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The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

nytimes.com

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Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#191

Post by omegaworks »

dreamdu5t wrote: post #133
omegaworks wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The human body has mechanisms for making you Hurt Real Bad when you don't have more calories coming in then going out. Maybe your ancestors had more reliable access to food resources and didn't have to develop these responses. The human population on this planet is incredibly varied. Good for you that you and the people in your social network do well following what you describe as a calorie-restricted diet. The self-…

The science is pretty basic. It's the law of thermodynamics. Your body can't magically create fat or other weight from calories you don't have.

>The science is pretty basic.

Actually it's not. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolism

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#192

Post by omegaworks »

potatolicious wrote: post #152
grhino wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The number of calories are measured in a food using a bomb calorimeter can be different from how many calories of the digested food are available for use to the human body. Also, some foods require more energy to be broken down. Some foods can trigger secondary effects that change behavior which could alter metabolism. Now, I think those secondary considerations have a small impact on overall calorie consumption. For…

I don't think that's really OP's point. The point isn't that 1 calorie for me = 1 calorie for you. We know for a fact that the digestive performance of people can vary greatly, and caloric use varies greatly also depending on person and activity level. The high variance is really besides the point, which is that if you are gaining weight, you are consuming too much for your current situation . You can either work to…

>You can either work to expend more, or reduce your intake, both of which are perfectly reasonable options.

Perhaps I should be more clear: Your body has mechanisms for defeating your ability to work to expend more (fatigue), and driving you to eat (cravings, hunger pangs). I'm not arguing with your basic premise: you must consume less then you expend. I'm arguing with your "calorie is a calorie" dogma. For insulin insensitive people (read: overweight people), 1 calorie of fat will satisfy you more (turning on the satiety mechanism) better then 1 calorie of sugar will.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#193

Post by kamaal »

teyc wrote: post #153
jmj42 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've not found it difficult to get my kids (2 teenage daughters) to consistently eat healthy foods. Hell, we can't keep fresh fruits and vegetables in the house. A one pound bag of baby carrots lasts about a week, one pound bunch of bananas: about 3 days, a pint of blue berries: About an hour (blue berries never last long at our house). The list goes on, but that's not the point. I don't think it's really a responsib…

I've two teenage kids albeit a little younger than yours. I found one way to hack their stomach share is to stick cut fruits/carrots on the table when they're doing homework. Another technique is to introduce subtle variety into the shapes, kind of like how pop songs have the same tune but a lot of work goes into varying the accompaniment. With carrots, give them a mix varying thickness, length, tapers etc. Observe h…

>>It is because the people have a different preferred set point. If you serve them typical American desert, they will actually react in disgust because it is overpowering.

As a Indian I realize how true this is. People from my workplace generally bring chocolates when they come back from the US work assignment. I find it strange that chocolates are so cheap and easily accessible in the US.

I find that as an over dose of sugar. I mean one chocolate down and I don't feel like I need sugar for the next 2 days. That is how much I feel full and yet I see kids in US munching them all the time.

Its just how you are seasoning your body to it.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#194

Post by shanev »

Goladus wrote: post #174
shanev wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me clear that up. The biochemistry of obesity is not trivial, but knowing what to eat to control your weight is not hard. It just takes some research and self experimentation. It's empowering when you figure out how certain foods affect you. I'm at a point where if I want a six pack again, I know exactly what to eat and for how long. I understand the makeup of most of the foods I eat and understand the consequenc…

Paleo isn't the only other option to the "Standard American Diet." Sure it's one answer, but the Paleo fear of agriculture can get a bit extreme. People in the US have been living to healthy ages for a long time despite eating lots of wheat, corn, rice, potatoes, and dairy products.

If you discovered a new species of ape, and wanted to put it in a zoo, what would you feed it? Would you try random things, or would you try to emulate what it ate in the wild? This is what paleo is attempting to do for humans. Agriculture is just a drop in the bucket compared to how long we've been eating an ancestral diet. Modern paleo folk don't fear agriculture. They just want to get back to a system of small, local, organic, sustainable farms, and away from GMO crops and factory farming. More Joe Salatin's Polyface farms, less Monsanto/ADM.

Sure you can sustain yourself on grains, but why would you do that when you can thrive on paleo? Hunter-gatheres were stronger and 4 inches taller than the farmers that followed. Keep in mind that modern wheat is nothing like our grandparents' wheat. Modern wheat is a dwarf variety 42-chromosome plant that cannot grow without human intervention. Ancient emmer wheat had 28 chromosomes and much less gluten than modern wheat. Cultures that traditionally ate lots of carbs also lived near the equator in warm climates and were way more active than us in the Western world. Potatoes are fine. Just eat them with plenty of fat/butter to blunt the resulting blood sugar spike, but it's traditionally eaten that way anyway. Dairy is a gray area. If you're of Eastern European descent and still produce the lactase enzyme to handle dairy, then you're fine. There's no cut and dry rules saying what is paleo and what isn't since it's impossible to perfectly emulate our ancestral diet. Modern fruits have been bread to contain much more fructose for example. This is why I believe Steve Jobs' pancreas problems were due to his fruitarian diet, but I'm getting way off topic now.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#195

Post by bambax »

tptacek wrote: post #90
127001brewer wrote: post #14

... "As a culture, we’ve become upset by the tobacco companies advertising to children, but we sit idly by while the food companies do the very same thing. ..." Why aren't parents more responsible for their children's health? As a parent myself, I know how damn hard it is for kids to eat anything consistently, especially "healthy" foods, such as fresh fruits and vegetables. And our kids have snacks in moderation. It…

Because they spend 50% of their waking hours in school where it is impossible to monitor exactly what they're eating. Parents do take responsibility for what their kids eat at home. The alarm comes from schools marketing unhealthful food to them when we can't be there to ensure they make good choices.

You could lobby the school to make sure there are NO "snacks" available, anywhere, anytime, ever.

I don't know how it works in the US but here in France if there were vendor machines in the schools where my kids go to, or if they were served hamburgers or fries at lunch, I would be up in arms, and eventually I would take them to another school (they're in a normal state-run school BTW, not a fancy private school).

My kids drink only water, at home... or in school!

It may be impossible to monitor what our kids eat during the day, but it's certainly possible to make sure schools don't feed them junk food just because it's more convenient.

Also, I don't think it's up to (young) kids to "make choices", good or bad. We make choices for them (we being parents and tutors). Schools should ONLY offer healthy food, and nothing else.

That's what schools are for: educate.

Offering a mix of healthy and unhealthy food for kids to choose is like teaching maths by offering either to watch TV or practice math problems, and expecting kids to not choose TV.

I wouldn't call such a place a "school".

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#196

Post by bambax »

teyc wrote: post #153
jmj42 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've not found it difficult to get my kids (2 teenage daughters) to consistently eat healthy foods. Hell, we can't keep fresh fruits and vegetables in the house. A one pound bag of baby carrots lasts about a week, one pound bunch of bananas: about 3 days, a pint of blue berries: About an hour (blue berries never last long at our house). The list goes on, but that's not the point. I don't think it's really a responsib…

I've two teenage kids albeit a little younger than yours. I found one way to hack their stomach share is to stick cut fruits/carrots on the table when they're doing homework. Another technique is to introduce subtle variety into the shapes, kind of like how pop songs have the same tune but a lot of work goes into varying the accompaniment. With carrots, give them a mix varying thickness, length, tapers etc. Observe h…

Yes yes yes, a thousand yes! Thanks for saying that. Drinking soda is the start of all problems.

Kids should drink only water, every day, all day.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#197

Post by dredmorbius »

rwallace wrote: post #43
ericabiz wrote: post #7

It amazes me that this article still pushes the agenda that "fat makes us fat." If there's one thing that hasn't proven out at all , it's that fat makes us fat! The NY Times has even run other articles saying as much: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/opinion/sunday/what-really... (by Gary Taubes, whose book "Why We Get Fat" is a must-read.) The problem with "low-fat" processed food in particular is that the fat is o…

'Carbohydrate' is a fine chemical term, but it is not a useful nutritional category. A plate of steamed vegetables and a can of Coke both contain carbohydrate, but they are at opposite poles in nutritional terms. The most useful nutritional term is 'junk food', and the most useful advice for most people is, instead of trying to fine tune the amount of this or that chemical substance, just stop eating/drinking junk fo…

Carbs are one of the three macronutrients. The two examples of carb sources you mention differ in that one offers a great deal of bulk fiber, as well as copious micronutrients, while the other doesn't.

This doesn't make either any less a source of carbohydrates.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#198

Post by solarbunny »

pvnick wrote: post #178
rickdale wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just curious, how long have you been on the warrior diet? been doing all the time? What sort of gains. I did the warrior diet this summer and lost all sorts of bodyfat/weight. I stopped and forgot about it, then I had the revelation that the last time I made progress was with the warrior diet. Now I am including it two to three times/week with slow carb diet and a cheat day for the others. It is good stuff and not wo…

I've been doing the full-on warrior diet for the past two weeks or so along with the full-body workout on this page: http://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/gironda-8x8-system... . I do that workout at least 3 times a week. I've gained about 5-6 pounds of muscle in the past two weeks and gotten leaner. It's been unreal. Like steroids unreal. But I also haven't been following the warrior diet to the t. I eat mostly…

Would you be so kind and elaborate a bit more on your resistance training, especially for 6-pack (repetitions, breathing, technique)? I am also doing great on IF and simply drinking natural goat milk whey before exercise instead of suggested BCAA intake. I can also second on avoiding fructose.

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#199

Post by stdbrouw »

maxerickson wrote: post #136
stdbrouw wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While that's a good point, things are a little bit more subtle than that. Changes in dietary composition have an effect on satiety and whether or not you experience hunger spikes, and thus can affect intake quite drastically. Two links in the chain of causality.

Sure, food choices can be used to make calorie reduction/control easier. My point is more that eating approximately the amount of calories your body will consume in a day is going to be effective with little regard to the exact percentage of macro nutrients. That doesn't make it any easier to correctly estimate the calories needed or the actual calories consumed.

Well, we were talking about the obesity epidemic, which you mentioned was caused by overeating. My point was that if our diets have changed over time (different protein/carbs/fat ratio), that in itself can explain overeating. (Rather than assuming that overeating is "something we just do".)

Re: The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

#200

Post by pvnick »

solarbunny wrote: post #198
pvnick wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been doing the full-on warrior diet for the past two weeks or so along with the full-body workout on this page: http://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/gironda-8x8-system... . I do that workout at least 3 times a week. I've gained about 5-6 pounds of muscle in the past two weeks and gotten leaner. It's been unreal. Like steroids unreal. But I also haven't been following the warrior diet to the t. I eat mostly…

Would you be so kind and elaborate a bit more on your resistance training, especially for 6-pack (repetitions, breathing, technique)? I am also doing great on IF and simply drinking natural goat milk whey before exercise instead of suggested BCAA intake. I can also second on avoiding fructose.

Certainly! First of all, the most important thing for having a visible six-pack is low bodyfat, around 8-9%. Having a strong, defined core is also important, so doing ab exercises such as hanging leg raises and ab wheel rollouts is a good idea. Avoid crunches though because those don't do anything.

Read up on hypertrophy as this is how your muscles get bigger. German volume training, vince gironda's 8x8, chad waterbury high frequency training are good plans to look into (all of chad waterbury's workout plans are "cutting edge" imho). I've recently been doing very high number of reps with very low intensity and not going to muscle failure so that I can target the same muscle groups several times a week. Such a workout plan focuses more on muscles getting larger rather than stronger.

Also, if you're looking to cut down on bodyfat in order to see your abs, I would actually use bcaas instead of the whey simply because the goat milk whey likely has calories that your body will use for fuel (ignore that sentence if it doesn't have calories), whereas bcaa's take a different metabolic pathway and go right to your muscles. The point of exercising on an empty stomach is that you're working out with a depleted glycogen supply, which your body will always use up before touching fat storage. If you take in calories before working out then your body will burn through those first before reaching into the fat storage.

After you've finished working out - hopefully your workout was done quickly so you should be very sweaty and have burned a ton of fat calories - wait for a couple hours (at least 2-3) before eating anything. During this time I generally drink almost a gallon of water containing a bunch of bcaas. Your body will continue to burn a shit-ton more fat and will still be primed for building muscle once you spike it with carbs and protein. Be careful to avoid fat though!

Good luck on attaining your fitness goals ;)

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