I just finished reading the book Good Calories Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. I was taking some notes during my reading it – notes about things that struck as stuff that should have been known by the general population but it is not.
Here is what we know so far:
- Exercise does not help weight loss – too few calories burned + appetite increase.
- On calorie surplus some individuals gain a lot, some do not gain much at all.
- Some overweight individuals eat less calories than lean people and still cannot lose weight (higher set point?).
- The First Law of Thermodynamics (calories in, calories out) is a cause of obesity in some individuals and an effect in other individuals (metabolic or hormone disorder).
- Extra calories from carbohydrates induce hunger, extra calories from protein and fat do not – at least not to a comparable degree.
- It’s easier to overeat on carbohydrates than it is on protein and fats.
- Refined carbohydrates tend to deplete 13 vitamins and tend to compete with vitamin C for absorption.
- 1200 Calories all protein and fats diet = significant fat loss; 1200 Calories mixed diet (800 Cal protein+fats and 400 Cal carbohydrates) largely fails (1 of 2 to 1 of 100 success rate).
- Total starvation completely eliminates hunger after day 3-4. All fat and protein – no hunger. Add carbs – hunger reappears.
- Obesity might be caused by a defect in energy distribution and fat metabolism. Fat people are hungrier because they are getting fatter – their adipose tissues are taking in more fat and holding onto it while the other tissues are starving. This is caused by hypothalamic abnormalities.
Although the book is very eye-opening and revealing, I think there are a few shortcomings and omissions. For example:
- It doesn’t become clear what is the role of leptin and leptin resistance in obesity. Only insulin and insulin resistance is discussed – to great lengths
- Insulin is the reason for storing extra carbs and energy in the fat cells. So, we have to avoid insulin spikes (by eating less or no carbs). But it is a well-known fact that protein foods raise insulin levels just as much as (some protein foods even more than) carbs themselves (1, 2, 3). So, what are we to do now – stop eating protein too?
2 Responses
One thing that struck me is that exercise does not burn fat. How do we reconcile the extreme fat loss that long distance runners incur. Even Oprah became very lean while she was running marathons.
Kemuel,
I didn’t say that exercise does not burn fat. It does. So does sitting on the couch. I merely said that the GCBC book suggests that exercise does not help weight loss because of too few calories burned and a concomitant increase in appetite. I have to stress that this doesn’t apply to long distance running. This type of running isn’t what’s usually practiced by fat loss adherents. The book mentioned regular physical activity that most dieters will engage in – like walking, jogging, etc.
The idea is that regular steady-state physical activity burns too few calories to account for the surplus of calories consumed in the typical western diet. For example, it takes 150-lbs person 41 minutes of 10 min/mile running in order to burn the calories in just one extra large commercial blueberry muffin (see more similar comparisons in a post I wrote a while back). But very few individuals (especially overweight individuals) will run at that speed for that long. And, quite a few individuals would eat this type of muffin at breakfast and even between normal meals as a snack.
Basically, normal physical activity burns too few calories to compensate for what we typically eat AND it produces hunger feeling that is in excess to what the physical activity burns. So, dieters who engage in regular and expected physical activity may end up even over-compensating for the few calories they burn during exercise.
This doesn’t apply to long-distance, extreme athletes. They burn A LOT of calories and as this study suggests they do experience increase in BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate – the calories you burn while doing nothing). Regular exercising does not seem to increase BMR. Only extreme exercise does. High-intensity exercise does as well (all-out sprints for example).