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Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

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Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#21

I've heard a talk recently by a guy who works with scientists who do calorie restriction experiments. What he said is an eye-opener. The animals look healthier but they don't live longer. They don't seem to die of age, but they do just drop dead one day, not always from any obvious cause at all - although they seem particularly susceptible to infections. His hypothesis was that calorie restriction works by forcing th…

Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing. --Redd Foxx

Being one of those Health Nuts, I practice CR during the weekdays, and let my self go (relatively) on the weekends, I'd recommend that anyone try it for a month. The first week is the hardest, but you will feel a lot more in tune w/ your body.

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#22
post #20

I've heard a talk recently by a guy who works with scientists who do calorie restriction experiments. What he said is an eye-opener. The animals look healthier but they don't live longer. They don't seem to die of age, but they do just drop dead one day, not always from any obvious cause at all - although they seem particularly susceptible to infections. His hypothesis was that calorie restriction works by forcing th…

Slack and crud?

I'm paraphrasing because I'm not a scientist.

Slack = various sorts of resources, including immune resources.

Crud = inter- and intra-cellular unwanted buildup of proteins, failing cells, non-reversible damage, yadda yadda. It all gets torn up and coincidentally cleaned up by the body's panic for materiel.

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#23

Basically, rhesus monkeys on a restricted calorie diet only lived longer if you remove "non-aging related deaths" . But some of those deaths (eg, dying under anesthesia during a blood test) could have links to their diet, so removing them is just withdrawing non-supporting evidence to prove your (pharma-funded) hypothesis. In other news, riding your bike to work is considered safer than driving a car ... once we remo…

could have links to their diet Replace that with could have been caused by aliens to see how ridiculous that sort of claim is. There is no reason to suppose that dying under anesthesia is related to the diet. Also your analogy doesn't make any sense. Perhaps if they removed bikers that died in traffic accidents while not riding a bike . And then you could argue 'bikers behave differently in traffic, so perhaps biking…

> There is no reason to suppose that dying under anesthesia is related to the diet.

If monkeys in one group were more likely to die under anesthesia than monkeys in a different group, I'd suspect that something is going on. (Being unimaginative, I'd exclude the possibility that dying under anesthesia causes a low calorie diet.)

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#24

I've heard a talk recently by a guy who works with scientists who do calorie restriction experiments. What he said is an eye-opener. The animals look healthier but they don't live longer. They don't seem to die of age, but they do just drop dead one day, not always from any obvious cause at all - although they seem particularly susceptible to infections. His hypothesis was that calorie restriction works by forcing th…

What a wonderful... anecdote.

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#25
post #7

There was a recent study online, about how moderately overweight people have a slightly lower mortality rate than those with "normal" weight. The problems are with the morbidly obese end of the spectrum. I can't find the study (anyone recall it?), but it seems compatible with the implication of this submission, that while being overweight might increase "age-related" deaths, it protects you against the others.

Here is a Hacker News thread about the finding you mention:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=675671

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#27
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

could have links to their diet Replace that with could have been caused by aliens to see how ridiculous that sort of claim is. There is no reason to suppose that dying under anesthesia is related to the diet. Also your analogy doesn't make any sense. Perhaps if they removed bikers that died in traffic accidents while not riding a bike . And then you could argue 'bikers behave differently in traffic, so perhaps biking…

> There is no reason to suppose that dying under anesthesia is related to the diet. If monkeys in one group were more likely to die under anesthesia than monkeys in a different group, I'd suspect that something is going on. (Being unimaginative, I'd exclude the possibility that dying under anesthesia causes a low calorie diet.)

If two monkeys in one group died under anesthesia, that doesn't constitute ground to conclude they were more likely to die: it is simply not statistically significant. Hence you may subtract them from the age related deaths.

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#28
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

could have links to their diet Replace that with could have been caused by aliens to see how ridiculous that sort of claim is. There is no reason to suppose that dying under anesthesia is related to the diet. Also your analogy doesn't make any sense. Perhaps if they removed bikers that died in traffic accidents while not riding a bike . And then you could argue 'bikers behave differently in traffic, so perhaps biking…

I haven't read the studies. Still, why isn't it reasonable to think that a monkey that eats too little will die more readily under stress? You can remove clearly unrelated causes (e.g. monkeys run over by bicyclists), but it's not nearly so clear for anesthesia.

Because the monkeys weren't being underfed and it's a straw man to suggest they were. Tibetan monks get by on much less food than we do and they will still kick our asses anytime.

Re: Calorie restrictive eating for longer life? The story we didn’t hear in the news

#30
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't read the studies. Still, why isn't it reasonable to think that a monkey that eats too little will die more readily under stress? You can remove clearly unrelated causes (e.g. monkeys run over by bicyclists), but it's not nearly so clear for anesthesia.

Because the monkeys weren't being underfed and it's a straw man to suggest they were. Tibetan monks get by on much less food than we do and they will still kick our asses anytime.

You're assuming that a monkey that eats 20% less than a monkey that's given the choice to eat as much as it wants necessarily isn't underfed? Maybe. But without some other research that I've missed, that really begs the question.

I think anyone living in a western country has enough data to realize that people eating a western diet tend to be overfed, so the comparison between westerners and Tibetan monks has little to do with monkeys.

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