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Comment by shanusmagnus | Hacker News Reader

This has been scattered around the existing comments, but I'd be really interested to hear people who are keto comment explicitly on its perceived cognitive effects. I know a number of pretty successful scientists who have told me they feel that being keto provides them a significant performance advantage. I'm really interested in how it affects perceived energy, clarity of thinking, fatigue, and creativity.

I'm gearing up for keto induction myself in the next month (the social things are the hardest for me to deal with, so require a lot of planning to make it feasible), but I'd love to hear (or be pointed to) stories on this topic, especially for knowledge workers / intellectual-types.

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Biggest benefit of Keto for me is the higher sustained mental energy level. I don't think I noticed any direct cognitive effects, but I was definitely able to keep focus, stay alert, and be productive all day. No more late-afternoon slumps.

I went through about 2 months of pure keto earlier this year. Small disclaimer, I generally follow a "warrior" diet and intermittent fasting. I think keto gave me a similar "sharp" awareness and energy. For whatever reason, not eating, while difficult at first, provided me with even more energy and clarity in the same way keto did. Even though I continued doing fairly intense workouts 3 days a week.

I also get a lot of mental clarity and alertness after extended periods of not eating, followed by tiredness and fogginess after a meal. This might be one reason why I'm underweight.

Unfortunately, a keto diet isn't really an option for me (vegetarian, and allergic to many vegetarian protein sources).

I wonder what the underlying science behind it is.

Science behind keto? This article explains it pretty well.

No, the science behind feeling mental clarity after extended fasting.

Unfortunately, everything I could think to Google just returned a bunch of grandiose pseudoscience.

Yeah I'm not a scientist either but I would equate this to the opposite of feeling sleepy after a big dish of pasta. Food does have a certain effect on the body especially if it's full of carbs. What I get out of fasting and keto is the opposite.

Can you please share your warrior diet experience? I am also on a warrior diet for the past 2-3 months (should have tracked better) and I like it so far. I am concerned about any long-term negative side effects.

I've never had any issues at all while on warrior diet. On the flip side, because I didn't do enough research, my first keto experience was rough.

IMO, warrior is like intermittent fasting. This is just me personally but I often use coffee to quiet down any feelings of hunger. Though for the most part once you get over the initial discomfort associated with diet change I don't even get hungry until evening hours.

With all of these, supplementing with vitamins is key. I don't think my body misses the calories but it probably does miss some vitamins so I would recommend taking a multivitamin even if every other day.

I enter ketosis for roughly a month or less every half a year or so. The main selling point for me is lowering body fat from my normal bulking diet that consists of 2-4 liters of milk per day.

But every time it surprises me as I end up able to stay focused for hours without interruption. It does not produce any kind of magic cognitive power but the simple fact that there is no preemptive signal going on my brain telling me to stop whatever I'm doing to eat something makes me really productive.

Out of ketosis I can get a similar effect by drinking some brands of energetic beverages but it only works for a limited amount of time and don't stack up very well: if I drink too much caffeine I end up anxious.

During my faste days, wherein my caloric intake drops down to the two-hundreds I have experienced significant improvements in cognition. Specifically my awareness of my surroundings, ability to concentrate for long periods of time and short term memory recall improved noticeably.

The first time it happened to me during one of my faste days it felt as though I had taken a powerful stimulant.

I've never tried keto, but I also get a lot of mental clarity and alertness after extended periods of not eating. It doesn't seem to make a lot of evolutionary sense.

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