3 ms·

The article doesn't say what the HN headline says, or at least, not in the way that most people reading the headline would interpret it.

mcguire 8y ago
"By August of 2014 the EBC researchers had preliminary results on their 17 volunteers: The data showed “no significant difference” in energy expenditure. That didn’t mean it was a failure; to the researchers, they had succeeded in verifying the methodology before using it in an even bigger, longer study. "But when Hall presented the pilot’s results in-person to representatives from NuSI at a meeting in Bethesda in September, they were not so rosy-eyed.... “From my perspective, the pilot was a failure for several reasons,” says Taubes." Then, there's "The fourth and largest [NuSI-backed study], conducted at Stanford, randomized 600 overweight-to-obese subjects into low-fat versus low-carb diets for a year and looked at whether or not their weight loss could be explained by their metabolism or their DNA. Published this February in JAMA, the study found no differences between the two diets and no meaningful relationship between weight loss and insulin secretion. The most significant finding was that it’s hard to stick to a diet for a whole year." The rest of the story may not describe the failure of studies. "As the remaining researchers continued to clash with NuSI over the summer about the second phase, the pilot results were finally published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in July. They received a lot of media attention, in no small part because Hall said the pilot, along with another study he’d conducted previously, “basically falsify” the theory that sugar makes people fat. By the end of the summer the Arnold Foundation had decided not to fund the second phase of the study."

3 ms·

The article doesn't say what the HN headline says, or at least, not in the way that most people reading the headline would interpret it.

by IB885588 8y ago

mcguire 8y ago
"By August of 2014 the EBC researchers had preliminary results on their 17 volunteers: The data showed “no significant difference” in energy expenditure. That didn’t mean it was a failure; to the researchers, they had succeeded in verifying the methodology before using it in an even bigger, longer study. "But when Hall presented the pilot’s results in-person to representatives from NuSI at a meeting in Bethesda in September, they were not so rosy-eyed.... “From my perspective, the pilot was a failure for several reasons,” says Taubes." Then, there's "The fourth and largest [NuSI-backed study], conducted at Stanford, randomized 600 overweight-to-obese subjects into low-fat versus low-carb diets for a year and looked at whether or not their weight loss could be explained by their metabolism or their DNA. Published this February in JAMA, the study found no differences between the two diets and no meaningful relationship between weight loss and insulin secretion. The most significant finding was that it’s hard to stick to a diet for a whole year." The rest of the story may not describe the failure of studies. "As the remaining researchers continued to clash with NuSI over the summer about the second phase, the pilot results were finally published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in July. They received a lot of media attention, in no small part because Hall said the pilot, along with another study he’d conducted previously, “basically falsify” the theory that sugar makes people fat. By the end of the summer the Arnold Foundation had decided not to fund the second phase of the study."