[Not sure which forum to put this in, so it goes here by default]
Linoleic acid is an essential fatty acid found in most, if not all, edible oils, especially vegetable oils. It turns out that too much of this stuff will cause overeating leading to weight gain. And, no surprise, your typical American diet of today has too much.
So what to do? You do need some of the stuff (that’s what “essential” means), so you don’t want to avoid all oils. But it’s best to avoid those with lots of it. Many vegetable oils are made of 50% or more linoleic acid, as shown in the list in the first link. Safflower oil, sunflower oil, corn oil, soybean oil and a number of other less commonly used oils are all in this category. Peanut oil (32%) is not so bad, as is canola oil (21%). The best commonly used oil is olive oil at only 10% (why is this not a surprise?). Palm oil is also that low, but it has other problems (i.e. saturated fat).
The last line in that abstract (2nd link) says you can also avoid the weight gain by consuming EPA and DHA. Those turn out to be omega-3 fatty acids. So some fish in the diet may help, although that’s not going to do much for us vegetarians.
PS Chocolate lovers will be pleased to note that cocoa butter has even less than olive oil.
Back in the day, when people seemed to have fewer problems with weight, animal fats were more common in the diet of non-vegetarians. Then animal fats were demonized.
The real solution to all this is DON’T eat a “typical American diet”. More fruits and vegetables, some legumes, some grains, animal flesh (if eaten) in moderation. The less processed the better. Don’t be afraid of a little fat in the diet, it is, as you point out, essential to have some.
Personally, I think it’s as much too much fat and sugar in the diet, often hidden in processed foods, as the overall quantity of food.
And dairy butter lower still! I’m feeling better about butter all the time! (I mean I’m feeling better all the time, not eating butter all the time. Well, actually, I am eating butter all the time, but still…)
Nothing wrong with butter - in moderation. Meaning small quantities. You’re better off (IMHO) with a cookie made with real butter with all the wonderful flavor than a half dozen “low fat” cookies that taste like sugared cardboard.
Of course, some people have issues with “moderation” - I’ve known a number of people who just keep eating if food is in front of them until the food is all gone, it’s like they’re not even aware they’re doing that. Their problem isn’t so much what they’re eating as their “off” switch is faulty. You could put the healthiest food on earth in front of them and they’d still overeat.
I have binge eating disorder and have since I was a teen (I’m 51 now!)
in very large part, it happened because of the way processed carbs work on our bodies. anything high on the glycemic index (candy, baked potato, Ritz cracker) does the same thing - fast increase in blood sugar followed by a big rush of insulin.
Ultimately, hand wringing about processed foods, linoleic acid, carbs, corn syrup and the like aside, it all boils down to:
If calories in > calories expended, then that extra amount translates directly to a specific amount of fat- i.e. 3500 calories = 1 lb of fat.
My personal opinion is that it’s portion size creep that’s making everyone fat, not anything in particular about the food itself.
Think about it. If in say… 1990, you went to a fast food restaurant and ordered a “medium” soda, you’d likely get something between 12 and 16 oz, with the “small” being something about 8-10 oz, and the large being probably 20-25 oz. A 32 oz “Big Gulp” was really big- it was the largest drink in general until the late 1990s, when a 44 oz became popular.
Same thing goes for food- back in the day, the Quarter Pounder and Big Mac were the largest hamburgers that McDonalds served, and one of either was generally considered sufficient for a grown man.
Now we have absurdities like the Baconator at Wendy’s that is marketed with a straight face as a reasonable burger.
This, and an increasingly sedentary lifestyle. Although, some of the stuff put into food IS bad for you, no doubt about that, like partially hydrogenated vegetable oils (supposedly healthier than animal fat; incidentally, not all saturated fat is bad, stearic acid lowers LDL cholesterol while lauric acidincreases HDL more than any other fat; the bad stuff is palmitic acid, a major component of palm oil, which makes it rather unhealthy, although it is also found in other sources of saturated fat, but they usually contain the others as well). Studies have also found possible links between excessive omega-6 consumption (that includes linoleic acid, among others). As Wikipedia puts it:
That makes it sound as if omega-6s are the main cause of all of the chronic diseases today (“prothrombotic, proinflammatory and proconstrictive” sounds like the recipe for heart disease); the same article has an interesting passage on the true essential-ness of linoleic acid.
It is also known that processed foods (not exclusively) are bad for you, and not necessarily because they have too much sugar, sodium (of course, recent studies have found that sodium isn’t as bad as widely thought) or fat and lack vitamins lost through processing (although when compared to fresh vegetables, even canned vegetables aren’t much different unless you eat them raw and soon after being picked, although processing like bleached wheat flour does remove a lot of nutrients, even after “enriching”); this study found that only processed red meat (and other forms of processed/cured meat) was linked to heart disease and diabetes, others have found the same for cancer.
People should not be panicking, or making lifestyle changes, on the basis of individual scientific research reports. Most reported scientific findings (in any area) are wrong.
Your bod’s like any other machine: garbage in, garbage out.
Would you put soda in your gas tank? No? Why not? OOOOOH…because the car can’t use it and it’ll mess it up. Gotcha.
It’s really that simple.
And I say this while eating cheetos, so I know of what I speak.
It’s what Michael Pollan describes as ‘‘nutritionism’’ - the idea that foods are merely the sum of their nutrient parts. First we’re supposed to eat low-fat, but the low-fat foods resulted in the even nastier trans-fats. Then we’re not supposed to eat carbs. Now linoleic acid.
I have come to realize this is a very profitable business, the idea that there is some health secret, some weight loss secret as yet to be determined. What it basically comes down to is eating stuff you already know is good for you. I realize, as a person who is constantly struggling with my own weight, that this is easier said than done. But that’s just the reality. If it’s actual food, eat it. If it’s made-up processed junk, don’t eat it. The trick is getting there.
(Yeah, I totally just finished reading ‘‘In Defense of Food’’ - for the second time.)
I didn’t know that. But then I spend most of my time in GQ.
Animal fats seem to be fairly low in linoleic acid. They aren’t going to be a problem.
It’s possible that certain foods, or rather an excess of them and linoleic acid may be one of them, do mess up the bodies “off switch”. Another is artificial sweeteners, which confuse the appetite on/off switch because it expects sweet foods to have a certain amount of energy. There have been studies showing that people who consume artificial sweeteners (especially diet soft drinks) tend to gain more weight than those who don’t.
I agree. All scientific results should be verified by other scientists before being accepted. This is not an exception. But note that if verified, it doesn’t actually change any mainstream dietary recommendations. Rather it’s delving into why those recommendations are the way they are. That makes me think that the results will, in fact, be verified.
