Stanford researcher compares diets in real world conditions

Billy wrote:
Susan wrote:
Doug Freyburger wrote:

I remember folks reacting against Lyle McDonald
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/ calling his claims ego matters. Like
him or not he's one of the most knowledgable experts in the world on low
carb metabolism. I definitely sympathize with Lyle and wish I had half
his expertese on the subject.

To the degree that's true of Lyle, Doug, the difference is that he
documents tons of research with citations to back up every assertion.

You ignore my citations because you disagree with my methods. You
follow Lyle's citations because you agree with his methods. That's not
how science works.

He doesn't rely on self referential assertions as fact.

And then you accuse my observations as self referential. That does
nothing to support your position. Science does not work by ignoring
obvservation when it produces results not wanted. That does happen a
lot in science but eventually the data wins.

Seems a bit gratuitously harsh. Admittedly, you are both over my head
with Atkins and low fat, but the search for "truth" doesn't exclude the
subjective, empirical approach. One can arrive at the truth without
understanding how it works. If nothing else, stating one's observations
is a good place for dialogue to begin. Perhaps you know Doug better than
I, but he has never seemed demagogic, indeed he is often critical of his
own observations.

Susan wants the science first and she does in fact assert that any
working directions fail when not backed up by science she agrees with.
The fact is the directions in the Atkins book work better than the
instructions of any book before and most of the books since in spite of
the fact that the scientific explanation is extremely poor in the Atkins
books.

I started out noticing that certain points in the Atkins book don't say
to do the obvious thing. It's obvious that less is better but phase 2
is called Ongoing Weight Loss with phase 2 cruising at well above the
minimum carb levels. I started out wondering if those higher levels
result in better loss.

Then I started observing people who asserted that less is better and
watched them stall in droves. I observed many quit in disgust and I
also observed many move on to find their CCLL. Sure enough the ones who
increaed their carb intake came off their stalls. This taught me that
Dr Atkins had to know that less isn't better and that led me to the
conclusion that he was a very poor technical writer. It's not a hard
conclusion to make when reading his books and actually tracking what
happens.

Once I had made such observations I started studying the science to try
to figure out why what I had observed could be true. I eventually
formulated a low carb hypothesis of my own that differs from what I read
in his books in details but not in general trend. On the other hand my
hypothesis differs greatly from common observation-free book-quoting
assertions that are commonly made on ASDLC. Over the years my
hypothesis has evolved.

That's how the scientific method progresses - make observations, study
the literature, formulate a hypothesis, make predictions, design and
conduct experiments, refine hypothesis into theory. Lacking the funds
to conduct real experiments I remain stuck in the hypothesis phase
looking for studies that answer questions I wish to ask in experiments.
I track experiments as they are reported in an attempt to refine my
hypothesis.

Compare that to Susan's method. Discard any methods not supported by
science she agrees with and therefore ignore the Atkins method and any
results from it. Having discarded observation of results from Atkins
practice, fail to build on science to try to explain it. Susan's method
does have its good parts. Follow the science and use the science to
form conclusions.

Susan and a lot of other posters have something in common. They pay a
lot more attention to their own results than to the result sof others.
Folks, any one person is only one data point in any one study and for
making any one conclusion. I get a ton of flack for taking the
experiences of others into account but when it comes down to it that's
the reason I end up ignoring those who give me flack on the topic.
Folks actually call me wrong for counting results other than my own.
It's pitiful.

In article ,
Doug Freyburger wrote:

Billy wrote:
Susan wrote:
Doug Freyburger wrote:

I remember folks reacting against Lyle McDonald
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/ calling his claims ego matters. Like
him or not he's one of the most knowledgable experts in the world on low
carb metabolism. I definitely sympathize with Lyle and wish I had half
his expertese on the subject.

To the degree that's true of Lyle, Doug, the difference is that he
documents tons of research with citations to back up every assertion.

You ignore my citations because you disagree with my methods. You
follow Lyle's citations because you agree with his methods. That's not
how science works.

He doesn't rely on self referential assertions as fact.

And then you accuse my observations as self referential. That does
nothing to support your position. Science does not work by ignoring
obvservation when it produces results not wanted. That does happen a
lot in science but eventually the data wins.

Seems a bit gratuitously harsh. Admittedly, you are both over my head
with Atkins and low fat, but the search for "truth" doesn't exclude the
subjective, empirical approach. One can arrive at the truth without
understanding how it works. If nothing else, stating one's observations
is a good place for dialogue to begin. Perhaps you know Doug better than
I, but he has never seemed demagogic, indeed he is often critical of his
own observations.

Susan wants the science first and she does in fact assert that any
working directions fail when not backed up by science she agrees with.
The fact is the directions in the Atkins book work better than the
instructions of any book before and most of the books since in spite of
the fact that the scientific explanation is extremely poor in the Atkins
books.

I started out noticing that certain points in the Atkins book don't say
to do the obvious thing. It's obvious that less is better but phase 2
is called Ongoing Weight Loss with phase 2 cruising at well above the
minimum carb levels. I started out wondering if those higher levels
result in better loss.

Then I started observing people who asserted that less is better and
watched them stall in droves. I observed many quit in disgust and I
also observed many move on to find their CCLL. Sure enough the ones who
increaed their carb intake came off their stalls. This taught me that
Dr Atkins had to know that less isn't better and that led me to the
conclusion that he was a very poor technical writer. It's not a hard
conclusion to make when reading his books and actually tracking what
happens.

Once I had made such observations I started studying the science to try
to figure out why what I had observed could be true. I eventually
formulated a low carb hypothesis of my own that differs from what I read
in his books in details but not in general trend. On the other hand my
hypothesis differs greatly from common observation-free book-quoting
assertions that are commonly made on ASDLC. Over the years my
hypothesis has evolved.

That's how the scientific method progresses - make observations, study
the literature, formulate a hypothesis, make predictions, design and
conduct experiments, refine hypothesis into theory. Lacking the funds
to conduct real experiments I remain stuck in the hypothesis phase
looking for studies that answer questions I wish to ask in experiments.
I track experiments as they are reported in an attempt to refine my
hypothesis.

Compare that to Susan's method. Discard any methods not supported by
science she agrees with and therefore ignore the Atkins method and any
results from it. Having discarded observation of results from Atkins
practice, fail to build on science to try to explain it. Susan's method
does have its good parts. Follow the science and use the science to
form conclusions.

Susan and a lot of other posters have something in common. They pay a
lot more attention to their own results than to the result sof others.
Folks, any one person is only one data point in any one study and for
making any one conclusion. I get a ton of flack for taking the
experiences of others into account but when it comes down to it that's
the reason I end up ignoring those who give me flack on the topic.
Folks actually call me wrong for counting results other than my own.
It's pitiful.

Again, both you and Susan are over my head with low carb. What I do know
is that you have been supportive and helpful of my inquiries into "low
carb" diets. I am also indebted to Susan for more thought provoking
information than I have been able to process, so far.

It seems that it should be sufficient to criticize a report, without
criticizing the messenger, even when it is the messenger's own
observations.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/6/2...al_crime_scene

Susan wrote:

I may be wrong, but I don't recall you citing much to support most of
your assertions, unless you mean that citing yourself is scientifically
sound?

Over the years your responses to my citations have had a significant
impact on the evolution of my view of how low carbing works. Disussing
my observations that have the exact same problem of being a
self-selected-set as Dr Atkins' patients is something I've been open
about all along.

Don't bother lecturing me about scientific thought

You have a blind spot in your reactions to Atkins. You don't like when
it is mentioned.

Lying liars lie. You're a lying liar, Doug.

Whatever. Plonk.

On Jul 6, 6:16*pm, Doug Freyburger wrote:
wrote:

In fact you're just a lying blowhard with an inflated ego.

Over the years you've gone from pointing out the problems with my data
without any suggestions as to how to improve the data to calling me a
liar.

Over the years I've gone from acknowledging your objections to the
anecdotal nature of my data to noticing that the same objection applies
to the zero data that Dr Atkins ever published.


The obvious difference is Atkins was an MD with decades of clinical
experience dealing with thousands of patients that he actually
monitored. Your "data" and "experience" consists of taking whatever
crap someone posts anonymously on the internet. And given how you
just lied about what Atkins said on a very clear point, only a fool
would believe anything you say you concluded from your "data."




That says a lot about the character of the people in the discussion.


It sure does. You made the specific claim in this thread that Atkins
stated that weight loss only slowed down when you add carbs IF YOU GO
OVER CCLL (critical carb level for losing). Yet, you can't produce a
reference because it doesn't exist. Not only doesn't it exist, but
even a novice who has read the books can tell you that what you claim
is impossible by definition. CCLL is the level at which weight loss
STOPS or REVERSES. The term was created and defined that way by
Atkins, so clearly he could not have said that weight loss slows down
when you go above it. This is pure BS that you once again have just
made up and attributed to Atkins. It's NOT a difference in
opinion. It's a flat out lie.


Something for anyone interested - What happens if you look at Dr Atkins'
data and apply the same approaches that trader4 has used on mine? *The
result is interesting. *He never published any data so make some
optimistic guesses. *No, realistically make the same sort of
pessimistic guesses that trader4 has made about me.


There you go again, comparing yourself to Dr. Atkins. But that isn't
the issue. The issue is, if Atkins stated what you claim he did,
then just give us the page. It's not about his data, his
experience. It's about what he wrote which is there in black and
white. Yet, you never provide a page reference and here you are
again, caught.



I'll go with optimistic guesses instead. *I will guess that in spite
of his never publishing any data that he did in fact keep tabular
data. *His patients had the same self-selected-set problems that
postings I have used, including drop outs. His sample size was in the
range of tens of thousands maybe 100,000, leading to interesting
conclusions about the on-line sample sizes in the ones of thousands and
the statistical value of sample sizes.

You like to make guesses. The problem is that many of those guesses
then get presented as fact and you can't understand the difference.

The vast majority of posters here show up, make maybe a few posts,
then disappear. Most of them are not even following Atkins, many
have never read a book of his, many are not doing the plan correctly,
etc. No rational person would consider any "data" allegedly gleemed
from this to be equal to Atkins experience with actual patients. Did
these internet posters send you their blood work reports? Did they
get on your office scale? Do you know what prescription drugs they
were taking? How old they are? What diseases they may have?

But then, that isn't the issue here. Just give us the page to back
up what you claimed Atkins said. That's how you prove it, not by
this distraction over comparing yourself to Atkins.




Dr Atkins and I asked different questions so the exercise is limited.
He did not learn of the existence of leptin about the time his final
edition was published. *I started out noticing differing interpretations
and trying to decide which option was best based on reported outcomes.
He started out wondering if low carbing was healthy. *I had that answer
from him at the start. *The list goes on but none of it effects the
analysis using trader4's methods.

Your "method" is to try to lie about what Atkins said and turn it into
something that fits your own concocted beliefs. If you're not then
just provide the page references right here for everyone to see.
I've done that many times over the years. You, never do. Yet we're
supposed to believe that you are so even handed, so fair, so open
minded. A true scientist who gleems and tabulates "data" from crap
internet postings. What a total crock