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Coca-Cola Funds Scientists Who Shift Blame for Obesity Away from Bad Diets

114 points by aaronbrethorst 11y ago

unchocked 11y ago
Body mass is simple: calories in - calories out = calories gained. It's silly to imagine that Coke is doing something nefarious (like Phillip Morris denying that smoking causes lung cancer, or Exxon Mobil FUD-ing solid climate science) by encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want.
- DannyBee 11y ago
  So let me get this right: We have billions of complex chemical processes involved in all of this, and know things like "absorption rates of medicine, vitamins, and nutrients" are affected by everything from random vitamins to environmental factors to whatever else. But body mass, that we have down 100% for-sure, and it's just that simple formula, no variables, no possibility for any other affecting factors. Sure.
  - sliverstorm 11y ago
    It can get complicated for sure, but to the best of my knowledge it is an axiom that if you eat less than you burn, you will lose weight. Vitamins and absorption rates have nothing on the laws of thermodynamics. Now, if your BMR is 2000 and you eat 2100, poor absorption can still cause you to lose weight. But if your BMR is 2000 and you eat 1000, there is no possible way you can gain weight. If you know how to gain weight on a calorie deficit, there's a lot of starving people in this world that would love to learn how.
    - DannyBee 11y ago
      "that if you eat less than you burn," Sure, but both the absorption and the burn rates are affected by other factors. So calculating calories out is not as simple as looking at a nutrition label. In fact, it's infinitely more complex: "Instead, the total caloric value is calculated by adding up the calories provided by the energy-containing nutrients: protein, carbohydrate, fat and alcohol. Because carbohydrates contain some fiber that is not digested and utilized by the body, the fiber component is usually subtracted from the total carbohydrate before calculating the calories." IE note: these are all things that are going to be digested or not digested (and thus, really count or not really count as calories) at different rates in different people. (Certainly, there is a max value, but this method won't give you that either :P)
      - sliverstorm 11y ago
        There is no variability in fiber absorption. You cannot digest fiber. Your burn rate doesn't drop below your BMR. Basically there's lots of variability when you are eating more than your BMR- you could gain weight, or you could not. But when you eat less than your BMR, you have a calorie deficit. Period. It doesn't matter if your digestion is working well or poorly, or if you exercised or if you didn't. You have a deficit. As for nutrition labels, I'm not aware of any hidden calories that aren't counted in the label but will be digested. Like I said, humans cannot digest fiber, at all.
        tracker1 11y ago
        The amount and ratio of water soluble to water insoluble fiber to other substances in food, in addition to how much breakdown there is during intake (such as a smoothie, vs raw berries) definitely has an effect on absorption. For that matter, taking in additional fiber will help inhibit absorption. There's also a given persons reaction to different macros over time... sugar vs fat vs protein have different chemical reactions in the body, where too much sugar in some will have different affects over time. Some will gain weight, and show signs of metabolic syndrome, others may have the issues, but not outwardly show via weight gain. Others still won't develop diabetes.. and this can be on roughly the same diet. BMR isn't in and of itself the only measure... while it's true that you will gain/lose weight depending on how many calories you take in/out... but beyond that is what types of mass are gained/lost. Most fat people don't have enough lean muscle once they're over 35-40, which means losing too much muscle (or any) is a detriment. If you start losing more than a sustainable muscle mass, you can actually be worse off. You need to take in a minimal amount of protein to maintain/gain muscle (combined with exercise to promote gaining/maintaining muscle)... with a calorie deficit enough for weight loss, but doesn't cause starvation response and metabolic slowdown. All of these are definitely variable by person.
        sliverstorm 11y ago
        Can fiber impact absorption? Yes. Can fiber be absorbed (and digested)? No. Which was my point one comment ago. Are your macros important to health and good body composition? Yes. I usually skip that part because someone inevitably jumps in and explains how sugar is metabolized differently than fat, and then try to use that to "prove" that sugar will make you gain weight no matter what your caloric intake.
  - Crito 11y ago
    It's thermodynamics dude. Your body only gets so much of its mass from the atmosphere with your lungs, the rest of it comes through food. It can't make mass. Fat tissue is no exception. Your body is only able to make it if you give your body sufficient raw materials to make it. Similarly, if your body is doing work, it is burning energy. Human bodies are not perpetual motion machines, they exploit energy stored in chemical bonds. You don't get that for free, you get that from the food you eat. You do not need to fully understand every nook and cranny of a system to examine it from first principles.
    - DannyBee 11y ago
      This is all completely and totally irrelevant. Read my other reply. Since the digestion/other rates vary from person to person, you can't simply calculate your calories out very easily, and positing this formula as if it is useful or helpful to anyone, is silly. What is your proposed mechanism for counting calories in and out for a given person (Note: nutrition labels will 100% fail you here, because of how they are calculating)?
      - Kodix 11y ago
        Here is a proposed mechanism: count calories as they are on the label, see if you lose weight. If you do not, lower them further, still counting by the label. It doesn't matter if they are exact for a given person so long as the labels are consistent. They are sufficiently consistent. I'm curious - have you tried losing weight, and is this from personal experience? Because I found it trivial by just counting calories and keeping a watch on my weight. I don't doubt that sometimes the calories I absorbed were less or more than what I wrote down, but that doesn't really matter in the long run - they're sufficiently accurate.
        sliverstorm 11y ago
        I have to imagine many of the people who argue that sustained caloric deficits do not lead to weight loss are engaging in magical thinking to justify their weight. Guys, metabolism is just too complicated for humans to understand, so there's nothing at all I can do about being overweight, it's literally beyond my control There's got to be some kind of cognitive dissonance or something at play; how else could a rational mind convince itself that the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to the human digestive system? Or the justifications that say, nutrition labels are not PERFECTLY accurate so it's hopeless from the start. I personally guarantee if you drink one can of Coke a day and eat nothing else, you will lose weight; I don't care whether the nutrition label is perfectly accurate.
- sliverstorm 11y ago
  It's like the equivalent of alcohol companies and their "please drink responsibly", except this is "please exercise".
- cscurmudgeon 11y ago
  Stop the FUD. Not all calories are equal.
- coldtea 11y ago
  >It's silly to imagine that Coke is doing something nefarious (like Phillip Morris denying that smoking causes lung cancer, or Exxon Mobil FUD-ing solid climate science) by encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want. It's silly to assume it's OK for Coke to pay scientists to promote any theory or results in scientific journals. Coke can pay scientists to work on their products and labs. Getting from there to paying to influence what goes to the diet/medical journals and the general public is downright fraud. As for "encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want" that's not Coke's business to do. And it's BS anyway, since the message "diet doesn't matter much" (which is the inverse of what you started your comment with), will also stick to people not able or willing to exercize.
- Ensorceled 11y ago
  That is a bit disingenuous. I literally just finished a 15.2KM run and burnt off 1190 calories so I guess now I can eat what ever I want. Except a Big Mac Combo with a Large Coke is 1580 calories so even that is a bit much of dinner. And it took an hour and forty minutes to actually run that distance, almost two hours in total with getting my running gear on, warm up and cool down.
- mikeash 11y ago
  The fact that weight loss/gain is due to calorie deficit/surplus is true but useless. The most difficult thing about weight management is willpower management. People (especially techies) love to ignore willpower. They'll say, if you want to lose weight, just eat less. Completely ignoring the fact that "just eat less" is an enormous challenge for many people. By calling into question the importance of calories, Coke is basically undermining people's willpower, which is a precious resource even under optimal conditions. Promoting exercise as a substitute is useless. On its own, exercise will do nothing to help you lose weight, because the extra calorie burn will just make you hungrier!
- crusso 11y ago
  I like this analogy when getting into the calories in/out discussion: We don’t get fat because we over eat. Meaning that overeating isn’t the cause of obesity, it’s an effect. If a room has a maximum occupancy of 20 people and the fire marshal gets upset and wants to know why it happened – you’re not going to say “well, it’s because more people came into the room than left.” Well duh, that’s what happened but that’s not the cause, the reason for the overcrowding. Rooms get overcrowded when more come in than leave and I get fat when I eat more than I burn; but that isn’t the cause. https://www.thebairs.net/series/ketogenic-soylent/ https://www.thebairs.net/series/ketogenic-soylent/ We get the thermodynamic argument, really we do... but if you're ignoring the metabolic effects of the insulin cycle upon weight gain in the modern diet, you're not really grasping the important details.
- Thimothy 11y ago
  Unless you are somehow burning your shit to measure the calories that your body didn't absorb in a certain digestion, I'm going to call bullshit on your formula.
doah78 11y ago
Things would probably work themselves out if there weren't so much in the sugar subsidy. If sugary treats and drinks were rare instead of common we probably wouldn't have as much diabetes or overweight people, myself included. I feel this kind of stuff is sadly typical of the world we live in, propaganda at its finest.
- adamnemecek 11y ago
  Sugar would be bad but it's even worse because it's high fructose corn syrup.
  - tracker1 11y ago
    I'm pretty sure it all feeds into the same system... as do things advertised as healthy lifestyle choices. Fruit smoothies are probably about as bad as soda (except you get a bit of fiber, and some micro-nutrients) in terms of the affect on your blood sugar. HFCS is only part of the problem... The bigger thing is the human (and all, really) body is complex and varied. A lot of things play into the nutritional needs of a person. We've also had a lot of migration and mixed heritage the past couple hundred years, much broader and deeper than any point in history before it. It usually takes some time for a society to optimize for certain food sources. Even then, we have some vary diverse cultures coming together (and I do love great fusion foods)... Combined with mixed family allergies, and a lot of mono-crops and ever limited diets by huge swaths of society. The body does adapt, as it stands though, most people are too sedentary (myself included)... Once metabolic syndrom sets in, it gets very complicated... I'm at a point where a bit of heavy starch (bread, pasta) throws me off for a couple days... many grains will mess me up too... if I have more than around 100g of net carbs a day, I have issues. Most people have way more than 100g of just sugar any given day. The "food pyramid" is mostly lopsided.. and subsidies mostly push some of the worst things for us. In general, we get too much grains, more meat than needed, not enough vegetables and fruits (I mean the likes of peppers, tomatoes, squash and cucumber here)... far too many heavily refined foods (from vegetable oils that are really unnatural, to fruit juices). Many people don't gain weight or really show it, but are just as unhealthy from their diets. I'm really bad at sticking with what works best for me... because I like pasta, and bread, and rice, and potatoes. I just know I shouldn't have them anymore, and when I do (a couple times a week) I really feel it. Not to mention that even if I go weeks with really minimal carbs/sugars, my body is really efficient with gluconeogenesis and starts creating a lot of keytones, which has its' own issues. It all sucks. I'm over 350#, and excercise is all but impossible with my bad knees... it's all I can do to not gain more weight. Since starting Invokana, my weight and blood sugar levels are at least stable (but elevated), but getting farther is difficult to say the least. I wish I know a lot of what I know today a few decades ago... I would have never started drinking "diet" soda, which is way worse in a lot of ways, and also would have cut most of the carbs back when it would have made more of a difference.
jug5 11y ago
No. Way. Everything big business does is for the greater good of man. Not for their own bottom line. Who are you vegetables?
trevyn 11y ago
Sweet, they should also fund this, also on the front page: "Scientists have synthesized a new compound that ‘mimics’ exercise." Yay progress!
logicallee 11y ago
why do they care that much? coke zero tastes fine, the energy from caffeine means you would move that much more, the fact that something sweet has filled your stomach means you're not eating something with calories in it. diet coke and coke zero are above and beyond coke's calorie-responsible choices - and they're marketed very heavily and available everywhere, even mcdonald's. exercise is super-important, as are food calories from stuff like hamburgers and fries, that don't HAVE a diet version. why does Coca-Cola care so much? Article would make more sense if it read "mcdonald's", but that's not what's stated - it says it's about coke. it just doesn't make that much sense to me. where's coca cola's incentive? (fwiw I thought I'd mention I have absolutely no disclaimer to make, no connection whatsoever with coca cola.)
- thaumasiotes 11y ago
  > why does Coca-Cola care so much? Article would make more sense if it read "mcdonald's" Because popular interest groups have been specifically demonizing soda. Compare: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugary_Drinks_Portion_Cap_Rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugary_Drinks_Portion_Cap_Rule
  - logicallee 11y ago
    good answer, thanks.
- bbcbasic 11y ago
  Not everyone likes the taste of coke zero, and others perceive it to be harmful due to the artificial sweeteners.
  - georgemcbay 11y ago
    > Not everyone likes the taste of coke zero Well, there's literally no accounting for taste. Coke Zero is a fantastic tasting diet soda. > others perceive it to be harmful due to the artificial sweeteners These people should be ridiculed, like Jenny McCarthy is, since there's no reputable scientific or epidemiological basis for their beliefs.
danso 11y ago
I've always thought it would be an interesting -- but not technically difficult -- project to do a data scrape of PubMed.gov and simply count up and classify all of the studies that contain a conflict of interest disclosure...but while the scraping would be easy, I'm not sure how accurate or complete the disclosures are. For example, from the OP: > Last week, the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana announced the findings of a large new study on exercise in children that determined that lack of physical activity “is the biggest predictor of childhood obesity around the world.” > The news release contained a disclosure: “This research was funded by The Coca-Cola Company.” This is the link to the press release, which contains the Coca Cola disclosure in the last line: https://www.pbrc.edu/news/?ArticleID=284 https://www.pbrc.edu/news/?ArticleID=284 The press release links to the PubMed page for the study: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26173093 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26173093 ...Maybe I'm missing it but I don't see the Coca-Cola disclosure in the PubMed abstract. However, the Coca-Cola mention is in the full text of the study: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1002/oby.21152/ http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1002/oby.2115... (note: this above link is visible for me because I'm on a university network. It may not work for you otherwise) On the other hand, the full text of the study also mentions the ClinicalTrials.gov ID number: NCT01722500. Which means it can be found here: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01722500 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01722500 So maybe the data collection approach should begin with ClincalTrials.gov, which does have endpoints intended for convenient bulk data analysis: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/resources/download https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/resources/download
- streptomycin 11y ago
  Disclosures basically never appear in abstracts on PubMed.
  - jonlucc 11y ago
    Also, it might not be so easy as just scraping the disclosures. I work at a major pharmaceutical company, and my name is on a paper, along with my affiliation. There are also non-pharma scientists on that paper. The paper contains a line stating that those two non-pharma scientists declare no conflict of interest. A scraper might dismiss that as non-industry, but more than half of the authors work in industry.
bbcbasic 11y ago
Sad state of affairs, but nothing that surprising. They need to fight dirty to ensure they exist as a company in the future. As more people realise the connection between high-sugar diets and weight gain. Tobacco V2.
- matwood 11y ago
  As more people realise the connection between high calorie diets and weight gain. Fixed that for you, although it should not be a novel realization.
  - bbcbasic 11y ago
    Sugar specifically though. It is a cause of high calories due to it's effect of creating a high and then a crash making you hungry again. It is also addictive in itself. WHO recommend getting it below 50g, ideally 25g per day. I looked on the side of some of the staple things I consumed (milk, bread etc.) and it is tough with modern processed foods to get that low. If everyone followed the WHO recommendation then full sugar coke is out of business!
    - matwood 11y ago
      Sounds like you agree that more calories leads to weight gain. Advertisements can make people hungry also, but we do not run around saying advertising makes us fat.
    - paintrayne 11y ago
      >WHO recommend getting it below 50g, ideally 25g per day. Really? Because that is how you get into ketosis. That is not just low carb, that is ultra low carb. I think you may be mistaken. I have been in that range and it is extremely difficult.
      - bbcbasic 11y ago
        Just sugar, not carbohydrates in general. You can do it by avoiding refined foods, but you can still eat, for example 100g of oats which you wouldn't do on an atkins-style diet.
sp3000 11y ago
Diet remains the single most important factor when it comes to weight management. Two cookies can erase the calories burned from jogging for 1 hour. People routinely overestimate the calories burned from exercise and underestimate the calories that are in food, especially sugary foods. On top of that, exercise can increase your appetite, resulting in a net positive calories if you're not careful. Exercise provides a myriad of benefits, the most important actually contributing to mental health. But if you are looking to lose weight, a proper and healthy diet should be your priority.
rosser 11y ago
I mean, on the one hand, pretty much anything that legitimately gets people exercising more can't be all bad. But on the other, we already have enough "science" with an agenda in the world. At least the agenda here is pretty transparent, I guess?
jmiwhite 11y ago
At every turn the GEBN scientists seem to acknowledge the role of excessive caloric intake and a sedentary lifestyle, then briefly handwave the former as overhyped - a large excerpt from one of the linked GEBN "Portfolio Items" containing a bald-faced example[0]: >Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is that they’re [...]blaming sugary drinks and so on. And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that in fact is the cause. [...] The big problem is we don’t really know the cause other than, well, too many people are eating more calories than they burn on too many days. But maybe the reason they’re eating more calories than they need is because they’re not burning many." So - he does know the cause. A combination of inactivity and overconsumptiom, both of which are remediated with lifestyle changes that invert their prefixes. Why abandon the latter, simply because each is well reported? [0]:http://www.sharewik.com/portfolio-items/the-global-energy-balance-getting-the-word-out/ http://www.sharewik.com/portfolio-items/the-global-energy-ba...
jgalt212 11y ago
I know flippant comments are not encouraged here, but this headline is probably the least surprising thing I learned this week.
- coldtea 11y ago
  A society is in trouble when people are going "that's not news" instead of enraged and looking to change it when learning about a wrongdoing. It doesn't matter an iota if it's "surprising"...
davidf18 11y ago
One 20oz (vending machine size) bottle of Coke per day is 52 lbs of sugar (well, actually high fructose corn syrup) per year. Next time you go shopping, count 10 5-lb bags of sugar. Each and every year. Ironically, the land for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which is located in Atlanta, Georgia was donated by none other than The Coca Cola Company.
- duaneb 11y ago
  > Ironically, the land for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which is located in Atlanta, Georgia was donated by none other than The Coca Cola Company. I don't think this is ironic at all. A company needs living clientele. Also, the CDC has better epidemics to worry about than the obesity one. I frankly don't care if people want to be fat.
  - undersuit 11y ago
    What makes you think people want to be fat?
    - duaneb 11y ago
      > What makes you think people want to be fat? Because I want to be fat.... health is overrated compared to how it effects quality of life.
      - DanBC 11y ago
        I want you to print out this thread and look back at it in thirty years time.
        duaneb 11y ago
        Hopefully, I won't be alive. The trick of maintaining a high quality of life is not overstaying your welcome.
  - totalrobe 11y ago
jongraehl 11y ago
This would be (barring outright fraud) nearly harmless if we had preregistration as a prerequisite for studies 'counting' (in meta-analyses, in discussions here, in academic rankings, etc) http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/registering-studies-reduces-positive-outcomes/ http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/registering-stu... I suppose they could still add ridiculous interpretations (as is often the case when people's livelihood depends on their work being seen to promote a given side), but at least you could trust the data.
geo77 11y ago
coca cola is simply funding the merchants of doubt in this case the Global Energy Balance Network great book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt ok doc: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3675568/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3675568/
xacaxulu 11y ago
"Company does thing that helps itself"
feketegy 11y ago
Broscience
kennydude 11y ago
The calories are not what you should worry about in Coca-Cola. 1 500ml bottle (supposedly 2 servings, but really who does that?) has ~60% RDA of sugar which is just ridiculous. I don't get why they don't just make a fizzy drink which contains at most 10-15g sugar per 500ml (and not fill it with artificial sweetener).
- undersuit 11y ago
  I cut my fruit juices with water, and if there is a soda water option on the soda fountain I'll do the same thing with sodas. I rarely drink sodas or juices which is probably more effective than my dilution efforts.

114 points by aaronbrethorst 11y ago

Body mass is simple: calories in - calories out = calories gained. It's silly to imagine that Coke is doing something nefarious (like Phillip Morris denying that smoking causes lung cancer, or Exxon Mobil FUD-ing solid climate science) by encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want.

DannyBee 11y ago
So let me get this right: We have billions of complex chemical processes involved in all of this, and know things like "absorption rates of medicine, vitamins, and nutrients" are affected by everything from random vitamins to environmental factors to whatever else. But body mass, that we have down 100% for-sure, and it's just that simple formula, no variables, no possibility for any other affecting factors. Sure.
- sliverstorm 11y ago
  It can get complicated for sure, but to the best of my knowledge it is an axiom that if you eat less than you burn, you will lose weight. Vitamins and absorption rates have nothing on the laws of thermodynamics. Now, if your BMR is 2000 and you eat 2100, poor absorption can still cause you to lose weight. But if your BMR is 2000 and you eat 1000, there is no possible way you can gain weight. If you know how to gain weight on a calorie deficit, there's a lot of starving people in this world that would love to learn how.
  - DannyBee 11y ago
    "that if you eat less than you burn," Sure, but both the absorption and the burn rates are affected by other factors. So calculating calories out is not as simple as looking at a nutrition label. In fact, it's infinitely more complex: "Instead, the total caloric value is calculated by adding up the calories provided by the energy-containing nutrients: protein, carbohydrate, fat and alcohol. Because carbohydrates contain some fiber that is not digested and utilized by the body, the fiber component is usually subtracted from the total carbohydrate before calculating the calories." IE note: these are all things that are going to be digested or not digested (and thus, really count or not really count as calories) at different rates in different people. (Certainly, there is a max value, but this method won't give you that either :P)
    - sliverstorm 11y ago
      There is no variability in fiber absorption. You cannot digest fiber. Your burn rate doesn't drop below your BMR. Basically there's lots of variability when you are eating more than your BMR- you could gain weight, or you could not. But when you eat less than your BMR, you have a calorie deficit. Period. It doesn't matter if your digestion is working well or poorly, or if you exercised or if you didn't. You have a deficit. As for nutrition labels, I'm not aware of any hidden calories that aren't counted in the label but will be digested. Like I said, humans cannot digest fiber, at all.
      - tracker1 11y ago
        The amount and ratio of water soluble to water insoluble fiber to other substances in food, in addition to how much breakdown there is during intake (such as a smoothie, vs raw berries) definitely has an effect on absorption. For that matter, taking in additional fiber will help inhibit absorption. There's also a given persons reaction to different macros over time... sugar vs fat vs protein have different chemical reactions in the body, where too much sugar in some will have different affects over time. Some will gain weight, and show signs of metabolic syndrome, others may have the issues, but not outwardly show via weight gain. Others still won't develop diabetes.. and this can be on roughly the same diet. BMR isn't in and of itself the only measure... while it's true that you will gain/lose weight depending on how many calories you take in/out... but beyond that is what types of mass are gained/lost. Most fat people don't have enough lean muscle once they're over 35-40, which means losing too much muscle (or any) is a detriment. If you start losing more than a sustainable muscle mass, you can actually be worse off. You need to take in a minimal amount of protein to maintain/gain muscle (combined with exercise to promote gaining/maintaining muscle)... with a calorie deficit enough for weight loss, but doesn't cause starvation response and metabolic slowdown. All of these are definitely variable by person.
        sliverstorm 11y ago
        Can fiber impact absorption? Yes. Can fiber be absorbed (and digested)? No. Which was my point one comment ago. Are your macros important to health and good body composition? Yes. I usually skip that part because someone inevitably jumps in and explains how sugar is metabolized differently than fat, and then try to use that to "prove" that sugar will make you gain weight no matter what your caloric intake.
- Crito 11y ago
  It's thermodynamics dude. Your body only gets so much of its mass from the atmosphere with your lungs, the rest of it comes through food. It can't make mass. Fat tissue is no exception. Your body is only able to make it if you give your body sufficient raw materials to make it. Similarly, if your body is doing work, it is burning energy. Human bodies are not perpetual motion machines, they exploit energy stored in chemical bonds. You don't get that for free, you get that from the food you eat. You do not need to fully understand every nook and cranny of a system to examine it from first principles.
  - DannyBee 11y ago
    This is all completely and totally irrelevant. Read my other reply. Since the digestion/other rates vary from person to person, you can't simply calculate your calories out very easily, and positing this formula as if it is useful or helpful to anyone, is silly. What is your proposed mechanism for counting calories in and out for a given person (Note: nutrition labels will 100% fail you here, because of how they are calculating)?
    - Kodix 11y ago
      Here is a proposed mechanism: count calories as they are on the label, see if you lose weight. If you do not, lower them further, still counting by the label. It doesn't matter if they are exact for a given person so long as the labels are consistent. They are sufficiently consistent. I'm curious - have you tried losing weight, and is this from personal experience? Because I found it trivial by just counting calories and keeping a watch on my weight. I don't doubt that sometimes the calories I absorbed were less or more than what I wrote down, but that doesn't really matter in the long run - they're sufficiently accurate.
      - sliverstorm 11y ago
        I have to imagine many of the people who argue that sustained caloric deficits do not lead to weight loss are engaging in magical thinking to justify their weight. Guys, metabolism is just too complicated for humans to understand, so there's nothing at all I can do about being overweight, it's literally beyond my control There's got to be some kind of cognitive dissonance or something at play; how else could a rational mind convince itself that the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to the human digestive system? Or the justifications that say, nutrition labels are not PERFECTLY accurate so it's hopeless from the start. I personally guarantee if you drink one can of Coke a day and eat nothing else, you will lose weight; I don't care whether the nutrition label is perfectly accurate.
sliverstorm 11y ago
It's like the equivalent of alcohol companies and their "please drink responsibly", except this is "please exercise".
cscurmudgeon 11y ago
Stop the FUD. Not all calories are equal.
coldtea 11y ago
>It's silly to imagine that Coke is doing something nefarious (like Phillip Morris denying that smoking causes lung cancer, or Exxon Mobil FUD-ing solid climate science) by encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want. It's silly to assume it's OK for Coke to pay scientists to promote any theory or results in scientific journals. Coke can pay scientists to work on their products and labs. Getting from there to paying to influence what goes to the diet/medical journals and the general public is downright fraud. As for "encouraging people to get more exercise so that they can consume what they want" that's not Coke's business to do. And it's BS anyway, since the message "diet doesn't matter much" (which is the inverse of what you started your comment with), will also stick to people not able or willing to exercize.
Ensorceled 11y ago
That is a bit disingenuous. I literally just finished a 15.2KM run and burnt off 1190 calories so I guess now I can eat what ever I want. Except a Big Mac Combo with a Large Coke is 1580 calories so even that is a bit much of dinner. And it took an hour and forty minutes to actually run that distance, almost two hours in total with getting my running gear on, warm up and cool down.
mikeash 11y ago
The fact that weight loss/gain is due to calorie deficit/surplus is true but useless. The most difficult thing about weight management is willpower management. People (especially techies) love to ignore willpower. They'll say, if you want to lose weight, just eat less. Completely ignoring the fact that "just eat less" is an enormous challenge for many people. By calling into question the importance of calories, Coke is basically undermining people's willpower, which is a precious resource even under optimal conditions. Promoting exercise as a substitute is useless. On its own, exercise will do nothing to help you lose weight, because the extra calorie burn will just make you hungrier!
crusso 11y ago
I like this analogy when getting into the calories in/out discussion: We don’t get fat because we over eat. Meaning that overeating isn’t the cause of obesity, it’s an effect. If a room has a maximum occupancy of 20 people and the fire marshal gets upset and wants to know why it happened – you’re not going to say “well, it’s because more people came into the room than left.” Well duh, that’s what happened but that’s not the cause, the reason for the overcrowding. Rooms get overcrowded when more come in than leave and I get fat when I eat more than I burn; but that isn’t the cause. https://www.thebairs.net/series/ketogenic-soylent/ https://www.thebairs.net/series/ketogenic-soylent/ We get the thermodynamic argument, really we do... but if you're ignoring the metabolic effects of the insulin cycle upon weight gain in the modern diet, you're not really grasping the important details.
Thimothy 11y ago
Unless you are somehow burning your shit to measure the calories that your body didn't absorb in a certain digestion, I'm going to call bullshit on your formula.

doah78 11y ago

Things would probably work themselves out if there weren't so much in the sugar subsidy. If sugary treats and drinks were rare instead of common we probably wouldn't have as much diabetes or overweight people, myself included. I feel this kind of stuff is sadly typical of the world we live in, propaganda at its finest.

adamnemecek 11y ago
Sugar would be bad but it's even worse because it's high fructose corn syrup.
- tracker1 11y ago
  I'm pretty sure it all feeds into the same system... as do things advertised as healthy lifestyle choices. Fruit smoothies are probably about as bad as soda (except you get a bit of fiber, and some micro-nutrients) in terms of the affect on your blood sugar. HFCS is only part of the problem... The bigger thing is the human (and all, really) body is complex and varied. A lot of things play into the nutritional needs of a person. We've also had a lot of migration and mixed heritage the past couple hundred years, much broader and deeper than any point in history before it. It usually takes some time for a society to optimize for certain food sources. Even then, we have some vary diverse cultures coming together (and I do love great fusion foods)... Combined with mixed family allergies, and a lot of mono-crops and ever limited diets by huge swaths of society. The body does adapt, as it stands though, most people are too sedentary (myself included)... Once metabolic syndrom sets in, it gets very complicated... I'm at a point where a bit of heavy starch (bread, pasta) throws me off for a couple days... many grains will mess me up too... if I have more than around 100g of net carbs a day, I have issues. Most people have way more than 100g of just sugar any given day. The "food pyramid" is mostly lopsided.. and subsidies mostly push some of the worst things for us. In general, we get too much grains, more meat than needed, not enough vegetables and fruits (I mean the likes of peppers, tomatoes, squash and cucumber here)... far too many heavily refined foods (from vegetable oils that are really unnatural, to fruit juices). Many people don't gain weight or really show it, but are just as unhealthy from their diets. I'm really bad at sticking with what works best for me... because I like pasta, and bread, and rice, and potatoes. I just know I shouldn't have them anymore, and when I do (a couple times a week) I really feel it. Not to mention that even if I go weeks with really minimal carbs/sugars, my body is really efficient with gluconeogenesis and starts creating a lot of keytones, which has its' own issues. It all sucks. I'm over 350#, and excercise is all but impossible with my bad knees... it's all I can do to not gain more weight. Since starting Invokana, my weight and blood sugar levels are at least stable (but elevated), but getting farther is difficult to say the least. I wish I know a lot of what I know today a few decades ago... I would have never started drinking "diet" soda, which is way worse in a lot of ways, and also would have cut most of the carbs back when it would have made more of a difference.

jug5 11y ago

No. Way. Everything big business does is for the greater good of man. Not for their own bottom line. Who are you vegetables?

trevyn 11y ago

Sweet, they should also fund this, also on the front page: "Scientists have synthesized a new compound that ‘mimics’ exercise." Yay progress!

logicallee 11y ago

why do they care that much? coke zero tastes fine, the energy from caffeine means you would move that much more, the fact that something sweet has filled your stomach means you're not eating something with calories in it. diet coke and coke zero are above and beyond coke's calorie-responsible choices - and they're marketed very heavily and available everywhere, even mcdonald's. exercise is super-important, as are food calories from stuff like hamburgers and fries, that don't HAVE a diet version. why does Coca-Cola care so much? Article would make more sense if it read "mcdonald's", but that's not what's stated - it says it's about coke. it just doesn't make that much sense to me. where's coca cola's incentive? (fwiw I thought I'd mention I have absolutely no disclaimer to make, no connection whatsoever with coca cola.)

thaumasiotes 11y ago
> why does Coca-Cola care so much? Article would make more sense if it read "mcdonald's" Because popular interest groups have been specifically demonizing soda. Compare: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugary_Drinks_Portion_Cap_Rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugary_Drinks_Portion_Cap_Rule
- logicallee 11y ago
  good answer, thanks.
bbcbasic 11y ago
Not everyone likes the taste of coke zero, and others perceive it to be harmful due to the artificial sweeteners.
- georgemcbay 11y ago
  > Not everyone likes the taste of coke zero Well, there's literally no accounting for taste. Coke Zero is a fantastic tasting diet soda. > others perceive it to be harmful due to the artificial sweeteners These people should be ridiculed, like Jenny McCarthy is, since there's no reputable scientific or epidemiological basis for their beliefs.

danso 11y ago

I've always thought it would be an interesting -- but not technically difficult -- project to do a data scrape of PubMed.gov and simply count up and classify all of the studies that contain a conflict of interest disclosure...but while the scraping would be easy, I'm not sure how accurate or complete the disclosures are. For example, from the OP: > Last week, the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana announced the findings of a large new study on exercise in children that determined that lack of physical activity “is the biggest predictor of childhood obesity around the world.” > The news release contained a disclosure: “This research was funded by The Coca-Cola Company.” This is the link to the press release, which contains the Coca Cola disclosure in the last line: https://www.pbrc.edu/news/?ArticleID=284 https://www.pbrc.edu/news/?ArticleID=284 The press release links to the PubMed page for the study: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26173093 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26173093 ...Maybe I'm missing it but I don't see the Coca-Cola disclosure in the PubMed abstract. However, the Coca-Cola mention is in the full text of the study: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1002/oby.21152/ http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1002/oby.2115... (note: this above link is visible for me because I'm on a university network. It may not work for you otherwise) On the other hand, the full text of the study also mentions the ClinicalTrials.gov ID number: NCT01722500. Which means it can be found here: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01722500 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01722500 So maybe the data collection approach should begin with ClincalTrials.gov, which does have endpoints intended for convenient bulk data analysis: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/resources/download https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/resources/download

streptomycin 11y ago
Disclosures basically never appear in abstracts on PubMed.
- jonlucc 11y ago
  Also, it might not be so easy as just scraping the disclosures. I work at a major pharmaceutical company, and my name is on a paper, along with my affiliation. There are also non-pharma scientists on that paper. The paper contains a line stating that those two non-pharma scientists declare no conflict of interest. A scraper might dismiss that as non-industry, but more than half of the authors work in industry.

bbcbasic 11y ago

Sad state of affairs, but nothing that surprising. They need to fight dirty to ensure they exist as a company in the future. As more people realise the connection between high-sugar diets and weight gain. Tobacco V2.

matwood 11y ago
As more people realise the connection between high calorie diets and weight gain. Fixed that for you, although it should not be a novel realization.
- bbcbasic 11y ago
  Sugar specifically though. It is a cause of high calories due to it's effect of creating a high and then a crash making you hungry again. It is also addictive in itself. WHO recommend getting it below 50g, ideally 25g per day. I looked on the side of some of the staple things I consumed (milk, bread etc.) and it is tough with modern processed foods to get that low. If everyone followed the WHO recommendation then full sugar coke is out of business!
  - matwood 11y ago
    Sounds like you agree that more calories leads to weight gain. Advertisements can make people hungry also, but we do not run around saying advertising makes us fat.
  - paintrayne 11y ago
    >WHO recommend getting it below 50g, ideally 25g per day. Really? Because that is how you get into ketosis. That is not just low carb, that is ultra low carb. I think you may be mistaken. I have been in that range and it is extremely difficult.
    - bbcbasic 11y ago
      Just sugar, not carbohydrates in general. You can do it by avoiding refined foods, but you can still eat, for example 100g of oats which you wouldn't do on an atkins-style diet.

sp3000 11y ago

Diet remains the single most important factor when it comes to weight management. Two cookies can erase the calories burned from jogging for 1 hour. People routinely overestimate the calories burned from exercise and underestimate the calories that are in food, especially sugary foods. On top of that, exercise can increase your appetite, resulting in a net positive calories if you're not careful. Exercise provides a myriad of benefits, the most important actually contributing to mental health. But if you are looking to lose weight, a proper and healthy diet should be your priority.

rosser 11y ago

I mean, on the one hand, pretty much anything that legitimately gets people exercising more can't be all bad. But on the other, we already have enough "science" with an agenda in the world. At least the agenda here is pretty transparent, I guess?

jmiwhite 11y ago

At every turn the GEBN scientists seem to acknowledge the role of excessive caloric intake and a sedentary lifestyle, then briefly handwave the former as overhyped - a large excerpt from one of the linked GEBN "Portfolio Items" containing a bald-faced example[0]: >Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is that they’re [...]blaming sugary drinks and so on. And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that in fact is the cause. [...] The big problem is we don’t really know the cause other than, well, too many people are eating more calories than they burn on too many days. But maybe the reason they’re eating more calories than they need is because they’re not burning many." So - he does know the cause. A combination of inactivity and overconsumptiom, both of which are remediated with lifestyle changes that invert their prefixes. Why abandon the latter, simply because each is well reported? [0]:http://www.sharewik.com/portfolio-items/the-global-energy-balance-getting-the-word-out/ http://www.sharewik.com/portfolio-items/the-global-energy-ba...

jgalt212 11y ago

I know flippant comments are not encouraged here, but this headline is probably the least surprising thing I learned this week.

coldtea 11y ago
A society is in trouble when people are going "that's not news" instead of enraged and looking to change it when learning about a wrongdoing. It doesn't matter an iota if it's "surprising"...

davidf18 11y ago

One 20oz (vending machine size) bottle of Coke per day is 52 lbs of sugar (well, actually high fructose corn syrup) per year. Next time you go shopping, count 10 5-lb bags of sugar. Each and every year. Ironically, the land for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which is located in Atlanta, Georgia was donated by none other than The Coca Cola Company.

duaneb 11y ago
> Ironically, the land for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which is located in Atlanta, Georgia was donated by none other than The Coca Cola Company. I don't think this is ironic at all. A company needs living clientele. Also, the CDC has better epidemics to worry about than the obesity one. I frankly don't care if people want to be fat.
- undersuit 11y ago
  What makes you think people want to be fat?
  - duaneb 11y ago
    > What makes you think people want to be fat? Because I want to be fat.... health is overrated compared to how it effects quality of life.
    - DanBC 11y ago
      I want you to print out this thread and look back at it in thirty years time.
      - duaneb 11y ago
        Hopefully, I won't be alive. The trick of maintaining a high quality of life is not overstaying your welcome.
- totalrobe 11y ago

jongraehl 11y ago

This would be (barring outright fraud) nearly harmless if we had preregistration as a prerequisite for studies 'counting' (in meta-analyses, in discussions here, in academic rankings, etc) http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/registering-studies-reduces-positive-outcomes/ http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/registering-stu... I suppose they could still add ridiculous interpretations (as is often the case when people's livelihood depends on their work being seen to promote a given side), but at least you could trust the data.

geo77 11y ago

coca cola is simply funding the merchants of doubt in this case the Global Energy Balance Network great book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt ok doc: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3675568/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3675568/

xacaxulu 11y ago

"Company does thing that helps itself"

feketegy 11y ago

Broscience

kennydude 11y ago

The calories are not what you should worry about in Coca-Cola. 1 500ml bottle (supposedly 2 servings, but really who does that?) has ~60% RDA of sugar which is just ridiculous. I don't get why they don't just make a fizzy drink which contains at most 10-15g sugar per 500ml (and not fill it with artificial sweetener).

undersuit 11y ago
I cut my fruit juices with water, and if there is a soda water option on the soda fountain I'll do the same thing with sodas. I rarely drink sodas or juices which is probably more effective than my dilution efforts.