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Comment by namelost | Hacker News Reader

The American diet isn't carbohydrate-heavy, it's food-heavy. Americans eat a lot more of every macronutrient than the average person on this planet.

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I disagree. I believe that the core of these problems are carbohydrates. Insulin spikes from carbohydrate consumption cause fat retention. Sugar doesn't create satiety, so it compounds eating.

The "it's an over-eating problem" fallacy keeps getting introduced by sugar companies. It happened in the states, then moved to South America, and is currently hitting India [1]. It's a playbook by the sugar industry that echoes of the tobacco industry's old tactics.

Suddenly, societies that have maintained healthy BMIs for thousands of years are having obesity problems as sugar gets introduced. They didn't develop gluttony overnight - it's a sugar problem.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/26/health/india-diabetes-jun...

Edit: Sugar is basically weaponized carbohydrates.

A high carb diet does not mean a high sugar diet.

Besides, obesity means basically too many calories no matter the source.

The worst case: fat + sugar.

Obesity is caused by eating too much. Carbs and sugars are the primary drivers of people eating too much in the United States.

"Dietary fat is not a major determinant of body fat." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12566139

"Do calories matter?" https://peterattiamd.com/do-calories-matter/

Try to eat 3000 calories of sugar or donuts one day then try to eat 3000 calories of steak.

If I have even 1800 calories of steak I won't need to eat the rest of the day.

More specifically, you won't want to eat more. Sugar is so crazy energy dense without making you sated. It's sort of nuts.

Try to eat 3000 calories in a vegan way without cheating by eating lots of processed vegan food like candy, fat or oil.

Nobody eats only steak. People want fat and carbs for the taste.

definitely difficult, but using nuts and bread would probably be the way to cram the calories in.

Yes. Nuts contain much fat and thus much energy per weight and volume.

Steak has fat and the fat has a satiating effect. Sugar is the opposite.

There are people that eat only steak: https://www.biohackerslab.com/ep19-dr-shawn-baker/

Of course there are always exceptions.

By "nobody" I meant "nobody representative of a noteworthy population in statistics".

Even if you do not trust the scientific consensus regarding nutrion (all recommend fruits (sugar) and vegetables, most recommend a whole food plant based diet, most warn against a high fat diet, most warn against animal products in large quantities) there are other reasons for avoiding animal products:

- Ethics. An animal is a sentient emotional being. Like a human.

- Destruction of the environment. E.g. waste of food by feeding animals, deforestation, water pollution, greenhouse gas emission.

- Waste of effictive antibiotics. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4638249/

- Animal products are expensive even if you buy the lowest quality.

Not debating any of those points, only that sugar and junk food makes you hungrier and therefore harder to diet. There is an obesity epidemic that seems to be getting worse. I'm more interested in that problem.

Some of what you describe can be attributed more to factory farming which I generally disagree and personally don't buy.

Animal products aren't expensive if you compare calories per dollar.

IMO this guy gives a bad unhealthy impression; physically and mentally.

Furthermore: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lc23vYwPihU

True! I ate ten hard boiled eggs one day and I was completely full all day. And that’s only 600 calories.

I am certainly not saying steak isn't more filling but just a random anecdote. As a dieted down currently lean person I ate 4000-6000 calories (all weighed to the gram) of steak/ground beef a day for a month no problem. This was sufficient to gain a substantial amount of weight in that time. But figured id try the meat only thing being talked about in the last year on myself.

Is that why everyone in China is fat?

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/...

This guy lost 27 pounds eating your "weaponized carbohydrates." The thing is you have fallen hook, line, and sinker for people and groups that make money off of selling you books and info about "weaponized carbohydrates."

Is sugar overconsumption bad? Of course. That doesn't mean that we have to begin breaking the laws of physics concerning calorie intake to justify it.

I'd love to see his A1C measured before and after that experiment.

Conservation of energy is basic physics. The relevant questions are whether a normal person has satiety on 1800 calories of sugar, and whether the metabolics of sugar are different than other sources of energy [1].

[1] https://peterattiamd.com/do-calories-matter/

I mean, can't you both be right? I doubt the OP was indicating that any amount of sugar automatically and magically makes you gain weight.

You can diet off of pure sugar if you want. Calories in, calories out. I doubt anyone denies that. Weaponized carbs is akin to drinking a beer vs hard liquor. Sugar gets pushed into everything, you like it, you eat a ton of it, and eventually you run into massive problems.

I think the weaponized carb idea is correct. Carb's aren't inherently bad, but when you take out ability to be sated from carbs, when you take out fiber from the carbs, removing natural barriers to consumption, when you refine it to pack in more carbs per weight.. all these things start becoming weaponized carbs. We're refining a drug.

Your reply also ignores sudden climbs in carb related problems. Eg, the India article that the OP linked. Your reply seems to suggest that suddenly, for no reason, India is just wanting to over eat. This over eating trend has been caused by something.

Modern junk food with massively refined carbs seems likely to blame.

You reply with an accusation of falling prey to a supposed vast group of profiteering researchers and support it with one anecdote?

The body is sufficiently complex that some people smoke cigarettes for 40+ years and still manage to die of something that isn't respiratory related first.

The Twinkie Diet guy may have been funded by coca-cola. http://observer.com/2015/10/here-are-the-people-coca-cola-ha...

Have you been to a restaurant in the US? Food portions are ridiculous. Even a fast food meal has 1200 calories. A sit-down casual dining place will give you > your daily allowance in one meal.

Our drink and appetizers sizes are enormous. It's disgusting.

I think an interesting direction to take reading up on the subject is instead of it being the spread of sugar look into the spread of industrial seed oils and how much their intake has increased.

Sure but it's not a uniquely American problem. Some other countries are even worse, and others are catching up fast. In a few decades this will be a worldwide issue.

Correct, and excess carbs only exacerbate the problem for people who can't process them properly.

You can eat a high calorie, low carbohydrate diet and still gain weight and develop related health problems.

Likewise, some people can eat a restricted calorie diet, but if they still eat a lot of carbs, will develop health issues.

Gotta love it when people downvote proven scientific facts.

I guess a grey font means being downvoted.

For those who tend to downvote: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_macronutrients

Regarding low carb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dj-Wmmt0FE&feature=youtu.be...

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