The Carb-Sane Asylum

Previously:   Intro & Part I The second installment of the University of California production, The Skinny on Obesity, featuring Dr. Robert Lustig and colleagues is entitled Sickeningly Sweet .  I've embedded the video at right.  I've entitled this installment of my Review & Critique Sickeningly Inaccurate.  That is, frankly an understatement about the information presented in this episode.  This video epitomizes what's wrong with many of the "anti-establishment" nutritional experts.  You do not counter bad science with more bad science.  This is what Lustig does here.  And it's not controversial -- at least there's some evidence supporting the lipid hypothesis -- but the "science" here is counter to known basic biochemistry and in opposition to the vast majority of the evidence of metabolism such as de novo lipogenesis.

... I bring you Being Interviewed 101     (hat tip LynMarie Daye).    In response to a request for advice on an upcoming interview, Fred had this response: Be honest. Good start. Keep your answers short. Make the points you want to make regardless of the questions asked if asked questions that throw you. Have 5 major points you want to get across and get them across.

The other day, Stephan Guyenet shared some of his own thoughts on David Despain's can't-say-enough-nice-things-about-it interview with Dr. John Sievenpiper.  In case you missed it, Stephan discusses his post looking at the links or lack thereof  between sugar consumption per se and obesity.  See:   Is Sugar Fattening?   At the end of the current post is the following footnote: ** If fructose is fattening due to its ability to become fat, then dietary fat should be even more fattening because it doesn't have to undergo an inefficient conversion process-- it's already fat. Excellent point!  I might add that if saturated fat is such a healthy fat for your body, fat produced by de novo lipogenesis -- mostly palmitic acid in the liver -- would be an even better source of that fat as it would give you a "metabolic advantage"!   It takes almost no calories to digest and store dietary fat in body fat.  It is highly energy intensive to convert fructose to fat, so you

For those who don't follow me on Twitter and who may miss James' alert comment here today, I'd like to point your attention to the following post on his Weightology blog: Why Losing Weight Is Like Trading Stocks, Part 2: Bashers and Pumpers Thank you James for speaking out about this abominable turn of events.  And while I'm at it, thank you to all who have emailed, commented publicly here, or even risked the consequences of posting and speaking up in the hostile territories.  I think it's a sad commentary on the nature of internet discourse that many seem hesitant to speak out ... if not in my defense, just simply in condemnation for reprehensible and unacceptable behavior.   It speaks to the ultimate motivation of silencing people is all I'll say about that.

Staying true to one of the founding missions of the Asylum, there's a YouTube series entitled The Skinny on Obesity, from University of California, that deserves critical attention.   If you're going to put forth science to explain obesity and associated disease, especially in the affirmative sense ("fact", "we know", "is" rather than "possibly", "probably", "evidence supports"), it should be correct to the best of current knowledge.   I've made it through five of the episodes to date, and sad to say, this series falls far short of that mark.   Thus far, there have been three contributors:  Dr. Robert Lustig, Elissa Epel, and Barbara Laraia.  Almost everyone is familiar with Lustig, the last two listed as affiliated with The Center for Obesity Assessment and Study at UC but we learn nothing about their backgrounds.   By far the major contributor to the science is Lustig and he gets some basic things so horrib

Hey all!  I'm planning to look into some different things this summer now that my schedule has cleared a bit.  One of these is doing some stuff where I'd like to "mark-up" documents, record written  "presentations" and/or just incorporating some free-hand drawings into content here.  So I was in Staples the other day to return something I didn't need that I received as a gift, and forgot about.  So first I checked that they still carried the item and they did.  Yay!  But as I browsed the aisle, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the writing tablets.  They are so much sleeker looking and seemingly functional (according to the descriptions) than one I had eons ago back when computers still came with 5" floppy drives and hard drive capacities measured in MB.  VERY interested -- also wide price ranges!  I'm well familiar with underspending on such devices and them having inadequate function ... but then again, nowadays you can get devices for $5

When I teach stats, we discuss a bit how numbers can be used to deliver alarmist messages. Using a generic Compound X that shows no toxic effects up to 100 units with single digit baseline levels, we discuss how varying increases in X might be reported.  So let's say baseline levels of X are 2 units.  Something is done, and levels of X rise to 3 units and this change reaches the level of statistical significance.  The alarmist reporting that gives the greatest impact would probably be to state something like:  "levels of X increased by 50%".  This is true, and it sounds daunting taken out of context.  Alternately you might see something like "levels of X were 1.5 times baseline", though I think the 50% number has more impact.  For anything less than 10X increase, the alarmist reporting almost always uses the percents, because over 100% has emotional intuitive impact.  So for example if X values rose to 4 units, "X values doubled" has impact, but "

This one is too good just to tweet.  One of those gems I mentioned the other day is David Despain's Evolving Health blog.  He's been posting quite a bit of late on fructose.  His latest:    Fate of fructose: Interview with Dr. John Sievenpiper . It's definitely worth reading the whole thing, but I'll excerpt a few things that address the problems with many of the fructose studies and problems with them, and some nice correcting of Lustig & Co.: The 50th percentile for intake in the United States is 49g per day, which is just a little less than 10 percent per day of energy from fructose. ... the 95 percentile for intake for NHANES for fructose consumes 87g of sugar or little less than 20 percent energy. It seems to me that sugar consumption in the US is often inflated, and the inflation is done by those who seem to have an "crisis agenda" -- by that I mean looking to whip up a crisis for the purpose of enacting legislation or finding a new tax revenue str

Accuse anyone who counters Taubes or LC Dogma of being me.  I've noticed an increasing trend in my Inbox.  Yes, from time to time folks who frequent other blogs and such will shoot me a "have you seen this?" alert.   When I first started blogging, I still had time to participate in comments elsewhere.  That's really diminished a lot of late.  I may not get 1000 comments here, but I very much enjoy that we really have discussions here and I try to at least answer all comments and questions.  If I miss you, please don't take it personally, sometimes I read a comment, intend to reply, but by the time I get around to it, I just plain forget or get distracted. Still, the occasional getting sucked-in with recent events aside, I don't have time to read, let alone participate on other blogs (that is, those that haven't put me in the blacklist queue) much anymore.  So if you're one of those sending me these types of emails, I do thank you for keeping me apprise

Below is the NHANES data for men and women, altered a bit from the source to take out the distracting diabetes data.

The image below comes from the blog of Dr. Richard Feinman .   Free drink and an appetizer at the Asylum Pub & Grill tonight for the first person to point out what's wrong with this picture! original image direct link

Alternate title:   Battle Pima ~ Bernstein v. Taubes In the comments on a recent post, Galina linked me to some online material by Diabetes "guru" Dr. Richard Bernstein.   Anyone who's frequented low carb forums and blogs will recognize that name as probably the go-to authority on diabetes management with a low carb diet, and it's not too much of a stretch to state that he's the second-most cited authority behind the great Gary Taubes himself.    Significant portions of his book, The Diabetes Solution , are free to read online, including his chapter on Weight Loss .   He writes:

Just putting this up here, from this study courtesy of Julianne Taylor:   Quantitative Analysis of Amino Acid Oxidation and Related Gluconeogenesis in Humans  (this is an older, large file, I've shared the full text in Google Docs, and I'll come back and edit in the link when GD decides to behave in my browser).   Mind boggling!

It's been a while since Part I of this series ... too many irons in too many fires and all that jazz.  But one research track I went down recently reminded me of this lingering series and I thought I'd finish up this second installment. We hear all the time truisms such as that the acute effects of a hormone differ from the chronic effects, and whenever a hormone is present in excess of normal levels, the term " fill in hormone here resistance" is sure to be close behind.  Now there is no doubt that hormone resistance is a very real phenomenon, but what does it mean, specifically? The concept of insulin resistance, IR, is highly complicated by the fact that insulin has varying actions in various tissues and organs.  I do intend to discuss tissue-specific IR in more depth as this series unfolds.  But for today, I am going to limit the discussion to insulin and the muscle cell.  After all, when general IR is discussed, it is usually systemic or skeletal muscle insulin

I've been musing a bit in comments and asides lately over the low carb movement.  When I discovered the LC internet community in early 2009 those were some still heady days.  In retrospect I'm not sure how much it was really growing vs. the hype of same, but it was a thriving community with well traveled blogs and discussion boards.  The number of "big names" touting Taubes' alternate hypothesis was staggering, really, and reports of how the mainstream was finally catching on were frequent.  Looking back, it seems the year or so before were even headier times for low carb.   Fast forward and in 2011 many big names jumped ship, not to mention the readership of blogs like this one increased dramatically.  Even many who remain wedded to LC as the only superior answer to all ills no longer believe TWICHOO to be correct.   Many have retooled their message, clarified their positions, etc.etc.  This is clearly more difficult for some than others -- it's hard to shi

A while back I asked if anyone had any evidence that insulin blocks leptin action in the brain.  There were many responses both here and on Twitter -- thanks!! -- one of which referenced the following study:   Suppression of insulin secretion is associated with weight loss and altered macronutrient intake and preference in a subset of obese adults ,  PA Velasquez-Mieyer ,   PA Cowan ,   KL Arheart ,   CK Buffington ,   KA Spencer ,   BE Connelly ,   GW Cowan ,   and  RH Lustig.  If you're the person pointed me to this, I apologize for not naming you.  Ahhhh Robert Lustig.  Haven't spent much time on him here, but as he muscles his way into the (misguided) War on Insulin, this too shall change.   I will have much more to say about that study on the whole at some future date.  They gave some people an insulin-lowering drug (a drug that does more than just suppress secretion) and some lost "significant" weight, some lost a wee bit, and some even gained weight.  In

It seems that part of the more recent trend of defining a "proper" low carb diet as being one that is moderate in protein and high (very) in fat is this notion that excess protein will just be turned to glucose.  Quite often I've seen Dr. Richard Bernstein cautions against eating too much protein because it just gets turned to glucose.  (I did look for a link but was unsuccessful, so if I'm misstating Bernstein here, please do correct me in comments.)   I had looked into this long ago, but never really said much about it, but there are two reasons why this never made sense to me. First, a little biochemistry.  There are exceedingly few reactions that occur in our bodies without the involvement of an enzyme.   This includes not only anabolic (synthesis, building, energy storing/requiring) reactions, but also catabolic (break down, energy releasing reactions) reactions.  Glucose and fatty acids no more "spontaneously combust" in our bodies than does propane

... Heller & Heller's Carbohydrate Addicts Diet?  I'm interested in finding out what the 17 questions to determine if you're a carb addict are.  Any help appreciated.  I presume it includes some of these 10 questions? http://www.carbohydrateaddicts.com/caquiz.html Thanks in advance!

Confession time.  I found out about that recent LC v. LF diet study from Andreas Eenfeldt's blog.  Andreas seems woefully misguided into thinking that obese Americans got that way listening to US Government guidelines and eating a low fat diet.  Any and every study that shows some advantage for LC is rapidly added to his list demonstrating that LCHF is superior and LF diets are nothing short of criminal at this point.  I'll have some personal things to say about all of this at the end of the post.  Gossip Mongers can skip to there if you like ;-) (scroll down to line, or browser search on "And so now") In any case, in a blog post entitled  New Study: High Fat Food is Good for Diabetics , Andreas cites this "news" article:   High-fat diet lowered blood sugar and improved blood lipids in diabetics .  Another low carb advocate, Dr. Eades, also tweeted the following :   RCT shows better glycemic control & improved lipid labs seen in diabetics on #lowcarb as

Paleobuzz.com, a site that has included me in their blog-roll for quite some time (thanks!), is a great resource.  I've mentioned it here a few times, but thought I'd give one more formal shout out for those not familiar with the site who might find it of value. I read a lot ... too much really ... about the net.  But it's sites like PB that make it easier to do so.  Yes, subscribing to blogs in RSS feeds is helpful, and I do that with several blogs and comments feeds, but sometimes just seeing what's new and interesting about the net in this community is better experienced the way PB does it.  I'm not sure if they are making any money from referrals or whatever, and I don't care.  They provide a valuable service without capitalizing on the blogger's content per se.   I find the chronological listing of content from various blogs, some I wouldn't normally bother to read, complete with excerpt of post, a nice format.  For example today and part of yeste

Yeah ... I'm off on a tangent again ;-)  In looking at that new LC v. LF study blogged on here and here , I was reminded of a few studies I've looked into previously that actually increase the protein in the diets.  That post is in the works, but in reviewing one study it hit me -- the macro percents were exactly what the recent Swedish study intended  to compare!   This study from Gannon & Nuttall fits the bill perfectly:   Effect of a High-Protein, Low-Carbohydrate Diet on Blood Glucose Control in People With Type 2 Diabetes .  I blogged on this long ago, here . {Aside:  Gannon & Nuttall are the researchers behind the Dreamfields pasta study one of my detractors used to blast the company and its product (I agree with that, BTW). But that study has since been  withdrawn  so another one of my detractors would feel justified in calling them liars.  Sigh.}

When I was a teenager, I had quite the lucrative babysitting business.  On Saturday nights, before cable and VCR's and DVR's there was Love Boat and Fantasy Island (then SNL and Don Kirshner's Rock Concert <- anyone remember that?).  Given that The Love Boat was aboard a cruise ship, and Fat Head weighs in with a tale that seems more fantasy than reality, I chose to title this post with Fantasy Island. Four days after the 5th Annual LC Cruise docked back in Galveston, Tom Naughton, aka Fat Head, weighs in with:   The Cruise (and Kruse) Report .  Now I wouldn't bother sharing this with you were it not for Fat Head's irresponsible blogging here.  I mean this was posted on May 17th -- long past when anyone with a computer and 6 neurons would have concluded that, whatever went down on the Carnival Magic vis a vis Dr. Jack Kruse, wasn't Jack's version.  Ahhh but we get new details from Tom:

I'm not sure the wisdom of making this post, but something I read yesterday on Nikoley's latest post on Jack Kruse just didn't sit right with me.  Were it not for the fact that Dick did his best to contribute to the angst of the past going-on two weeks, I probably would just let it slide.  He's just not the sort of blogger I have ever had much interest in.  I can't relate, and, frankly, he's so cryptic at times as to be exasperatingly annoying.  Really, it's almost as frustrating as having a discussion with Fred Hahn, and anyone who ever has ended up getting talked in circles (as opposed to getting talked circles around) by Fred knows what I mean.    So any way, here was Dick's first post on Kruse.  You see, he had "inside information" having spoken to Kruse on the night of Jan. 9 when Kruse claims to have undertaken his now infamous epic biohack -- complete with elective surgery, MRSA, no local/post op pain management, and 120 lbs of ic

This post is a continuation of  LC v. LF Diet Comparison Study Shows Calories Determine Weight Loss , discussing the following study: In type 2 diabetes, randomisation to advice to follow a low-carbohydrate diet transiently improves glycaemic control compared with advice to follow a low-fat diet producing a similar weight loss What distinguished this study from many other comparison studies, was that there was an attempt at keeping calories constant between the diets.  Usually LC is ad libitum , which, especially the first time one follows a low carb diet, tends to substantially spontaneously reduce caloric intake more than what is generally prescribed for a "responsible" calorie restricted diet (CRD).  This was also a longer term study where macro percentages were fixed for the duration of the trial (as opposed to the Atkins induction and progression to increase carbs in many trials).  Presuming compliance, then, the study controlled for calories and sought to look at the

Hey gang!  I thought I'd bring your attention to a new page I added to the blog.  I have published over 600 posts here in the past two or so years.  The archives widgets are wanting in terms of being able to browse titles.  I do try to organize by labels, but even many of those lists are cumbersome.  Even when I try to find some of my own posts it often takes quite a while.  And then it hit me, that it would be nice to just have a list of all of my blog posts.  So I went searching for such a widget and found one quite quickly.  If you look down the right side bar you will now see a link to the page where all my posts are listed in chronological order.  While not all of my post titles are descriptive, many are, and I think this might help some of the newer readers, especially, to peruse what older material they might find interesting.  

On Monday the hubs and I finally got around to checking out the new Korean owned market that opened up nearby recently.  It's "full sized" -- taking the place of a regular grocery store and pretty much keeping the produce department intact.  I can see getting fish/seafood from there quite often if that department stays as clean and stocked as it was.   They have a full complement of the shiritake, konjac, yam noodles and such (all the same thing essentially though some have a tinge of soy that makes them look less like cellophane noodles and more like ramen).  These days I avoid those although prepared properly they can be an acceptable low carb/calorie filler.  But I had heard of the kelp noodles and thought I'd like to give them a try.   So there amongst the others sat a package of Sea Tangle Noodles.  I went to try them yesterday.  They come in a plastic package, much like the shiritake.  I was happy to discover there was no fishy smell that required extensive ri

This time in a somewhat heterogeneous (mixed) population of Type 2 diabetics.   In type 2 diabetes, randomisation to advice to follow a low-carbohydrate diet transiently improves glycaemic control compared with advice to follow a low-fat diet producing a similar weight loss From the paper: In the low-fat group, the mean age was 62.7±11 years, there were 13 men and 18 women and the mean duration of known diabetes was 8.8±6.2 years.Corresponding figures for the low-carbohydrate group were 61.2±9.5 years, 14 men and 16 women and a duration of known diabetes of 9.8±5.5 years. Age, sex distribution and known duration of diabetes did not differ between the groups (all p>0.5). This was a two year study with assessments at 6, 12 and 24 months along with an additional assessment of intake at 3 months.  These time frames match up with Shai.   Unlike Shai, the dietary prescriptions for both LF and LC were calorie restricted -- 1600 cal/day women, 1800 cal/day men and for LC there was no indu

Originally lucky post #13 made on March 23, 2010 In light of all of the "fat burning" , respiratory quotient and mitochondrial mayhem discussions of damaged metabolisms, I thought this might be a fitting post to bump to the top today.  The take home message of this study, IMO, is that the body burns what it needs to burn, and hormone levels adjust accordingly, not so much the other way around.   Energy deficit without reducing dietary carbohydrate alters resting carbohydrate oxidation and fatty acid availability Reduced carbohydrate (CHO) availability after exercise has a potent influence on the regulation of substrate metabolism, but little is known about the impact of fat availability and/or energy deficit on fuel metabolism when dietary CHO availability is not reduced. The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of a postexercise energy deficit, independent of CHO availability, on plasma substrate concentrations and substrate oxidation.

In light of recent events, I thought I'd do a little bump fest.  My apologies to my regulars.  I will be putting out new material very soon. Original post date:  9/29/11 Oh CarbSane, why must you constantly criticize my favorite guru?  After all: He/she helped me lose XX lbs He/she is right about ABC & LMNOP He/she is just trying to get the studies done He/she saved my life! He/she has helped me finally understand why I'm fat He/she cured my XYZ The mainstream is wrong, we need more like him/her, don't discourage them Ad Hominem!!!! etc. etc.

While I was looking at something unrelated (except that it was a fatty acid), the following popped up in my search:   Weight loss supplement - conjugated linoleic acid - shows nasty side effects .  Conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) first came to my attention, other than hearing about it as a supplement from time to time, during a discussion on trans fats and trans fat content of certain foods.  CLA is a trans fat, it's just not an unnatural nasty chemical we associate with the term these days.  It's found in meat of grassfed animals in particular, milk/dairy from same animals and eggs.   If you do a search on CLA and trans fat you'll turn up all manner of reports how it's the "good" or "healthy" trans fat.  In addition to some anti-cancer claims, it's also touted as the "belly busting" trans fat.  Sign me up!   But, not so fast according to the article, which references two studies: (2007, nothing new here, just thought I'd pass

Yesterday on FTA, Jack Kruse posted the following: Jack Kruse // May 12, 2012 at 13:59 Somebody just pointed me to Deans blog this PM of 5/9. I left a comment there that was similar to the one I posted here last night and she refused to post it. I will say it again here clearly for all to hear again. I named no one to anyone publically. The people protecting the people who participated in this crime and did this are saying I did. I challenge anyone to post one blog or media comment where I listed any names I gave anywhere or to anyone publically. There is none and Deans et al. can’t handle that truth. The only person I shared the list of names I gave the FBI was to Robb Wolf and that was for the protection of the ‘movement”. The people who participated in this behavior caused the proximal harm here. It was not the victim or the caller who has already been deposed by my representation. He is no part of this community and just a concerned citizen which further points the gun at the owne

... the more I wonder, what was Jack Kruse doing going on the LC Cruise?   There was enough notoriety surrounding his TEDx talk, that Jimmy urged on his forum for members to lobby TEDx Nashville to for the speaking slot.  I can't imagine Jimmy Moore didn't watch it.   So I'm putting myself in his shoes and thinking to myself, this isn't good news here.  I know I'd be a bit panicky if my first two leading headliners backed out relatively late in the game ( * see footnote 1) but still in time for would be cruisers to cancel their plans were their heart set on meeting either of these two.  Given the popularity of Jack's podcast appearance and being the #1 vote-getter for Encore Week, of course Jack was the guy to call.  I would have!  Jack was quirky and eccentric at the time, but his bad behavior was limited to PH near as I can tell and nobody would be harmed by a little fun talk about how your leptin receptors can't process electrons from carbohydrates and s

Good Thursday afternoon my fellow inmates ...  Today is May 10th, Day 4 of the LC Cruise.  There have been a number of developments, so I thought I'd share some links and thoughts in one place for those who don't frequent certain blogs and websites and such. First, I'm safe, sound, and have yet to be contacted by any legal authorities in this matter.  I suspect that if the FBI is even still involved in this case, it is probably to see whether Jack himself was involved in the whole sordid saga and what part one Kevin Cottrell may have to do with it.   I don't know when Cottrell uploaded the unsigned letter from Carnival to Scribd, but the Harkness' posted a slightly different copy of the letter they blogged was received on May 8.   It seems awfully suspect that there would be a PDF of such a file floating around, and I'm no e-doc specialist but Cottrell's letter does not appear to be a scan.  In the properties, the document was created on May 7 at 7:58:5

From FTA: Jack Kruse // May 9, 2012 at 17:42 I have a conundrum here. What was done to me will be found in justice. What kind of justice, I am unsure as yet. But I have a consciousness about the movement that this “twatter” undermined by the actions said. They people who are complicit in this are crafting a message that my response has damaged the movement. Quite the contrary……the “twat” opened that can of worms. I have to protect that emotion in spite of my anger, because the movement and helping others is part of my mission. The ‘respected leaders’ have to back “paleo the movement”, but neurosurgery pays my bills, so I must protect my house first and foremost. I have hired peopel to do just that on Sunday night as I was driven back to Houston after being removed from the boat. The first person I called was Robb Wolf because I knew what he was crafting was just hit with a torpedo from the “in paleo crowd”. The respected leaders forget to easily, because Paleo pays their

Well the internet is a-buzz.  Jack's sh!t has hit the fan. Nashville Surgeon Target Of Cyber Attack, Kicked Off Cruise Ship  , archived . Nashville surgeon removed from cruise ship  , archived . I don't know who these reporters are, but even these articles smell super fishy.    "I know that one of the main ringleaders that's tied to the twitter feed is in New York and they're probably going to be talking to her very soon," Kruse said. Kruse was told a conviction for this type of crime could carry anywhere from a ten to twenty year sentence. Let me be perfectly clear.  I WILL NOT BE INTIMIDATED.  I've retweeted a few @shitkrusesays tweets because I thought they were funny.  Nothing more, nothing less.  I have NOTHING to do with that account, and not only that, I have no clue who is behind it.  This is more than likely why neither the FBI nor any other law enforcement agency has yet to contact me, let alone show up at my door.  Surely this morn

METABOLIC ADAPTATIONS TO A "STUFF AND STARVE" FEEDING PROGRAM. I. STUDIES OF ADIPOSE TISSUE AND LIVER GLYCOGEN IN RATS LIMITED TO A SHORT DAILY FEEDING PERIOD This is quite an old study, published in 1962, and it's in rats who are known to have greater DNL in adipose tissue.  This was a fairly short study, wherein rats were put on a 2 hr/day ad libitum eating schedule for one week.  Intake was 60% lower on day 1, but back up to 95% of normal ad libitum intake by the second day.  Thus the rats lost weight early on, but were back within 10% of their start weight by week's end.   Essentially it appears that in short order with a switch to such a regime, adipose tissue storage and DNL in adipose tissue is upregulated considerably (10 fold).  Normally a 24 hr fasted rat will have depleted glycogen stores as some is burned along with fatty acids.  Rats adapted to this regime had full liver glycogen after the 24 hr fast indicating that they likely use fats preferentially f

If you haven't already done so, I highly recommend an internet bop on over to Anthony Colpo's blog to read his awesome interview with Muata Kamdibe .   Muata made a number of great points in that interview that resonated with me and that I've been meaning to blog on before this past week's little diversion.  So this probably won't be the last post inspired by that interview.  I first "met" Muata on James Krieger's Weightology website, and you may recognize the unique name as someone who comments here occasionally. So in the context of discussing getting obsessed over PubMed studies and scientific minutia (yes, I'm guilty of that quite often!), Muata said: Also, folks who do actually realize that “Eat Less, Move More” is simply a template, tend to get carried away with macro breakdowns; however, they aren’t willing to track their calories for more than a few weeks. Give me a break! I mean, how silly is it for an obese person to really concern him

OK, let's get back to some science here :-)  In comments on my recent query for evidence that insulin blocks leptin in the brain, Kindke posted a link to the following article:   Yin and Yang of hypothalamic insulin and leptin signaling in regulating white adipose tissue metabolism .   ABSTRACT:   Fatty acids released from white adipose tissue ( WAT) provide important energy substrates during fasting. However, uncontrolled fatty acid release from WAT during non-fasting states causes lipotoxicity and promotes inflammation and insulin resistance, which can lead to and worsen type 2 diabetes (DM2). WAT is also a source for insulin sensitizing fatty acids such as palmitoleate produced during de novo lipogenesis. Insulin and leptin are two major hormonal adiposity signals that control energy homeostasis through signaling in the central nervous system. Both hormones have been implicated to regulate both WAT lipolysis and de novo lipogenesis through the mediobasal hypothalamus (MBH) in a

I've been befuddled for a good long time how Jack Kruse can make the claims he makes yet remains a practicing neurosurgeon in good standing.  Well ... perhaps this sheds some light on goings on: AANS Neurosurgeon At its Nov. 18, 2011, meeting, the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) Board of Directors approved the recommendations of the Professional Conduct Committee that three members be disciplined for unprofessional conduct while appearing as expert witnesses in medical malpractice lawsuits. The disciplinary actions are: John J. Kruse, MD — Six-month Suspension . The Board concluded that Dr. Kruse gave false testimony in a deposition regarding the size of pedicle screws used in surgery by another neurosurgeon. There were several other matters which, while not the basis for the suspension recommendation, were causes for concern. Well, this would explain a lot.  "Jack" is John unless anyone even doubts.   This is not a suspension of license to practice,

direct image link I'm floored. I usually read Jimmy's cluttered-with-ads blog in my feed reader, so am not normally subjected to the sponsors, etc.  But I went to his site directly this past week and lo and behold, Jimnatius Mooreilly has a new sponsor.  The promo image is shown at right.   At first I thought, this looks like a supplement, so eh?  So what if it apparently isn't working for Jimmy Moore, who no doubt was given free product to evaluate, at least it's just a supplement containing all of those micronutrients we know deficiencies in cause obesity.  Hypocritical, yes, but not tragically so. And then I clicked the link ... The manufacturer's site is HERE , and the specific product link is HERE .  It's a meal replacement shake.  That's right.  A meal replacement shake.   Is it Primal Fuel?  Bwa ha ha.  Not even close. For $35-40 (-10% LLVLC discount) you get 21 servings of this shake.  Let's forget the claims made for a moment, and look at

I suppose I should be flattered, but I really get angry at times when content from here is ripped off.  This latest case is especially maddening because one has to be an idiot -- yes I just called names -- and IDIOT, to think that they can cut and past entire blog posts of original content from a blog such as this, post them on their website with some commentary, ask readers for feedback ... yada yada ... and not think, nay KNOW, this is wrong.  Therefore I am posting this here prior to getting a response from the latest rip off artist in the form of one Barry Cripps of Paleo Diet News, to make an example of them.   I posted the comment that follows on this post:  http://paleodietnews.com/5507/paleo-diet-is-there-a-negative-to-coconut-oil  ... and I will C&P back from there at the end of this post so please don't do these hacks the favor of following the link unless you feel compelled to weigh in on their behavior. Hello Barry, On occasion since my content was being ripped off

The title of this post is a little play on the phrase "cult of personality".  Have a listen, or read the lyrics  of the Living Colour song.   {And during the few moments that we have left  We want to talk right down to earth In a language that everybody here can easily understand} Look in my eyes What do you see? The cult of personality I know your anger, I know your dreams I've been everything you want to be Oh, I'm the cult of personality

In recent comments here, someone hit the nail on the head about Jimmy Moore.  He's become a professional sympathy seeker, PSS.  This is evident in his latest whine blog post:  Aren’t You Going To Respond To The Negative Attacks Against You? Jimmy posts some screenshots of comments made about him and says this: I guess these people have an expectation that if they write a comment like this on my blog, Facebook wall or Twitter page, at a YouTube video, on my forum or elsewhere online that I have a duty to publish it. I do not. I tend to agree with the famous blogger Tim Ferriss from “The Four-Hour Workweek” blog and his doctrine of it being okay to disagree with the ideas I share on my blog. But once you cross the line into personal attacks against me or others, there is no expectation that your comment will ever see the light of day. DELETE! I’m more than happy to entertain lively debate and discussion of the topics I blog about (that’s what a blog is for, right?). But if

A comment I read on PaleoHacks led me to this article on Livestrong:  Does Coconut Oil increase your appetite?   It cites the following study:  Ingested Medium-Chain Fatty Acids Are Directly Utilized for the Acyl Modification of Ghrelin . ABSTRACT: Ghrelin, an acylated brain and gut peptide, is primarily produced by endocrine cells of the gastric mucosa for secretion into the circulation. The major active form of ghrelin is a 28-amino-acid peptide containing an n -octanoyl modification at serine that is essential for activity. Studies have identified multiple physiological functions for ghrelin, including GH release, appetite stimulation, and metabolic fuel preference. Until now, there has not been any report detailing the mechanism of ghrelin acyl modification. Here we report that ingestion of either medium-chain fatty acids (MCFAs) or medium-chain triacylglycerols (MCTs) increased the stomach c