One of the primary arguments of a keto/paleo diet is that the different diets affect how many calories your body thinks it needs, how it uses them, and how it influences behavior as a result. (Disclaimer: using imaginary numbers below to illustrate the theory.)
Let's say your body typically wants 1000 calories at breakfast, and you eat 1000 calories with a heavy load of carbs. Carbohydrates with a high glycemic index cause your insulin to spike. That signals fat cells that they should start storing energy, and they do so, tucking away 300 of the 1000 calories you ate.
This means your body only gets to spend 700 of the 1000 calories you ate, and as such, it says "hey, I'm still hungry". You eat 300 calories worth of food. But your fat cells are still sucking up (X%) of what you eat into storage, due to the insulin reaction. So, your body gets 200 of those 300 it wants, and it stays a little bit hungry. (Or, more likely, your body wants 300, but you eat 500 to make it shut up.)
Carbs have the unfortunate habit of converting useful calories into fat storage prior to processing them for the purposes of nutrition. This means carb-heavy diets tend to cause unconscious overeating, and also constant feelings of hunger/cravings/etc.
One of the advantages of a paleo/keto diet is that they often avoid the type of carbohydrates that cause this problem, namely ones with a high glycemic index. This means when you eat 1000 calories, your fat cells don't skim any off the top before your metabolism gets to them, and you get the full 1000; this means you don't end up hungry after a meal, and don't suffer from the urge to snack/eat more. Because your body got all the energy it wanted, it doesn't start saying it's hungry again until it actually does need the nutrition, and you're more likely to eat closer to the correct amount for your body's needs.
The difference between the examples you give, 4500 of Paleo and 1200 of junk food, is primarily how they'd make your body react. 1200 of junk food would certainly be a caloric deficit, but you'd be ravenously hungry at that level. (I've done 1000 calories a day for 6 months straight - it's pretty awful for the first few months.) But with keto, you could eat 4500 calories in a day, but you won't want to. When I'm done eating a keto-style meal, I am completely uninterested in food until the next. Those meals, for me, are typically 1-2 small/medium brats with no bun. But if I go out and cheat, and grab a burger and fries, I've got to fight the urge to follow it up with some ice cream, even though the fries and burger combined are drastically more calories than the brats I was satisfied with the meal before.
It's really interesting stuff. The "calories-in, calories-out" model is completely right from a completely energy-based perspective, but it doesn't account for the side effects produced by the energy source, and how people react to them.
This is pseudo science, there are droves of scientific literature that shows that meal timing is irrelevant and that as long as macronutrient content is similar, a calorie is a calorie.
And there are droves of scientific literature that show that meal timing is important and even if macronutrient content is similar, a calorie is not a calorie.
The simple fact is: No one was able to prove anything beyond shallow platitudes ("If you eat three tons of flesh each day you will get fat too!" "If you eat nothing for month you will get lean!").
A quick search of PubMed finds some recent (within the last year) papers like:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23357955 - "Timing of food intake predicts weight loss effectiveness" It starts "Background: There is emerging literature demonstrating a relationship between the timing of feeding and weight regulation in animals. However, whether the timing of food intake influences the success of a weight-loss diet in humans is unknown."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23167985 - "Effects of exercise before or after meal ingestion on fat balance and postprandial metabolism in overweight men."; "It is unclear how timing of exercise relative to meal ingestion influences substrate balance and metabolic responses."
These make me think that there isn't "droves of scientific literature" which show the importance of meal timing in humans, much less characterize the magnitude of the importance. (Eg, if there's a measurable 1% difference in overall effect on weight then it's statistically significant finding, but almost certainly not enough for most people to care about.)
Where is the parent saying anything about meal timing? It's about the effect on your body of a particular meal. Carbs and sugars spike insulin much more than fats or protein.
That is an issue of meal timing. Individual meals doesn't matter. Transient insulin spikes are irrelevant, what matters is your overall expenditure vs intake.
Insulin spikes are completely relevant, since insulin signals your fat cells to take up energy from your blood stream. Now you have no energy and feel hungry again.
It doesn't work that way. Show me a study that concludes that blood glucose levels have not been meaningfully increased after a meal due to it all going straight to adipose tissue -- in humans -- and I'll show you the next Nobel Prize winner.
Insulin spikes are irrelevant in so far as you will lose weight at a calorie deficit, insulin spikes or not. Also, fat can be synthesized in the absence of insulin spikes. http://www.jlr.org/content/30/11/1727
Physiologically, what matters is a caloric deficit. Execution wise, some foods make this easier than others, but that is highly individual.
Steady levels of insulin make it much easier to maintain a caloric deficit. If your blood sugar is yo-yoing all over the place, you're going to get cravings, increase your risk of bingeing, etc.
While it's easy to fall back on 'calories in, calories out', weight loss has much more to do with psychology, physiology and compliance than physics.
You're absolutely right that losing weight has a lot to do with psychology, and that the execution of it depends on finding a method, a diet tailored to the individual's needs, to succeed.
But that diet will only result in weight loss if there is a caloric deficit, completely independent of insulin spikes. Now, the trick to achieving and maintaining that caloric deficit over a period of time is an effort that is psychologically demanding, absolutely. But the weight loss itself is pure thermodynamics.
If your interest lies in designing diets or meal plans that help people achieve their weight loss goals, your focus should rightly be the psychological aspect of it. That's the battle. But at the end of the day, a caloric deficit is necessary, whether you choose to ignore that or not.
IMHO, diet and nutrition is confusing as hell to the average person, and hiding the necessity of a caloric deficit and instead talking about "good" and "bad" foods or macronutrients, is a poor approach in the long run. But that's just my opinion. The necessity of a caloric deficit is not opinion though, it's cold hard scientifically proven fact.
> The necessity of a caloric deficit is not opinion though, it's cold hard scientifically proven fact.
It is not that simple. If you have a calorie deficit but aren't getting enough nutrients you will get cravings but won't be able to sustain your diet. If you're addicted to sugar you will get cravings/constant hunger and won't be able to sustain your diet.
Focusing on calories ignores all of the other things (nutrients, insulin, blood sugar, motivation) that need to happen for a diet to be successful.
> It is not that simple. If you have a calorie deficit but aren't getting enough nutrients you will get cravings but won't be able to sustain your diet.
That makes no sense. In that case, you aren't on a caloric deficit. If you aren't able to achieve a caloric deficit, then you are not on a caloric deficit.
There's a pretty good chance this is an over-analysis.
A daily 50 Calorie excess stacked up over 5 years amounts to a gain of about 25 pounds.
So it is certainly possible that a diet could be subtly tipping metabolism in the wrong direction, but between a complex explanation of more calories being stored as fat and a simple explanation of slightly too much consumption, I like the second one.
I guess that it is easy to consume large amounts of carbs makes them a frequent component of weight gain.
Frequently the addiction is not the brain trying to avoid pain. Sometimes it is a socially acceptable substance with addictive chemical properties.
A friend of mine is an alcoholic who, after a DUI, went on a massive downward spiral. He didn't start drinking because of pain, he started drinking because this is Nebraska, and drinking is a gigantic part of social interaction in Nebraska. All the things that are wrong with his life are directly caused by his addiction, and so he drinks because of the pain/depression, and the problems keep coming.
So, in his case, the only way to take care of the real cause of the addiction is to stop the addiction. This game may be something that can help with it.
Being addicted to a substance isn't something you can just wish away, or meditate away. Acting like it's just a matter of self control is borderline disrespectful of the effect a substance dependency can have on a person.
In my case personally, I've been on prescription Adderall for years. I went cold-turkey once to reset my tolerance and drop from 25mg to 5mg; I can assure you that the physical and mental withdrawal symptoms are NOT something you can just meditate away. Amphetamine withdrawal was a goddamn nightmare made flesh, and I was on a relatively small pharmaceutical dose. Alcohol withdrawal is apparently less immediately bad, but drastically more insidious, and there are so many social structures in the world that encourage drinking that quitting completely is astoundingly hard.
I'm not saying meditation can't help, or that it didn't work for you, but I am saying it's not a magic bullet, and definitely won't work for everyone. This game is just a tool that some people can use to help themselves.
He's saying that homeopathy is not directly lethal when applied by someone who knows what they're doing.
There was a case recently where a woman was doing unlicensed "plastic surgery" by pumping rubber cement into incisions in people's butts. Her absolute incompetence can't be reasonably used as a critique against the plastic surgery industry.
There are plenty of perfectly good data points to use against homeopathy practitioners. This case is definitely not one of them.
Homeopathy is a gigantic scam that depends solely upon the placebo effect. But this specific case is a really stupid one to use as an indictment. It's like railing against the liquor industry because someone was beaten/stabbed to death with a liquor bottle.
I think it's more appropriate to say that the improper application of homeopathy killed him - so, not unlike the improper application of any number of legitimate medical techniques. The difference here is that the proper application of medical techniques might have helped, whereas the proper application of homeopathic techniques would have done nothing.
I am not a fan of homeopathy, but there is probably some underlying truth to that concept. I think it is more complicated than that, but the immune system works by identifying threats and going after them. It is a little bit like what happened in WWII in the U.S. when lots of Japanese Americans were rounded up and sent to camps because they were deemed a potential threat. I have found that strengthening the body first and then re-exposing myself is a way to get healthier. That was not a plan and most re-exposures for me were unintentional. But, having worked on strengthening my body, I have found that re-exposure triggers mop up of old problems along with new.
I have not used homeopathy nor read up on it. I don't really know exactly what they do. But my impression is they are skipping that first part, that their mental model is missing something and thus results are rather hit or miss.
No, homeopathy is 100% a scam. The principle is that a compound (say, penicillin) has some amount of vibrational energy that is imparted into the surrounding molecules. As you continually dilute out the original "active" molecule, the "energy" of the molecule is imprinted onto the remaining solute.
Even better, the more you dilute, the more potent it becomes. You literally get to a point where there is no active molecule left...just H2O.
What you are saying (exposing your immune system to a small threat so it can safely build a response) is a valid argument. In fact, that's how vaccines work. Give your body a little bit of non-infectious virus so it can build appropriate antigens before you encounter it in real life.
I have no idea what you are saying about Japanese Americans though.
What I mean about Japanese Americans is that they were rounded up wholesale. There was no sorting. The immune system works like that. After years of being sick, as I grew stronger, exposures resulted in wholesale roundup of both the new germs and old ones which had been quietly flying below the radar for years.
I am not a big fan of vaccines, but that's a bear I usually try to not wrestle. Still, I appreciate the acknowledgement that the principle is valid.
I really dislike that mental model. I dislike the entire concept of "we don't really know what is going on, so we will claim your body is merely attacking itself for no real reason". I cannot prove it wrong, but I believe it to be wrong. For my edification, can you list some of the specific conditions which are viewed as "auto-immune disorders" caused by a "strong" immune system?
Why is difficult to accept that a system that evolved to attack certain cells can misidentify targets, especially if the real targets have selective pressures to mimic friendly cells?
It happens all the time in other systems (friendly fire, false positives in anti-virus-software)
They say that about my condition. It doesn't explain what is going on. If it were accurate, it should be actionable.
They say people with CF "overproduce" mucus and are "drowning in their own mucus". It isn't true. They are drowning in phlegm because they underproduce healthy mucus and become highly infected. Unlike skin, mucus membranes do not keep out infection when dry. One study found people with CF produce too little mucus, yet this crazy idea persists, even though it isn't logical and doesn't fit the facts.
Well maybe your specific condition is more complex, but I have a pollen allergy and antihistamine alleviates the symptoms. You didn't address the general mechanism at all.
Antihistamines alleviate the symptoms. They do not resolve the underlying problem. Allergies indicate some overload on the system. Removing other (chemical/biological) stressors on the system can help. So can nutritional support for the adrenals and thyroid. And if you need nutritional support, that is a weakness in the system, not evidence of an overly strong immune system. An allergy is a reaction to an outside source. I do not see how it makes sense to call reaction to an outside source an auto-immune disease. I think that is a bad mental model for the problem and actively interferes with finding real solutions which do more than merely alleviate the symptoms.
I am sorry that I don't know how to make my case in the format you feel it needs to be made in. That is a problem space I am working on resolving. But I did not get well in order to impress anyone or prove anything. I did it to get my life back. Being good at doing something does not automatically make one good at explaining it.
Nothing you state is in contradiction to the hypothesis that my symptoms are caused by the immune system misidentifying targets. Stressors or nutrition might have something to do with it, they might not. Maybe it's excessive hygiene and lack of exposure to certain infectious agents (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hygiene_hypothesis)
The proper treatment of the root cause is allergen immunotherapy, which completely consistent with the false-target hypothesis. I'm just too lazy to do it and I'm fine with treating the symptoms or suffering through them for a few weeks a year.
Then I am sorry to have wasted your time. I cannot really afford to merely suffer through what my condition causes and alleviating symptoms without treating underlying problems is known to kill people like me. That no doubt biases my assumption that an individual would prefer to solve the underlying problem, especially if it isn't a significant burden to do so.
"I dislike the entire concept of "we don't really know what is going on, so we will claim your body is merely attacking itself for no real reason". "
Likely because you have an unrealistic expectation for how the immune system actually works. One that works "too well" is not advantageous. "No real reason" is silly, because that is the job of the immune system, to attack invaders. If it misidentifies your own systems as invasive, it will attack your own systems. The mechanism is not in question, how to treat it best is.
And the conclusion about how to treat it will be strongly shaped by the mental models framing the inquiry. A lot of our current mental models are actively hostile to the body. There have been articles posted to HN about the fact that most medical research is highly biased from the get go to confirm the researcher's pre-existing bias.
"A lot of our current mental models are actively hostile to the body."
Because plenty of the conditions are due to the body's hostility to itself, or because what may kill invaders will also injure the body.
There are rarely, if ever cure-alls that do not affect the body's normal function, and assuming that the body's function is at all times beneficial is a mistake, a flaw in your "alternate" models.
The body can generally take care of itself, but does not always, in every person and situation. We are not perfect beings and clinging to those assumptions hurts humanity more than any flaw in the dominant model.
Reform is a wonderful, necessary goal. Tossing aside evidence-based medicine to do so is utterly foolish.
Your mental model is that it is due to the body's hostility to itself. You do not need to defend that because that is a generally accepted model. It is still a mental model, which is distinct from reality. Yet mental models also shape reality. How we perceive or frame something influences how we address it.
I am not saying nothing ever goes wrong or that we are perfect beings. Nor am I clinging to any assumptions.
"It is an observation after the act, not an assumption."
You are unsatisfied with the "assumptions" of medical science's model, so you are offering your own interpretation of reality. Why should your assumptions about behavior and causal relationships be judged any less harshly than you judge the dominant model?
I am not trying to offer my own "interpretation" of reality. I am trying to figure out how to share my best understanding of what worked and why. I don't assume it will merely stop there. And I am trying to figure out how to cross the chasm of communication. However, when I make sincere efforts to try to find out what I need to do to get there from here, the most common result is dismissive and hostile personal attacks, not useful feedback.
I realize that is not your problem to solve. But when you accuse me of not even trying, the only meaningful reply I have is that I can find no path forward since I am constantly attacked and shut out. For now, I remain at an impasse, unable to develop the site in a manner satisfactory to those who feel it is inadequate and feel that is sufficient justification for ugly ad hominems.
Your willingness to talk to me about this is essentially a first. Most people either wish to paint me as a potential savior, who can magically get them well without this communication process, or evil and insane. I want neither role. So I have intentionally stepped away from situations where I was given no other option. I believe it is far better to not share the information than to have people trying things on personal faith in me with no understanding of the process involved. I view that as deadly dangerous. Educating people is hard work. It is impossible work when they want salvation rather than education -- when they want me to tell them what to do, not how to think and problem solve on their own.
"I am not trying to offer my own "interpretation" of reality. I am trying to figure out how to share my best understanding of what worked and why. I don't assume it will merely stop there. And I am trying to figure out how to cross the chasm of communication. However, when I make sincere efforts to try to find out what I need to do to get there from here, the most common result is dismissive and hostile personal attacks, not useful feedback."
My point is, as an individual point of data, you are unable prove that what you did had anything to do with the end result.
"I remain at an impasse, unable to develop the site in a manner satisfactory to those who feel it is inadequate and feel that is sufficient justification for ugly ad hominems."
Well, without proper research methods and controls being employed, it is tough to extrapolate the experience to others.
"Most people either wish to paint me as a potential savior, who can magically get them well without this communication process"
Could it be possible that you are fitting into this mold, where your condition is varying as your expectations shift?
As I have already said, I am not an individual data point.
I am not looking to extrapolate the experience to others. I am trying to figure out how to share my best understanding. What I have done is not "unique". I have, at best, gone farther, faster than others. A lot of people are pursuing alternative treatments and better nutrition to help themselves. Most people are far less open about that fact. It gets seriously bashed on CF lists.
The climate used to be a lot more rejecting of anything proactive and filled with a lot of prayer requests on the assumption that no human could really do much, not even doctors. The one thing I have managed to do so far is to change the discussion from "My child needs surgery. Please pray for us." to "My child needs surgery. Please tell me your experiences with this specific surgery. Did it help? Do you regret it? Were there complications? What is the best way to prepare for this?"
I do not really know what you mean by your last question. I have gotten off multiple drugs. I no longer have constant excruciating pain. I no longer dehydrate so readily. I am more resilient to both heat and cold. My skin does not tear as readily. My blood sugar is more stable. And on and on. There are significant physical changes. Those are not the result of some kind of magical thinking. They are the result of sustained effort to resolve the underlying problem.
It is an observation after the act, not an assumption. I did not go around intentionally exposing myself to anything. My focus was on removing things and eating better.
Oh, I agree - one of the root causes was the belief in homeopathic philosophy. My main point is that this case is a lousy talking point when campaigning against homeopathy. It's not like there's a lack of real, tangible evidence against homeopathy - people should use that to argue against it instead.
(Not like it's likely to do any good. Homeopathic believers are pretty hard to sway.)
I've never worn a 10 year old piece of clothing outside of my house, because none of the clothing I've bought has been durable enough to survive even 5 years.
Based on the article (which does seem biased), these sweatshirts are a throwback to the days when you would buy things and expect them to last. The fancy Kitchenaid standing blenders used to be durable as hell and just keep working. The newer ones are made a lot more cheaply, and while they last longer than some other kitchen appliances, they're a far cry from their original model... without any significant improvement in features.
Our manufacturing mindset was originally about durability and quality. Cheap labor and cheap materials led to a shift into replaceable, cheaper goods. But as materials/labor get more expensive, hopefully we'll see more of a shift to making quality, lasting goods again.
Let's look at two scenarios: They both involve a show that 100k people want to watch, but 20k of those people can't/won't watch it using the methods legally provided. (Fuzzy/simple math to illustrate the point.)
In scenario one, those 20k pirate the show instead. This means that the known demand for the show is 100k viewers, 80k using legal distribution, 20k using illegal distribution.
In scenario two (what Marco proposes), the 20k simply don't watch it at all. In that case, the known demand for the show is 80k viewers total, all of which obtained the show legally.
In scenario one, the content providers know there are 100k units of demand, 80k of which they are receiving revenue for - which implies 20% of the viewers want the show, but not for its current price/availability. Thus, they have a semi-accurate view of demand.
In scenario two, the content providers only know there are 80k units of demand. They don't know that the other 20k users even exist, or are at all interested in the product. They have less usable information, and no change is enacted - if they don't know those 20k exist, their absence can't be noted.
In this case, piracy provides an indicator of unfulfilled demand, whereas abstaining from piracy provides no feedback whatsoever. I think the concept of "protest via absence" in this situation isn't going to do anything useful.
In this case, piracy provides an indicator of unfulfilled demand
Only if the content providers actually treat it as an indicator of unfilled demand. They're not; they're treating it as an indicator of criminal behavior.
If piracy is an indicator of unfilled demand, the correct response is to fill the demand by changing your method of distribution. It's not to sue people and try to buy ever more draconian government enforcement.
How does that contradict what I said? I wasn't talking about whether or not the companies have the data; of course they do. I was talking about what they do with the data.
I don't think their outward actions are a reliable indicator of how they're using these data internally. I _do_ think that these analytics can play a big role in which shows get cancelled.
I _do_ think that these analytics can play a big role in which shows get cancelled.
So what? How does that fix the distribution problem that motivates people to pirate? And how does it affect the propensity of media companies to sue people who pirate, instead of fixing their broken distribution system?
The 'so what' is that Marco is telling people to boycott cable companies by not watching their shows, which would most directly hurt the writers, artists, directors, etc, who have worked really hard on their shows.
I don't see how pirating the shows, as opposed to not watching them, is any better for the writers, artists, directors, etc. all things considered. Yes, in the short term, a show might not get cancelled if pirated demand is taken into account. But the global effect is that more and more people hate the media companies because they prosecute ordinary people that just want to watch shows and movies, instead of fixing their broken distribution system.
Sooner or later that is going to catch up with those companies, and when it does, all the writers, artists, directors, etc. who have tied their fates to the fates of the media companies will go down with them. If anything, pirating, as opposed to just not watching, postpones the pain of that happening, which will make it even worse when it finally does.
I've personally lost 35 pounds in 5 months on keto, and I've had all my cholesterol levels drop, along with my blood pressure. (Which probably has more to do with my weight loss than the meat-based diet.) I literally can't lose weight while eating any amount of carbs; I ate 1250 calories a day for 2 months, lost 5 pounds, and was miserable. (Yes, 1250. I was super anal about calorie counting, and only drank water + black coffee. It sucked.)
The long and short of it is that every person has a slightly different combination of body chemistry quirks, so there's never really a one-size-fits-all method for losing weight. You've got to find something that works for you, considering both weight reduction and quality of life. If I didn't love meat so much, I'd probably be in a tough situation.
What you did was not a healthy way to lose weight and unless you make a LIFESTYLE change that you can live with for the rest of your life then you will find yourself repeatedly using this starvation technique to lose weight unhealthily. Find something sustainable, keto is not sustainable for most people, and especially not at 1250Calories...
I think you misread the comment. Ketogenic was one diet, 1250kcal/day was another. I lost a significant amount of weight on a ketogenic diet as well but it's been about a year and a half and it's hard to keep away from those carbs...
Either way both methods are not sustainable which is the point I'm trying to make. 1250kcal is way too low and as taligent said, keto is used by bodybuilders to lean out a few weeks before competition, it is not something they do for long periods of time. I think the key to prolonged success is to make permanent lifestyle changes that you can commit to for the rest of your life.
I actually did the 1250kcal method for a full year when I was 10 years younger, and it worked like a charm. It required a LOT of discipline and extremely careful calorie counting, but it definitely worked.
Being in my late 20s now, 1250kcal is just not sustainable, but going with keto is working great and is likely to remain so for a long time. It helps that all I ever drink are water, tea, black coffee, and milk. (That's been the case my entire life, so that part isn't unusual.)
I eat eggs/sausage/bacon for breakfast (one of the three), then I eat an earlyish dinner of steak or bratwurst. Since I'm on Adderall XR, lunch never happens. On days I feel like carbs, I go out to Ivanna Cone (amazing local gourmet ice cream) for half a scoop. That consistently puts me at less than 30g of non-fiber carbs per day, with a fairly steady decline in overall weight. I'm never hungry outside of meal time, and I don't have problems saying no to carbs, aside from when I'm eating out with friends.
Once I've lost the weight I want to lose (another 20 pounds or so) I'll be able to figure out what level of carbs I can have without gaining on a daily basis, and live with that.
I have to eat carefully, but not eating carefully is what got me fat in the first place, so that's just what I'll have to deal with.
There are more and less extreme forms of every diet. What Keto is for weight loss, Low Carb is for maintenance.
If you are 5kg overweight, a "sustainable lifestyle change" will be sufficient. And there are those people for who even the severe risks of a gastric bypass outweigh the damage their weight does. Quite obviously, in between those extremes, there will be people were an unsustainable diet will be healthier than staying at their weight or losing it only slowly. And why not choose a diet that has been shown to minimize the loss of lean body mass.
1250kcal is unhealthily low for an adult male. My weight loss intake is between 2000 and 2500. BMR in a healthy adult male is 2500ish alone, tack on any sort of activity and it's easy to get your TDEE well past 3000. A deficit of ~1000 a day should be enough to sustain about 2lbs of loss per week.
Getting into a keto state is by the far the fastest and most reliable way to lose weight. Probably also hard to maintain as it can be hard to get that full feeling like you do with carbs.
It is the same diet which professional bodybuilders use. And they know EVERYTHING about how to lose weight since every % of body fat they lose can make a massive difference in muscle definition.
Schwarzenegger's book on bodybuilding (which I read in the late 90's) had a fairly long section on ketosis. He actually bought urine testing strips to make sure he didn't go into ketosis. When cutting, he reduced his carbohydrate intake, but he immediately increased it again at the first sign of ketosis for reasons he explained in some detail. AFIK, most successful bodybuilders eat tons of carbs while bulking and then try to go as low as possible without going keto while cutting.
Bodybuilders generally have not bothered with keto, until recently.
They just do the standard bulk (overeat in the off season, gain muscle and fat) in the off season and cut (heavy calorie restriction to cut the fat) to look good on stage.
I was in a similar situation to yours, until I took MSM (review: http://www.vitaflex.com/res_msmreva.php). It's a little-known, little-researched substance (my link only contains refs to veterinary studies), but reportedly contained in raw meat and vegetables. Once I began taking 3-5g a day (powder form), I have been almost unable to put on bodyfat, and already lost a good deal of it. People say it changes carbohydrate metabolism, but I suspect it's also got to do with detoxification (bodyfat stores toxines - can't find studies for that) and the fact that it does away with candida.
Hm the conclusion there appears to be that claims for it aren't based on research as there is very little, which the parent acknowledges.
The weight loss claims here are of course anecdotal, but it certainly seems worth a try, given that it seems perfectly safe. Presumably the worse that can happen is you simply pass it out of your system and it does nothing.
According to the research, unused MSM is processed by the renal system. In relatively high doses, no adverse effects were observed but I'd be cautious about effects which didn't get observed, especially from prolonged use for which there are inadequate studies. So the worst that can happen in passing it out of your system might be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renal_failure
Ah, point taken! That wouldn't be such a good outcome :-)
I slightly regret the response now actually, I was being quite majorly hand-wavey, I guess the fact that there is a great deal of uncertainty here and the promise of easy weight loss has combined to provide some bias here :-)
There is no indication (neither anecdotal nor peer-reviewed) that this poses a problem. All the quackwatch page says is "Well we found no objections, but be careful nonetheless, even though there is no indication that it it's dangerous to take MSM". That's a speculative conclusion based on assumptions, not exactly what I would expect from someone debunking quack myths based on scientific reasoning.
In October 2000, the FDA warned [Karl Loren] that the long list
of therapeutic claims he was making for these products made them
drugs would be illegal to market without FDA approval. The letter
stated that the FDA had seen no evidence that the products were
safe and effective for their intended uses.
Absence of evidence that it's safe doesn't necessarily imply that it's unsafe. However, one should be cautious until peer-reviewed research on the long-term effects have been studied.
Very interesting, it's available from health food shops in the uk, labelled as helping with joint pain. Since I also get a bit of that I'm going to have to try this. Do you have any other links that discuss its use for weight loss?
Interestingly there is hardly any information on weight loss. I'm quite sure that there are not many people taking as much as I do (the effect occurs with 2 teaspoons daily). I know for certain that this dose has quite quickly done away with candida (no white tongue anymore, and IBS almost gone), while lower doses were not as effective.
Why? What's wrong with that? Do you think the stuff we ingest nowadays will completely leave our bodies? Side products from maldigestion? Traces of BPA, pesticides, antibiotics? Don't you think the body will deposit some of those toxines _somewhere_ if we don't drink enough every day, allowing for flushing them out?
I am still on keto, and it's continuing to come off. I'm not insanely strict with myself, so I'm not losing weight as fast as I could be, but I've found a good balance based on my personal activity level and quality of life considerations.
Once I've lost the weight I want to lose, I'll keep on with keto, and just gradually increase+track my carb consumption, until I find the a point where I start to gain weight... then I'll set that as my limit.
Have you looked at gwern's nootropic page? I've seen articles from it posted on HN on occasion. He seems to be doing a pretty solid job of testing the potential effects of various nootropics on himself.
His efforts to double-blind himself and using Dual N-Back for testing effectiveness indicate he takes this topic seriously, and is trying to be very scientific about it. (I say "trying to" because I'm absolutely clueless in this area; it looks to me like he's being pretty rigorous, but I'm not knowledgeable enough to make that claim confidently.)
In particular I liked reading about his experiments with Adderall (which I am using currently), modafinil, and especially the choline/racetam combinations.
Part of the problem may be the pitching of certain drugs as "smart drugs" when instead they are "effectiveness drugs". Adderall doesn't make me any smarter; it corrects a chemical imbalance in my brain, and in doing so makes me more effective.
(Well, honestly, it doesn't "correct" anything; it's like putting your thumb over the end of a garden hose and spraying water at a guy who's thirsty. Solves the problem, just not without a lot of mess. And with dopamine instead of water.)
I just have to comment that in his page, I disagree on using dual n back as a measure of mental ability. As the mind repeats a task over and over it learns what to expect.
I personally view n-back as any other repetitive task, only it is mostly in the mind; the more you whittle, the better you will be at whittling.
If you look at the wikipedia page [1] you will see that there have been papers both for and against n-back improving cognitive ability.
The way I propose to test effectiveness would be to have a bunch of subjects all try to learn a difficult task that is unfamiliar to them. Those with the placebo supposedly would not be able to learn it as quickly or understand it as well. The large sample size would account for statistical inaccuracies and differences among people's abilities.
I personally took nootropics this last winter for three months. My theory is that people who claim improvement are looking for improvement, and notice more just how good they are at tasks... I took piracetam, choline, aniracetam, and oxiracetam (and a tiny sample of pramiracetam, the supposed best, for free), and noticed nothing the entire time. Originally I thought I noticed improvement, but only realized I was looking for improvement in every task I did, which made me notice everything I did. After this realization I didn't notice anything at all, for the rest of my supplies. I learned more than just their ineffectiveness during this self experiment...
EDIT:
I will revise my statement to add that I do not think that *racetams are completely ineffective. I do believe that they are relatively useless on healthy individuals without any disorders, though. Most of the studies in the wikipedia page are on people with disorders, and I do remember reading before that their benefits on people without problems is disputed.
> I just have to comment that in his page, I disagree on using dual n back as a measure of mental ability. As the mind repeats a task over and over it learns what to expect.
So?
> I personally view n-back as any other repetitive task, only it is mostly in the mind; the more you whittle, the better you will be at whittling.
Progress in n-back is very slow. I'm up to 2400 rounds and still am only at 30-50% on D5B; a difference of 10% is perfectly noticeable.
> If you look at the wikipedia page [1] you will see that there have been papers both for and against n-back improving cognitive ability.
The Wikipedia page is completely useless compared to my FAQ, but yes. That's not relevant to whether it is a useful way to measure variations in mental ability.
True, n-backs don't necessarily represent cognitive improvements, but they are a method to identify changes in some kinds of mental processes.
For instance, if you do Dual 3-Back for 3 weeks with an identical supplement regimen, you can graph the progressive improvement over time. That'll give you a semi-baseline, and if all you change (in your life) is a supplement from that point, you can attribute the alterations in your typical N-Back to something supplement related.
I know, placebo effect, etc. It's not causation, just correlation. Just because correlation gets pimped out on the street corner by people with agendas doesn't mean we should ignore him. We should just be careful when we utilize his services.
All it takes is for one person getting burned to affect their entire social circle. Every person who's been shouted at for trying to help a kid has probably told everyone they know about the event; at that point, none of them are likely to help.
This is especially notable in the social media heavy environment we're in now. I personally know someone who got shouted at because he led a kid to customer service so their parent could be found; posted the event to Facebook, and now everyone he knows (who read the article) is going to be a little less likely to help.
There's a reason Good Samaritan laws had to be put in place; people have been prosecuted for attempting to help others in good faith, and that led to others not trying. Shitty situation, but that's how it goes.
I think one advantage of his test is that it's (apparently) independent of an entity with a stake in the outcome.
Based on everything I've seen about OkCupid, there's no shortage of integrity, but independent verification is still valuable.
Also, I'm curious: I've read a couple of articles online proposing different methods for OkCupid handling Mandatory answers to questions. One in particular involves treating Mandatory answers as only negative, so that agreeing with someone about the size of the sun (for example) doesn't mean you're a better match, it just means you're a worse match if you disagree. What are your thoughts on that? (Not the company's thoughts, of course.)
Let's say your body typically wants 1000 calories at breakfast, and you eat 1000 calories with a heavy load of carbs. Carbohydrates with a high glycemic index cause your insulin to spike. That signals fat cells that they should start storing energy, and they do so, tucking away 300 of the 1000 calories you ate.
This means your body only gets to spend 700 of the 1000 calories you ate, and as such, it says "hey, I'm still hungry". You eat 300 calories worth of food. But your fat cells are still sucking up (X%) of what you eat into storage, due to the insulin reaction. So, your body gets 200 of those 300 it wants, and it stays a little bit hungry. (Or, more likely, your body wants 300, but you eat 500 to make it shut up.)
Carbs have the unfortunate habit of converting useful calories into fat storage prior to processing them for the purposes of nutrition. This means carb-heavy diets tend to cause unconscious overeating, and also constant feelings of hunger/cravings/etc.
One of the advantages of a paleo/keto diet is that they often avoid the type of carbohydrates that cause this problem, namely ones with a high glycemic index. This means when you eat 1000 calories, your fat cells don't skim any off the top before your metabolism gets to them, and you get the full 1000; this means you don't end up hungry after a meal, and don't suffer from the urge to snack/eat more. Because your body got all the energy it wanted, it doesn't start saying it's hungry again until it actually does need the nutrition, and you're more likely to eat closer to the correct amount for your body's needs.
The difference between the examples you give, 4500 of Paleo and 1200 of junk food, is primarily how they'd make your body react. 1200 of junk food would certainly be a caloric deficit, but you'd be ravenously hungry at that level. (I've done 1000 calories a day for 6 months straight - it's pretty awful for the first few months.) But with keto, you could eat 4500 calories in a day, but you won't want to. When I'm done eating a keto-style meal, I am completely uninterested in food until the next. Those meals, for me, are typically 1-2 small/medium brats with no bun. But if I go out and cheat, and grab a burger and fries, I've got to fight the urge to follow it up with some ice cream, even though the fries and burger combined are drastically more calories than the brats I was satisfied with the meal before.
It's really interesting stuff. The "calories-in, calories-out" model is completely right from a completely energy-based perspective, but it doesn't account for the side effects produced by the energy source, and how people react to them.