Posted on 08/26/2013 6:20:13 PM PDT by Signalman
Is sugar toxic and the cause of the obesity epidemic? Here’s a great new video called Toxic Sugar. It’s a recent segment from the major Australian science program Catalyst, on ABC.
It’s arguably the best 18-minute introduction ever made on the true causes of the obesity epidemic. The program features the #1 enemy of the sugar industry: professor Robert Lustig. Also appearing: science writer Gary Taubes and obesity expert professor Michael Crowley.
See it and then tell your friends. This needs to be seen by a lot of people
Yeah, what Jeeves said.
Are you of the opinion that a body can consume less energy than it burns and still gain weight?
The striking statistics showing that a miniscule # of people able to maintain weight loss make it quite clear that there are physiologic mechanisms at work that are not yet understood.
Overeating is a learned behavior. It can also be unlearned. Our society has become increasingly sedentary and no longer possesses a basic understanding of science, especially human nutrition. This is the problem, not some unknown physiological mechanism.
Obesity in the US is a phenomenon that has risen since WWII and our lifestyles since then have become more dramatically lethargic. Meanwhile, science and technology have combined to make food production and distribution much more efficient so that the average adult spends much less than 20% of their income on food and they have buying power to purchase more than the bare necessity. Nutritional education is lacking and the stigma attached to obesity has been removed so it's OK to be obese.
The genetic basis that was in our recent ancestors who were relatively trim are the same genes that are in us producing the same enzymes and controlled by the same hormones, yet we are obese. It seems to me that the answer for the majority of us is that we eat too damn much for the calories we burn.
The real culprit here is high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). If many of our foods switch back to real sugar from sugar beet or sugar cane, I’ll almost guarantee the obesity could go down quite a bit.
nonsense....if sugar ( or any other food for that matter) was ‘the cause’ of obesity then people would have been fat for thousands of years. Obesity is caused by lack of exercise....these obese children do not go outside to play (for lots of reasons), the eat generally crappy diets, and no one at home is interested in changing anything.
Sugar is not the enemy.
you can buy all sorts of food that contain NO high fructose corn syrup....all this food NAZIism is getting as boring as the climate mongers. Eat fewer calories exercise more....that has always been the key to losing weight.
Can’t just be the food. There are people (I’m one of them) who just won’t get fat, no matter how much they eat.
Your genetics have a large influence on metabolic rates..... None the less obesity was NOT common in the last century. People were active. They did not spend hours in front of the tv or the computer. They ate food that was local and fresh (or they used the canned stuff that was unpalatable). They did not try and eat crap from Mexico or south america. Fast food joints weren’t the ‘go to’ place for your children’s food.
Take a look at the obese children. Their parents (IF they have two) are obese. They do not eat from all food groups. They eat crap. They sit around playing video games and computer games.
The truth is that if you eat less calories than you burn (unless you have a problem with your thyroid....and that isn’t all that common) you will lose weight. One cannot get around that.
I know. The point is that there’s no “one size fits all” solution, but these kinds of articles always end up calling for some kind of government regulation and that’s what they always turn out to be.
I will watch it. Thanks!
How did we come to believe saturated fat and cholesterol are bad for us?
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Disagree with the video on a couple of things such as the term toxic and the nanny state idea of “controlling” sugar.
Fructose corn syrup is used in many foods. Found one brand of ketchup without it. They barely touched on this topic, and more could have been said.
On the issue of cholesterol - indoctrination and propaganda worked well and it has sold a lot of pharma medications.
All I can say is keep reading. The calorie is a calorie theory is long dead. The body can and does adjust how it burns food for energy. Individual metabolism is a powerful factor and many very thin people eat circles around the obese. The pyramid proposed in the mid 50’s pushed starches and correlates to the beginning of obesity in America. High fructose syrup has also been a disaster. Simplicity is attractive but really doesn’t explain obesity. There is even recent research documenting that gut flora effect digestion and can cause obesity and weight can be lost by changing the gut flora.
Even if you just read the obesity studies posted on Free Republic in a few months you will have a lot more information.
There is so much incorrect information in your reply that I don’t know where to begin. But this is typical of the responses regarding this debate, and goes to my point how we no longer educate our society in basic science.
A calorie is a measure of the amount of energy and it is always the same. It has always been defined in this manner. Amino acids, carbohydrates and fats are all metabolized using different pathways, and yes, there will be different efficiencies for each. But the untrained person rarely understands the difference between a calorie, and the efficiencies of that calorie.
High fructose corn syrup is fructose and glucose. Fructose and glucose from HFCS is no different chemically than fructose and glucose from any other source. Your body can’t tell where these two chemicals came from nor does it care. To say that there is something wrong with HFCS, but not with sucrose, or honey for that matter, only proves that the person saying such nonsense doesn’t understand very basic chemistry.
Claiming gut flora is responsible for obesity may be a great way to attract grant money, but this kind of nonsense isn’t considered serious by more objective people who have advanced training in chemistry, biology, and human physiology. I spent way too much of time in my life learning these subjects as and undergrad and grad student, and have spent way too much time in a lab putting my training to work in a real world environment to buy into any of the nonsense the purveyors of junk science are wanting to sell.
The answer is really quite simple, but simplicity doesn’t sell books or generate lecture fees and grant money. Sorry, but you’re dealing with someone who understands how these things operate, especially grant money. I’m a sound science guy who doesn’t believe stuff simply because someone sounds like they know what they’re talking about. Taubes isn’t even a scientist. He’s a freaking journalist. Yet the world treats him as an authority. Lustig doesn’t even understand fructose metabolism, yet he’s touted as an expert on that very subject.
Even though HFCS and sucrose are made up of the same chemicals and provide the same number of calories?
How does that guarantee a reduction in the rate of obesity?
http://www.medpagetoday.com/Endocrinology/Obesity/38134
http://www.nature.com/news/gut-microbe-may-fight-obesity-and-diabetes-1.12975
1. Ley, R. E., Turnbaugh, P. J., Klein, S. & Gordon, J. I.
Nature 444, 1022–1023 (2006).
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er.2006-0040 (2006).
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Science 280,1378–1383 (1998).
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http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/33/10/2277.full
A little light reading.
A little light fructose reading, seems reputable to me:
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/79/4/537.full
I don't doubt that all of the overweight prisoners the allies found in the concentration and prison camps near the end of WWII suffered from these same gut flora issues.
You can throw up all sorts of links to research that supports whatever it is you want to claim. But I'm the last person who is going to believe that you've read through and fully understand what they've done here, and have taken the time to slog your way through all of the references. Yeah, sure.
Again, if a person consumes less energy than they burn, they will lose weight. It will take some people longer to do so, but in the end, you cannot deny thermodynamics. Not even gut flora can do it. Sorry.
I'm not going to suffer my way through all the links you conveniently post to me. But I will pose a question to you that I hope you can/will answer in your own words: If HFCS is responsible for obesity in any way, why isn't sucrose, honey, or any other caloric sweetener also responsible? HFCS is made up of fructose and glucose. So is honey. So is sucrose. If HFCS is responsible for this country becoming a nation of fatties, why aren't honey and sucrose also culpable?
well said.
thanks for posting, mark for later
Thanks for posting this.
Just started the paleo diet after seeing it work for several people.
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