ate fruits when they were in season. Nowadays we have access to fruits that are much sweeter and have access to them all year round, so eating a lot of fruits can cause issues. Thankfully, they are high in fiber so it's hard to over eat them, but personally I prefer to eat veggies over fruits since I get all the vitamins minus the issues related to carbs.

Are there any studies showing negative health effects from the over consumption of fruit?

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Colpo is talking about Lustig no? And Lustig (at least in everything I've seen him do) is pretty obviously overweight.

He also decided to throw Taubes into the "prodigious waistline" group:

"Lustig has also written a New York Times bestseller titled Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease. In doing so, the clearly overweight Lustig joins the long list of best-selling anti-carb gurus who loudly proclaim to know the cause and solution to the obesity epidemic, all while sporting prodigious waistlines themselves, including the late Dr. Robert Atkins, Gary Taubes, and the girdle-wearing Michael Eades."

I'm not even sure it's fair to call Lustig an anti-carb guru. His crusade is against fructose specifically.

I stopped paying attention to it a while back I'm afraid.

Thanks! I'll keep looking!

 

[Vicetrailia]

Sugar is my weakness. I've been eating like a slob my whole life, but only now at 30 under all the wrong lifestyle conditions (F/T college and 3rd shift job) is it catching up with me. I wanna lose but can't be arsed to change my eating habits. When I try I fail miserably lol. But I'm still in shape (and gym) so the urgency is limited.

But I need to buckle down now.

 

[Psychotext]

I'm not even sure it's fair to call Lustig an anti-carb guru. His crusade is against fructose specifically.

Had you said sugar I might have agreed, fructose is what he focussed a lot of his arguments on, but he makes continuous reference to sucrose too.

On Taubes, it seems he was fat when he first hit "fame", but he's lost a good chunk of weight since.

 

[IceCold]

Are there any studies showing negative health effects from the over consumption of fruit?

I don't have any at my finger tips, but Ashton Kutcher went to the hospital with pancreas problems after trying a fruitarian diet for his role on the Steve Jobs movie he did.

The fact that a high fructose diet can issues such as a fatty liver is nothing new though.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Had you said sugar I might have agreed, fructose is what he focussed a lot of his arguments on, but he makes continuous reference to sucrose too.

Well, sucrose is half fructose! What I mean is that I don't think he has anything against glucose on its own.

I don't have any at my finger tips, but Ashton Kutcher went to the hospital with an inflamed pancreas after trying a fruitarian diet for his role on the Steve Jobs movie he did.

The fact that a high fructose diet can issues such as a fatty liver is nothing new though.

Not sure that's perfectly fair, since the fruitarian diet consists of nothing but fruit, right? "Only fruit" is obviously very different to "a whole lot of fruit."

 

[Hypron]

One of these days I should probably sit down and do some reading to find a healthy eating plan. I'm not overweight (184cm-70kg/6'-155lbs) but I'm sure I could eat better. I probably eat too much pasta at the moment, replacing that by brown rice might be a good idea to start with.

 

[Muppet of a Man]

It's funny how quickly our society turned from "HFCS is terrible, only eat real sugar" to "all sugar is poison."

And the real underlying message isn't even that. If you read between the lines, it's really, "Stop eating processed/refined/concentrated 'foods', especially refined/concentrated sugar." You're body did not evolve the mechanisms to deal with sugar or any sort of nutrients outside of its original source for the long haul without deleterious effects to your health.

 

[Duracelllll]

Same. Sometimes my friends and family don't understand and they keep trying to convince me to eat sweets. "A little won't harm you." They don't understand that my will power in avoiding sugar is tenuous, and once I eat some it's a struggle for me to resist reverting to my old, sugar eating ways the next day. My mind and body crave it so much that it takes a few days to "cycle" it out of my system. That's if I'm lucky and don't fall off the wagon completely.

That's exactly why I go cold turkey when it comes to sweets. Currently been 8 months straight without any sweets whatsoever. Last thing I had was on my birthday. Haven't had anything but water for the same time period too.

 

[hockeypuck]

The large meta-studies done on this subject says that some poly-unsaturaed fat offers heart protective effects but it hasn't been shown that saturated fat itself can induce damage. At worse, it is neutral.

Recommendations from authority figures like the AHA are useful to a certain extent but they are less so when the science says the opposite and policy-making is lagging as a result. This is one of those instances.

Depends on which meta-analysis you use, but the science does not exactly say the "opposite."

The Cochrane meta-analysis still supports replacing saturated fat with polyunsaturated fat to reduce heart attack risk.

The BMJ meta-analysis you're referring to indeed did not see any association between saturated fat intake and increased mortality in the average population. However, I like the methodologies of the studies included in the first meta-analysis I mentioned more compared to the second's. Why? The first one was interventional, the second one was purely observational (and skipped out on the data for the middle groups, only focusing on extremes).

Is there another body of science as hard to trust "consensus" in as nutrition? It sounds like any sort of peer-review is just an inquisition of whether your results match what they want to be true.

Absolutely no other body of "science."

The second meta-analysis was based on studies that were based on food questionnaires, which so many GAFfers love to point out the bullshittiness. Which is hilarious, because that is virtually what any long-term nutritional study is going to be based on. So, after having been relatively enthusiastic in discussing nutritional data (in the average population) on this forum, I now pity my earlier naive self. Nutritional epidemiological science is an oxymoron. Everyone's a potential armchair expert because everyone experiences nutrition their entire lives. Nutrition isn't some acute illness that affects a subset of a population whose confounding variables you can easily control. You can't measure nutrition as easily like you can with cigarettes in packs per day if you want to talk about a case-control study done well. The majority of case-control or cohort studies have binary exposures (yes or no). Nutrition is not like that. You have to measure it. And since measurements are not standardized, every researcher does it differently. Which makes any meta-analysis even more piss-poor.

Now, before The Lamp gets on my case for seemingly putting down RDs/nutritionists/PhDs in this field, I will say that the majority of these folks are NOT trying to tout one-diet-fits-all approach to the general population. The best RDs IMO are the ones who focuses only on the persons in front of them and adjusts their diet to address a quantifiable nutrient deficiency that can be explained by a known physiological/anatomical process. Frankly, I think any health authority should stay out of nutritional recommendations to the average person who doesn't have a specific disease process to address. There is no good data.

When the most famous so-called experts of a supposed health field are the folks who do not do any of the research themselves, that's a red flag. And fuck you, Dr Oz.

Edit: I will also point out that from a purely biostatistical point of view, nutrition and case-control studies should NEVER mix. That defeats the damn purpose of having a case-control study in the first place. They're designed to estimate odds risk for RARE diseases that do not affect the WHOLE population.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

Statistically speaking, yes you are. You are in the upper echelons of the 1%. Failure using that approach is practically universal.

That's interesting. I've lost 30 lbs this year and slimmed down a ton just by restricting myself to a 1900 cal/day diet. That has worked because crappy food is very calorie dense and I want to feel full, therefore I don't eat crappy food. Is it really that much of an anomaly that I was able to lose weight like this? That's going from 230lbs to 200lbs without losing much strength (I work out at the gym quite frequently)

 

[Psychotext]

That's interesting. I've lost 30 lbs this year and slimmed down a ton just by restricting myself to a 1900 cal/day diet. That has worked because crappy food is very calorie dense and I want to feel full, therefore I don't eat crappy food. Is it really that much of an anomaly that I was able to lose weight like this? That's going from 230lbs to 200lbs without losing much strength (I work out at the gym quite frequently)

It's a meaningless statement really. Failure is practically universal for calorie counting because eventually almost everyone gives up calorie counting (either because they hit their target, or just can't be arsed).

Go look in the fitness thread to see how effective calorie counting can be.

 

[elrechazado]

Carbs for me are like alcohol to an alcoholic. I have to abstain almost completely, especially from sugar, or I eat them compulsively. When I eat sugar and wheat I get rashes, back spasms, migraines, acid reflux, and of course gain weight like crazy.

I cut them from my diet and I feel wonderful, lose weight, and have tons of energy. It's a pretty easy thing to do in terms of life choices, and I can lose weight, feel and look good, and not starve myself.

Really all I need to know after struggling with all of those symptoms above for 30 years before finding the cure.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

It's a meaningless statement really. Failure is practically universal for calorie counting because eventually almost everyone gives up calorie counting (either because they hit their target, or just can't be arsed).

Go look in the fitness thread to see how effective calorie counting can be.

So assuming I continue to count calories (I actually need to add some back because I think I'm comfortable in the 190's for my frame and musculature) I should be able to keep the weight off, right? There's got to be a way to keep in homeostasis and, frankly, I still like my taco bell (I just avoid the soda and bread when dining out).

 

[Deleted member 17706]

That's interesting. I've lost 30 lbs this year and slimmed down a ton just by restricting myself to a 1900 cal/day diet. That has worked because crappy food is very calorie dense and I want to feel full, therefore I don't eat crappy food. Is it really that much of an anomaly that I was able to lose weight like this? That's going from 230lbs to 200lbs without losing much strength (I work out at the gym quite frequently)

So, was it the 1,900 calories per day restriction you implemented or the fact that you stopped eating "crappy food" that you've been so successful?

It's a meaningless statement really. Failure is practically universal for calorie counting because eventually almost everyone gives up calorie counting (either because they hit their target, or just can't be arsed).

Go look in the fitness thread to see how effective calorie counting can be.

Of course it's effective if you pay close to attention to things like nutrient composition and ensuring that you feel full.

 

[Psychotext]

Of course it's effective if you pay close to attention to things like nutrient composition and ensuring that you feel full.

Feeling full is irrelevant as long as you have decent self control. It's a major advantage for diet adherence for average Joe, but I'm not really talking about average Joe in this case.

Nutrient composition isn't that important in the short term either. Longer term is another story though obviously.

So assuming I continue to count calories (I actually need to add some back because I think I'm comfortable in the 190's for my frame and musculature) I should be able to keep the weight off, right? There's got to be a way to keep in homeostasis and, frankly, I still like my taco bell (I just avoid the soda and bread when dining out).

Short answer would be yes, but you'd need to continually adjust your calories. Long answer involves research on the metabolisms of long term dieters and a whole shitload of complications:

http://www.drsharma.ca/obesitywhy-is-it-so-hard-to-maintain-a-reduced-body-weight

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Feeling full is irrelevant as long as you have decent self control. It's a major advantage for diet adherence for average Joe, but I'm not really talking about average Joe in this case.

Nutrient composition isn't that important in the short term either. Longer term is another story though obviously.



Short answer would be yes, but you'd need to continually adjust your calories. Long answer involves research on the metabolisms of long term dieters and a whole shitload of complications:

http://www.drsharma.ca/obesitywhy-is-it-so-hard-to-maintain-a-reduced-body-weight

The level of self control that is required to constantly deal with hunger pains, blood sugar crashes, head aches, etc. just to meet an arbitrary caloric goal is pretty insane. I like to think that I have good discipline, but I was miserable every day when I would try calorie-restricted diets. Nothing crazy, either, just 1,800 calories or so of conventional low-fat/high-carb non-junk stuff like pasta, rice, bread, chicken breast, fish, high-fiber cereal, low-fat milk, etc.

The longest I ever managed was a couple of weeks before needing to eat lot more (and more frequently).

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

These threads are fascinating. I think people react to anyone challenging received wisdom about diet similarly to discussing religion. I guess it makes sense considering that it is so intertwined with culture, etc.

As for the actual topic...I've never seen a refutation of the work of Taubes that did anything but fall back on the very wrong mantras he utterly discredits. Frankly, I don't believe any of the detractors here have read his work, and I don't believe it is possible to read it with an open mind and come away believing that it is not at least somewhat compelling.

http://www.weightymatters.ca/2011/01/book-review-gary-taubes-why-we-get-fat.html

https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/gary-taubes-and-the-cause-of-obesity/

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com...ave-doubts-about-gary-taubess-why-we-get-fat/

Taubes also surrounds himself in very conspiratorial circles along with Perlmutter, like Mercola and Mike Adams of natural news.

Regardless, diet wars are fucking dumb. The best diet is the one you can stick with long term. Be it low carb, calorie restriction, keto, IF. It doesn't matter.

People treat diet as gospel. It isn't. Individuals are different, live in different cultures and circumstances, have different needs. The inundation of magical diet cures is actually very negative to actual change in people's health.

 

[ItIsOkBro]

Diet soda, in theory, shouldn't do a damn thing. It contains no calories.

I mean, it's not a health food, but I've yet to see a compelling argument against drinking it (obviously in addition to copious water).

I mean there's just gotta be something wrong with it

 

[Deleted member 17706]

http://www.weightymatters.ca/2011/01/book-review-gary-taubes-why-we-get-fat.html

https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/gary-taubes-and-the-cause-of-obesity/

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com...ave-doubts-about-gary-taubess-why-we-get-fat/

Taubes also surrounds himself in very conspiratorial circles along with Perlmutter, like Mercola and Mike Adams of natural news.

I certainly don't think Taubes is infallible or gets everything right, but in the "sciencebasedmedicine" article you linked:

The laws of physics tell us that if you ate 7000 calories of protein and fat during a period of time when you only expended 3500 calories, you would gain a pound, even if you ate no carbohydrates at all. There is no getting around the physics.

Really? Really now? This is a claim being made by a site that claims to be medicine based in science?

It then follows up with:

If you expend more calories than you ingest, you will lose weight.

No shit, your body will break down its own tissue for energy before it allows itself to die. That's not in debate and has nothing to do with the previous example which more or less states the opposite, which would be something along the lines of "if you consume more, in calories, then the amount of energy, in calories, that your body expends, you will gain weight." That's the point of contention. That's what Taubes is arguing is wrong. That's what I know to be wrong in my own experience.

 

[Makai]

I mean there's just gotta be something wrong with it

Tastes flat

 

[jiggle]

Trying to quit coke was such a big mistake
I ended up consuming, and developing an affinity for, other sweet edibles (cakes, biscuits, ice cream etc) that I never had much interest in before
And any long period I was able to abstain always ended up with a binge
So I was actually skinnier when I drank a lot of soda lol
Sticking with my futile effort though cuz I really don't want diabetes

 

[Psychotext]

The level of self control that is required to constantly deal with hunger pains, blood sugar crashes, head aches, etc. just to meet an arbitrary caloric goal is pretty insane. I like to think that I have good discipline, but I was miserable every day when I would try calorie-restricted diets. Nothing crazy, either, just 1,800 calories or so of conventional low-fat/high-carb non-junk stuff like pasta, rice, bread, chicken breast, fish, high-fiber cereal, low-fat milk, etc.

The longest I ever managed was a couple of weeks before needing to eat lot more (and more frequently).

Isn't that the point though, everyone is different. For me, that's easily do-able, but (and I've done it for a significant period of time) I find keto to be utterly miserable, and worse, it caused pretty serious depression in my wife (apparently it can fuck with some women badly, should have researched more).

There are many in the fitness thread that do multi-day fasts. Tell that to an average person, and tell them that they find it easy... and they'd look at you like you'd just dropped out of space.

Some eat 10,000kcal one day, only to switch to 1,500 for the rest of the week.

Again, so many different ways of doing it. One thing ward studies have told us for sure, is that (adherence and "ease" aside) none of these methods are significantly better than any others... and this is why I take issue with people spouting about gold standard diets.

Edit - Oh, and I have no idea why people are so obsessed with the grilled chicken, bran and broccoli route when they calorie count. I've been doing it for years and eat a ridiculous assortment of foods (I don't bother cutting pasta or anything like that either, though I keep bread intake fairly low). People switching to brown rice too... blech. Basmati is pretty much just as good, and has the advantage of not being full of phytates.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Definitely agree that everyone is different and, ultimately, each person needs to self experiment in order to find what works for them and their goals.

I don't agree that we have enough evidence via the limited ward studies available to us to draw any kind of conclusions that are applicable to all, however. I mean, your stating that is kind of contradicting your point that everyone is different and there should be no gold standard diet, no? It's got to go both ways.

 

[natsuyasumi]

One of these days I should probably sit down and do some reading to find a healthy eating plan. I'm not overweight (184cm-70kg/6'-155lbs) but I'm sure I could eat better. I probably eat too much pasta at the moment, replacing that by brown rice might be a good idea to start with.

The Whole30 (google) is a great way to get started with a fresh slate. It's kinda like the cold turkey approach: ditch all the junk and only eat W30-approved foods for a month. The results are always educational and sometimes striking.

 

[Psychotext]

I don't agree that we have enough evidence via the limited ward studies available to us to draw any kind of conclusions that are applicable to all, however. I mean, your stating that is kind of contradicting your point that everyone is different and there should be no gold standard diet, no? It's got to go both ways.

I don't think you understood what I said. The ward studies indicate that basically all the methods work and that none have any particular advantage.

In the real world this means that people can pick whichever one they feel they can stick to best and gives them the best results.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

I don't think you understood what I said. The ward studies indicate that basically all the methods work and that none have any particular advantage.

It's hard to comment without seeing concrete examples of what you're referring to, but if everyone is actually different in terms of the effect that different foods have on their physiology, then all of this would still depend on the person, right?

Unless what you're referring to is simply that, when calories are kept to a very, very small number, everyone will inevitably lose weight (or, in other terms, starvation will reduce your body mass).

 

[Psychotext]

I'm referring to ward studies where, all other things being equal, people have lost basically the same amount of weight (and with similar body composition changes) on low carb, high carb, high fat, low fat etc. Not low protein for what it's worth (body composition problems) but yeah... fill your boots as they say.

That doesn't get into psychological aspects, which is why I said that in the real world you'd pick what works for you.

The simple fact is that none of these diets are magic (Fasting has some interesting effects, but it's barely been studied... unless you count going without water too.), through one method or another they all create a calorific deficit which results in weight loss.