It appears Taubes has been bitten by a meme. The subjects in the NIH study consumed isocaloric diets and were put in a chamber that measured all of their thermo

It appears Taubes has been bitten by a meme. The subjects in the NIH study consumed isocaloric diets and were put in a chamber that measured all of their thermodynamic outputs -- it turned out thermogenesis was a tiiiiiiny amount higher on one diet. Why is that? Well, the "loading" (pre-test) diet was mostly carbohydrate, the low-fat diet was also, but the low-carbohydrate diet was mostly fat. After only six days, the subjects' metabolisms were still adjusting to the diet. Where did I get that idea? It's in the study abstract: > Mathematical model simulations agreed with these data, but predicted that the body acts to minimize body fat differences with prolonged isocaloric diets varying in carbohydrate and fat. Even some of the media stories, like the one in your first link, quote the author of the paper saying this: >Indeed, Hall's mathematical modeling predicts that in the long term the body acts to minimise body fat differences between diets that are equal in calories but varying widely in their ratio of carbohydrate to fat. >"Over the long term it's pretty close," says Hall. You'll recognize Hall as the first author of the study. Let's be clear: the lead author of the study said in plain English that there was probably not a significant long-term difference in energy usage resp. composition. Why is the media blowing this up? Because they just want a story. They want nutrition to be an argument, rather than a gradually developing science with occasional surprises. Their goals are at odds with researchers who want to make useful information about nutrition available to consumers. That includes the New York Times. Keep that in mind.