Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

unsettledscience.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 296 posts

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#161

Post by vrc »

baisq wrote: post #119
genghizkhan wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not enough fibre.

If you do keto, you are allowed to eat many vegetables that are rich in fibre. But if you follow a meat-only diet will make it really difficult to poop. I wonder how carnivorous animals do it. Are they constipated all the time?

I believe their stomach acids are far stronger, their bowels are a faster path to exit, and they often eat adjuncts which I assume help move things along.

Here’s a brief explanation from a member of Cornell faculty: http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2004-10/1096814276.Zo.r...

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#162

Post by chrisco255 »

swalsh wrote: post #160

My main issue with low carb is that humans have been eating carbs for thousands of years. The obesity epidemic is only decades old. I've seen enough evidence that low carb is working for people, so it would seem like something in the carbs we eat in particular is causing the problem... not carbs in general. We should significantly increase the science in this area in my opinion.

Your ancestors spent hundreds of calories a day farming those carbs in the fields. They didn't order it straight to their door via Uber Eats.

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#163

Post by api »

mreiner wrote: post #121

Interesting reports of individuals turning their life upside down. Just don't understand how they account for confounders and seem to make carbs responsible for everything that went wrong before their transition. But since sometimes it's those individual reports that get people to take action, I don't judge, happy for everyone taking charge of their health. There are many factors driving weigth loss or gain, the macr…

Too much carbohydrate creates issues, but I think the real culprit is sugar. The science is pretty solid there. Refined sugar can border on toxic.

Close behind sugar would be heavily processed carbohydrates like white bleached flour, etc., which are not that much better.

But there are of course confounding factors. There are people who eat more of this stuff and are healthy, but they seem to get a lot of exercise. That probably helps in multiple ways including burning up extra sugar quickly.

I'd hypothesize that high carb and especially high sugar diets are really unhealthy when coupled with a more sedentary lifestyle.

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#164

Post by poisonarena »

chrisco255 wrote: post #162
swalsh wrote: post #160

My main issue with low carb is that humans have been eating carbs for thousands of years. The obesity epidemic is only decades old. I've seen enough evidence that low carb is working for people, so it would seem like something in the carbs we eat in particular is causing the problem... not carbs in general. We should significantly increase the science in this area in my opinion.

Your ancestors spent hundreds of calories a day farming those carbs in the fields. They didn't order it straight to their door via Uber Eats.

i mean even in the 70s and 80s people werent ham planets like they are now

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#165

Post by phpisthebest »

namdnay wrote: post #134
strken wrote: post #109

I'm not convinced by some of the common beliefs about low-carb diets either. They seem to be good for weight loss[0] but bad for all-cause mortality[1]. If you're making dietary recommendations, it's hard to justify choosing a diet that makes the people who eat it skinnier and less diabetic but also kills some of them. I'm also not convinced that "low-carb" in the literature means you can draw conclusions about ketog…

yeah, obviously nutrition is far from being the only factor for their longevity and health in old age, but if you take the japanese diet, rice is a pretty major component in their calorie input...

The Japanese diet contains small portions of rice, which may translate into a major component of total calories because it is calorie dense

Like with most things food, portion control seems to be the biggest problem in the American Diet

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#166

Post by jasonhansel »

ncmncm wrote: post #142

I would be satisfied if the USDA recognized fructose as a toxin, and required labels to say how much fructose is in everything. We might then start seeing the things pumped full of sugar having glucose/dextrose instead. And, the greatest health crisis the UK and its former colonies has ever seen might then start winding down. If we can institute emergency measures for COVID-19, it seems like we ought to be able to do…

So...fruit would now be considered toxic? Fructose is naturally occurring.

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#167

Post by hackerfromthefu »

dgfitz wrote: post #135
eldenwrong wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans have been "listening" to their bodies for the past decades. Has it worked out for them? This is terrible advice sir

Surely you don’t mean that. You just stereotyped ~350M people, some of them are obese, and some of them world class athletes, and everywhere in between. What a thoughtless, low-effort comment to make.

"According to statistics, over 70% of Americans adults are either overweight or obese. "

https://www.livin3.com/obesity-statistics

https://www.tuwamari.com/blog/how-america-became-the-most-ob...

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#168

Post by fsflover »

ncmncm wrote: post #149
fsflover wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Organic food itself is a fraud as it doesn't actually mean anything. > Citations needed. Here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_food#Health_and_safety Quote for you: There is little scientific evidence of benefit or harm to human health from a diet high in organic food, and conducting any sort of rigorous experiment on the subject is very difficult.

That quote does not not support the assertion. And personal health was never the point of organic farming.

What was the point? Any links?

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#169

Post by goodpoint »

thelittleone wrote: post #32

Even without the science... for me personally at 47 and a life long sugar addict (used to eat tablespoons of white sugar from pantry), a low carb (keto) diet has been a complete game changer. I kept my weight in check by doing 6 days of exercise a week, but I was on an energetic roller coaster. 3 months in, no sugar, no cravings (I crave oils sometimes) and damn I just feel well in a way I haven't for long before I c…

> eat tablespoons of white sugar from pantry), a low carb (keto) diet

You jumped from an extreme diet to the opposite. Some societies (mostly US) have a very unhealthy sugar addiction and it should be avoided.

Equally, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketogenic_diet is meant to ameliorate epilepsy and it's not a safe diet to be adopted without medical supervision or without a real need.

It had been turned into an internet fad, like no-gluten diets and so on.

Also, just because you feel better it does not mean something is healthy.

EDIT: silent downvotes for saying this. Some cargoculting here...

Re: USDA ignoring the science on low-carb diets

#170

Post by gjvnq »

swalsh wrote: post #160

My main issue with low carb is that humans have been eating carbs for thousands of years. The obesity epidemic is only decades old. I've seen enough evidence that low carb is working for people, so it would seem like something in the carbs we eat in particular is causing the problem... not carbs in general. We should significantly increase the science in this area in my opinion.

The big issue is probably the "hidden carbs" in snacks and the vast amounts of sugar on everything.
Post reply on HN