The World Turned Upside Down: The Second Low-Carbohydrate Revolution by Richard David Feinman
Authors: Richard David Feinman
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than it
actually is.
In the event, though, workers in carbohydrate restriction were
sufficiently
happy to see the positive outcome that they were disinclined to be too
critical
of the methods. At face value, the lipophobes had had their shot and
they lost.
They tried to maintain a a façade of impartiality while still putting the
burden
of proof on low-carb, but basically it was a loss. So, what happened to
the
first low-carb revolution? Why didn't it move forward? How did low-fat
loyalists prevail in the face of such strong scientific evidence?
What stopped it?
It was an opportunity. The public had
a chance to see if the
low-carbohydrate idea would work. Many did try it and many had good
success.
Popular articles were written about it. What happened? If it wasn't the
thing
for everybody, it seemed to work for most who tried it. Frequently, it
seemed
miraculous. People described it as "pounds melted away." Why didn't it
move
forward? First, there was poor understanding of what was involved and
there was
a proliferation of products designed to make it easier because it was
perceived, incorrectly for most people, as a difficult strategy. This
allowed
the company Atkins Nutritionals® and many others to sell a lot of
products many
of which were not clearly helpful. They are still doing that. There was
little
disappointment in the low-carb community when the company declared
bankruptcy.
Since resurrected its approach to low-carb principles is tied to
offering
substitutes for what you are giving up. There was a proliferation of
companies
and products containing sugar alcohols – carbohydrates that are
digested slowly
if at all and therefore were presumed to not contribute to blood
glucose.
Untested and poorly understood, sugar alcohols gave some people
intestinal
problems but, more important, they cast what should have been a
straight-forward diet in a slightly bizarre light. But, in the end, the
nutritionists and the Professors of Medicine stopped it.
Second, let's kill all
the dietitians.
''The first thing we do, let's kill
all the lawyers'' –
William Shakespeare, Henry
VI, Part II
What was remarkable about the whole
state
of affairs was that the
low-fat strategy had failed in competition with a real alternative.
Low-fat had
failed in numerous large scale trials starting with the Framingham
study but
here it could not compete with a low-carb diet even with the experiment
set up
in their favor and with the authors' putting a positive spin on it. It
was a
direct challenge to nutritional orthodoxy but they did not go gentle
into that
good night. What torpedoed the first low-carbohydrate revolution, was
the
nutritionists. They had the chance to tell the public "if you do want
to try a
low-carbohydrate diet, this is what we recommend." Instead, they acted
as if
Foster's paper had never existed and they ignored those studies that
followed
it which further supported carbohydrate restriction.
Nutrition has never been highly
thought
of. The field derives
from the practical job of making menus. The advances of physiology and
biochemistry meant that nutrition had increasing overlap with more
solid
science, but the field was, and is, very slow to change. In the real
world,
nutritionists have attempted to put on the mantle of professionalism
and are
currently trying to establish the newly re-named Academy of Nutrition
and
Dietetics (AND) with the legal right to be the sole voice on nutrition
and to
legally repress anybody else. They recently exercised this power by
trying to
stop low-carb blogger Steve Cooksey from "offering counseling" on his
blog
despite appropriate disclaimers ( Figure 4-4). Currently challenged in court on second
amendment grounds, the case highlights the adversarial state of
nutritional
science. And for those familiar with computer logic, my witticism is to
refer
to our own group as OR (Objective Research) and the Cooksey affair as
NAND-gate.
Underlying all of the resistance,
however,
is the idea that
actually is.
In the event, though, workers in carbohydrate restriction were
sufficiently
happy to see the positive outcome that they were disinclined to be too
critical
of the methods. At face value, the lipophobes had had their shot and
they lost.
They tried to maintain a a façade of impartiality while still putting the
burden
of proof on low-carb, but basically it was a loss. So, what happened to
the
first low-carb revolution? Why didn't it move forward? How did low-fat
loyalists prevail in the face of such strong scientific evidence?
What stopped it?
It was an opportunity. The public had
a chance to see if the
low-carbohydrate idea would work. Many did try it and many had good
success.
Popular articles were written about it. What happened? If it wasn't the
thing
for everybody, it seemed to work for most who tried it. Frequently, it
seemed
miraculous. People described it as "pounds melted away." Why didn't it
move
forward? First, there was poor understanding of what was involved and
there was
a proliferation of products designed to make it easier because it was
perceived, incorrectly for most people, as a difficult strategy. This
allowed
the company Atkins Nutritionals® and many others to sell a lot of
products many
of which were not clearly helpful. They are still doing that. There was
little
disappointment in the low-carb community when the company declared
bankruptcy.
Since resurrected its approach to low-carb principles is tied to
offering
substitutes for what you are giving up. There was a proliferation of
companies
and products containing sugar alcohols – carbohydrates that are
digested slowly
if at all and therefore were presumed to not contribute to blood
glucose.
Untested and poorly understood, sugar alcohols gave some people
intestinal
problems but, more important, they cast what should have been a
straight-forward diet in a slightly bizarre light. But, in the end, the
nutritionists and the Professors of Medicine stopped it.
Second, let's kill all
the dietitians.
''The first thing we do, let's kill
all the lawyers'' –
William Shakespeare, Henry
VI, Part II
What was remarkable about the whole
state
of affairs was that the
low-fat strategy had failed in competition with a real alternative.
Low-fat had
failed in numerous large scale trials starting with the Framingham
study but
here it could not compete with a low-carb diet even with the experiment
set up
in their favor and with the authors' putting a positive spin on it. It
was a
direct challenge to nutritional orthodoxy but they did not go gentle
into that
good night. What torpedoed the first low-carbohydrate revolution, was
the
nutritionists. They had the chance to tell the public "if you do want
to try a
low-carbohydrate diet, this is what we recommend." Instead, they acted
as if
Foster's paper had never existed and they ignored those studies that
followed
it which further supported carbohydrate restriction.
Nutrition has never been highly
thought
of. The field derives
from the practical job of making menus. The advances of physiology and
biochemistry meant that nutrition had increasing overlap with more
solid
science, but the field was, and is, very slow to change. In the real
world,
nutritionists have attempted to put on the mantle of professionalism
and are
currently trying to establish the newly re-named Academy of Nutrition
and
Dietetics (AND) with the legal right to be the sole voice on nutrition
and to
legally repress anybody else. They recently exercised this power by
trying to
stop low-carb blogger Steve Cooksey from "offering counseling" on his
blog
despite appropriate disclaimers ( Figure 4-4). Currently challenged in court on second
amendment grounds, the case highlights the adversarial state of
nutritional
science. And for those familiar with computer logic, my witticism is to
refer
to our own group as OR (Objective Research) and the Cooksey affair as
NAND-gate.
Underlying all of the resistance,
however,
is the idea that
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