Flutterby™! : Eat more fat 2010-04-27 23:39:05.378309+00

Eat more fat

2010-04-27 23:39:05.378309+00 by Dan Lyke 6 comments

Refined carbs increase the risk of obesity, diabetes and heart disease more than (saturated) fat.

Thanks Dan, glad to be back. :)

I think one of the more sensible things I've read in recent times was an article a few years ago linking obesity to a narrowing diet. It seemed that when man was much younger as a species, we had a huge variety of eating what we were able to find. Pine nuts, meats, fish, vegetables, etc. When we became agriculturally aware, we narrowed our proverbial "horn o' plenty" into a much smaller swath of available foods. As an example, the article made a point to bring up the potato famine of Ireland. It seems there were only two types of potatoes grown in Ireland at the time, one was the vast majority, and when a famine hit that one particular kind of potato, then entire culture and country had huge issues because it was such a devastating effect.

To counteract this, the author placed a different air around Chile, who suffered the same potato famine at the same point in time. The reason we don't know about the infamous Chilean potato famine is because out of the twenty-something types of potato grown in Chile, the famine also affected just one type. Before reading the article, I didn't even know there were 20+ types of potatoes... I figured there were "red", "brown" and "sweet" with little more to choose from.

I like having a variety in my diet though, not just for taste change now and again, but simply because it "feels" healthier to not be bogged down to a single type of food, or even a single ethnic group of food. I'm always looking to expand my horizon when it comes to eating, and I really think in the long run it's probably a better idea to keep trying as many new things as I can in the process... and as long as I'm running, biking, and excercising, have them in the amounts that I like to eat too.

On the diet thing in general, yeah, if there's a trend of evidence, so far as I can tell it's no more conclusive than Michael Pollan's "eat less, mostly vegetables" line. What consistently amazes me is how much of medicine in general, not just diet, is based on large pronouncements of stuff we just don't know and attempts to evoke the placebo effect by stating things with the air of authority.

Popularized scientific news is not scientific knowledge. This is especially true in the area of diet, which has been driven by fad and mental pathology for thousands of years.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I really miss doing the riverwalk up to the dam on the weekends. I'm really doing a lot of PT in training right now, but when I hit my next duty station, I'm really considering buying a bike instead of a car. I figured the wife will have one if I really need to drive somewhere, but for daily stuff, I'm going back to just getting another mountain bike and pedaling around base/town.

How is it that we know so little about food that we get these flip-flops in dietary reasoning every 6 months to a year? Eggs are great for you, Eggs are bad for you, Eggs are again great for you if you don't eat the yolks, Egg yolks add cholesterol but they're better because they add %s to your diet! Eat carbs, no carbs, balance your carbs, you can't have carbs, eat carbs with protein and you're ok!

In all honesty, if you're worried about what you're eating affecting your weight, you're either eating too much or not exercising enough. I went from 200 to 240 eating about 2500 calories per day and doing nothing and went from 230 to 190 eating about 6,000 or more per day with a big increase in activity. I don't believe in eating more of this or less of that will have more of an effect on your weight, your health, or your heart than just plain not getting outside enough and getting some exercise.

Put down the low fat, low carb, sugar free, chemical enriched, fiber laced, flavorless gelatin patty the magazine said you should be eating for whatever diet is popular this month and buy a bike, go for a walk, or play frisbee with your dog for a few hours. Your body and your dog will thank you for it. (I mean "you" figuratively, not as a personal attack to anyone)