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Oops. Turns out the Keyes hypothesis (fat = harmful) was awful science based on cherry-picked data. High-carb is actually the killer, and it's not a coincidenc

by thras 17y ago

Oops. Turns out the Keyes hypothesis (fat = harmful) was awful science based on cherry-picked data. High-carb is actually the killer, and it's not a coincidence that has our diet got higher and higher in simple carbohydrates, our obesity levels have tripled (since 1970). Of course, since we evolved to be hunter-gatherers and live off of high-fat, high-protein diets, it's sort of bizarre that medical professionals ever thought that high-carb was healthy in the first place. But that's what you get when you let doctors do the research instead of scientists. Iatrogenic disease has a long and sordid history.

daveungerer 17y ago
I'll forgive you guys for modding this up, as the article is quite poorly written - the author uses the terms "high glycemic index" and "high carb" interchangeably, when they are in fact vastly different. High carb: food that contains a lot of carbs, saying nothing about the effect on blood sugar. High glycemic index: carbs that cause blood sugar spikes. High glycemic load: the (very bad) combination of the above 2 factors. In other words, it's possible for one food with the exact same amount of carbs as another to have a much lower glycemic index. High-carb is NOT the killer. High GI carbs are. Low GI carbs are good for you. That is the point of the article.
- trapper 17y ago
  Correct - but tecnically all food causes a blood sugar "spike" - it's the rate of change, and potentially area under the curve that counts. We know the body treats glucose in the bloodstream like a poison in the sense that it tries it's damnedest to get it out. Interesting articles: http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14045678.php http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14045678.php http://darwinstable.wordpress.com/tag/glucose/ http://darwinstable.wordpress.com/tag/glucose/
  - daveungerer 17y ago
    If a graph has a spike, that implies "high rate of change". How high the peak is is all that really counts, as the body produces insulin in accordance to how high your blood sugar currently is - it has no way of knowing what the area under the curve will be in the end. And inevitably it overproduces if the peak is too high, since we are not evolved to deal with modern high GI carbs.
    - trapper 17y ago
      "How high the peak is is all that really counts". You severely underestimate the bodies predictive capability. There are 21+ pathways feeding into the insulin response system, all of them trying to prepare the internal system to get rid of glucose. Thought, taste, smell etc all contribute to our predictive capability. The point is that the body tries to predict the amount of glucose ingested to minimise peaks. A long term marker of the bodies success at this is hba1c. I'd love to see a reference for your last claim. Surely the mechanism of fat storage in periods of high sugar availability would be a desirable trait?
- thras 17y ago
  Are low-GI carbohydrate really "good" for you? Or are they not as bad for you as high-GI carbohydrate? Is chronically elevated sugar the problem or chronically elevated insulin? There's good evidence that both are very bad for you. And in that case, GI simply isn't enough.
  - daveungerer 17y ago
    Elevated insulin levels are the body's natural way of trying to deal with elevated blood sugar levels. They go hand in hand, so your question "is chronically elevated sugar the problem or chronically elevated insulin?" makes no sense. Low GI carbs are good because they release energy slowly, which means the blood sugar rises less but for a longer period, which doesn't strain your body's insulin production capabilities. Which means none of the complications normally associated with carbs, like weight gain, the need for even more high GI after a crash, diabetes, etc.
    - thras 17y ago
      Insulin is tied up in fat metabolism and is a necessary molecule to move FFAs into fat cells. Inject a person with insulin and they'll gain weight fast. The rates of the growth of many types of cancer seem to increase in the presence of insulin. Straining insulin production facilities may not be the real issue, as most people over-produce insulin (in response to all the high-GI carbohydrate they've eaten over their lifetime). A bigger problem is insulin insensitivity, which leads to high insulin levels. Yes, insulin "natural" but that's no argument. Fever is a natural response of the body too, but high fever can kill you. Now maybe the problem is what is called "low-GI." Stuff with GIs around 10 aren't that harmful. Green vegetables mainly. But get up to 30-50 (low-GI range) and you're nearly to white bread. The best advice, in the absence of better studies than we've got is probably: eat like your ancestors evolved to eat. They didn't have any of this crap. They didn't have breads or pastas. They didn't have vegetables like potatoes or corn. They ate a good amount of meat, a reasonable amount of green vegetables, nuts, and berries once or twice a year when they could get them.
      - hachiya 17y ago

by thras 17y ago

daveungerer 17y ago

I'll forgive you guys for modding this up, as the article is quite poorly written - the author uses the terms "high glycemic index" and "high carb" interchangeably, when they are in fact vastly different. High carb: food that contains a lot of carbs, saying nothing about the effect on blood sugar. High glycemic index: carbs that cause blood sugar spikes. High glycemic load: the (very bad) combination of the above 2 factors. In other words, it's possible for one food with the exact same amount of carbs as another to have a much lower glycemic index. High-carb is NOT the killer. High GI carbs are. Low GI carbs are good for you. That is the point of the article.

trapper 17y ago
Correct - but tecnically all food causes a blood sugar "spike" - it's the rate of change, and potentially area under the curve that counts. We know the body treats glucose in the bloodstream like a poison in the sense that it tries it's damnedest to get it out. Interesting articles: http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14045678.php http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14045678.php http://darwinstable.wordpress.com/tag/glucose/ http://darwinstable.wordpress.com/tag/glucose/
- daveungerer 17y ago
  If a graph has a spike, that implies "high rate of change". How high the peak is is all that really counts, as the body produces insulin in accordance to how high your blood sugar currently is - it has no way of knowing what the area under the curve will be in the end. And inevitably it overproduces if the peak is too high, since we are not evolved to deal with modern high GI carbs.
  - trapper 17y ago
    "How high the peak is is all that really counts". You severely underestimate the bodies predictive capability. There are 21+ pathways feeding into the insulin response system, all of them trying to prepare the internal system to get rid of glucose. Thought, taste, smell etc all contribute to our predictive capability. The point is that the body tries to predict the amount of glucose ingested to minimise peaks. A long term marker of the bodies success at this is hba1c. I'd love to see a reference for your last claim. Surely the mechanism of fat storage in periods of high sugar availability would be a desirable trait?
thras 17y ago
Are low-GI carbohydrate really "good" for you? Or are they not as bad for you as high-GI carbohydrate? Is chronically elevated sugar the problem or chronically elevated insulin? There's good evidence that both are very bad for you. And in that case, GI simply isn't enough.
- daveungerer 17y ago
  Elevated insulin levels are the body's natural way of trying to deal with elevated blood sugar levels. They go hand in hand, so your question "is chronically elevated sugar the problem or chronically elevated insulin?" makes no sense. Low GI carbs are good because they release energy slowly, which means the blood sugar rises less but for a longer period, which doesn't strain your body's insulin production capabilities. Which means none of the complications normally associated with carbs, like weight gain, the need for even more high GI after a crash, diabetes, etc.
  - thras 17y ago
    Insulin is tied up in fat metabolism and is a necessary molecule to move FFAs into fat cells. Inject a person with insulin and they'll gain weight fast. The rates of the growth of many types of cancer seem to increase in the presence of insulin. Straining insulin production facilities may not be the real issue, as most people over-produce insulin (in response to all the high-GI carbohydrate they've eaten over their lifetime). A bigger problem is insulin insensitivity, which leads to high insulin levels. Yes, insulin "natural" but that's no argument. Fever is a natural response of the body too, but high fever can kill you. Now maybe the problem is what is called "low-GI." Stuff with GIs around 10 aren't that harmful. Green vegetables mainly. But get up to 30-50 (low-GI range) and you're nearly to white bread. The best advice, in the absence of better studies than we've got is probably: eat like your ancestors evolved to eat. They didn't have any of this crap. They didn't have breads or pastas. They didn't have vegetables like potatoes or corn. They ate a good amount of meat, a reasonable amount of green vegetables, nuts, and berries once or twice a year when they could get them.
    - hachiya 17y ago