Article on Fat

Today, from the Reuters feed on Yahoo, an orthodox metabolist tells us, "(T)he body will do its best to compensate and sabotage even... modest effort (to lose weight).

"I don't want to tell you not to try. There is no question that losing weight in many can improve health, as can becoming fit," Friedman said in a telephone interview.

And he said, it should be within most people's reach to lose 10 pounds (5 kg). But it will not be easy."

Dr. Friedman's biography may be read here.

Hm. 10 lbs, eh? Lessee. I started using the Atkins diet in July, 2002. At the time, I weighed 279 lbs.

This morning, I weighed 243 lbs -- a loss of 36 lbs, or 13% of my body weight.

So, which do I believe? The 36 lbs, or Dr. Friedman?

Hm.

I first started looking into Atkins after reading an article in the New York Times. (NB: That's a reprint, hosted at Atkins' web site.) One of the strong points in that article was how the nutrition researchers all thought a calorie is a calorie is a calorie forever more, and the endocrine researchers -- the ones who study how the body processes food -- thought that Atkins' approach of starving the body of carbohydrates to induce the body to burn fat should work.

Now, in the Science article written up by Reuters, the orthodox are continuing to complain that the US diet just has too many raw calories -- rather than noticing that the bulk of the calories provided, both in sheer number and in cheap cost, are carbs, and that protein and fat have been slowly declining in the US diet for decades. Even while obesity and diabetes increase in the country.

Hm.

Well, I guess I know what I and my 36 lbs believe. :)