Quality also matters, not just quantity

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Nothing that article says can convince me not to eat fried chicken.

To try and head off a discussion where everyone is talking past each other, I want to clarify a couple of things.

(1) When people say a calorie is a calorie or calories are all that matter, they mean for weight loss specifically, all else equal. I'm not aware of anyone here who would argue that overall diet is irrelevant as to other things, like health or nutrition.

(2) When people say there is no such thing as a healthy or unhealthy food, they mean that context matters. There are, of course, healthier and less healthy diets, but whether a particular food makes a diet more or less healthy depends on context--what else have you eaten, what are your goals. For a couple of examples, if you've eaten no protein, an apple, while normally a perfectly great food, is not going to be as good a choice as a steak, despite the existence of studies that suggest that red meat can have adverse effects (and we can debate those too, of course). Similarly, if you are on a long bike ride and not terribly far from bonking, some sugar is needed, even though the same sugar might be a poor choice for someone who had spent the day on the couch and already had 5 cookies.

The study that you point to doesn't seem to me to contradict the usual MFP arguments on these points, because it seems to be about diets (which of course can be more or less health-promoting, although individual differences will always also matter too, as in a minority of people seem to have cholesterol levels that are responsive to diet/dietary cholesterol, whereas most seem not to, although they do often have levels that improve with weight loss).

I'm curious why you think that the study is inconsistent with the arguments. Do you see something wrong in what I've said, or were you understanding the arguments to be something other than what I've stated here?

Hornsby wrote: »

eveedance wrote: »

Seems like the "there is no unhealthy or healthy food" concept is being challenged a bit here.

http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1108492

You are either missing what this study is showing, or you are missing what moderation is. Either way, the study kinda falls into the "no crap" category.

Who ever had this concept??? I have read on this site repeatedly that when it comes to weight, calories are calories, and weight loss/gain does not care about the calories coming from fresh salads or deep fried mars bars. Which is true. But who on their right mind would ever claim that when it comes to health what you eat does not matter?[/quote]

Apparently the OP eveedance must have claimed it, and is now attempting to refute his confused understanding...