[feel free to edit the post/delete the latter comments. apologies.]

Also, the “chubby cheeks” thing was kind of a poor point – a more rounded face is typical amongst Asiatic peoples. It reminded me of waaaaaay back in the day when Margaret Cho lost so much weight she went into kidney failure, but what still being told by network execs that her face was too ’round.’

The social-psycho-neuro-hormonal control you speak of is complex to say the least and certainly poorly understood so far. I do think always maintaining a perspective which includes evolution and is informed about the evolution of human nutrition and lifestyles is very important. By learning more about the foods and activity levels we are best adapted to perform with, we inform ourselves a lot about how to be healthiest as a species. Yes there is a wide range and a continuum and no one-size-fits-all approach, but there is certainly a framework that evolution provides us with and we can all take things from there and refine them individually.

I get the drift of what people like Leigh, Aragon, McDonald, and others are quibbling with in terms of paleo-based eating. They see many in the paleo community being overly dogmatic about low-carbohydrate intake and not allowing for more of a range depending upon the individual and his/her goals. They also see a lot of claims being made by the paleo ‘experts’ that are not backed up by solid peer-reviewed randomized trials. They find many faults in Taubes’ claims in GCBC and see many of the pro-Taubes folks as being spoon-fed information without questioning it and believe the book goes too far in ignoring the basics of energy intake vs. expenditure as well as demonizing carbohydrates as responsible for weight gain, when it is just as possible to get fat overeating other macronutrients. I actually think that all of those positions are good points and if there are people in the paleo camp who are that dogmatic and carb-obsessed then they should be called out! I’m just not one of them.

We are all in the same boat; we want to know more about nutrition to make the most informed decisions
about our health and performance. However, nutrition
is a very controversial and enormously comlicated
subject. As Michael Pollen states in Food Rules,
nutrition science is in it’s infancy! The food industry and
unfortunately researchers certainly have their biases.
However, unlike alcohol, we all need to eat something;).

As a trainer and a student of science, I am ashamed to
see every nutrition blog full of personal attacks. I am
hopeful to dig deeper than just simple calorimetry. We
have known the energy equivalent of fat, cho, and
protein for the last century. We also have known for
that time that creating and energy deficit causes weight
loss. However, we have made tremendous advances in neurobiology, genetics, and cell biochemistry to gain a deeper understanding of the extremely sophisticated cellular control of nutrition partitioning, appetite, and chronic disease pathology. I invite anyone to bring me a different hypothesis or study to help expand the picture. Even if these ideas seem to be in contrast to what you see in your line of work. The human body is extremely complex and no one has it all figured out. I work with clients with clients trying to lose fat everyday. But, I am always retesting my “knowledge.”

I equate telling someone to eat less and move more to a business consultant telling a business to increase revenue and decrease expenses! I wish it was so black and white. It is all much more complex than that. That is what I want to know: how does social-psycho-neuro-hormonal control of nutrient partitioning and energy balance work? Insulin is one of scores of cell-signalling molecules involved. It is infinitely more complicated than what we reduce it to be. Ironically, our ancestors probably didn’t have these arguements about carbohydrate content of our diets!

Apparently I know much more than you about Celiac Disease. I know that the NIH has reported that it is grossly underdiagnosed and estimates that 1 in 133 Americans has Celiac- that’s about 3 million people. I also know that because the clinical threshold for diagnosis is so high (biopsy showing damage to duodenal brush border) that millions more people who test negative are still gluten intolerant and would great benefit from dropping the grains. Ulcerative colitis, a barrage of autoimmune reactions, liver damage, allergies, on and on- all of these can occur from gluten intolerance.
Furthermore, I just don’t see why calling gluten out as something to generally be avoided is something you would argue with? I have already stated several times that I don’t demonize carbohydrates and vegetables, tubers, and some fruits are just fine. Does this mean one can’t eat grains and do ok? Again, of course not- but I would argue that he/she is doing fine in SPITE of the grains, not because of them.

Leigh Said: “For the record I believe to eat a low gluten diet, I do not like fake carbohydrate foods. I like whole food overall. There is a difference between choosing foods that give your biggest bang for your buck and bastardizing foods when people are out of control with them or a select few have issues with them.”

Ok so we pretty much agree 100% because that is my position. I guess I would just argue that more than a select few have issues with gluten. And that it gives you little benefit by being included in your diet when there are other foods that will give you more ‘bang for your buck’ AND not irritate your gut.

Leigh said “Excess = More than daily caloric expendture. This is excess in all area by the way, fat and protein included. However it is hard to overeat protein. That doesn’t mean it is the golden god of food. Fat is insanely easy to over eat, just ask any bodybuilder with a peanut butter jar. ”

I wish I could view the human body as one large bomb calorimeter like you do, life would be so much simpler! Unfortunately, it’s a dynamic nonlinear system with a multitude of variables at work other than just ‘calories in’/'calories out’. It’s hard for me to understand that a person who claims to cling to ‘common sense’ as much you do wants to argue against the fact that the QUALITY of the calorie, not just its quantity, matters. I completely agree that overeating things other than carbohydrates can make you fat- again that is just common sense.

For the record, I have read what Lyle MacDonald and Alan Aragon have to say about nutrition and in general I am NOT a fan- I think they are out to lunch on a lot of things and are misinformed about some key points. Alan seems like an ok guy, but Lyle just seems miserable, grumpy, and completely closed to reason at times. Wonder what he’s eating I’m wondering if you’ve broadened your horizons and taken a look at some other sources for your information (aside from Taubes’ book) – I would recommend Kurt Harris M.D.’s Panu Blog, Stefan Guyenet PhD’s Whole Health Source, Petro Dobromylskyj DVM’s Hyperlipid and Robb Wolf’s site if you haven’t looked at those yet. If you have others you think I’d be interested in, that would be great.

Leigh said: “I don’t think people aren’t eating in excess, I think they are. Doesn’t mean they are bad though. There are 1001 reasons we overeat, the product we choose is but one small factor.”

You completely lost me with this reasoning. I never said people who overeat are bad, but I do think that a high incidence of obesity and diabetes in our society IS bad as I’m sure you do. They don’t only affect those with the conditions, they affect all of us. I agree that there are many reasons why we overeat, I completely disagree that the product we choose is a small factor- rather it is a HUGE factor! Again- common sense.

Leigh said: “For the record I believe to eat a low gluten diet, I do not like fake carbohydrate foods. I like whole food overall. There is a difference between choosing foods that give your biggest bang for your buck and bastardizing foods when people are out of control with them or a select few have issues with them.”

It looks like we agree on much more than we disagree on. I have the same position. I was not bastardizing all carbohydrates so maybe you misunderstood my argument or I didn’t make that clear. If so, my apologies.

Leigh said: ”
Just so you know, Taubes is not a research reference. Looking forward to you actually reading the studies and understanding how these things work. ”

Thanks for clarifying that for me Leigh. I was referring to Taubes because it was YOU who prefaced your POST and your video by alluding to his BOOK. I was not citing him as a research reference. As for you telling ME to actually read studies and understand how things work- well…I’m going to leave that one alone and be nice

Leigh said: “For the record, since you think I am evading, I have s**t for education. No, seriously I don’t have any. I never had stated such either and you can listen to any interview, podcast, etc. I am just a trainer. I write this blog, usually with horrific grammar, and sadly I have more common sense than most of the people on your book shelf. I don’t claim to be an authority on anything other than helping people not be fat, get in shape and learn to self educate themselves.”

Thank you for answering the question honestly and sincerely, I respect that. I don’t doubt that you have helped and will continue to help many people lose weight. There is more than one way to skin a cat and you certainly don’t need a degree to do it. I’m not sure about you having more common sense than those on my bookshelf, as you haven’t seen my bookshelf, but I’ll chalk that up to you being a little defensive and hyperbolic.

Again, I suspect we agree on much more than we disagree and I didn’t mean to waste your time here or spin your wheels. I honestly like a good healthy thought-provoking debate about these things and I am open to having my positions challenged and conceding when someone makes a point. Contrary to what you may believe, I am not a ‘paleo-zombie’ here to defend eating low carb, or out to demonize a macronutrient (ha!). I couldn’t really care less what people eat if it works for them. I am more interested in using medical science, evolutionary biology, and empirical results for making health decisions and giving others advice.

Thanks for the discussion and good luck with your practice!

Yes. He denies this.

“Because I don’t think that’s what Taubes was saying at all. As I understand it, he says that the body is self-regulating via its hormonal system, and fat gain or loss is controlled in this way. The problem is that the main hormone for fat storage is insulin, and insulin is produced when you eat carbohydrates. In some people, eating high levels of carbohydrates produces such a massive release of insulin that all the energy from that food gets tucked away as fat immediately – but at the expense of feeding the cells. So the person is still starving on a cellular level, and is hungry and / or lethargic. So they eat more.”

First, this doesn’t make sense. Not an insult to you but this isn’t correct. Aside from that, even it it were true, the point is they eat more. More than their daily needs. Eating the wrong kinds of foods make you eat more therefore blowing your daily expenditure. If that was all Gary was saying I would drop it and say “yeah I mean I get you buddy, I still don’t think you should blame it all on teh evil carbs but they do contribute to overeating.”

That isn’t what Gary is saying. He has stated, that you can eat more calories in other foods and not gain fat. He is saying a macro alters your storage state regardless of surplus. That is why he is wrong.

If you still don’t believe in his lack of intelligence I beg you to read this interview on t-muscle discussing growth hormone (must have been where fred hahn got it) in a relation to obesity, the fact that ALL of the biggest losers gained their weight back. All? “All,” he states. And that calories don’t matter, it is all about the homeostasis.

http://www.tmuscle.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance_interviews/eat_your_lungs_out_while_getting_leaner

The take home point is…

Can you eat like crap, which is not what I or any sane person recommend, and get all sugar addicted and hopped up and become a fat ass? Yeah, no brainer.

Does it defy the laws of energy balance towards expenditure, for the last time, no it does not.

You would also be amazed the metabolic burn most obese people have before serious health problems come in. If they just move (like we see on the biggest loser) they drop weight like hot cakes. The problem is they don’t move and they overeat. They don’t just overeat because of carbs, again it is like saying all people are drunks because of booze. Sure, it can cause you to not think straight but do you really blame the alcohol on a person who kills someone with a car driving drunk? No, you blame the messed up stuff going on in their head that led them too that point. So, unless you are also for prohibition I think you need to look at your stance.