http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.c...rpretation.html

Interesting hypothesis!

Also,



I think there's much more to be learned about this. When I was struggling to lose weight on zero-cab, I was admonished to use no salt or spices on the meat. Salt increases the palatability of meat, i.e., makes it taste better, so I eat more salted meat than unsalted meat. By not salting my meat, I would make it more likely that I would eat less of it.

Why is it that on low-carb we often find that we must avoid nuts, especially roasted, salted nuts, and cheese, despite their relatively low carb counts? These are very palatable foods, and most of us can eat quite a lot of them before we feel any urge to stop.

It's actually pretty banal to point out that we eat a lot more of foods that taste good--except in high end restaurants where they give us such small portions! It's less banal to reflect on the fact that "food science" has made great strides in recent decades, in developing additives that enhance the palatability of processed foods. This is very much a growth field, and these additives are created using rigorous methodologies, including double-blind testing. In short, the science of food additives is now at a level comparable to medical and pharmaceutical research. And for the same reason: There's an awful lot of money to be made doing it.

Ubizmo

I used to get upset when somebody said that the low carb diet was monotonous compared to a mixed diet, but cheer when somebody said that low carb was more satiating. Two sides of the same coin, really. What's more appetizing? Pretty much by definition, whatever you'll eat more of.

This sort of implies that fat loss is a consequence of the reduction of caloric intake. The more probable explanation is that the fat loss provides more fuel therefore reduces the caloric intake requirement, which then reduces hunger, which then reduces caloric intake.

This implies that the sole reason we eat more of it is that it now tastes better. It is just as probable that we eat more of it because somehow it affects energy systems in such a way to create an internal caloric deficit that must then be compensated for by eating more. This is made much more probable by the fact then when we're hungry, things just taste better, and when we're full, things just don't taste so good anymore.

He didn't use any toppings at all for his potatoes. Boy, that would be tough to enjoy just plain. He only used oil to cook them.



Other than the first 3 weeks he ate what he had computed his caloric requirements required. So presumably he shouldn't have lost weight beyond the first 3 weeks.

Not necessarily. It could also imply that the way food is perceived, its palatability, affects the regulation of bodyfat; so that the fat loss provides more fuel, therefore reduces, the caloric intake requirement, reducing both hunger and calorie intake, as you've said.

Which is pretty much what Stephan says here;

You mean it starts with how food tastes? No, that won't work. It would imply that our physiology is controlled by our psychology.

No, it wouldn't. Perception of food isn't just psychology, it's physiology. The physiological response to the flavour is what would matter here. (I use flavour here in a broader sense of taste, smell, texture, any of the ways we sense food.) A person walks by a bakery, smells the bread. There's a hormonal response to the smell, making the person hungry. Is this hunger the only hormonal effect? I don't know of any hormones that only affect hunger.

Suppose, just suppose, that being exposed to certain flavours triggers a hormonal cascade that leads to an increase in body fat. Being exposed to these flavours on a regular basis, a person's fat mass increases--until a new settling point, a new equilibrium is achieved. So a person's appetite increases because they're getting fatter, and once they reach a new higher plateau of body fat, their appetite is reduced. The appetite isn't the cause, it's the symptom.

I agree. A response to external stimuli to prepare for the arrival of food.

M Levac - So do you believe all people should be able to lose weight on a 5,000 calorie per day diet, as long as carbs are near zero and excess insulin producing amino acids aren't consumed, and therefore insulin is kept very low?

You totally discount calories as a factor entirely?

I mean gosh...even Dr Eades says calories do indeed count...and that LC gives AT BEST a 100 to 300 calorie "metabolic advantage." He has also discussed the fact that nuts and cheese are why many LCers stay FAT, due to the fact they are easy to overeat...DESPITE their low carb content.

You think Dr. Eades is wrong?

Calories don't matter.

See here:
http://www.why-low-carb-diets-work....eight-loss.html

Let's argue just the one called Growth Hormone Deficiency. GH acts directly on fat cells telling them to release fat. This makes the individual leaner. GH deficiency means there's less GH telling fat cells to release fat. This makes the individual fatter. GH acts independently of caloric intake and expenditure. How is that about calories?

I looked at GH in PubMed and found a few papers that said that obesity tracks with GH deficiency. Maybe one causes the other. But the more reasonable explanation is that whatever causes obesity, also causes GH deficiency. A further explanation is that whatever causes obesity, does so by first making GH lower than normal, thereby changing the fat balance at the fat tissue directly.

Considering how GH acts on fat cells, we can hypothesize that having enough GH floating around means we could eat 5,000kcals and still lose weight. We can further hypothesize that having not enough GH means we could eat as little as 1,000kcals and still gain weight, or at the very least not be able to lose it.

Okay. Fat accumulates when more fat goes into the fat cell than comes out. Eating more "calories" won't necessarily lead to a positive fat balance, because you have to consider both sides of the equation. Carbs and insulin might increase the flow of fat into the cell, while decreasing the flow out. So that eating less carbs can decrease or reverse fat accumulation.

Eating less fat (in the context of a low carb diet) will have little effect on insulin, and at least in the short term, will do little to prevent the availability of free fatty acids from pre-existing fat stores. Too little fat, and you get into Kimkin's territory, not so good. I don't think we can rule out a benefit (at least in weight-loss) from more moderate restriction.

I have a feeling growth hormone might come down to this; growth hormone is released, in part, to encourage the release of free fatty acids. The greater the free fatty acids, the less growth hormone might be needed to reach a particular level of free fatty acids in the blood. I was reading about this yesterday, growth hormone actually increases after a meal with obesity, instead of decreasing; this might be facilitated by an increased ability for fat cells to mop up free fatty acids, so fatty acids go down, growth hormone goes up. I've noticed from reading niacin studies, that when niacin inhibits lipolysis, growth hormone goes way up while free fatty acids go way down. When the niacin dose wears off, free fatty acid rebound above baseline, while growth hormone plummets. So I'm not sure the problem is the action of growth hormone on lipolysis; but of course that isn't all that growth hormone does, so that doesn't mean that growth hormone isn't important to the improvements seen on a low carb diet.

The only study I've found that gave low-carbing any kind of metabolic advantage, given the caloric intake reported by the participants, showed nowhere near 100 to 300 calories (more like 70, if you could trust that) - I WISH it was 300 calories.

The advantage for many low carbers seems to come at higher calorie levels. Sure, when low carb dieters and low fat dieters are each put on 1200 calorie per day diets, they seem to lose about the same amount of weight. But I have seen many people lose weight on low carb or zero carb diets at calorie levels that would be maintenance level calories on a SAD diet. And what about those, myself included, that have eaten 4000-5000 calories per day and not gained? Try THAT on a diet of pizza and donuts.