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This book, and "The Case Against Sugar" have been, by far, the two most impactful books in my life in recent years. They've genuinely changed my life for the be

by leesec 7y ago

This book, and "The Case Against Sugar" have been, by far, the two most impactful books in my life in recent years. They've genuinely changed my life for the better.

FrojoS 7y ago
What is your opinion on this, quite damning review? http://www.stephanguyenet.com/bad-sugar-or-bad-journalism-an-expert-review-of-the-case-against-sugar/ http://www.stephanguyenet.com/bad-sugar-or-bad-journalism-an... as well as this one https://nutritionsciencefactcheck.com/2017/07/20/the-case-against-the-case-against-sugar/ https://nutritionsciencefactcheck.com/2017/07/20/the-case-ag...
- whatshisface 7y ago
  >Rather, I say this book doesn’t need to exist for the following reasons: All of the reasons that follow boil down to, essentially, "this book is so obviously true that there's no need to read it." That's hardly a damning review, it's a bit closer to the most vehement agreement possible.
  - FrojoS 7y ago
    Did you read the rest of the review? Here is an example quote: "Scientifically, The Case Against Sugar suffers from a condition Steven Pinker has called the “Igon Value Problem”. This term describes the tendency of certain science journalists to arrive at obtuse conclusions due to a superficial understanding of their subject matter" and later "Taubes argues that sugar is the only factor that reliably shows up when a culture develops Western noncommunicable diseases, supporting the point with examples of cultures that adopted sugar-rich diets and became ill. Yet he makes no effort to look for a counterexample that could refute his argument: a traditionally-living culture that has a high intake of sugar and does not suffer from Western noncommunicable diseases." These are just two examples. My understanding (from those two reviews only!), is that you will come away LESS well informed when reading this book. Now, if you provide me with an expert opinion in favour of the book, I'm happy to change my mind. FYI Apart from moments where I try to recover fast (1-60min) from a near max physical effort, I avoid sugar anyway. I do NOT promote eating sugar.
Chazprime 7y ago
If you haven’t read it, check out The Hacking of the American Mind by Robert Lustig. It might be right up your alley; it opened my eyes as to what influences my dietary choices.
- heymijo 7y ago
  Dr. Lustig has some good insights. Two caveats on him: 1) He is an evangelist about the dangers of fructose, which is ubiquitous in the Standard American Diet (SAD) 2) I gather that he has a few positions that are not unreasonable but are also not fully supported by research, yet Having said that, I learned a lot from him about fructose metabolism, how it has to be metabolized by the liver, and what happens to excess. The analogy that sticks in my head is that excess fructose consumption is like foie-grasing ourselves. We get Non-alocoholic fatty liver and it's happening to children at unprecedented numbers. He too was on Peter Attia's podcast (I mentioned in a comment above) and it has some good show notes. https://podcastnotes.org/2018/09/11/lustig/ https://podcastnotes.org/2018/09/11/lustig/

by leesec 7y ago

This book, and "The Case Against Sugar" have been, by far, the two most impactful books in my life in recent years. They've genuinely changed my life for the better.

FrojoS 7y ago

What is your opinion on this, quite damning review? http://www.stephanguyenet.com/bad-sugar-or-bad-journalism-an-expert-review-of-the-case-against-sugar/ http://www.stephanguyenet.com/bad-sugar-or-bad-journalism-an... as well as this one https://nutritionsciencefactcheck.com/2017/07/20/the-case-against-the-case-against-sugar/ https://nutritionsciencefactcheck.com/2017/07/20/the-case-ag...

whatshisface 7y ago
>Rather, I say this book doesn’t need to exist for the following reasons: All of the reasons that follow boil down to, essentially, "this book is so obviously true that there's no need to read it." That's hardly a damning review, it's a bit closer to the most vehement agreement possible.
- FrojoS 7y ago
  Did you read the rest of the review? Here is an example quote: "Scientifically, The Case Against Sugar suffers from a condition Steven Pinker has called the “Igon Value Problem”. This term describes the tendency of certain science journalists to arrive at obtuse conclusions due to a superficial understanding of their subject matter" and later "Taubes argues that sugar is the only factor that reliably shows up when a culture develops Western noncommunicable diseases, supporting the point with examples of cultures that adopted sugar-rich diets and became ill. Yet he makes no effort to look for a counterexample that could refute his argument: a traditionally-living culture that has a high intake of sugar and does not suffer from Western noncommunicable diseases." These are just two examples. My understanding (from those two reviews only!), is that you will come away LESS well informed when reading this book. Now, if you provide me with an expert opinion in favour of the book, I'm happy to change my mind. FYI Apart from moments where I try to recover fast (1-60min) from a near max physical effort, I avoid sugar anyway. I do NOT promote eating sugar.

Chazprime 7y ago

If you haven’t read it, check out The Hacking of the American Mind by Robert Lustig. It might be right up your alley; it opened my eyes as to what influences my dietary choices.

heymijo 7y ago
Dr. Lustig has some good insights. Two caveats on him: 1) He is an evangelist about the dangers of fructose, which is ubiquitous in the Standard American Diet (SAD) 2) I gather that he has a few positions that are not unreasonable but are also not fully supported by research, yet Having said that, I learned a lot from him about fructose metabolism, how it has to be metabolized by the liver, and what happens to excess. The analogy that sticks in my head is that excess fructose consumption is like foie-grasing ourselves. We get Non-alocoholic fatty liver and it's happening to children at unprecedented numbers. He too was on Peter Attia's podcast (I mentioned in a comment above) and it has some good show notes. https://podcastnotes.org/2018/09/11/lustig/ https://podcastnotes.org/2018/09/11/lustig/