Evidence debunking low sodium diet

[facetguy]

So you forget telling a poster earlier that calories in and out doesn't work.

It's just not that simple. Why? Because the metabolic/hormonal/whateveryouwanncallit effect of the particular calories of your body. Robert Lustig explains it clearly with this example (start at 2:30, runs just a few minutes) :

[YOUTUBE]Yo3TRbkIrow[/YOUTUBE]

Of course, insulin is a major player, maybe the key player. But on top of that there are myriad other metabolic factors, as you know. To look at two food labels and say "gee, this one's 500 calories, and that one's also 500 calories, so these foods must have exactly the same effect on my body and health" is a gross over-simplification.

If that's not what you're saying, please explain.

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[SpecterGT260]

oh god.... you're doing it again....

 

[SpecterGT260]

To look at two food labels and say "gee, this one's 500 calories, and that one's also 500 calories, so these foods must have exactly the same effect on my body and health" is a gross over-simplification.

If that's not what you're saying, please explain.

I never once said this was the case. I said that calories in and calories out are physical measurements and are what result in weight gain or loss. Only those two things. Many many many things play a role in calories out, but all such things - exercise, basal rate, metabolism effectors, whatever..... ALL add up to calories out. It was only careless comment you made about a page ago, I am a little confused why you are so stuck on this notion that I am claiming that all foods will have the same impact on your health and metabolism... that is obviously not true. ricin has a caloric value, btw

 

[facetguy]

I never once said this was the case. I said that calories in and calories out are physical measurements and are what result in weight gain or loss. Only those two things. Many many many things play a role in calories out, but all such things - exercise, basal rate, metabolism effectors, whatever..... ALL add up to calories out. It was only careless comment you made about a page ago, I am a little confused why you are so stuck on this notion that I am claiming that all foods will have the same impact on your health and metabolism... that is obviously not true. ricin has a caloric value, btw

So there's no issue then. Let's move along with the discussion.

 

[SpecterGT260]

You can be such a killjoy some times

 

[Miss Alyssa]

While this is true, I think getting patients to eat the right amount of greens is probably the hardest part of the low carb diets. I'd wager the (possibly) increased risks of colon cancer would be a good tradeoff for a functioning metabolism, though.

I think once people get over the notion that salt, and dietary fat are unhealthy, they will cook greens in ways that make them yummy. Cook them with butter, ham, bacon, salt, mayo, cheese, cream....

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/southern-fried-cabbage/
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/collard-greens-recipe/index.html
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/the-ladys-coleslaw-recipe/index.html
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/soupsandsalads/r/cauliflower-cheese-soup.htm


what have you guys heard about low-carb and pregnancy? Is it still considered safe? Is it well tolerated (I hear a lot of pregnant women crave carbs)? does it lower gestational diabetes?

 

[facetguy]

I think once people get over the notion that salt, and dietary fat are unhealthy, they will cook greens in ways that make them yummy. Cook them with butter, ham, bacon, salt, mayo, cheese, cream....

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/southern-fried-cabbage/
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/collard-greens-recipe/index.html
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/the-ladys-coleslaw-recipe/index.html
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/soupsandsalads/r/cauliflower-cheese-soup.htm


what have you guys heard about low-carb and pregnancy? Is it still considered safe? Is it well tolerated (I hear a lot of pregnant women crave carbs)? does it lower gestational diabetes?

Off the top of my head, I recall Jay Wortman, MD writing some pregnancy-related info relating to low carb when his wife was pregnant. Anecdotal, of course.
http://www.drjaywortman.com/

There's another guy, a reproductive endocrinologist, who recommends low-carb to his patients having difficulty getting pregnant, who was interviewed on this podcast. I never listened to it, but perhaps he mentions pregnancy issues:
http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/...eating-low-carb-improves-fertility-pcos/10192

 

[Perrotfish]

I never once said this was the case. I said that calories in and calories out are physical measurements and are what result in weight gain or loss. Only those two things. Many many many things play a role in calories out, but all such things - exercise, basal rate, metabolism effectors, whatever..... ALL add up to calories out.

When people say that fat accumulation is about 'calories in, calories out' what they mean (and what our offical AMA/AAP/AAFP recommendations says) is that staying thin is about the number of calories you eat (regardless of type) and the amount that you move/exercise. In other words that weight gain is primarily a disease of behavior, and needs to be treated with behavior modification. The low carb theory, by contrast, is that some calories you take in can make you fatter than others because they affect the rate that calories go out of you, (because they increase insulin resistance and decrease your basal metabolic rate) and the rate that calories go into you (because they increase your appetite). So the only behavior you need to modify is kind of food you eat and your endocrine system will take care of the rest.

Now you're right that, in the broadest sense, calories in - calories out does equal fat accumulation. If you're fine with all the appetite supression, variable metabolic rates, and whatever else affects that equation then yes, you're right that calories in and calories out does determine your weight gain. You're also responding to an argument that clearly no one else here is having, that no one disagrees with, and which doesn't have anything to do with the kind of diet we would recommend to patients. Which is what this thread is about. Which recasts your posts from being a somewhat avid denial of the physiology behind a low carb diet as a deliberately obtuse ramble about high school level physics.

 

[Slade]

How do you pro-low-carb peeps explain the French paradox?

 

[facetguy]

How do you pro-low-carb peeps explain the French paradox?

Low-carb diets include higher amounts of fat, yet are beneficial in many ways including improvements in CV risk factors. It would seem that low-carb diets, in this regard, solve the French paradox.

 

[Perrotfish]

How do you pro-low-carb peeps explain the French paradox?

The french paradox is that the French have a low rate of cornoary artery disease and weight gain despite having a diet high in saturated fats. Its a paradox if you assume our rate of coronary athrosclerosis is proportional to our ingested fats. However it goes hand in hand with the low carb diet theory: that athrosclerosis is not determined by injested fat, but rather by triglycerides released from your liver. The rate that triglycerides is released from you liver is determined by insulin. However your liver, like your muscles, is one of the organs that suffers from insulin resistsnace, which the low carb diet presumes (with, granted, limited experimental evidence) is due to the repeated 'spikes' of insulin that we get after eating simple carbs, which our bodies were not built to handle, rather than the slow, low tide of insulin you get with fats and proteins. So even though the average middle age american has a body flooded with a physiologically excessive amount of insulin, tthe only cells that are able to percieve it are fat cells (which is why they keep getting fatter), while our liver, unable to percieve the insulin and assuming that we are starving, keeps pumping out the dense LDL and high amounts of triglycerides that give us heart attacks.

Interesting the ATOZ trial in 2003, which compared the Atkins, Ornish, tradiational (low cal, high exercize) and zone diets found that Atkins had by far the best improvement in serum triglycerides and HDL, and only lagged slightly behind the other diets in LDL.

 

[Slade]

Low-carb diets include higher amounts of fat, yet are beneficial in many ways including improvements in CV risk factors. It would seem that low-carb diets, in this regard, solve the French paradox.

Low-carb diets cannot "solve" the French Paradox since the French eat an exceptional amount of BOTH carbs (all the bread and pasta) and fats (mostly dairy-based), yet remain at a healthy weight and have a lower prevalence of cardiovascular disease.

 

[Perrotfish]

Low-carb diets cannot "solve" the French Paradox since the French eat an exceptional amount of BOTH carbs (all the bread and pasta) and fats (mostly dairy-based), yet remain at a healthy weight and have a lower prevalence of cardiovascular disease.

Both the percentage and the glycemic index of the carbs you eat should, if the atkins theory is right, affect the rate you progess to insulin resistance and therefore the rate at which you get fat. The french have a diet that is low in one thing: refined sugar, which is the food causing all of our problems in the low carb hypothesis. In other words their diet isn't perfect, but its drastically bettter than ours, so their endocrine systems should implode at a much slower rate than ours.

 

[Slade]

Both the percentage and the glycemic index of the carbs you eat should, if the atkins theory is right, affect the rate you progess to insulin resistance and therefore the rate at which you get fat. The french have a diet that is low in one thing: refined sugar, which is the food causing all of our problems in the low carb hypothesis. In other words their diet isn't perfect, but its drastically bettter than ours, so their endocrine systems should implode at a much slower rate than ours.

The French eat almost the opposite of the Paleo diet as it has been explained to me here. They eat a lot of fruit as well as a TON of puff pastry in the form of croissants and salty pastries in addition to white bread (all refined sugar). What they don't eat that much of is meat. A typical French person eats meat less than 3 times per week (not counting fish which is an additional 2 times per week).
Isn't this the opposite of the low-carb diet??

The thing is the French walk a lot and eat REASONABLE portions of everything, ie low-cal. In fact when Americans travel to France, what they complain of is that portions are too small!

 

[Perrotfish]

The French eat almost the opposite of the Paleo diet as it has been explained to me here. They eat a lot of fruit as well as a TON of puff pastry in the form of croissants and salty pastries in addition to white bread (all refined sugar). What they don't eat that much of is meat. A typical French person eats meat less than 3 times per week (not counting fish which is an additional 2 times per week).
Isn't this the opposite of the low-carb diet??

The thing is the French walk a lot and eat REASONABLE portions of everything, ie low-cal. In fact when Americans travel to France, what they complain of is that portions are too small!

Nope. Here's quoting wikipedia"

According to FAO data,[4][dead link] the average
French person consumed 108 grams per day of fat from animal sources in 2002
while the average American consumed only 72. The French eat four times as much
butter, 60 percent more cheese and nearly three times as much pork. Although the
French consume only slightly more total fat (171 g/d vs 157 g/d), they consume
much more saturated fat because Americans consume a much larger proportion of
fat in the form of vegetable oil, with most of that being soybean oil.[5][dead link] However,
according to data from the British Heart Foundation,[6][dead link] in 1999, rates
of death from coronary heart disease among males aged 35–74
years were 115 per 100,000 people in the U.S. but only 83 per 100,000 in
France.

They do not have 'balanced portions' of everything (unless you agree that our portions are unbalance because they have too little butter and meat) and they definitely don't have a diet that's lower in anmal products than our. They don't exercise more, they don't smoke less. They are eating some of the highest calorie content foods on the planet. What they have is a high protein, high fat diet with lots of butter and relatively few sugars. More than none, but way less than us. That goes along with the atkins diet.

 

[Slade]

I'm pretty sure dairy fat counts as animal sources... (which would make sense with all the butter, cream and chesse they eat, compared to actual meat). And, even if it doesn't, eating animal fat is not equivalent to eating meat. French cook with a lot of animal fat, even when they are preparing vegetarian dishes.

Please show me a source saying the French eat few carbs.

 

[CaptainSSO]

I'm pretty sure dairy fat counts as animal sources... (which would make sense with all the butter, cream and chesse they eat, compared to actual meat). And, even if it doesn't, eating animal fat is not equivalent to eating meat. French cook with a lot of animal fat, even when they are preparing vegetarian dishes.

Please show me a source saying the French eat few carbs.

You are mixing the point of the "paradox." The paradox is that they eat more saturated fat than us and have less heart disease. That's the paradox.

The paradox is not that France is a beacon of health.

They had 83 CVD deaths compared to our 115 per 100k in 1999, according to Wikipedia.

Right on the wikipedia page, it says they eat "Less sugar, and lower amounts of snack foods that Americans eat such as soda and processed foods."

 

[Perrotfish]

I'm pretty sure dairy fat counts as animal sources... (which would make sense with all the butter, cream and chesse they eat, compared to actual meat). And, even if it doesn't, eating animal fat is not equivalent to eating meat. French cook with a lot of animal fat, even when they are preparing vegetarian dishes.

Please show me a source saying the French eat few carbs.

I can give you a percentage of total daily energy which comes from fat: way higher than in the US.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000282239600185X

I can't find a direct estimate of carbohydtrate intake (all the articles on france are focused on fat intake) but I feel like the math is self evident: there are only three real sources of calories, and if you dramatically increase the percentage that comes from fat and protein (which the links I've given shows) then the only give is in carbs.

 

[Slade]

Quick Google search since we are quoting:
Average Annual Meat Consumption per Human.
Top Ten Countries & Worldwide, 1998 - 2002.
Meat in this Table means livestock and poultry.
Kilograms of meat per human.

US 125 kg
France 101 kg
http://www.animalethics.org.uk/i-ch7-6-meat-consumption.html

 

[Slade]

I can give you a percentage of total daily energy which comes from fat: way higher than in the US.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000282239600185X

I can't find a direct estimate of carbohydtrate intake (all the articles on france are focused on fat intake) but I feel like the math is self evident: there are only three real sources of calories, and if you dramatically increase the percentage that comes from fat and protein (which the links I've given shows) then the only give is in carbs.

You can't assume.

French eat high-caloric foods, smaller portions (look in that Wikipedia article you were quoting).

They eat a lot of fat (dairy, vegetable oil, some meat, though less than in US). That I will not dispute.

But they also eat a lot of carbs. Their carbs might be less processed than in the US, I admit, which might be where the difference is. But they do not eat anywhere close to a low-carb diet, and I wouldn't be surprised if they more carbs on average than people in the US.

Either way, my point is that they are eating a balanced (ie, not minimizing one food group) diet, with smaller portions, which probably helps maintain their overall healthier weights.

 

[Slade]

Found it!
Here is an article that shows that French men and women get around 38-40% of their energy from fat and 38% from carbs!
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...G63oF4&usg=AFQjCNHkItcE3_R9nhhNcuZv1kmZ03qPaQ

Now, please show me how that is a low-carb diet!

 

[Slade]

This site shows that average kcal in US is 3770 compared to 3550 in France though (not much difference). So maybe it's not lower calories that is making the difference.
http://chartsbin.com/view/1150

In any case, it is not lower carbs!

 

[CaptainSSO]

This site shows that average kcal in US is 3770 compared to 3550 in France though (not much difference). So maybe it's not lower calories that is making the difference.
http://chartsbin.com/view/1150

In any case, it is not lower carbs!

If they're eating more fat than us and less calories, by definition they're eating less carbs.

 

[Slade]

If they're eating more fat than us and less calories, by definition they're eating less carbs.

Look up one post and you will see the study which showed the French received equal amounts of energy from total fat and carbs. They are not eating less carbs.

 

[KinasePro]

Either way, my point is that they are eating a balanced (ie, not minimizing one food group) diet, with smaller portions, which probably helps maintain their overall healthier weights.

In my opinion, these types of population studies have too many confounders to even take seriously. The average BMI in china and greece is also much lower than the US, and they all eat plenty of carbs as well. These gedanken don't bring us anything terribly useful, IMO.

The real selling point of paleo and low carb (to me at least) is that it is an effective way to repair metabolic derangements that already exist in people with truncal obesity, lipidemias, diabetes etc... If you take an obese american who lives on carbs, and put them on a french diet, I'm highly skeptical that you would see anything worth writing home about. I mean, that's practically the history of our diabetes epidemic... the AHA was reccommending high carb diets for the past 30 years.

 

[SpecterGT260]

When people say that fat accumulation is about 'calories in, calories out' what they mean (and what our offical AMA/AAP/AAFP recommendations says) is that staying thin is about the number of calories you eat (regardless of type) and the amount that you move/exercise. In other words that weight gain is primarily a disease of behavior, and needs to be treated with behavior modification. The low carb theory, by contrast, is that some calories you take in can make you fatter than others because they affect the rate that calories go out of you, (because they increase insulin resistance and decrease your basal metabolic rate) and the rate that calories go into you (because they increase your appetite). So the only behavior you need to modify is kind of food you eat and your endocrine system will take care of the rest.

Now you're right that, in the broadest sense, calories in - calories out does equal fat accumulation. If you're fine with all the appetite supression, variable metabolic rates, and whatever else affects that equation then yes, you're right that calories in and calories out does determine your weight gain. You're also responding to an argument that clearly no one else here is having, that no one disagrees with, and which doesn't have anything to do with the kind of diet we would recommend to patients. Which is what this thread is about. Which recasts your posts from being a somewhat avid denial of the physiology behind a low carb diet as a deliberately obtuse ramble about high school level physics.

if by "nobody is arguing" and "nobody disagrees with" you are talking about the instances where you, facetguy, and SSO specifically disagreed with me, well.......

Ive been as clear as I can on this point since it was first made. You guys are the ones who split hairs over non-points and now you are attempting to turn that around on me. If you would like, I can quote the specific instances that brought us down this "interesting" path.

 

[Slade]

In my opinion, these types of population studies have too many confounders to even take seriously. The average BMI in china and greece is also much lower than the US, and they all eat plenty of carbs as well. These gedanken don't bring us anything terribly useful, IMO.

The real selling point of paleo and low carb (to me at least) is that it is an effective way to repair metabolic derangements that already exist in people with truncal obesity, lipidemias, diabetes etc... If you take an obese american who lives on carbs, and put them on a french diet, I'm highly skeptical that you would see anything worth writing home about. I mean, that's practically the history of our diabetes epidemic... the AHA was reccommending high carb diets for the past 30 years.

I understand your point and to be clear I am not advocating a high-carb diet, but I don't think a low carb diet is the answer either (what about the increased rate of colon cancer from less fiber?); it's just going from one extreme to the other. Balanced diet is a nice middle ground, and that will be what I will advocate for my patients. In any case, that's the beauty of having medical advice given by humans instead of machines, docs can advise their patients per their philosophy (within reason of course)!

As a side note, through my quick lit search just now, I actually saw an article saying Americans who visited France and ate a French diet actually lost weight! Wouldn't that be a nice weight loss regimen to prescribe: go stay in Paris for a week or two, paid for by insurance

 

[CaptainSSO]

Look up one post and you will see the study which showed the French received equal amounts of energy from total fat and carbs. They are not eating less carbs.

They must be. If I'm eating more fat, and fewer calories, I HAVE to be eating less carbs. That's just how the numbers work out.

Fiber and colon cancer is inconclusive. You know how we got on this fiber kick anyway? To explain away refined carbs as the basis of disease. It's not the refined carbs that are bad, it's the lack of fiber, was their hypothesis.

BESIDES, paleo doesn't imply low fiber. That's a misconception. You can eat as many vegetables as you want.

 

[Slade]

They must be. If I'm eating more fat, and fewer calories, I HAVE to be eating less carbs. That's just how the numbers work out.

Fiber and colon cancer is inconclusive. You know how we got on this fiber kick anyway? To explain away refined carbs as the basis of disease. It's not the refined carbs that are bad, it's the lack of fiber, was their hypothesis.

Why are you so stubborn? Look at the study it shows in black and white that the French get equal amounts of energy from fats and carbs.

 

[SpecterGT260]

They must be. If I'm eating more fat, and fewer calories, I HAVE to be eating less carbs. That's just how the numbers work out.

Fiber and colon cancer is inconclusive. You know how we got on this fiber kick anyway? To explain away refined carbs as the basis of disease. It's not the refined carbs that are bad, it's the lack of fiber, was their hypothesis.

BESIDES, paleo doesn't imply low fiber. That's a misconception. You can eat as many vegetables as you want.

I tend to agree with this.... without seeing hard numbers, you have to assume that it is impossible to be eating an equal amount of a major energy source as us if they have more of another high energy source but fewer overall.

 

[KinasePro]

I understand your point and to be clear I am not advocating a high-carb diet, but I don't think a low carb diet is the answer either (what about the increased rate of colon cancer from less fiber?); it's just going from one extreme to the other. Balanced diet is a nice middle ground, and that will be what I will advocate for my patients. In any case, that's the beauty of having medical advice given by humans instead of machines, docs can advise their patients per their philosophy (within reason of course)!

I would agree that this is perfectly reasonable given the current recommendations and evidence. But you owe me $10 if the guidelines change to low carb in another decade, I'm calling it now.

As a side note, through my quick lit search just now, I actually saw an article saying Americans who visited France and ate a French diet actually lost weight! Wouldn't that be a nice weight loss regimen to prescribe: go stay in Paris for a week or two, paid for by insurance

This would be interesting, and I'm sure there's more than one way to skin this cat. Low calorie definitely does work, but it's pretty damn hard to comply to and low carb might end up working better.

 

[SpecterGT260]

Why are you so stubborn? Look at the study it shows in black and white that the French get equal amounts of energy from fats and carbs.

that could potentially mean it is a bad study if they claim something so unrealistic. Just because it is published doesn't mean it is true (brb, gotta stop our local peds clinic from giving kids autism real quick )

It doesnt follow that they are eating more fats than us, 200cal less a day, and then the unknown variable - carbs - can also somehow be equal. I wanna see a bar graph!

 

[facetguy]

Either way, my point is that they are eating a balanced (ie, not minimizing one food group) diet, with smaller portions, which probably helps maintain their overall healthier weights.

It's probably more relevant that they eat less processed foods.

Found it!
Here is an article that shows that French men and women get around 38-40% of their energy from fat and 38% from carbs!
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...G63oF4&usg=AFQjCNHkItcE3_R9nhhNcuZv1kmZ03qPaQ

Now, please show me how that is a low-carb diet!

38% of kcals as carbs may not be akin to Atkins Induction Phase, but it is lower than the typical American's carb intake. And remember the Zone Diet? That's quasi-low-carb and ascribes to a 40-30-30 ratio (carbs-protein-fat).

In my opinion, these types of population studies have too many confounders to even take seriously. The average BMI in china and greece is also much lower than the US, and they all eat plenty of carbs as well. These gedanken don't bring us anything terribly useful, IMO.
.

I agree. There are likely many factors beyond just macronutrient ratios that make the American diet less healthy than, say, the French. I suspect, however, that over time the rest of the world will continue to adopt our diet and suffer the same fate.

 

[SpecterGT260]

slade, upon closer inspection, your websites don't tend to be very well suited to support your argument..... Where are you pulling the comparison to US population? Just because they get 38% from carbs doesnt mean that people in the US arent getting something like 60% (i completely made that number up....) but only having half of the story doesnt allow us to draw any conclusions.....

 

[Slade]

But you owe me $10 if the guidelines change to low carb in another decade, I'm calling it now.

Sounds good

We should buy some stock in vegetable oil companies

 

[Slade]

that could potentially mean it is a bad study if they claim something so unrealistic. Just because it is published doesn't mean it is true (brb, gotta stop our local peds clinic from giving kids autism real quick )

It doesnt follow that they are eating more fats than us, 200cal less a day, and then the unknown variable - carbs - can also somehow be equal. I wanna see a bar graph!

Hold on, there's a misunderstanding here. When I said that carb intake is equal, I mean that the French get equal amounts of cals from fat and carbs (ie not a low-carb diet). Saying the French might even eat more carbs than Americans is just me speculating. My point is that they don't eat a LOW-CARB diet.

 

[Perrotfish]

Look up one post and you will see the study which showed the French received equal amounts of energy from total fat and carbs. They are not eating less carbs.

Equal amounts from fat and carbs is way more fat and way less carbs than american eat. Americans take in just shy of 50-60% of their calories from carbs alone, more than protein and fat combined. That is, by our standards, a low carb diet. Not a ketotic diet, but definitely low carb.

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhanes/databriefs/calories.pdf

 

[SpecterGT260]

Equal amounts from fat and carbs is way more fat and way less carbs than american eat. Americans take in just shy of 50-600% of their calories from carbs alone, more than protein and fat combined.

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhanes/databriefs/calories.pdf

Wow.... good guess *pats self on back*

 

[Slade]

Here, this study shows that average carb intake for Americans is 10% higher than the French (at 48%).
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db49.htm

Is a 10% drop in carb enough to be called a low-carb/paleo diet?

 

[Perrotfish]

Here, this study shows that average carb intake for Americans is 10% higher than the French (48%).
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db49.htm

Is a 10% drop in carb enough to be called a low-carb/paleo diet?

Depends why you think it works. If you think that what makes it work is that its a ketogenic diet (your tissue starts to run on ketones rather than sugars) then you need to take in barely any carbs in a day to make it work. A single apple a day kills that diet. On the other hand if you think its a gradual decline in the function of insulin receptors due to spike in your insulin (the Taube's theory) then its a continum, and everything that improves the glycemic index and increases the fat content of your diet is an improvement and should promote weight loss over time. Actually under that theory even all carbs aren't created equal. High glycemic index carbs like whole wheat (which cause a slower insulin spike), or even just eating your carbs with fat, shouldn't be as bad a low glycemic index carbs like refined sugars, especially when those sugars taken alone and without fat (like drinking a coke). That's the theory, anyway.

Paleo almost always refers to somone eating the most extreme form of the atkins diet, so I probably wouldn't call it that. Same with 'atkins'. Low glycemic index or low carb might be appropriate labels.

 

[CaptainSSO]

This would be interesting, and I'm sure there's more than one way to skin this cat. Low calorie definitely does work, but it's pretty damn hard to comply to and low carb might end up working better.

Exactly. You can eat like a monk, and count your calories, and whip yourself for eating too large a portion. Or you can eat Paleo, and never worry about overeating. (To an extent. But the Paleo has a much higher "therapeutic index" than low-cal).

 

[Slade]

High glycemic index carbs like whole wheat (which cause a slower insulin spike) shouldn't be as bad a low glycemic index carbs like refined sugars. That's the theory, anyway.

That I believe wholeheartedly! The biggest difference in the French and American diet that I see is that Americans eat a whole lot of processed crap. Eating whole wheat pasta (even if it has the same amount of carbs) is not the same as eating chips and a soda.

I don't think a 10% difference from 50 to 40% is enough to call a diet low-carb (especially with such a huge difference in fat intake) but maybe we can call it low-crap-carb diet

 

[Slade]

Exactly. You can eat like a monk, and count your calories, and whip yourself for eating too large a portion. Or you can eat Paleo, and never worry about overeating. (To an extent. But the Paleo has a much higher "therapeutic index" than low-cal).

I love how, in your mind, cutting down on portions gradually is "eating like a monk" but cutting out ALL carbs including fruit is a piece a cake!

 

[CaptainSSO]

I love how, in your mind, cutting down on portions gradually is "eating like a monk" but cutting out ALL carbs including fruit is a piece a cake!

You don't have cut out ALL carbs. I eat fruit. You are clearly ignorant about the Paleo diet.

Like I already said earlier, you can fight your body and eat low cal. Or you can let your body run how it evolved to run and eat paleo.

Which is harder. Low cal would be like not having sex. Paleo would be like having safe sex.

 

[Perrotfish]

That I believe wholeheartedly! The biggest difference in the French and American diet that I see is that Americans eat a whole lot of processed crap. Eating whole wheat pasta (even if it has the same amount of carbs) is not the same as eating chips and a soda.

Maybe we should call it low-crap-carb diet

I definitely agree that the first trick is always getting rid of the sodas (crap carbs, good name). If theres anything all the different nutrition recomendations agree on, its that.

I love how, in your mind, cutting down on portions gradually is "eating like a monk" but cutting out ALL carbs including fruit is a piece a cake!

It doesn't involve hunger. That's less painful.

 

[SpecterGT260]

You don't have cut out ALL carbs. I eat fruit. You are clearly ignorant about the Paleo diet.

Like I already said earlier, you can fight your body and eat low cal. Or you can let your body run how it evolved to run and eat paleo.

Which is harder. Low cal would be like not having sex. Paleo would be like wearing a condom.

The "evolved to run" argument is completely baseless. Please stop using it as it makes my brain hurt.

 

[Slade]

You don't have cut out all carbs. I eat fruit.

Like I already said earlier, you can fight your body and eat low cal. Or you can let your body run how it evolved to run and eat paleo.

Which is harder. Low cal would be like not having sex. Paleo would be like wearing a condom.

What?? Wow your analogy is way off. No sex would be like starving yourself. Here's a better analogy:
Low-cal would be like having sex 5 times a week instead of every day, while Paleo is like taking oral sex completely out. In any case, terrible comparison.

 

[CaptainSSO]

The "evolved to run" argument is completely baseless. Please stop using it as it makes my brain hurt.

No, it's not. It's not my fault you're misinformed about this, and clearly don't know very much about human evolution.

It's just like feeding a rabbit chosterol. They did not EVOLVE to eat chesterol, and thus their bodies cannot process it.

 

[CaptainSSO]

What?? Wow your analogy is way off. No sex would be like starving yourself. Here's a better analogy:
Low-cal would be like having sex 5 times a week instead of every day, while Paleo is like taking oral sex completely out. In any case, terrible comparison.

Perrotfish explained it better than I did. One involves fighting hunger. One doesn't. Hunger is a powerful survival mechanism that isn't easy to ignore.

My point was that low cal is a shotgun approach--cutting down on every macronutrient, even though not every macronutrients is a problem. Paleo cuts out the macronutrients that are the problem.

 

[SpecterGT260]

No, it's not. It's not my fault you're misinformed about this, and clearly don't know very much about human evolution.

It's just like feeding a rabbit chosterol. They did not EVOLVE to eat chesterol, and thus their bodies cannot process it.

Right and because my body cannot handle glucose it..... wait....
It is an asinine argument man.