Re: Gary Taubes interview at Seth's Blog

Cookie Cutter Wrote:
Taubes is a science writer, not a snake oil salesman. The book covers
research that has been done. A major focus of this book is conveying an
understanding of the scientific method, of understanding that the
scientific method demands that an hypothesis be framed in such a manner
as to try to disprove it. He educates his reader to the difference
between controlled experiments and epidemiological studies and makes
clear the limitations of epidemiological research. He shows how
politics, both scientific and governmental, can drive opinion, research,
and even conclusions in scientific papers. He explains in excruciating
detail how much of our biochemistry works as it relates to nutrition.
This book is not an easy read; most certainly, the main audience that he
wishes to influence is the scientific community.

Here are two very specific issues where is wrong:

1. In his Berkley lecture about 1:35 he proposes a metabolic ward
study comparing a eucaloric (weight maintaining) diet of mixed
macronutrient content to an equal calorie diet containing low carb/
high fat.

http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216

He maintaines that subjects will lose weight on the high carb/low fat
version.

This experiement has been done by Liebel and company and the results
were negative. Diet varied from 15%carbs to 85% carbs and there was no
difference in caloric needs, ie subjects maintaned constant weight.
See Reference a.

2.In the epilog Taubes list his concluding remarks. Number 6 states:

"Consuming excess calories does not cause us to grow fatter, any more
than it causes a child to grow taller. Expending more energy than we
consume does not lead to long-term weight loss; it leads to hunger."

The most recent rebuttal to this outragious statement comes from
research done at Pennington Biomedical Research Center where a
long,meticulous metabolic ward study found that reducing calorie
intake, or burning more calories throught exercise added up to produce
the results the modern world has accepted : Calories In - Calories Out
= Weight Loss or Gain.
See Ref b.

a.
Energy intake required to maintain body weight is not affected by
wide variation in diet composition
Laboratory of Human Behavior and Metabolism, Rockefeller University,
New York, NY 10021.

Diets rich in fat may promote obesity by leading to a greater
deposition of adipose-tissue triglycerides than do isoenergetic diets
with less fat. This possibility was examined by a retrospective
analysis of the energy needs of 16 human subjects (13 adults, 3
children) fed liquid diets of precisely known composition with widely
varied fat content, for 15-56 d (33 +/- 2 d, mean +/- SE). Subjects
lived in a metabolic ward and received fluid formulas with different
fat and carbohydrate content, physical activity was kept constant, and
precise data were available on energy intake and daily body weight.
Isoenergetic formulas contained various percentages of carbohydrate as
cerelose (low, 15%; intermediate, 40% or 45%; high, 75%, 80%, or 85%),
a constant 15% of energy as protein (as milk protein), and the
balance
of energy as fat (as corn oil). Even with extreme changes in the fat-
carbohydrate ratio (fat energy varied from 0% to 70% of total intake),
there was no detectable evidence of significant variation in energy
need as a function of percentage fat intake.

PMID: 1734671 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

b.
Effect of calorie restriction with or without exercise on body
composition and fat distribution.Redman LM, Heilbronn LK, Martin CK,
Alfonso A, Smith SR, Ravussin E; Pennington CALERIE Team.
Pennington Biomedical Research Center, 6400 Perkins Road, Baton Rouge,
Louisiana 70808, USA.

CONTEXT: There is debate over the independent and combined effects of
dieting and increased physical activity on improving metabolic risk
factors (body composition and fat distribution). OBJECTIVE: The
objective of the study was to conduct a randomized, controlled trial
(CALERIE) to test the effect of a 25% energy deficit by diet alone or
diet plus exercise for 6 months on body composition and fat
distribution. DESIGN: This was a randomized, controlled trial.
SETTING: The study was conducted at an institutional research center.
PARTICIPANTS: Thirty-five of 36 overweight but otherwise healthy
participants (16 males, 19 females) completed the study. INTERVENTION:
Participants were randomized to either control (healthy weight
maintenance diet, n = 11), caloric restriction (CR; 25% reduction in
energy intake, n = 12), or caloric restriction plus exercise (CR+EX;
12.5% reduction in energy intake + 12.5% increase in exercise energy
expenditure, n = 12) for 6 months. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Changes in
body composition by dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry and changes in
abdominal fat distribution by multislice computed tomography were
measured. Results: The calculated energy deficit across the
intervention was not different between CR and CR+EX. Participants lost
approximately 10% of body weight (CR: - 8.3 +/- 0.8, CR+EX: - 8.1 +/-
0.8 kg, P = 1.00), approximately 24% of fat mass (CR: - 5.8 +/- 0.6, CR
+EX: - 6.4 +/- 0.6 kg, P = 0.99), and 27% of abdominal visceral fat
(CR: 0.9 +/- 0.2, CR+EX: 0.8 +/- 0.2 kg, P = 1.00). Both whole-body
and abdominal fat distribution were not altered by the intervention.
CONCLUSION: Exercise plays an equivalent role to CR in terms of energy
balance; however, it can also improve aerobic fitness, which has other
important cardiovascular and metabolic implications.

PMID: 17200169 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Regards
Randy
.