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

Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 89 posts

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#21

Post by rubashov »

pyre wrote: post #9
toddh wrote: post #3

The theory is about total carbs, which includes sugar, potatoes, etc, not just grains. Strange to just focus on grains.

I thought that the theory was the simple carbs (e.g. sugars, refined grains) were worse offenders than complex carbs (e.g. potatoes).

A potato is basically sugar, as far as digestion is concerned.

The "complex carb" and glycemic index thing is pretty well nonsense. A carb is a carb. The only question is whether you have a properly functioning metabolism and insulin sensitivity. They call a screwed up insulin sensitivity "metabolic syndrome". If you've developed one, typically through many years of poor eating, you need to cut out starch, because your fat cells and pancreas can't handle it properly. If you're thin, well then the glycemic index thing is useless. Your pancreas and fat cells work fine.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#22

Post by georgieporgie »

We spend enormous amounts of mental energy thinking about types and combinations of calories, but not much time burning them. We pay huge signup and monthly fees to gyms that we never find the time to visit, meanwhile we never walk our streets.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#23

Post by rubashov »

StavrosK wrote: post #7
chipsy wrote: post #2

I'm started speculating that there's another theory for the obesity epidemic, based on this recent study: http://www.ausfoodnews.com.au/2011/04/08/coffee-and-fast-foo... The key thing here is that we've been putting caffeine alongside saturated fat for quite a while - coffee and chocolate or pastries, burger/fries/soda, etc. Although one of these meals screws up our blood sugar for about 1/4th of the day, apparently…

I can just imagine the future: "So, kids, in 2020 it was discovered that X was making people fat. Before that, nobody knew that it had any adverse effects. In fact, they used it almost everywhere, from X, Y and Z to J." Basically, they'll be talking about X the same way we talk about X-rays or DDT or whatnot.

The obesity epidemic had a start date. It was not a gradual trend, or something that ebbed and flowed over the decades. People first got obese in large numbers in the early 1980s.

Whatever is making everybody huge can be traced to a change in the 1980s. That is a useful data point in that it rules out a lot of things. It's not exercise. It's probably not starch.

Personally I suspect it's a mix of telling everybody to cut out saturated fat and the increased prevalence of fructose.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#24

Post by [deleted] »

elptacek wrote: post #20

Take a cup of flour from 1914 and a cup of AP flour from 2011. Place them side by side on the counter top. Tell me how they are different from each other. Take a cup of oatmeal from 1914 and a cup of Quaker Oats from 2011. Place them side by side on the counter top. Tell me how they are different from each other. Take a slice from loaf of bread baked in the home from 1914 and place it next to a slice of bread from th…

[deleted]

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#25

Post by rubashov »

This article repeats the lie that wild meat is lean, lacking fat.

The white and yellow stuff in in the pictures below is loads of fat in free range grass fed bison. http://www.tribeoffive.com/2011/04/hunting-for-good-food-and...

Kurt Harris has lately been addressing this misconception that the ancestral diet was low fat. http://www.archevore.com/panu-weblog/2011/4/5/wild-vs-grass-...

http://www.archevore.com/panu-weblog/2011/4/4/imagining-head...

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#26

Post by gregwebs »

rubashov wrote: post #23
StavrosK wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can just imagine the future: "So, kids, in 2020 it was discovered that X was making people fat. Before that, nobody knew that it had any adverse effects. In fact, they used it almost everywhere, from X, Y and Z to J." Basically, they'll be talking about X the same way we talk about X-rays or DDT or whatnot.

The obesity epidemic had a start date. It was not a gradual trend, or something that ebbed and flowed over the decades. People first got obese in large numbers in the early 1980s. Whatever is making everybody huge can be traced to a change in the 1980s. That is a useful data point in that it rules out a lot of things. It's not exercise. It's probably not starch. Personally I suspect it's a mix of telling everybody to…

You aren't going to find dramatic changes in 1980. The human body is remarkably adaptable and many health problems accumulate over years or possibly even generations (epigenetics). Obesity implies an impaired metabolism, which takes years (used to be decades) to develop. Moreover, health problems have been epidemic in our society pre 1980 (just with less dramatic consequences). I think you are going to really limit yourself with a 1980 cutoff, and that it is more likely that the same factors just got worse around that time.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#27

Post by tsotha »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #11
AJ007 wrote: post #4

Illogical question, obviously everyone was way more active in 1914.

The quote at the beginning of the article implies that this was compensated for, to an extent: "Historically people worked a lot more than they do now. They also ate a lot more than they do now."

That is absolutely true, at least in my family. My grandfather ate more calories for breakfast than I do all day. He was thin as a rail, and I'm... not.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#28

Post by tptacek »

gregwebs wrote: post #26
rubashov wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obesity epidemic had a start date. It was not a gradual trend, or something that ebbed and flowed over the decades. People first got obese in large numbers in the early 1980s. Whatever is making everybody huge can be traced to a change in the 1980s. That is a useful data point in that it rules out a lot of things. It's not exercise. It's probably not starch. Personally I suspect it's a mix of telling everybody to…

You aren't going to find dramatic changes in 1980. The human body is remarkably adaptable and many health problems accumulate over years or possibly even generations (epigenetics). Obesity implies an impaired metabolism, which takes years (used to be decades) to develop. Moreover, health problems have been epidemic in our society pre 1980 (just with less dramatic consequences). I think you are going to really limit y…

This doesn't ring true. Epigenetics may take a lot of time, but memetics don't. Social changes can produce sharp changes in diet very quickly. Many epidemics predate 1980, but obesity, by the numbers, does not appear to.

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#29

Post by Gaussian »

elptacek wrote: post #20

Take a cup of flour from 1914 and a cup of AP flour from 2011. Place them side by side on the counter top. Tell me how they are different from each other. Take a cup of oatmeal from 1914 and a cup of Quaker Oats from 2011. Place them side by side on the counter top. Tell me how they are different from each other. Take a slice from loaf of bread baked in the home from 1914 and place it next to a slice of bread from th…

Exactly. The average American's day starts in the kitchen. It then migrates to the seat of a car, then to a comfy chair at a desk, then back to the steering wheel, which, of course, gives way to the kitchen and the dinner table. Then to the sofa and to bed. Rather than what comprises our diets, I'd prefer to see a chart of obesity plotted against the average square feet of an American home during the same period. (The creeping size of homes being a indicator, in many cases, of sprawl and its related side-effects).

Re: Are grains making us fat? If so, we should be much thinner than 1914.

#30

Post by jf271 »

rubashov wrote: post #23
StavrosK wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can just imagine the future: "So, kids, in 2020 it was discovered that X was making people fat. Before that, nobody knew that it had any adverse effects. In fact, they used it almost everywhere, from X, Y and Z to J." Basically, they'll be talking about X the same way we talk about X-rays or DDT or whatnot.

The obesity epidemic had a start date. It was not a gradual trend, or something that ebbed and flowed over the decades. People first got obese in large numbers in the early 1980s. Whatever is making everybody huge can be traced to a change in the 1980s. That is a useful data point in that it rules out a lot of things. It's not exercise. It's probably not starch. Personally I suspect it's a mix of telling everybody to…

Not just fructose. In fruit fructose is fine. High fructose corn syrup is different and became prevelent in the 80's because of the sugar tariffs in the late 1970's in the USA.
Post reply on HN