Low Cal or Low Carb????

Omanya

FredDoyle wrote: »

frob23 wrote: »

Omanya wrote: »

Bear in mind that humans throughout most of human history have eaten mostly carbs - generally above 70%

Source?

This,
Yet I imagine, even if a paper is cited, it's going to be at best speculation.

See above post.

The general ignorance about research into human evolution is disheatening. We don't know everything, but we're not as clueless as so many folks seem to think we are.

Either way, there is no research to indicate that 'human' diets even possibly could have significantly comprised meat for even half our history, let alone most of it, so it wouldn't change my claim that we consumed high-carb diets for most of our history.

Omanya

Sam_I_Am77 wrote: »

No, no its not. WHY DO YOU THINK LOW CARB WORKS? Because you feel full, causing you to eat less and then stay under your calorie allowance. That's all it is OP. That is why I prefer low carb over low calorie.

Honestly, low carb works for a couple reasons.
.
2. It forces people to cut out the crap like sugar sodas, candy, chips, ice cream, fast food, pizzas, <insert food type here>, etc, etc.

This right here. When it comes to food (as opposed to NEAT), an increased consumption of those kinds of carbs accounts for most of our overall increase in energy intake. Following that reasoning, it makes complete sense that cutting back on those foods will result in fat and overall weight loss.

Only issue is that they tend to go *too* low carb and also significantly decrease fruit and vegetable - and plants in general consumption, which are energy-dense foods. We get our energy primarily from carbs, which are primarily plants. That's why a low-carb diet results in feeling like complete s--- and isn't sustainable for most.

As a general rule, you shouldn't reduce any macronutrient below 20% of your general intake. Certain populations, particularly those adapted to super-cold climates, are unusually efficient at metabolizing lipids, and some, such as those whose ancestors maintained mostly herbivorous diets, are unusually bad at breaking down animal proteins, so their requirements will differ, but generally anywhere between 40% to 60% carbs is best, depending on population-wide NEAT levels.

SofiV79

Bakkasan wrote: »

Sometimes Mac and cheese just makes everything better in the world.

Always!!!

Liftng4Lis

why don't you just eat at a caloric deficit?

jgthomas78

I've started what I'm calling Low-ish carb. Limiting the refined carbs to 1-2 servings/day. Trying to stay under 90 grams of carbs. Figure the days I exercise I'll throw in an extra serving. Low-ish carb has REALLY helped me in keeping my calories below goal which I have been struggling with. Definitely less hungry too.

blktngldhrt

Barring any medical conditions, I would do low calorie. If you have trouble feeling full with your deficit, lower your carbs and up your fats and proteins. It's all about finding something that will be sustainable for you. No matter what you do, if you don't make it a lifestyle and go back to your old eating habits, you will most likely gain back any loss.

Julieboolieaz

Omanya wrote: »

frob23 wrote: »

Omanya wrote: »

Bear in mind that humans throughout most of human history have eaten mostly carbs - generally above 70%

Source?

The only way humans would have been able to drastically decrease carb consumption is to drastically increase their meat consumption, which would require a few things:

1) Teeth capable of decently chewing meat
2) Digestive tracts capable of processing meat
3) Tools to enable a reliable consumption of meat
(among others)

Firstly, know that hominids to have evolved up to 2.4 million years ago, with anatomically modern humans estimated to have evolved up to 200,000 years ago, but we can reasonably go back 4 million years, and up to 7 million if you really want to stretch (that point is less reasonable for our purposes, however).

Onward...

http://www.cast.uark.edu/local/icaes/conferences/wburg/posters/pungar/satalk.htm

http://www.manticmoo.com/articles/jeff/scholarly/an-evolving-human-dentition.php

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology/research/directory/teeth_hillson

(Humans would not have been able to reliably chew meat until relatively recently.)

http://nature.berkeley.edu/miltonlab/pdfs/meateating.pdf (ignore the hypothesis; the discussion of the gut is the focus here)

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2012/07/23/human-ancestors-were-nearly-all-vegetarians/

(Human guts did not evolve to adequately process meat until relatively recently.)

I have to go now, so I can't give you papers about tools, but you can look this stuff up yourself. The main point is that meat-eating does not appear to have been absolutely common until around 200,000 years ago.

I only read the first link. Here's a quote from the first page: "What can front tooth size tell us of the diets of Miocene apes?" What apes ate...not what humans ate. I'm not a monkey, neither are you.
Your argument is 100% dependent on humans having evolved from apes. Not a stich of actual scientific evidence exists for cross species evolution. Sorry. But this does not strengthen your argument that humans were not originally meat eaters. I didn't go on to read the other links, but guess it's an evolutionary argument too?

I know, don't mean to open a can of worms, but the fact remains, humans were originally meat eaters (any recieps for cave man cookies or cakes? Nope). The Old Testament talks a good deal about meat eating too.

That said, most healthy people can lose weight on a calorie deficit alone. Low carb is one way to lose weight, and it works best for me. But it's not for everyone. Most Americans can't/won't give up their processed carbs. If you can lose and eat your cake too, why not?

I personally lost 120lbs with LC 11 years ago and have maintained with a range of carbs in my diet. I've recently gone back to LC to lose 10 more lbs. I was eating at a 25% deficit with regular exercise (mostly weight training) for 4 months with no loss. I know my body does best on LC. There is no "one size fits all" approach to fitness. Find what works for YOU and what you can stick to.