3 ms·

This is almost right, but still manages to be dangerously wrong. Frustose and glucose are very different, one never gets converted to the other. All cells can

by 08-15 10y ago

This is almost right, but still manages to be dangerously wrong. Frustose and glucose are very different, one never gets converted to the other. All cells can and will take up and metabolize glucose, but only the liver can import and metabolize fructose. Metabolically, fructose does not behave like a carbohydrate, but like alcohol. Insulin affects mostly fat, muscle and liver cells. They react by storing the excess glucose, which they do harmlessly. Excess glucose does not cause insulin tolerance; fructose seems to do that, thought I don't remember the whole mechanism. Neither chitin nor lignin are carbohydrates, lignin isn't even chemically related. Even ruminants can't digest lignin, only a few funghi can do that. At any rate, the bottom line is that frustose is a problem, glucose isn't, and lumping both under "carbs" confuses matters. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM for lots of details. (But don't take Dr. Lustig's words at face value---check other sources. Most of it is uncontroversial.)

maxerickson 10y ago
Conversion to glucose in the liver is a major metabolic pathway for fructose. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3533803/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3533803/ The main similarity with alcohol metabolism is the "in the liver" part.
greendestiny_re 10y ago
I appreciate your input on the matter. You know as well as I do the complexity of dietary matters. You also know that there is a worrying dearth of first-hand information regarding diet. We mostly rely on aggregate studies that lump individuals together and try to answer extremely complex questions. What we find raises new questions without answering the old ones. Now, as soon as you mentioned "fructose" and "alcohol" in the same sentence, I thought about a Youtube video I watched a while back. In that video, an energetic professor had a rapid-fire exposition of how fructose is toxic and affects the liver like alcohol, how cholesterol indicates risk of heart disease and that people are in danger because they have no idea what they're eating or how it affects them. I scroll down through your comment and see a familiar name "Dr. Lustig". Hey, that's the name of the guy in the video I watched! Isn't that a coincidence? Don't you find it disconcerting that we both use a singular source of information, simply because there is no other? I'm not saying Dr. Lustig is lying; I actually trust what he's saying, I think he has good intentions but our knowledge of diet is so limited, he's like a guy looking through a pinhole and trying to convey to us the wondrous sights he sees. Now, that brings me back to my original comment. I've been a professional writer for 4 years now. I quickly discovered what I call "Writer's dilemma". In theory, there is a perfect piece for every occasion, the only problem is it takes an infinite amount of time to write it. So, I have to decide on where to cut corners. No matter what I write, someone will disagree with it. No matter how I write it, there will be those who don't understand what I said. In that case, I can only make a bona fide effort to convey the information while making a good story. But simply quoting someone else doesn't make a good story. In fact, it's called plagiarism and can result in my client's AdSense account getting suspended. Also, chitin is a derivative of glucose. I checked that in 5 seconds on Wikipedia, it's the very first sentence. So, in trying to correct me, you also got at least one of your facts wrong. But I wrote a good story.

by 08-15 10y ago

maxerickson 10y ago

Conversion to glucose in the liver is a major metabolic pathway for fructose. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3533803/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3533803/ The main similarity with alcohol metabolism is the "in the liver" part.

greendestiny_re 10y ago

I appreciate your input on the matter. You know as well as I do the complexity of dietary matters. You also know that there is a worrying dearth of first-hand information regarding diet. We mostly rely on aggregate studies that lump individuals together and try to answer extremely complex questions. What we find raises new questions without answering the old ones. Now, as soon as you mentioned "fructose" and "alcohol" in the same sentence, I thought about a Youtube video I watched a while back. In that video, an energetic professor had a rapid-fire exposition of how fructose is toxic and affects the liver like alcohol, how cholesterol indicates risk of heart disease and that people are in danger because they have no idea what they're eating or how it affects them. I scroll down through your comment and see a familiar name "Dr. Lustig". Hey, that's the name of the guy in the video I watched! Isn't that a coincidence? Don't you find it disconcerting that we both use a singular source of information, simply because there is no other? I'm not saying Dr. Lustig is lying; I actually trust what he's saying, I think he has good intentions but our knowledge of diet is so limited, he's like a guy looking through a pinhole and trying to convey to us the wondrous sights he sees. Now, that brings me back to my original comment. I've been a professional writer for 4 years now. I quickly discovered what I call "Writer's dilemma". In theory, there is a perfect piece for every occasion, the only problem is it takes an infinite amount of time to write it. So, I have to decide on where to cut corners. No matter what I write, someone will disagree with it. No matter how I write it, there will be those who don't understand what I said. In that case, I can only make a bona fide effort to convey the information while making a good story. But simply quoting someone else doesn't make a good story. In fact, it's called plagiarism and can result in my client's AdSense account getting suspended. Also, chitin is a derivative of glucose. I checked that in 5 seconds on Wikipedia, it's the very first sentence. So, in trying to correct me, you also got at least one of your facts wrong. But I wrote a good story.