Welcome to Debate Club! Please be aware that this is a space for respectful debate, and that your ideas will be challenged here. Please remember to critique the argument, not the author.

The Latest Trend is Fasting: What say you?

Options
1235789

Replies

  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 13,175 Member
    Options
    Was this study one-and-done, or have the results been expanded upon (or found incorrect) in the six years since it was published? Because if the results had merit, I'm sure there would be follow-up work on the topic.

    It also seems like they are talking about normal overnight "fasting" periods - the time between an evening meal and a morning meal. The study found that when subjected to a 24-hour fast, mice showed an 80% reduction in the number of rhythmic transcripts.

    Again - this study is looking at daily patterns. It says, "As feeding and fasting naturally alternate between day and night, interactions among feeding-fasting–driven regulation, metabolism, and circadian clocks have evolved to maintain normal physiology."

    Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.
  • BartBVanBockstaele
    BartBVanBockstaele Posts: 623 Member
    edited October 2022
    Options
    I say I am better off eating smaller amounts more frequently and I don't do well without breakfast so IF is not for me.
    Fasting works. There is not a sliver of doubt about that. It can lead to great success, just check out Angus Barbieri, as far as I know, history's most successful well-documented faster.
    What remains usually unmentioned though, is the fact that he died at the very young age of 51. I have never been able to find a reasonable explanation for this, so his fast may or may not be related to his early death.
    Also, check out the concentration camps of the second world war. While Angus Barbieri fasted because he wanted to, the victims of the concentration camps fasted because they were not given a choice. And the results, including shocking pictures, can be found in just a few clicks.
    Fasting works because it is impossible for it not to.
    Unfortunately, that does not make it advisable.
    While a short fast is not likely to do much harm or more harm than being overweight or downright fat, it is also only going to have meaningful results if done for relatively long periods of time, or for very many short periods of time.
    I would stay away from it until scientists have come up with some trustworthy results in favour of fasting and I would not hold my breath until then. No need to take unnecessary risks when we already have methods that do work and that are reasonably safe, i.e. safer than being overweight or obese.

    And I agree with a previous commenter: experts never said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Companies did that, and quacks did that. Experts did not, for the very simple reason that we have no data upon which to base such a claim. Even in a post-truth world, facts and reality continue to matter.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    edited October 2022
    Options
    mtaratoot wrote: »
    Was this study one-and-done, or have the results been expanded upon (or found incorrect) in the six years since it was published? Because if the results had merit, I'm sure there would be follow-up work on the topic.

    It also seems like they are talking about normal overnight "fasting" periods - the time between an evening meal and a morning meal. The study found that when subjected to a 24-hour fast, mice showed an 80% reduction in the number of rhythmic transcripts.

    Again - this study is looking at daily patterns. It says, "As feeding and fasting naturally alternate between day and night, interactions among feeding-fasting–driven regulation, metabolism, and circadian clocks have evolved to maintain normal physiology."

    Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    Dr. Sangin Panta is the foremost authority on the subject and most of the current literature on intermittent fasting and time restricted eating can largely be attributed to Sangin and he's world renowned in this field and has a book called the Circadian Code and yes there's many studies that actually came before and after and you can take a look at his work and look under publications.
    https://salk.edu/scientist/satchidananda-panda/

    This study is about the body's circadian Rythm and it's biological effects which is dictated by sunlight and darkness so basically an overnight fast for all intents and purposes generally will represent about 12 hours. Empasis on time restricted eating and his reasoning you'll find in other publications, which there are plenty in the link I provided. It appears from my observation that the 16:8 is preferred. It appears also that eating just before you're going to go sleep is not a good idea and to leave 3 or 4 hours of leeway to get out of the anabolic state which allows the fasted state to be more pronounced for those particular benefits during sleep, which also helps setting the 8 hr window for feeding. I think if you go down the rabbit hole, you'll enjoy it, I know I do. Cheers

  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    edited October 2022
    Options
    [quote="mtaratoot;c-47073073
    "Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    And if we can expand on your insight, then it's probably not a good idea to fast with our mouths full. cheers. lol
  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 13,175 Member
    Options
    [quote="mtaratoot;c-47073073
    "Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    And if we can expand on your insight, then it's probably not a good idea to fast with our mouths full. cheers. lol

    That would take extraordinary willpower. And it would be extremely uncomfortable. And if it was a long fast, the food could actually spoil in your mouth and give you food poisoning when the fast was over.

    I would only start a fast after I swallowed whatever I was eating.

    And of course if you fast with your mouth full, you can end the fast at any moment. Choking hazard though if it's overnight.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    mtaratoot wrote: »
    [quote="mtaratoot;c-47073073
    "Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    And if we can expand on your insight, then it's probably not a good idea to fast with our mouths full. cheers. lol

    That would take extraordinary willpower. And it would be extremely uncomfortable. And if it was a long fast, the food could actually spoil in your mouth and give you food poisoning when the fast was over.

    I would only start a fast after I swallowed whatever I was eating.

    And of course if you fast with your mouth full, you can end the fast at any moment. Choking hazard though if it's overnight.
    mtaratoot wrote: »
    [quote="mtaratoot;c-47073073
    "Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    And if we can expand on your insight, then it's probably not a good idea to fast with our mouths full. cheers. lol

    That would take extraordinary willpower. And it would be extremely uncomfortable. And if it was a long fast, the food could actually spoil in your mouth and give you food poisoning when the fast was over.

    I would only start a fast after I swallowed whatever I was eating.

    And of course if you fast with your mouth full, you can end the fast at any moment. Choking hazard though if it's overnight.

    Obviously there no fooling you, great answer. Cheers.

  • mtaratoot
    mtaratoot Posts: 13,175 Member
    Options
    While it is totally anecdotal, during some stages of my weight loss, I had developed some routines that could have been considered fasting. I never considered it fasting. Some might.

    I am not much of a breakfast eater. There's exceptions, like when on the dive boat and it's time for breakfast. I have an option to have it made right before the galley closes and have it warm when I get back from my first dive, but that puts lunch too soon after breakfast. Under normal circumstances, my breakfast is usually just coffee.

    My routine was typically to have some food between 10:00 and 11:00 or thereabouts. It was usually yogurt that I had mixed in some rolled oats and let sit for an hour or two. I got to enjoy the "empty" feeling. This meal was so close to mid-day that I often would eat a pretty small lunch, and then not until later in the afternoon. It worked for me, but one reason I can't really call it fasting is that I did have coffee in the morning and usually a packet of electrolyte replacement and vitamin supplement powder. The powder has some sugar in it as well.

    The thing is, and again this is anecdotal evidence, it did work for me. I also was tracking my calories pretty close, and my weight loss followed the path that would be expected from calorie restriction.

    I have no idea of the longer windows without eating contributed to my success or were ancillary. I do know that I never had an issue eating later at night. In fact, I'd check if I had calories left and often would make something really tasty later in the evening.

    So I'm interested in some of the research. I'm also a recovering scientist, so I'm at least a little cynical about claims that seem counter to what people generally observe. Wasn't it Carl Sagan who said, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence?" It will take more than a passing reference to circadian "fasting" to convince me there's something more to it. I am very much open to the idea. It might be nice if it's true, but that doesn't make it true. So show me more.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    Ok, fair enough. You're a diver, cool. I'm a chef and today is lobster day so it's breakdown for lobster rolls and bisque but I'll put something together tonight. Cheers
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    edited October 2022
    Options
    The science of Chronobiology isn't new and has been around a long time and the first encounter of the phenomena dates back to the 18th century, anyway Circadian rhythm is well researched around the world, and most would probably recognize "jetlag" as one of those phenomena. When we travel across multiple time zones our internal clock will be different to local time and for example flying from the east coast to the west or to Europe can take a few days for our clocks to realign properly.

    In 2017 a new discovery was made, and it was determined that not only do we beat along with our circadian rhythm but every cell in the body has a clock (actually a protein) kind of like a natural timing device that regulates the circadian rhythm in that cell and CR has also been observed in our microbiome. Not only cells but all of our organs independently have these internal clocks and have been observed everywhere in nature now including plants. It kind of freaked me out a little when I read that the master clock which is in the brain syncs all internal clocks together called the suprachiasmatic nucleus or SCN was in the hypothalamus which receives its direct input from our eyes. There are literally thousands of studies easily found using Google Scholar but if you need some help there, let me know.

    Anyway, now the part that has everyone on the interwebs going berserk, Time Restricted Eating or Feeding and, as it relates to our circadian rhythm.

    Sangin Panda the scientist I mention above who authored the Circadian Code came out with a landmark study in 2012 called "Time-Restricted Feeding without Reducing Caloric Intake Prevents Metabolic Diseases in Mice Fed a High-Fat Diet" which pioneered the path to time restricted eating (TRE) basically he's the guy that got the ball rolling around the world in TRE and fasting in general. Now there's hundreds of studies on humans for TRE from that point on.

    There were 4 groups of mice in this study and they gave them different types of food and in the 1st group they gave them unlimited amounts of normal mouse chow ad libitum or basically any time they felt like eating over the 24hour cycle and a 2nd group with normal mouse chow but were restricted to an eating window of 8 hours but were given as much food as they wanted during that time. The 3rd group were given a high fat diet and again ate at any time they wanted over that 24hr cycle. 4th group given the high fat diet but again restricted to 8 hours.

    The basic takeaway from the study was the mice that ate the high fat but were restricted to 8 hours either maintained their weight or lost weight over time. The other group that ate the same high fat diet but were not time restricted, ate the same number of calories gained weight, some obese and quite sick. The other point was the 2 groups that were restricted showed improvement in health markers. Another important point was that when we eat is as important as what we eat which ties into our internal clock and matched to the light/dark cycle and everything is in harmony, genes are expressed properly, so to speak but when these mice ate whenever they wanted with no time restriction it caused an 80% reduction in rhythmic transcripts and gene expression and that's when bad things happened downstream. For example the liver had the signs of liver disease with fatty deposits and now studies in humans show that for fatty liver TRE can enhance liver health.

    The body needs time to digest and rejuvenate and it takes a lot of energy to do this mostly while we're sleeping and digestion can take 5 or 6 hours and if a person is eating from 8 in the morning and still having a snack at 11they're still basically digesting food, which is anabolic in the fed state until the middle of the night, 3am possibly. All of these studies have been replicated in humans and again google time restricted eating or time restricted feeding and hundreds of studies come up and there's studies for TRE just for organs as. I believe and so do most people in the space that when you eat is important for overall health based on the science and this has nothing to do with weight lose, this is about general health. if someone thinks that TRE will contribute to a calorie defict, well that's the diet industry, what can you do but say sure give it a go.

    Anyway here's a pod cast with Sangin Panda who basically talks with Dr. Bret Sheer and it pretty relaxed and geared towards less technical speak and makes himself understood quite well as far as a PhD can, I would imagine.

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=Mj-qleik1P0&t=855s
  • pfwatkins
    pfwatkins Posts: 1 Member
    Options
    The data supporting IF are increasing but still need greater study. The science behind IF point to significant benefits from improved insulin resistance and other hormone activity to improved cellular autophagy. There are many factors that impact the “success” or impact of IF based on the ratio of fast vs feeding, how the fast is broken and the diet your are eating when not fasting. There is no one size fits all so not everyone will find IF as an option. But the science is pointing to significant benefits in overall wellnesssnd longevity.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    pfwatkins wrote: »
    The data supporting IF are increasing but still need greater study. The science behind IF point to significant benefits from improved insulin resistance and other hormone activity to improved cellular autophagy. There are many factors that impact the “success” or impact of IF based on the ratio of fast vs feeding, how the fast is broken and the diet your are eating when not fasting. There is no one size fits all so not everyone will find IF as an option. But the science is pointing to significant benefits in overall wellnesssnd longevity.

    Agreed. There's been a lot of rodent studies, but human trials didn't start until 2016 so it's still in its infancy and of course fraught with skepticism, which is a good thing. Dr. Panda would not have ever started that very first human trial in 2016 if it wasn't for the data that was collected from that one controversial rodent study he did in 2012 and he now thanks his critics because he says he would never thought of doing human trials, funny how science works sometimes.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,897 Member
    Options
    mtaratoot wrote: »
    Was this study one-and-done, or have the results been expanded upon (or found incorrect) in the six years since it was published? Because if the results had merit, I'm sure there would be follow-up work on the topic.

    It also seems like they are talking about normal overnight "fasting" periods - the time between an evening meal and a morning meal. The study found that when subjected to a 24-hour fast, mice showed an 80% reduction in the number of rhythmic transcripts.

    Again - this study is looking at daily patterns. It says, "As feeding and fasting naturally alternate between day and night, interactions among feeding-fasting–driven regulation, metabolism, and circadian clocks have evolved to maintain normal physiology."

    Don't eat while you're sleeping. Seems like reasonable advice to me.

    Yes, I was rushing to get out of the house yesterday and foolishly put a tin of 24 gingersnaps I'd just made in my office, which is off of my bedroom. I wake several times throughout the night. I'm embarrassed to admit how many are left today.
  • the_real_me_lissa
    the_real_me_lissa Posts: 40 Member
    Options
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!
  • BartBVanBockstaele
    BartBVanBockstaele Posts: 623 Member
    edited November 2022
    Options
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!
    Wise words. For the rest, even if there is something to it, it is going to be minimal. The reality remains that the only way to lose fat weight is to ingest less energy than needed to stay alive, and the only way to gain fat weight is to ingest more energy than needed to stay alive. While other factors may influence that process somewhat, the fundamentals will not and cannot change. Only quacks claim something else, and they have zero evidence to back it up.
    There is, of course, fat removal surgery, and that is just about the most ill-advised thing one can do.

  • Xellercin
    Xellercin Posts: 924 Member
    Options
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    Xellercin wrote: »
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.

    I think most of the confusion and not just in fasting but in general is the misunderstanding of energy expenditure where some people seem to think it challenges CICO, which it does not, it's just not well understood, and basically devolves from there.
  • BartBVanBockstaele
    BartBVanBockstaele Posts: 623 Member
    edited November 2022
    Options
    Xellercin wrote: »
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.

    I think most of the confusion and not just in fasting but in general is the misunderstanding of energy expenditure where some people seem to think it challenges CICO, which it does not, it's just not well understood, and basically devolves from there.
    I concur. These erroneous claims are all over the place, sometimes even made by people who *know* that what they are saying is nonsense, for example:

    "Allegedly, to avoid weight gain we would simply have to burn the same number of calories as we eat. The theory sounds logical. Unfortunately, it is untrue."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=485s

    "fat accumulation equals sort-of calories in minus calories out and they say "well that's always true because if you look at it from a physics perspective, that is always true but the problem is that's physics and we are dealing with human physiology and it really has nothing to do with each other."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=510s

    Jason Fung is particularly shocking, because he claims that CICO is untrue and then turns around to recommend fasting, which is about as extreme CICO as one can go.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    Xellercin wrote: »
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.

    I think most of the confusion and not just in fasting but in general is the misunderstanding of energy expenditure where some people seem to think it challenges CICO, which it does not, it's just not well understood, and basically devolves from there.
    I concur. These erroneous claims are all over the place, sometimes even made by people who *know* that what they are saying is nonsense, for example:

    "Allegedly, to avoid weight gain we would simply have to burn the same number of calories as we eat. The theory sounds logical. Unfortunately, it is untrue."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=485s

    "fat accumulation equals sort-of calories in minus calories out and they say "well that's always true because if you look at it from a physics perspective, that is always true but the problem is that's physics and we are dealing with human physiology and it really has nothing to do with each other."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=510s

    Jason Fung is particularly shocking, because he claims that CICO is untrue and then turns around to recommend fasting, which is about as extreme CICO as one can go.

    Well, not so fast. Calories in has an impact (effect) on calories out and calories out will also have an effect on calories in.
  • BartBVanBockstaele
    BartBVanBockstaele Posts: 623 Member
    edited November 2022
    Options
    Xellercin wrote: »
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.

    I think most of the confusion and not just in fasting but in general is the misunderstanding of energy expenditure where some people seem to think it challenges CICO, which it does not, it's just not well understood, and basically devolves from there.
    I concur. These erroneous claims are all over the place, sometimes even made by people who *know* that what they are saying is nonsense, for example:

    "Allegedly, to avoid weight gain we would simply have to burn the same number of calories as we eat. The theory sounds logical. Unfortunately, it is untrue."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=485s

    "fat accumulation equals sort-of calories in minus calories out and they say "well that's always true because if you look at it from a physics perspective, that is always true but the problem is that's physics and we are dealing with human physiology and it really has nothing to do with each other."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=510s

    Jason Fung is particularly shocking, because he claims that CICO is untrue and then turns around to recommend fasting, which is about as extreme CICO as one can go.

    Well, not so fast. Calories in has an impact (effect) on calories out and calories out will also have an effect on calories in.
    No thinking scientist would deny the possibility of that. More scientists would ask for verifiable evidence of that. There is, but it is scant and very unreliable. There are good reasons for that, but that does not by magic validate the claims. We should be open-minded enough to accept the possibility, but not so naive as to accept the claims as facts, just because they are hard to prove.

    And in the end, the message is always the same: CICO is where it's at. All these secondary effects can do is change energy consumption a little bit. Nothing more. Stop feeding a living system, and that living system will die. Before it dies, it will lose weight. Feed a living system less than it needs, and it will die, it will just die a little slower, again while losing weight. Feed it more than it needs and it will again die a little faster. this time while gaining weight.

    And of course, all living systems eventually die, regardless of what we feed them. The point is simply to find the optimal point, the sweet point, the bliss point, it does not matter how we call it. We usually define it as the place where optimal weight is maintained, even if that is more of a concept than a real thing.
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,886 Member
    Options
    Xellercin wrote: »
    Fasting? Oh, you mean privileged starving!!

    Way over hyped & totally unnecessary!!

    K...

    Well I'm just going to stick with it since it was prescribed by my world renowned neurologist, and I find it much more pleasant than eating multiple times a day...

    I'm not even doing this for weight loss, I've been in maintenance doing IF for nearly a year and I have no interest in ever going back.

    Besides, I don't think anyone has said it's "necessary," just that some of us prefer it.

    I don't get the judgement.

    I think most of the confusion and not just in fasting but in general is the misunderstanding of energy expenditure where some people seem to think it challenges CICO, which it does not, it's just not well understood, and basically devolves from there.
    I concur. These erroneous claims are all over the place, sometimes even made by people who *know* that what they are saying is nonsense, for example:

    "Allegedly, to avoid weight gain we would simply have to burn the same number of calories as we eat. The theory sounds logical. Unfortunately, it is untrue."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=485s

    "fat accumulation equals sort-of calories in minus calories out and they say "well that's always true because if you look at it from a physics perspective, that is always true but the problem is that's physics and we are dealing with human physiology and it really has nothing to do with each other."
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DboTyNu-FLk&t=510s

    Jason Fung is particularly shocking, because he claims that CICO is untrue and then turns around to recommend fasting, which is about as extreme CICO as one can go.

    Well, not so fast. Calories in has an impact (effect) on calories out and calories out will also have an effect on calories in.
    No thinking scientist would deny the possibility of that. More scientists would ask for verifiable evidence of that. There is, but it is scant and very unreliable. There are good reasons for that, but that does not by magic validate the claims. We should be open-minded enough to accept the possibility, but not so naive as to accept the claims as facts, just because they are hard to prove.

    And in the end, the message is always the same: CICO is where it's at. All these secondary effects can do is change energy consumption a little bit. Nothing more. Stop feeding a living system, and that living system will die. Before it dies, it will lose weight. Feed a living system less than it needs, and it will die, it will just die a little slower, again while losing weight. Feed it more than it needs and it will again die a little faster. this time while gaining weight.

    And of course, all living systems eventually die, regardless of what we feed them. The point is simply to find the optimal point, the sweet point, the bliss point, it does not matter how we call it. We usually define it as the place where optimal weight is maintained, even if that is more of a concept than a real thing.

    My statement takes CICO into account, I'm not sure what you mean by verifiable evidence, it's well understood and documented.

    A direct example would be the calorie content, macronutrient composition, nutrient absorption and digestion which effects our energy expenditure expressed by changes in the thermic effect of food (TEF).

    An Indirect effect would be when we either undereat or overeat, and in the bodies attempt for find stasis will effect NEAT (non-exercise energy thermogenesis)

    None of this violates the 1st law of thermodynamics.