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Is this news? I was under the impression that it was fairly common knowledge that all calories aren't created equally.

by jbwyme 14y ago

martythemaniak 14y ago
It is definitely not common knowledge amongst the general population. I believe low-carb diets (low carb, slow carb, paleo, etc) are well understood and praised amongst people with interest in nutrition and fitness, but it's still slowly making it's way into the general population.
- mertd 14y ago
  > It is definitely not common knowledge amongst the general population. For a good reason. First and foremost, general population just needs to eat less, a lot less. Once we get past that point, macro-nutrient composition can be the next level of diet optimization.
  - bad_user 14y ago
    I like meat and meat keeps me full for longer periods of time, while at the same time whenever I eat rice, or potatoes, or pasta (without any meat) I feel hunger in 2 hours tops. I don't know if this is a property of high-fat versus high-carb diets, but either way it's a mistake to think in absolute terms. I also disagree that we have a weight problem because "we eat too much". I lost more than 40 pounds by cutting all the sugars from my diet, while still eating plenty of food.
    - mertd 14y ago
      I meant eating less in terms of calories.
      - bad_user 14y ago
        I know what you meant, but I don't think this strategy works, mostly because "eating less calories" has to be a side-effect of a healthy diet not the goal, otherwise it isn't sustainable. I tried it myself and it didn't work. The mental pressure, the guilt when you go wrong, the bad moods you have when you can't satisfy some urge - all of these are culminating with depression, until finally you give up because being overweight suddenly doesn't seem so bad. Besides I've seen some statistics with the growth of the average caloric intake in the past couple of decades, compared with the growth of sugar intake and the growth of sugar in our daily diet has a much, much better correlation with the rise of obesity and diabetes. People should be encouraged to stop eating crap that they don't even like and start eating good and healthy food.
  - scdc 14y ago
    But why do they eat too much? Two things to consider: higher fat meals can make you feel sated sooner, so you eat fewer calories. Also, there is evidence that carbohydrates trigger an insulin release which activates a hunger response.
    - mertd 14y ago
      I never understood the satiety argument. Fat also packs more than twice the calories of carbs. It needs to fill you up twice as fast or keep you full twice as long for this argument to work. Besides, the body takes about 20 minutes to send the first "I am full" signal anyway. I can go through the majority of a large pizza within that time with my "normal" eating pace.
crazygringo 14y ago
There are a lot of people who insist that calories must be equal in terms of weight loss/gain, or else there would be violation of the laws of thermodynamics or something... To quote Gary Taubes, who tries to puncture this myth: The reason people believe we get fat because of overeating and sedentary behavior is because they believe the laws of thermodynamics somehow dictate this to be true. In particular the first law, which tells us that energy is conserved, so if a system takes in more energy than it expends, the energy contained in the system has to increase. If that system happens to be our fat tissue, than the fat tissue accumulates fat. That’s the logic. So if we eat more than we expend, we get fatter and the logic turns this around to say that we get fat because we eat more than we expend. And so, overeating and sedentary behavior are the causes. This is the logic that leads virtually every government health agency and independent health organization (the AHA, the AMA, you name it) to have some variation of this World Health Organization statement on its website or in its promotional material: “The fundamental cause of obesity and overweight is an energy imbalance between calories consumed on one hand, and calories expended on the other hand.”
- kyberias 14y ago
  I don't understand how this quote from Taubes proves anything. If I stop eating, I will lose weight and eventually die. Also, if I eat more, I will gain weight. Thus calories must have SOMETHING to do with weight, right? I think Taubes is fighting a straw man here: I haven't heard anyone argue that eaten calories are stored in 1:1 ratio. But they have some causal relationship.
  - bitdiffusion 14y ago
    If you read the whole article, Taubes isn't saying that there is not a link between calorie intake and weight-gain - what he is saying is that it's not "causal" in any useful sense. Why exactly overweight people consume more calories is still a mystery and it's a gross oversimplification to discuss the law of thermodynamics when considering "why someone is overweight".
    - kyberias 14y ago
seanalltogether 14y ago
Except that many have been trying to prove they are created equal. http://www.slashfood.com/2010/11/09/eat-twinkies-lose-weight-one-mans-wacky-diet-that-worked/ http://www.slashfood.com/2010/11/09/eat-twinkies-lose-weight...

Is this news? I was under the impression that it was fairly common knowledge that all calories aren't created equally.

by jbwyme 14y ago

Is this news? I was under the impression that it was fairly common knowledge that all calories aren't created equally.

It is definitely not common knowledge amongst the general population. I believe low-carb diets (low carb, slow carb, paleo, etc) are well understood and praised amongst people with interest in nutrition and fitness, but it's still slowly making it's way into the general population.

mertd 14y ago
> It is definitely not common knowledge amongst the general population. For a good reason. First and foremost, general population just needs to eat less, a lot less. Once we get past that point, macro-nutrient composition can be the next level of diet optimization.
- bad_user 14y ago
  I like meat and meat keeps me full for longer periods of time, while at the same time whenever I eat rice, or potatoes, or pasta (without any meat) I feel hunger in 2 hours tops. I don't know if this is a property of high-fat versus high-carb diets, but either way it's a mistake to think in absolute terms. I also disagree that we have a weight problem because "we eat too much". I lost more than 40 pounds by cutting all the sugars from my diet, while still eating plenty of food.
  - mertd 14y ago
    I meant eating less in terms of calories.
    - bad_user 14y ago
      I know what you meant, but I don't think this strategy works, mostly because "eating less calories" has to be a side-effect of a healthy diet not the goal, otherwise it isn't sustainable. I tried it myself and it didn't work. The mental pressure, the guilt when you go wrong, the bad moods you have when you can't satisfy some urge - all of these are culminating with depression, until finally you give up because being overweight suddenly doesn't seem so bad. Besides I've seen some statistics with the growth of the average caloric intake in the past couple of decades, compared with the growth of sugar intake and the growth of sugar in our daily diet has a much, much better correlation with the rise of obesity and diabetes. People should be encouraged to stop eating crap that they don't even like and start eating good and healthy food.
- scdc 14y ago
  But why do they eat too much? Two things to consider: higher fat meals can make you feel sated sooner, so you eat fewer calories. Also, there is evidence that carbohydrates trigger an insulin release which activates a hunger response.
  - mertd 14y ago
    I never understood the satiety argument. Fat also packs more than twice the calories of carbs. It needs to fill you up twice as fast or keep you full twice as long for this argument to work. Besides, the body takes about 20 minutes to send the first "I am full" signal anyway. I can go through the majority of a large pizza within that time with my "normal" eating pace.

crazygringo 14y ago

There are a lot of people who insist that calories must be equal in terms of weight loss/gain, or else there would be violation of the laws of thermodynamics or something... To quote Gary Taubes, who tries to puncture this myth: The reason people believe we get fat because of overeating and sedentary behavior is because they believe the laws of thermodynamics somehow dictate this to be true. In particular the first law, which tells us that energy is conserved, so if a system takes in more energy than it expends, the energy contained in the system has to increase. If that system happens to be our fat tissue, than the fat tissue accumulates fat. That’s the logic. So if we eat more than we expend, we get fatter and the logic turns this around to say that we get fat because we eat more than we expend. And so, overeating and sedentary behavior are the causes. This is the logic that leads virtually every government health agency and independent health organization (the AHA, the AMA, you name it) to have some variation of this World Health Organization statement on its website or in its promotional material: “The fundamental cause of obesity and overweight is an energy imbalance between calories consumed on one hand, and calories expended on the other hand.”

kyberias 14y ago
I don't understand how this quote from Taubes proves anything. If I stop eating, I will lose weight and eventually die. Also, if I eat more, I will gain weight. Thus calories must have SOMETHING to do with weight, right? I think Taubes is fighting a straw man here: I haven't heard anyone argue that eaten calories are stored in 1:1 ratio. But they have some causal relationship.
- bitdiffusion 14y ago
  If you read the whole article, Taubes isn't saying that there is not a link between calorie intake and weight-gain - what he is saying is that it's not "causal" in any useful sense. Why exactly overweight people consume more calories is still a mystery and it's a gross oversimplification to discuss the law of thermodynamics when considering "why someone is overweight".
  - kyberias 14y ago

seanalltogether 14y ago

Except that many have been trying to prove they are created equal. http://www.slashfood.com/2010/11/09/eat-twinkies-lose-weight-one-mans-wacky-diet-that-worked/ http://www.slashfood.com/2010/11/09/eat-twinkies-lose-weight...