I’m not really sure what your point is. My very first cite from Liz Aplegate says much the same thing as you are quoting from Harvard. That is, some fats are good, some carbs are bad
The USDA food period, while certainly mainstream isn’t exactly on the cutting edge of nutrition and health.
I wouldn’t say the USDA food period is a joke but… Yeah, ok I would say it’s a joke.
In fact, there was a pretty funny article in Runner’s World a few months ago about a guy attempting to actually follow the USDA food pyramid for an entire week.
Around day four after falling hopelessly behind (not being able to gag down the vast quantity of food the pyramid demands,) he decided he could no longer choke down any more bread and so pronounced beer both a “grain,” and a “vegetable.”
He also had a problem with the quantity of meat and dairy on the thing.
So, telling me that the food pyramid is a bit off is a hardly a revelation.
You also tend to be repeating some of the things I’ve been saying as if they are a refutation or my criticism of Atkins. They are not.
I.e. -Americans tend to eat way to many carbs. I said that. Some fats are good, some carbs are bad. I said that.
Those articles didn’t just support one view or the other, Scylla. Scylla. I thought they were informative articles to add to this discussion.
You said,
My point is that the latest research from eminant scientists in the field of nutrition supports recommendations that are indeed contrary to what the mainstream nutritional guides have said. The head of the Harvard School of Medicine Nutrition Dept. seems to think this is new information, anyway. The pyramid IS/WAS the mainstream message. The latest information - not just from fad dietary gurus - suggests that we eat too many carbs, even way too many complex carbs. And that we should eat more protein and more (good) fats than has previously been recommended. Used to be that we were supposed to eat all the grains we could and should cut down on protein and avoid fat, except in miniscule amounts.
And if Atkins works for somebody - and apparently it has worked for a lot of people, who feel healthier and have lost weight - what good does it do to bash it? The fact is that it is inspiring a lot of further study about nutrition, which can only be a good thing.
But that’s the prob. It hasn’t. Again, according to that study cited, less than 3% of people who make a successful long term weight loss do it on Atkins.
That’s a bad number.
Atkins’ centers, do not keep long term weight loss records.
A diet that makes people lose weight quickly and in the short-term only to gain it back, is neither new nor helpful.
Perhaps I’m missing something. I just read the last few posts. But isn’t this statistic irrelevant to whether Atkin’s works? What if only 3% of the people who made a successfull long term weight loss even tried Atkins . That would give Atkin’s a 100% success rate.
The problem with that theory is the number of sales claimed by Atkins regarding his books. They’ve been in print since the 70’s and have sold millions of copies. Atkins also claims tens of thousands of sucess at the Atkins’ clinic. These numbers should show somewhere, but they don’t.
In fact, one of the more touted studies of Atkins vs. low-fat (one where its short term advantages are played up) the results are actually almost invalid due to the sheer number of people dropping out of the Atkins part of the program.
It’s not a theory, it’s basic reasoning about statistics. If the Atkins diet is really hard to be on, or unpopular, or nonworking in some way, there’s ways to measure that. The quoted statistic is not it, though, since it doesn’t tell you anything about any of those measures.
I can’t seem to find Scylla’s link to the study that produced that statistic. My question is whether WeightWatchers was also evaluated? Or the Zone? What we need here are a number of different statistics:
The rate of success per population of those who used Atkins for weight loss (and over what period of time)
The rates of success per population of those who used WeightWatchers/exercise/either-or/etc.
The dropout rate for each of the diets
Among those who successfully lost weight and kept it off, the percent that followed each diet and/or counseling and/or exercise regimen.
We also need to know how overweight these people were and how many pounds they took off, whether they reached their “goal” weights, etc.
My guess is that none of the diets were all that successful over the longterm.
I see mostly descriptive studies here - not true prospective and retrospective studies of large numbers of people. I know there have been some studies of large numbers of persons trying to lose weight that give drop out rates, success rates, success over time, etc. Am I missing this on that site?
Twas I who used the term “clean” carb, and you’re right I was using it meaning mostly “raw” foods, I also was the one who posted about the clean carbs being “slow burners” and helping prevent these “spikes”.
But then Scylla followed up on the whole thing with some great info too.
(I agree with about 99% of what he has to say, but like all professions, opinions will differ occasionally.:D)
I have an old saying, I think I learned it back in HS Home Ec.
It’s:
“The whiter the bread, the sooner you’re dead”. Our home ec teacher told us (I don’t have a cite, so this could be an old wive’s tale) that the way that they make white flour is to bleach it using formaldehyde. UGH!!
I think that the closer to “whole” a food is, the better it probably is for a person’s health. Of course that’s probably REALLY stating the obvious!
PS, I think we’re going to have to move this thread to IMHO, or GQ or something, it’s become SO polite!!!
Well, continuing to follow Atkins’ principles (or whoever coined them, i.e., no white flour, no sugar/caloric sweeteners, limited fruit, low carbs), and ate still ate like a pig this weekend, I still lost weight! I have now lost almost 7 pounds since I started almost two weeks ago!
Any negatives? Honestly, a little constipation (not much), and some heartburn. But the positives WAY outweigh the negatives - feel better, more energy, look better, etc.
nisobar, I’ve never bothered to check by keeping track of my calorie count on any given day, but I susect there are times when I feel like I “eat like a pig”, when in fact, my calorie intake is not all that high. You see (this is just my WAG), I suspect that these foods are so satisfying that it feels like I’m over-indulging, when, in fact, I’m getting just what my body needs, when I need it.
As for the constipation, try taking Metamucil capsules, two with each meal, until your body adjusts. One of the ways my body protested the loss of white carbs was to get constipated (didn’t make sense, since I was eating more veggies than ever), and hubby had the same problem. We both ended up taking these capsules for about 4 or 5 days, until our bodies adjusted. All has run smoothly (hehe) ever since.
I’ll WAG that any diet that requires commitment over the long run, constraint, and moderation will be hard to stick to because American culture is based on a fantasy of instant, spectacular results with little effort. Also, American culture is bad at the idea of in-betweens–either you’re a winner or a loser.
I’ve lost and kept off 48 pounds since January. I’ve done nothing that is very difficult, except to be consistent even when I don’t feel like it. People I barely know beseige me at work, begging to know my “secret.” It’s interesting that when I describe what I’ve been doing (in summary: Moderate exercise before breakfast and 10 minutes after each meal; moderate fat and protein; high unrefined carbohydrates, no refined carbohydrates; vitamins and supplements), most peoples’ eyes glaze over and they dismiss this with “I could never do that.”
I think we’re talking about two big factors here: What actually helps a particular person be in better health, and what that person believes is reasonably possibile. A healthy diet for a given individual is very hard to determine, and sources of information are biased–e.g., the American Diabetes Association does not recommend my diet/exercise plan, though it has resulted for me in blood sugars in the normal range, and is supported by JAMA. And, nobody’s going to stay on a diet that doesn’t seem doable to that person.
Hey I have a way to solve starvation in ethiopea!!! Feed starving ethiopeans with obese americans!!! Think of it we’d be doing a good deed and saving money by having narrower stairs in new buildings.
I also think that obese people can be a very efficient renewable source of energy but I don’t know how to implement that yet.
Let me end this post with a Winston Churchill quote:
“If you are fat you have to be friendly and kind because you can’t fight very well or run very fast”
