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Sugar Love

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Re: Sugar Love

#11

Post by InclinedPlane »

001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

Good points. Though it's actually not a zero sum game, it's worse than that. When you get down to it there's a very important link between the satiety/calorie ratio of food and weight gain. Sure you can talk about will power and so on, but those are higher order effects, it should be obvious that if there's a zero will power diet that frequently results in obesity and a zero will power diet which doesn't that's significantly more important than the idea that people can potentially starve themselves thin. The same sort of thing applies to wealth, for example, but nobody tells the poor to just acquire some will power and start spending less than they earn.

A lot of low fat foods end up being high in sugar and end up having lower satiety than "regular" foods. The perfect example being skim milk vs. whole milk. That's super important because it means that people can consume the same calories but still feel hungry with a "low fat" food. And then they are faced either with persistent feelings of hunger or to eat more until they feel full. Also, high sugar foods are easily converted into body fat, which just makes the problem that much worse.

Re: Sugar Love

#12

Post by ehsanu1 »

001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

Define a "balanced diet". For most, and in the conventional formulations, it's chock full of carbohydrates, and not much better than a "low-fat diet".

Re: Sugar Love

#13

Post by syntheticnature »

001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

The whole gluten free kick fries my brains. It exists because some people have an actual problem with gluten, but lots of people have jumped on the bandwagon since if it's on the label it must be for general health reasons. (Where are the "nut-free" folks? How about the folks that only eat things labelled "New and Improved?") Actual gluten issues have existed for a while -- I found a cookbook for those with Celiac disease from the 70s at a used book sale, but now it has a lot more attention.

This, of course, muddies the waters for those with an actual issue, as a bandwagoner gone gluten free won't have a reaction if they accidentally consume gluten. This leads to erroneous beliefs about what is/isn't gluten free.

Of course, this isn't unique to gluten. One can find plenty of people claiming to be vegetarian, even vegan, who solely refuse to eat red meat.

Re: Sugar Love

#14

Post by MisterBastahrd »

001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed that a balanced diet includes 5-7 servings of rice and grains a day, 2 servings of fruits and veggies, 2 servings of protein, and a small amount of fat.

That's one of the biggest problems here. What people have been taught is patently incorrect. It's a recipe for riding a blood sugar roller coaster.

We teach our kids from an early age to eat sugary foods. We use cartoon characters to goad them into begging their parents for them. What's cereal and milk? Most of the time, it's a sugar coated grain-based product soaked in a sugary liquid that is somehow healthier when you remove all the fat from it and add more sugar. What do kids want for a drink? Sunny Delight, a half-artificial sugar bomb which is nutritionally not much better for you than a can of soda. What do most kids get at school for lunch? Two enriched slices of bread surrounding a small piece of meat and some fried starch on the side. And more milk, because you can't ever have enough sugar to drink.

I can go on and on, but the point is, this starts with parents getting educated and taking charge of the eating habits of their kids.

Re: Sugar Love

#15

Post by js2 »

stefantalpalaru wrote: post #9

> [...] an injection of sugar into the bloodstream stimulates the same pleasure centers of the brain that respond to heroin and cocaine. All tasty foods do this to some extent—that’s why they’re tasty!—but sugar has a sharply pronounced effect. In this sense it is literally an addictive drug. Sugar doesn't get into the blood stream. Glucose does. Glucose is the only nutrient that neurons are using in normal condition…

Glucose is the only nutrient that neurons are using in normal conditions.

And to elaborate, the other is ketone bodies produced by the liver from fatty acids.

Their production occurs in healthy individuals as nutritional ketosis under a carbohydrate restricted diet (typically less than 100g/day) or in diabetics as the pathological condition ketoacidosis.

Re: Sugar Love

#17

Post by stefantalpalaru »

js2 wrote: post #15
stefantalpalaru wrote: post #9

> [...] an injection of sugar into the bloodstream stimulates the same pleasure centers of the brain that respond to heroin and cocaine. All tasty foods do this to some extent—that’s why they’re tasty!—but sugar has a sharply pronounced effect. In this sense it is literally an addictive drug. Sugar doesn't get into the blood stream. Glucose does. Glucose is the only nutrient that neurons are using in normal condition…

Glucose is the only nutrient that neurons are using in normal conditions. And to elaborate, the other is ketone bodies produced by the liver from fatty acids. Their production occurs in healthy individuals as nutritional ketosis under a carbohydrate restricted diet (typically less than 100g/day) or in diabetics as the pathological condition ketoacidosis.

Not ketone bodies, but lactate. More details in this article titled: Energy Substrates for Neurons During Neural Activity: A Critical Review of the Astrocyte-Neuron Lactate Shuttle Hypothesis[1]:

> The brain can consume lactate as a substrate, as has been demonstrated by studies showing that the brain uses lactate during hypoglycemia or during periods of elevated blood lactate [...]

> However, because lactate does not pass through the blood-brain barrier nearly as well as glucose [...], lactate cannot serve the brain as a blood-borne substrate the way glucose does.

[1]: http://www.nature.com/jcbfm/journal/v23/n11/full/9591474a.ht...

Re: Sugar Love

#18

Post by crusso »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #14
001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed that a balanced diet includes 5-7 servings of rice and grains a day, 2 servings of fruits and veggies, 2 servings of protein, and a small amount of fat. That's one of the biggest problems here. What people have been taught is patently incorrect. It's a recipe for riding a blood sugar roller coaster. We teach our kids from an early age to eat sugary foods. We us…

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed

This is what sets my alarm bells off the most loudly. When I was growing up in the 70s and 80s, we heard over and over how the science was settled. Fat was bad for you. Nutritionists the world over were supposedly on board with the food pyramid. Contrarians like Atkins who had objections to the science and advocated something different were ignored -- or to the extent that they received media attention, they were ridiculed or held up as misguided or frauds.

It was an extremely painful and costly example of top-down, politically motivated, government funded "science". Although we learned some lessons about sugar vs fat vs protein, society learned almost nothing about avoiding this kind of trap again in the future.

Re: Sugar Love

#19

Post by grannyg00se »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #14
001sky wrote: post #7

Americans are fat because they eat too much and exercise too little. But they eat too much and exercise too little because they’re addicted to sugar, which not only makes them fatter but, after the initial sugar rush, also saps their energy, beaching them on the couch. “The reason you’re watching TV is not because TV is so good,” he said, “but because you have no energy to exercise, because you’re eating too much sug…

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed that a balanced diet includes 5-7 servings of rice and grains a day, 2 servings of fruits and veggies, 2 servings of protein, and a small amount of fat. That's one of the biggest problems here. What people have been taught is patently incorrect. It's a recipe for riding a blood sugar roller coaster. We teach our kids from an early age to eat sugary foods. We us…

"Parents getting educated"

I think most of us know that sugar cereals are bad, sunnyd is fake and disgusting, and soda is poison. The problem is we just don't care. At least that's what it looks like. When you see an obese child whose parents are also obese and they're all happily consuming their favorite poisonous snack do you see that as an educational challenge? I see it more as a discipline problem.

Re: Sugar Love

#20

Post by sparkie »

crusso wrote: post #18
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed that a balanced diet includes 5-7 servings of rice and grains a day, 2 servings of fruits and veggies, 2 servings of protein, and a small amount of fat. That's one of the biggest problems here. What people have been taught is patently incorrect. It's a recipe for riding a blood sugar roller coaster. We teach our kids from an early age to eat sugary foods. We us…

Balanced diet? For the longest time, the FDA has claimed This is what sets my alarm bells off the most loudly. When I was growing up in the 70s and 80s, we heard over and over how the science was settled. Fat was bad for you. Nutritionists the world over were supposedly on board with the food pyramid. Contrarians like Atkins who had objections to the science and advocated something different were ignored -- or to the…

I see quite a striking parallel in the way AGW "denialists" are treated similarly to how the likes of Yudkin were treated for speaking out against the dogmatic ideas of health "science".

Very few scientists today speak out against the "climate change" dogma out of fear of losing their jobs, status among their peers, or funding - and those who dare are ridiculed, despite having published peer reviewed science (although little of it gets into established journals). There's no such thing as "settled science", and the term alone should set alarm bells ringing.

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