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Generally it's good to be skeptical but this- "We found a significant fold increase in the levels of several tumor suppressor and DNA repair gene protein produc

Generally it's good to be skeptical but this- "We found a significant fold increase in the levels of several tumor suppressor and DNA repair gene protein products (GP)s at the end of 4th week during 4-week intermittent fasting (CALU, INTS6, KIT, CROCC, PIGR), and 1 week after 4-week intermittent fasting (CALU, CALR, IGFBP4, SEMA4B) compared with the levels before 4-week intermittent fasting." But why would this suddenly happen? There's some physiology here to be uncovered. That hardly is 'nothing'. Is it calories? Is it fasting? Is it nutrient timing? You can't find out which from "no control", but there's definitely a physiological effect being seen, correct?

aaaxyz 6y ago
Is it climate change? Is it because the stock market went up 10%? Because Saturn's orbit crossed it's periphelion? Or more seriously, could it just be the Hawtorne effect? As you pointed out, without a control group, you cannot claim that any change in your measurements are due to anything. The fact that the researchers do attribute it to fasting is just bad science and makes me doubt the rest of their findings.
- marketingPro 6y ago
  If any of those happened, wouldn't the entire world see those physiological effects? Being a bit more realistic is the hawthorne effect, which can be easy to test with follow up experiments. My biggest takeaway isn't to do IF or cut calories, but rather it seems some phenomena was found. If you asked me if diet, fasting, etc... Would cute cancer, I'd have said NO! but this study has changed that answer to "I don't know". I suggest that is a huge difference and benefit.
andi999 6y ago
Well, could be a different thing altogether. This was probably done in Ramadan (the no-drinking thing, and the researches from Turkey as I saw in a different comment). So there would also be no smoking allowed for 14h per day. Maybe this has an effect.

aaaxyz 6y ago

Is it climate change? Is it because the stock market went up 10%? Because Saturn's orbit crossed it's periphelion? Or more seriously, could it just be the Hawtorne effect? As you pointed out, without a control group, you cannot claim that any change in your measurements are due to anything. The fact that the researchers do attribute it to fasting is just bad science and makes me doubt the rest of their findings.

marketingPro 6y ago
If any of those happened, wouldn't the entire world see those physiological effects? Being a bit more realistic is the hawthorne effect, which can be easy to test with follow up experiments. My biggest takeaway isn't to do IF or cut calories, but rather it seems some phenomena was found. If you asked me if diet, fasting, etc... Would cute cancer, I'd have said NO! but this study has changed that answer to "I don't know". I suggest that is a huge difference and benefit.

andi999 6y ago

Well, could be a different thing altogether. This was probably done in Ramadan (the no-drinking thing, and the researches from Turkey as I saw in a different comment). So there would also be no smoking allowed for 14h per day. Maybe this has an effect.