Fast-5 Diet and Lifestyle: Re: [fast5] Why eating less on Fast 5 is easier

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Re: [fast5] Why eating less on Fast 5 is easier

I agree there are a ton of variables in the experiment, which
make it rather not a test of pure "calorie restriction". One thing
that stands out to me is that the participants are eating a lot
of "low calorie density foods". I.e. lots of apples.

In the healthier countries, eating LOTS of vegies is common.
There was an article recently about one immigrant lady who competes
in food-eating contests: she eats huge meals normally. But
she eats, like, 10 tomatoes in a row. She also normally eats
only one meal a day.

Anyway, eating a lot of vegies gives you a lot of polysaccharides,
which keep your gut happy, which help keeps your blood happy.

The same criticism holds true for IF too though. When people
do Fast-5, they tend to "automatically" make better food
choices. They also eat fewer calories. Which is why it's
so difficult to say why IF works: is it the better food? The
fewer calories? How in the world can you separate the
variables? Do we care, if it works?

And I tend to agree with the concept: I think Americans just
plain do eat more than the body can handle. The fact that
these people reach a plateau ... the body just adapts to the
lower calorie count ... probably indicates there were too
many calories to begin with. Our culture is a culture of
overeating, and that simply has to have a bad result in terms
of heart disease and arterial health. It's like we engineered
our food and eating times just so people could stuff more
into their faces (and so spend more money and help the
overall economy). When a guy lowers his BP from 130 to 105:
his heart *will be* healthier. Even if we don't really know
why his BP went down. And there is no way I know of that
eating less can trigger cancer: cholesterol tends to be low
in developing countries too, and they tend to have less
cancer.

The part that did not work for me in the study is the
artificialness of it. Ideally, the human body should know
how much it wants to eat, and the amount and type of food
will vary depending on exercise and nutritional needs. The
study doesn't (and can't) address that, and they are basically
saying most people can't follow that lifestyle anyway.

And yet ... following the Fast-5 lifestyle has been easy
and natural for probably most people who have tried it.

On Wed, Oct 14, 2009 at 1:37 AM, HELENA <hastings.press@virgin.net> wrote:
> Heather Twist wrote: "how much work is it to do calorie restriction
> WITHOUT Fast-5? There is a neat article here:
> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/11/magazine/11Calories-t.html?pagewanted=5&_r=2&hpw"
>
> I had a look at that article and Fontana, the guy running the experiment
> is an idiot!
>
> Speaking about the people taking part in calorie restriction he stated:
>
> "In terms of cardiovascular diseases — the No. 1 cause of death; 4 out
> of 10 people die of it in the U.S. and Europe — we know that they will
> not die of cardiovascular death,"
>
> This is the most stupid thing to say. It is impossible to predict that a
> whole group of people "will not die of cardiovascular death" just
> because they have "cholesterol around 160, blood pressure around 100
> over 60, high HDL, low triglycerides and very low levels of inflammation
> ". He stated again: "So these people won't develop these diseases." Well
> not only can he not guarantee that, but what about the elephant in the
> room? What, exactly, ARE his guinea pigs going to die from? Low
> cholesterol is associated with cancer. So even if what he claims is in
> fact true, he is saving them from a quick death but giving them a long,
> slow, drawn-out, painful death.
>
> He also claimed that calorie restriction is "basically cleaning out the
> arteries".
>
> The man is a fool!
>
> The point of the experiment is to see if calorie restriction will make
> people live longer, or not. The subjects are restricting calories, yes,
> but they are also accidentally restricting carbs when they give up cakes
> and pastries etc. So they are reducing their insulin levels generally.
> So when they announce triumphantly at the end that "calorie restriction
> will indeed make people live longer", how can they say that it wasn't
> the reduction in INSULIN levels that made them live longer?
>
> So, a very unsatisfactory experiment in which the outcome is foggy and
> blurred.
>
> Helena
>
>
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