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The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

bbc.com

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Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#101

Post by chiefalchemist »

dghughes wrote: post #67
chiefalchemist wrote: post #42

A few thoughts. It seems that "calorie restriction" is a misleading term. If these funds are correct, CR should be considered the norm/ideal. That means the majority, currently, over-consume. That aside. I wonder if it's also related to modern food, and the production there of. If inflammation is the root of most disease, and CR, I presume, reduces inflammation, then what is it about our foods that trigger so much in…

A CRON or calorie restriction optimal nutrition diet is a thing, not only eating fewer calories but what you do eat has to be absolutely perfect in nutrition. Micheal Mosley on BBC interviewed a CRON advocate he are an apple peel but threw away the inner part. I've read that a rumbling stomach is necessary for gut health without it your microbiome suffers, CR may incidentally do that.

Yes. The arc of my point, kinda, was that we eat for what we perceive as nutritional. When we should really focus (more) on eating for our gut.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#102

Post by Cyph0n »

jpatokal wrote: post #98
dpark wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about it?

Ramadan is popularly associated with gaining weight, because people tend to binge before dawn and after sunset and are more sedentary than usual. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/07/cairo-the-...

Middle Eastern cuisine doesn't help either. Most of our food is high in carbs and fats, and we eat a ton of bread!

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#103

Post by KGIII »

SwellJoe wrote: post #66
pors wrote: post #52

There is lots of proof now that obesity is not caused by "more calories in than calories out", it is caused by hormone reactions to what you eat (esp. insulin). Just read the books by Gary Taubs for zillions of details and references to studies. So the "eat less" claim in this article is again back to the old MD advice, "eat less and move more". Not going to work if you don't look at your macronutrients.

That's an oversimplification. Hormone response is not well-understood enough to make blanket statements like that, as far as I know. There's been tons of research on diets. Low-carb high-protein diets certainly do work, but so do several other diets, including some of the traditional "eat less calories" diets (the research I've seen indicates those diets are on par with Atkins and keto in terms of long-term weight lo…

At the same time, I eat what I want and when I want to. I have been 172 pounds, with some exceptions, since I was about 18. I am retired and almost 60.

I am active but not for the sake of fitness. The only time my weight really changes is when I am sick.

My physician doesn't know, I don't know, and it is just how it is for me. I've tried to pound calories into me, but I pretty much stay at 172 pounds. Why 172? I have no idea. I can get on the scale and that's usually what it reads, within maybe two pounds.

If I eat less, I stay the same unless I really, really eat less - like go on a binge of illegal substances type of not eating. I dunno?

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#104

Post by dpark »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #94
dpark wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If these funds are correct, CR should be considered the norm/ideal. That means the majority, currently, over-consume. If we found that consuming a quart of squid ink daily extended life by 20%, we wouldn't call that "the norm". The norm is what people actually do. "Ideal" is extremely subjective, as "never satiated" is a tough steady state for most people. > If inflammation is the root of most disease That's a pret…

Ok. Fair enough. Allow me to clarify. I was speaking of norm for the body, not norm of what most people do. In any case, my point was "restriction" isn't a restriction if you're over-consuming to begin with. It's a language/communication issue. Telling people to reduce (when they think they're normal") is, imho, the wrong message. We've normalized obesity by, to some extent, allowing people to believe obesity is perf…

> I was speaking of norm for the body, not norm of what most people do. In any case, my point was "restriction" isn't a restriction if you're over-consuming to begin with. It's a language/communication issue. Telling people to reduce (when they think they're normal") is, imho, the wrong message. We've normalized obesity by, to some extent, allowing people to believe obesity is perfectly normal.

Almost no one actually thinks obesity is normal. a very small set of people argue it's healthy, but that is a tiny minority.

As for "norm", caloric restriction is not about being normal weight. Caloric restriction is about cutting calories significantly below the level needed to maintain a normal weight. I don't see any way to argue that this is "normal".

> As for sedentary lifestyle and obesity...those are symptoms. What happens in the body is, often, inflammation. Inflammation in turn gets manifested as various diseases. Obesity is not what kills you per se. But it does trigger various things (often rooted in inflammation) that will.

All indications are that sedentary lifestyle is a root cause, not a symptom. Obesity is perhaps a symptom, but sedentary lifestyle is a step before that.

I don't believe there's actually any evidence for the claim that inflammation is the root issue for most disease. I get the distinct impression that this is a pseudoscience claim made by people who are selling quick fixes (as opposed to the diet and exercise people already know they need). "Inflammation" is almost a magical claim. It sounds scientific but there doesn't generally seem to be any actual science behind claims of inflammation causing arbitrary health issues.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#106

Post by dpark »

listentojohan wrote: post #78
cyrusshepard wrote: post #37

Good overview of the benefits of calorie restriction, but doesn't touch on two of the most important schools of thought of the past couple years. 1. Calorie restriction is almost impossible for most humans to follow long term 2. Many of the same benefits of calorie restriction may be achievable through intermittent fasting, which is much easier for people to follow. I've been experimenting with a daily 16 hour fast (…

Have thought about the fasting as well, but isn't it basically the same as skipping breakfast?

Yes, most people "doing IF" are just skipping breakfast. There are other styles but of course adherence is lower because skipping breakfast is easy and actually fasting for extended periods of time is hard.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#107

Post by aianus »

coldtea wrote: post #71
louprado wrote: post #12

My father has had a low calorie diet all of his life. At 78, he is in perfect physical and mental condition. His doctor had only one concern; he is slowly losing weight each year and needs to reverse that. The doctor wanted to prescribe an appetite enhancing drug but my father explained he can not simply gain weight by eating more. It's as if his digestive system is already at a maximum threshold. I wonder if habitua…

> The doctor wanted to prescribe an appetite enhancing drug but my father explained he can not simply gain weight by eating more. It's as if his digestive system is already at a maximum threshold. Well, actually he can. It's not 100% just calories in/calories out, but it's very much that. If he eats potato chips and fries and lard every day he WILL gain weight.

Although this is true, I can say from personal experience that my body will ramp up the vomiting and diarrhea to keep the weight gain to a minimum.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#108

Post by codingdave »

pors wrote: post #52

There is lots of proof now that obesity is not caused by "more calories in than calories out", it is caused by hormone reactions to what you eat (esp. insulin). Just read the books by Gary Taubs for zillions of details and references to studies. So the "eat less" claim in this article is again back to the old MD advice, "eat less and move more". Not going to work if you don't look at your macronutrients.

That doesn't mean that "more calories in than calories out" is wrong... it means that "calories out" is FAR more complex than people give it credit for. We don't even know all the variables yet. Taubs' writings do bring to light some of our unknowns. We keep finding more variables for the equation, but that doesn't mean the equation is wrong... just incomplete.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#109

Post by discreteevent »

dpark wrote: post #89
oh_sigh wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any source of proof of any of this? I have no problem waking up at 630am after 7 hours of sleep and not eating anything until after noon. Thinking to premodern humans, do you think they would frequently have food waiting for them as soon as they awoke? Some days maybe, but then other days probably not.

> Do you have any source of proof of any of this? Of course not. There's never been any significant evidence of health benefits from breakfast.

Firstly, you weren't asked the question. Secondly, you don't answer it. Proof was asked for yet you confidently come in with "Of course not" and no evidence or proof, for or against.

Re: The secret to a long and healthy life? Eat less

#110

Post by ams6110 »

Cyph0n wrote: post #84
dpark wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many of the same benefits of calorie restriction may be achievable through intermittent fasting, which is much easier for people to follow. I've been experimenting with a daily 16 hour fast Citation? I can't get the NIH study to load, but the other two are wildly different from 16/8 IF. IF proponents like to look at alternate day fasting or periodic weekly fasting and claim evidence for the effectiveness of 16/8 fa…

How about skipping breakfast and lunch, as done by Muslims during Ramadan? In general, Islam recommends voluntary fasting for 2 days every week (traditionally Monday and Thursday).

It's probably better to skip breakfast and dinner, and eat only at mid-day. You're still generally active for hours after the mid-day meal, so you don't have the tendency to gorge and then curl up on the couch or go to bed.
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