[Outraged At FLA]

Well, as someone who diets every year to lose what I like to call my "Winter Weight", I usually cut out a lot of fat and carbs and fill that hole with fibers that are not as readily absorbed and also change what kind of fats I take such as instead of red meat, I will eat more fish and chicken and nuts.

I don't think fat is defacto bad for you as the paradigm says, but I do stand by what even my great grandfather used to say: "Everything in moderation".

All in all, I still believe in eating sensibly, EXERCISE!, and general healthy living will beat any vegan, or pre-processed low fat, or pill induced diet.

Perhaps science is finally starting to agree with me. :)

[Phantom Lord]

Fat = Flavor

[jlogajan]

Elsewhere the FDA is going to require the labeling of trans-fatty acids in foods -- which they now claim are bad in any amount. This would include anything "hydrogenated" and occurs also in meats, especially upon heating for cooking.

A better source of fats would be something like flax seed or fish oils.

[marty60]

I agree, I went on the Atkins diet and lost weight. Plus I felt great. I went off the diet and my cholesterol shot thru the roof. (400) My Dr. said eat Carbs etc. My choleserol stayed high. Then Lipitor, it came down to 288. Finally I convenced my Doc, it's the Carbs that are causing the problem. i am going back on the Atkins diet, to lose weight and bring down my cholesterol. Carbs are BAD for you. They may kill me!!!!

My Daughter is on Atkins, she had her choleserol checked and her results were 81 and 84. Her #'s are to low. I'm sick of these people pushing the one rule for everyone. humans are different. What's right for one, may kill another. But, that is the collectivist thought process. If you don't fit the mold, you deserve to die.

[Alberta's Child]

I heard a great radio interview about this subject this morning. The doctor who was the guest on the show said that the U.S. Department of Agriculture is directly responsible for the rise in obesity levels in this country. I never knew this, but he said that childhood obesity was never a serious problem until the USDA began publishing that stupid "food group pyramid" with all the grain products at the bottom.

Maybe I'm just a little simplistic here when I suggest we should ignore the entire carbohydrates/fat discussion. If your daily caloric intake matches the number of calories you burn every day, you won't have a problem (which is why exercise is far more important than dieting in any weight-loss program).

[LiveFreeOrDieTryin]

Your link is labelled NY Times but goes to a Time Magazine 5 page article on whether we should be vegetarians or not.

[SpinyNorman]

I find that my "polar bear morphology" greatly enhances my resistance to cold water, very useful in SCUBA diving in northern New England, and ice diving.

[babyface00]

I'm on Atkins right now. I find it does work for me, although it requires a lot of pre-preparation for lunch - you can't readily buy low-carb foods at restaurants.

The best thing, though, is I seem to have much more energy, which helps me get motivated to exercise, which helps me loose more weight. I also don't get those 3pm blahs.

Lastly, I've found that my allergies are nearly non-existant when on Atkins, and my skin clears up within a week. I'm convinced its largely due to the elimination of sugar from my diet.

You can get low-carb chocolates that are pretty darn good - makes it easier to stay on. I'm also starting to make sugar-free ice cream (heavy cream has no carbs) with diet sugar. Mmmm.

I can't say it will work for everyone, but I'm a definite Atkins fan.

[aardvark1]

There's a terrific book on the topic of nutrition fads in the US called "New Nuts Among the Berries." Funny and interesting.

I'm on Atkins "maintenance" now after losing 20 lbs without once feeling hungry. I have to admit I do crave french fries.

[Angel]

I too was raised on the "everyting in moderation philosopy". My best diet was the "weigh down workshop" that said eat when you're hungry and stop when you're satisfied. It's based on biblical principals, but works for everyone. The key is don't eat everyting on your plate if you're no longer hungry.

[Kay Soze]

Bump

[NC_Libertarian]

I've tried the Atkins diet - and it is works fantastically - I felt great, lots of energy, and fat would melt away. Unfortunately I totally felt deprived of all the other stuff I like to eat.

I wonder if there is a plan that has a middle ground?

[KuRoKo]

Well here are some answers for every one out there.

As the saying goes you are what you eat, but more to the point you are what you used to eat, for a good indication on what I mean all one has to do is look at the way humans as a species have adapted with the food we have eaten.

on a better look we should study the three food consumption types for mammals.

Vegitarian, carnivorous, and omnivirous (probobly spelt them wrong) any way, the vegitarian side to mammals shows that fat is really what the animal is say producing?

I know there have been no studies into it and that is a shame because I can only speak about what I know and that is evolution and hence animal interaction with environment.

But it is a better indication that fat is produced and burnt before the food is in vegitarians, looking at all vegitarian mammels you would think that this would seem fairly logical right? well it is, vegitarian animals in the wild at times cover grounds where there is no food but it isn't the food they are living off, every one knows cammels do this but do not think of other mammels, must others have a hump for this task?

Back onto the topic vegitarians be them animal or human are constantly producing higher fat quantities, if it were not for an animals high metabolism thier cholestrol would be some where off the charts, on this note please keep in mind that a humans metabolism is ten times slower then most animals, take a look at your pet dog or cat and think about why they have such short life spans then take thier pulse and take your own, there is a good indication why.

On this note a cow would produce fat arround it's muscle as a direct food supply so if there was no food for say five days there would not be much way time for the cows metabolism, I would personaly speculate that it is the mentality of the animal which controls wether the creature is about to put it's body into starving mode, so to say it shuts down parts of it's bodies uneeded priorities so as it can survive longer.

humans in relation to this is an interesting one, we do not go through perriods of having no food arround and so should one choose to be a vegitarian they would be producing fat for a while, wich is why some people find it hard to loose fat even if they were to have the same ammount of fat as others they could have slower metabolisms hence lower chalory burning or more so the fat cells are full of stored protiene.

now a look at carnivors, to say that a carnivor does more moving arround then vegitarians in the wild is quite the rash statement, buffelo and such walk virtually thier whole lives, while most carnivors are territorial.

But there are several things which split carnivors from vegitarians, usually a carnivor would hunt only when it is hungry on this note it eats fairly regularly but is not set to times, vegitarians eat at any chance they can, which is a wise move for any wild vegitarian mammal as it does not know when there may not be food.

carnivors though do not need to produce as much fat, needless to say they do produce fat but it is not some thing one which has a good food supply needs, and the reason why they do not need to produce much fat is that they gain thier high fibre, fat, calcium and any thing else you may think of from the meat fat and bones from thier prey.

Fat and muscle cells are very much alike in many ways, both can be drained of thier minerals and protiene in an effort to support the life of the animal so for this both are high in protiene, keeping this in mind it only seems logical that high intakes of meat and fat would mean less need to produce fat for storage puroposes as all the requirements are met in the initial intake.

this also means the carnivor is going to keep slim and lighter for killing other prey.

and then we come to omivors, pretty much mix the two together vegitarians and carnivors and thats about as much an omnivor as you are going to get.

but when you look at the range of species which are omnivors you dont see a large range, usually they are carnivors until they absolutely NEED to eat vegitation to survive, funny about that right?

A human being is designed with omnivorous intentions, our stomachs are designed to cator for vegitation, infact some might say it acts more like a vegitarian stomach then a carnivorous one but then again most omniverous stomachs are like that as I am willing to bet most creatures which had to eat vegitation had to do so regularly enough to have it become an evolutionary stage ^_^ only logical right?

Back to the topic, on the inside we may seem vegitarian, on the outside we are as close a predator as one can get, take a good look in the mirror and then wonder about your eye's, why are they both facing forwards and why are they close together, the answer? so you can judge distance from yourself to your prey, what does this mean? well it means your designed to be able to focus better, should humans have been designed to eat only vegitation being able to judge distance between ourselfs and the next blade of grass would be FAR less important then say having our eyes on either side of our heads (like most vegitarians, cows, horses, elephants!) so we may have a better degree of seeing which would allow us better security from predators.

Next our teeth, perfect omniverous design, evolutions greatest might I say, our hind most teeth are designed to slice AND crush along with grind as well, evolution does not get much better then that, we have canine teeth for piercing though we moved along from using our teeth as our main weapon in hunting and we have the four main front plated teeth for ripping movements on plants and such, but for meat most would prefer to use thier mauler teeth to slice away at meat ^_^ ok imagin this, here you have a really tough piece of meat in your hands (finger food mmmm ^_^) and it's hard to bite a piece off from the front of your mouth.. what do we all find ourselfs doing? twisting our heads arround and giving our maulers a try at it, thier shape is great for slicing meat while being able to crush nuts and such too.

ok enough about the teeth, what else indicates what we are?

funnily enough the very thing which sets us apart from most animals, our two legs and how we walk on them sets us apart from both vegitarians and carnivors... why? because what do we gain when we only use two legs? the ability to carry food we have gathered in our hands!!

bassicaly humans can gether nuts and such and carry them along grounds, making us more then just vegitarians because we may be eating nuts but gatherers which are as different from most animals as grass is to a meat eater.

it's only natural that this ability also spawned the abiltiy for us to use tools as we moved as well..

but back to the topic at hand, humans are capable of eating any food type we wish, but remember that when your about to eat one of these food groups look at the other habitants of the food group.. it is a good indication where it will lead you, personally I eat what I feel like when ever I want, I have my own beliefe that if your body really wants some thing or lacks some thing it will let you know by giving you cravings for it ^_^, call it a faze or what not but lately I have been wanting fruites alot.

Oh yes, and for all the die hard vegitarians out there, did you know there is no vegitarian (the idea of a vegitarian is some one who does not lie and eat eggs, fish, butter, milk, cheese or any animal product) over the age of 90 in the US?

Research found this one out and I found it VERY interesting to hear.

Robert.S AKA KuRoKo

sorry for any spelling mistakes, revenge of the lazy person.