Taubes -not eating and moving stuff

Ah!
Done.
The book ends at page 460 of 601+.

PAGE 454

Page 454 has his conclusions based on the detailed research, analysis, and
hypotheses presented throughout the book.

There is the danger that by skipping the core of the book you may dismiss
these ten conclusions. Bear in mind that after reading the whole thing he
has me hook, line, and sinker.

Cubit
320/152/160

Cubit wrote:
Ah!
Done.
The book ends at page 460 of 601+.

PAGE 454

Page 454 has his conclusions based on the detailed research, analysis, and
hypotheses presented throughout the book.

There is the danger that by skipping the core of the book you may dismiss
these ten conclusions. Bear in mind that after reading the whole thing he
has me hook, line, and sinker.

Cubit
320/152/160



But if you read just those ten items, on less than a page, you will get
a distorted idea of what the book is about, and what the diet "untruth"
is and how it got there.

On Feb 6, 5:01 pm, "Principal Skinner"
skinner*at*springfieldcityschools.edu wrote:

At this point I think I am going to just stick with the Eades books, and
maybe one day will pick up the Taubes book. But, maybe you all can convince
me to give it a shot. I don't need to be convinced of the benefits of LC - I
am already there and have been living it (again) for the past five months. I
would be reading it more for refuting my non-LC friends, family, etc claims
that what I am doing is "unhealthy". Perhaps there is a more efficient way
to gather that knowledge (ammo) than by reading the Taubes book?

Taubes is only essential for knowing how we got to where we a
a low fat world, filled with calorie in/calorie out, eat less, move
more
simple recommendations that simply don't seem to work.

Protein Power or Protein Power Life Plan are much more practical on
the microscale of how to fix what's not working for you. Taubes is a
fairly comprehensive review of the history of diet research and the
research that's out there. It's a great read. It makes me feel angry.
And evangelical. And a whole lot of other things I didn't really want
to get into (like arguing with low fatters, a generally non-productive
state of affairs). Not essential reading for someone looking to eat
more healthfully, lose weight, control their diabetes, or whatever
it is that brings people to low carb. It's essential reading from a
public policy/medical/epidemiological/information cascade point
of view. If you're not particularly interested in those, send it back
so someone else can read it.

I loved the book. But I don't recommend it widely. A
nice "Taubes for Dummies" or "Complete Idiot's Guide to Taubes"
would probably come in handy. I heard that Ladies Home Journal
had an article in January, but I can't find it.

Last thing: Low fat diets advocates and their insistence that
low carb doesn't work: Think of it as Evolution in Action.

"Principal Skinner" skinner*at*springfieldcityschools.edu writes:

At this point I think I am going to just stick with the Eades books,
and maybe one day will pick up the Taubes book. But, maybe you all can
convince me to give it a shot. I don't need to be convinced of the
benefits of LC - I am already there and have been living it (again)
for the past five months. I would be reading it more for refuting my
non-LC friends, family, etc claims that what I am doing is
"unhealthy". Perhaps there is a more efficient way to gather that
knowledge (ammo) than by reading the Taubes book?

The Eades books, especially "Protein Power Life Plan," are very good,
and certainly a faster read. They do a good job of explaining how the
basic biology works. However, some of the things they know come from
their experience of treating thousands of patients with their diet: "We
know this works because we've done it." That's not going to convince
anyone who doesn't already trust them; low-fatters will just say they're
trying to sell a product. (As if anyone isn't.) They don't cite other
sources to back up every single thing they say, because much of their
knowledge comes from their own work.

Taubes, on the other hand, being an outsider, has a more objective
viewpoint, which should make his arguments stronger for skeptics. He
goes through each of the competing hypotheses about obesity, diabetes,
and heart disease one by one, showing how they became popular,
presenting the evidence for them, and shooting holes in that evidence
where possible. He cites enormous amounts of research; far more
research supports low-carb (and condemns low-fat) than I had any idea
existed. All those citations should make it the best source for info to
convince your friends, assuming they're willing to listen at all. (Most
people aren't; and will just get irritated with your evangelism.)

GCBC is a long book, but he doesn't ramble; practically every page has a
great point or citation. It's too packed to be a page-turner for me,
but it's not really hard reading either. It's just dense with info. As
far as I know, it's far and away the most important book ever written on
diet and the diseases of civilization. (If it's not, someone please
tell me what book is, so I can get that one too.)



--
Aaron -- 285/253/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz

"Cubit" wrote:

It seems pretty clear at this point how I could have prevented the diseases
of the Western diet including obesity and type 2 diabetes in myself.

With viral diseases the long term solution works - Focus on
prevention in the next generation by preventing contagion and
by developing vaccines. What a "vaccine" would be that prevents
obesity is I don't know. Such a vaccine is too late for me but I
would cheer it on for young folks.

The experience with treating every viral disease in history is
clear - The best that can be done is to bolster the immune system
and treat symptoms. Some day there may be anti-viral medications
that really work but so far they are pretty pitiful. Not that I
turned
them down the last time I had influenza back in Dec 1999-Jan 2000.

I'm not crystal clear on how to repair a body that has already been damaged.

I offer a pair of very biased alternative definitions:

Diabetes - A metabolic disorder mostly insulin based where the
body can not properly control blood sugar levels.

Obesity - A metabolic disorder mostly insulin based where the
body can not prevent fat from being pumped incorrectly into
storage.

Using these two very biased definitions it can be clear that
preventing either takes the same strategy - Low carb to keep
insulin release low long term. It also suggests that any treatment
plan for obesity needs to be viewed as similar - Level of damage
tells whether it can be ignored (never except in the prevention
phase), controlled by diet (it seems like as few diabetics are
able to do this as obese people who can keep their loss off
forever), controlled by medications (so far any obesity treatment
medications have been laughable compared to glucophage and
so on but it seems like the vast majority of diabetics end up on
shots 5+ years after dignosis so laughable is relative and can be
applied to both at different scales).

One of the scientists quoted in the early part of the book had the opinion
that it took about 20 years for full manifestation of the diseases of
civilization after changing to the modern diet. *I'm thinking there may be
epigenetic changes involved. *If so, simple diet changes may not be enough.

The observation is in plenty of the popular low carb books.

"Principal Skinner" skinner*at*springfieldcityschools.edu wrote:

I got this book out of my library a week ago, along with some of the Eades
books.

Their plans are custom tuned to the individual for protein grams
and goal weight, then one size fits all for carb grams, then very
little mention of fat grams or total calories. Not a bad approach
as it is less work than the fully customized Atkins. Almost no
one puts in the effort to do the entire Atkins process so a simpler
plan makes sense as long as it works for you.

But, maybe you all can convince
me to give it a shot. I don't need to be convinced of the benefits of LC - I
am already there and have been living it (again) for the past five months.

Then your motivation to read Taubes is based on your own
curiousity level.

I
would be reading it more for refuting my non-LC friends, family, etc claims
that what I am doing is "unhealthy".

Far simpler to point out your own success and health compared to
theirs IMO. But the reality I've faced is that some are True
Believers
in the low fat way no matter how much evidence they see with their
own eyes. So what that low carb works for you and low fat fails
for them, the pressure to eat wrong isn't ever going to let up. For
many food is like religion not like science so no amount of evidence
is ever going to have any effect whatsoever.

I think it's best to work on your own internal self. If you want to
better understand why low carb works to be better able to tune
your own food and better able to stick with it, learning the science
is one of many ways to go about it.

Perhaps there is a more efficient way
to gather that knowledge (ammo) than by reading the Taubes book?

Learning the biochemistry is a lot of work. No way out of that that
I've ever heard of.

If you like Taubes, try http://www.junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/ and
http://www.thincs.org/.

I'm not sure I totally agree with the former, but the latter has a very
scientifically minded review of the cholesterol hypothesis and its cousin,
the saturated fat is a killer hypothesis.

On Thu, 07 Feb 2008 09:35:03 -0500, Hollywood wrote:

On Feb 6, 5:01 pm, "Principal Skinner"
skinner*at*springfieldcityschools.edu wrote:

At this point I think I am going to just stick with the Eades books, and
maybe one day will pick up the Taubes book. But, maybe you all can
convince
me to give it a shot. I don't need to be convinced of the benefits of
LC - I
am already there and have been living it (again) for the past five
months. I
would be reading it more for refuting my non-LC friends, family, etc
claims
that what I am doing is "unhealthy". Perhaps there is a more efficient
way
to gather that knowledge (ammo) than by reading the Taubes book?

Taubes is only essential for knowing how we got to where we a
a low fat world, filled with calorie in/calorie out, eat less, move
more
simple recommendations that simply don't seem to work.

Protein Power or Protein Power Life Plan are much more practical on
the microscale of how to fix what's not working for you. Taubes is a
fairly comprehensive review of the history of diet research and the
research that's out there. It's a great read. It makes me feel angry.
And evangelical. And a whole lot of other things I didn't really want
to get into (like arguing with low fatters, a generally non-productive
state of affairs). Not essential reading for someone looking to eat
more healthfully, lose weight, control their diabetes, or whatever
it is that brings people to low carb. It's essential reading from a
public policy/medical/epidemiological/information cascade point
of view. If you're not particularly interested in those, send it back
so someone else can read it.

I loved the book. But I don't recommend it widely. A
nice "Taubes for Dummies" or "Complete Idiot's Guide to Taubes"
would probably come in handy. I heard that Ladies Home Journal
had an article in January, but I can't find it.

Last thing: Low fat diets advocates and their insistence that
low carb doesn't work: Think of it as Evolution in Action.



--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

" wrote:

You don't have to go to extreme cases to see that eating less and
exercising more works. How about many third world countries, where
people consume a lot less calories and get a lot of exercise, farming,
hauling water, walking instead of driving a car, etc.? They are no
where near concentration camp levels, but certainly well below the
calories and quantities we eat here in the US. BTW, in many of those
cases, the diet can be high in carbs, eating rice, grain, etc. Yet,

I have to chime in here. I spent a few weeks in India, and being 6'3"
and 290lbs I couldn't help but notice that there were two varitiees of
Indian people. I kept looking for some physcial trait to maybe
identify some as belonging to a particular region, but the predominant
split seemed more about wealth.

The people living in the lower economic strata of the country were
distinctly shorter and smaller in stature. Besides being very thin,
they were very short and small boned. I saw a lot of this. Entire
construction crews working on buildings were small and thin. Then we
went to more luxury locations and suddenly I was standing with Indian
who were closer to my height, even taller than me and had a very
western build. the difference became very distinct to my eyes.

I couldn't help but believe that the nutritional difference of the
poorer income people had changed their body structure throughout life
and prevented them from what we see as normal "western" growth. It
wasn't just about skinny and fat. So to say third world people lack
obesity is missing the mark. They lack nutrition, they lack bone mass,
they lack height. Their bodies are fundamentally smaller and have been
proportioned to need less food. And they have a shorter lifespan than
westerners. Who knows what other affects that has had on them
medically.

I think people have accepted the concept that all bodies are pretty
much equal and work the same exact precise unwavering way, and it
isn't true. I don't think the only difference betweeen an Inuit,
American, Brazilian, CHinese, and Indian, and African is the color of
their skin, the shape of a nose or eyes, and their hair. I think, and
genetics have proved this, that they genetically varied and there is
no reason to think that the major functions of the body are absolutely
unaffected by thousands of years of evolution under radically
different situations.

One of the challenges to Darwinism is the idea that changes happen
slowly over millions of years, but there are genetic changes in
animals that occur in months (for example, there is a bird that is
born with webbed feet or without depending upon if it is born in the
monsoon season). The genetics turn off and on per generation,
something Darwin never imagined.

I imagine some people have ability to survive better a diet that
others couldn't. Stories like the egg guy or looking at Inuits lack
the depth of understanding of the body and lifespan. I doubt the
egg-guy didn't eat other things. Seriously, I bet that guy was
sneaking other food all his life. He just liked the attention being
the egg guy. Or he may have had the ability to extract nutritents
efficiently from the egg. Others wouldn't have that speicifc
chemistyr.

I've heard iguanas live on romaine lettuce alone and live over 100
years. The idea that an animal can get every nutrient it needs from
lettuce is shocking.
DiGiTAL_ViNYL (no email)
350/288/225 month-start: 292 monthly-goal: 8 since: 12/01/2004
Low Carb started Jan 12, 2004.

"Cubit" wrote:

I'm up to page 444.

It seems pretty clear at this point how I could have prevented the diseases
of the Western diet including obesity and type 2 diabetes in myself.

I'm not crystal clear on how to repair a body that has already been damaged.

One of the scientists quoted in the early part of the book had the opinion
that it took about 20 years for full manifestation of the diseases of
civilization after changing to the modern diet. I'm thinking there may be
epigenetic changes involved. If so, simple diet changes may not be enough.


There is a statistical model that says it takes AT LEAST 20 years for
any trend to show itself in a large population.
DiGiTAL_ViNYL (no email)
350/288/225 month-start: 292 monthly-goal: 8 since: 12/01/2004
Low Carb started Jan 12, 2004.

On Feb 20, 11:08*am, DigitalVinyl wrote:
" wrote:
You don't have to go to extreme cases to see that eating less and
exercising more works. *How about many third world countries, where
people consume a lot less calories and get a lot of exercise, farming,
hauling water, walking instead of driving a car, etc.? * They are no
where near concentration camp levels, but certainly well below the
calories and quantities we eat here in the US. * BTW, in many of those
cases, the diet can be high in carbs, eating rice, grain, etc. *Yet,

I have to chime in here. I spent a few weeks in India, and being 6'3"
and 290lbs I couldn't help but notice that there were two varitiees of
Indian people. I kept looking for some physcial trait to maybe
identify some as belonging to a particular region, but the predominant
split seemed more about wealth.

The people living in the lower economic strata of the country were
distinctly shorter and smaller in stature. Besides being very thin,
they were very short and small boned. I saw a lot of this. Entire
construction crews working on buildings were small and thin. Then we
went to more luxury locations and suddenly I was standing with Indian
who were closer to my height, even taller than me and had a very
western build. the difference became very distinct to my eyes.

I couldn't help but believe that the nutritional difference of the
poorer income people had changed their body structure throughout life
and prevented them from what we see as normal "western" growth.

Yes, it has. No one disputes the fact that if you have a group of
people without adequate nutrition, they are not going to grow as tall
as a group that does. You can see that here in this country. Over
the last 200 years, the average height has increased primarily because
of better nutrition.

But, you take those same small people living in India and bring them
here and what happens? With increased income and access to a broad
range of food and no longer doing manual labor, they quickly become
more like Americans, ie many of them will become obese. It has
nothing to do with their genetics suddenly changing.




It
wasn't just about skinny and fat. So to say third world people lack
obesity is missing the mark. They lack nutrition, they lack bone mass,
they lack height.

I don't buy that. There are plenty of tall Africans for example,
living in areas where they get a reasonable diet. They are neither
undernourished nor obese. But they do consume a lot less than a
typical American and they get a lot more excercise.


Their bodies are fundamentally smaller and have been
proportioned to need less food. And they have a shorter lifespan than
westerners. Who knows what other affects that has had on them
medically.

I think people have accepted the concept that all bodies are pretty
much equal and work the same exact precise unwavering way, and it
isn't true. I don't think the only difference betweeen an Inuit,
American, Brazilian, CHinese, and Indian, and African is the color of
their skin, the shape of a nose or eyes, and their hair. I think, and
genetics have proved this, that they genetically varied and there is
no reason to think that the major functions of the body are absolutely
unaffected by thousands of years of evolution under radically
different situations.

One of the challenges to Darwinism is the idea that changes happen
slowly over millions of years, but there are genetic changes in
animals that occur in months (for example, there is a bird that is
born with webbed feet or without depending upon if it is born in the
monsoon season). The genetics turn off and on per generation,
something Darwin never imagined.

Are you proposing that the actual genetics change each season?
Having genetics that get activated depending on the season is very
different than suggesting that major genetic changes like this can
occur in one season.





I imagine some people have ability to survive better a diet that
others couldn't.


No doubt that is true. But it doesn't change the fact that if you
actually eat less and excercise more, you will lose weight.



Stories like the egg guy or looking at Inuits lack
the depth of understanding of the body and lifespan. *I doubt the
egg-guy didn't eat other things. Seriously, I bet that guy was
sneaking other food all his life. He just liked the attention being
the egg guy. Or he may have had the ability to extract nutritents
efficiently from the egg. Others wouldn't have that speicifc
chemistyr.

I've heard iguanas live on romaine lettuce alone and live over 100
years. The idea that an animal can get every nutrient it needs from
lettuce is shocking.
DiGiTAL_ViNYL (no email)
350/288/225 *month-start: 292 monthly-goal: 8 since: 12/01/2004
Low Carb started Jan 12, 2004.