Carbs are making you fat

Yes, I believe I remember a double -blind study proving this. However, the subjects who ate the cupcakes died happy at least.

People are making hash out of a very complex topic here. Carbs and dietary fat both have important contributing factors to unwanted weight gain. Calories in/out may be the ultimate arbiter of weight gain/loss, but caloric needs, insulin response, genetic somatype, and substances in your diet that screw with the brain's satiation signals also contribute significantly.

Atkins was successful because his diet, primarily consisting of protein and fat, makes you feel full much more quickly and forces your body to draw on those macronutrients instead of the much easier and more efficient carb-energy pathway. But is it healthy? Eh... A lot of experience later says no. Sure you can lose weight with it according to kcals in/out just like any other diet, but it's horrible in terms of good nutrition.

On the other hand carbs jack your insulin, which tells the body excess energy is available and to do something with it. Well if you aren't using it for activity, the next trick is to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles for instant future use. But once muscle glycogen has been topped off, those carbs have gotta go somewhere because they can't keep floating around in your bloodsteam. So nature made it very easy to turn excess carbs into fat. So easy in fact that your body only has to expend 4.4 calories of energy to transform 100 calories worth of carbs into fat stored in fat cells. (For a comparison, it's slightly easier to store fat as fat at 2.2 kcal/100, and a lot harder to store protein as fat at 30 kcal/100.) If you're eating foods high in carbs but not feeling full, you're induced to eat more than you really need.

And then there's fructose, which the body can't deal with like glucose or galactose and has to get the liver seriously involved. A significant portion of fructose gets turned into fat while being metabolized by the liver via a similar mechanism that metabolizes alcohol. Alas, no buzz. But guess what sucrose (table sugar) is made of?

So yes, kcals in/out but please let's give the body a little more credit for having really annoying ways to knock you off your path to the ideal body weight and size.

Oh and all those muscle guy pics who eat carbs? I wouldn't be nearly concerned with the mashed potatoes on their plates so much as the steroid salad they are also ingesting. Or injecting into their butt cheeks.

;-)
-A

i think the important thing to take from this is that different diets work for different people. instead of all arguing, let's realize that we are all different. there is no magical equation like "178.224 grams of carbs, 143.856 grams of protein, and eat 86.684 grams of fat and you will be healthy no matter what". this is because, believe it or not, none of us are going to be able to react the same to different diets. this is where genetics really does come in. i personally believe you might have to try a couple of different diets, keep track of how your body reacts, and look back at the data, and find what works for you. like i said before, there is no magical formula. if there was then man kind would all abide by it. please give the arguments a rest and just focus on doing you

People are making hash out of a very complex topic here. Carbs and dietary fat both have important contributing factors to unwanted weight gain. Calories in/out may be the ultimate arbiter of weight gain/loss, but caloric needs, insulin response, genetic somatype, and substances in your diet that screw with the brain's satiation signals also contribute significantly. Mental health and dependency plays a big part, too.

Atkins was successful because his diet, primarily consisting of protein and fat, makes you feel full much more quickly and forces your body to draw on those macronutrients instead of the much easier and more efficient carb-energy pathway. But is it healthy? Eh... A lot of experience later says no. Sure you can lose weight with it according to kcals in/out just like any other diet, but it's horrible in terms of good nutrition.

On the other hand carbs jack your insulin, which tells the body excess energy is available and to do something with it. Well if you aren't using it for activity, the next trick is to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles for instant future use. But once muscle glycogen has been topped off, those carbs have gotta go somewhere because they can't keep floating around in your bloodsteam. So nature made it very easy to turn excess carbs into fat. So easy in fact that your body only has to expend 4.4 calories of energy to transform 100 calories worth of carbs into fat stored in fat cells. (For a comparison, it's slightly easier to store fat as fat at 2.2 kcal/100, and a lot harder to store protein as fat at 30 kcal/100.) If you're eating foods high in carbs but not feeling full, you're induced to eat more than you really need.

And then there's fructose, which the body can't deal with like glucose or galactose and has to get the liver seriously involved. A significant portion of fructose gets turned into fat while being metabolized by the liver via a similar mechanism that metabolizes alcohol. Alas, no buzz. But guess what sucrose (table sugar) is made of?

So yes, kcals in/out but please let's give the body a little more credit for having really annoying ways to knock you off your path to the ideal body weight and size.

Oh and all those muscle guy pics who eat carbs? I wouldn't be nearly concerned with the mashed potatoes on their plates so much as the steroid salad they are also ingesting. Or injecting into their butt cheeks.

;-)
-A

On the other hand carbs jack your insulin, which tells the body excess energy is available and to do something with it. Well if you aren't using it for activity, the next trick is to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles for instant future use. But once muscle glycogen has been topped off, those carbs have gotta go somewhere because they can't keep floating around in your bloodsteam. So nature made it very easy to turn excess carbs into fat. So easy in fact that your body only has to expend 4.4 calories of energy to transform 100 calories worth of carbs into fat stored in fat cells. (For a comparison, it's slightly easier to store fat as fat at 2.2 kcal/100, and a lot harder to store protein as fat at 30 kcal/100.) If you're eating foods high in carbs but not feeling full, you're induced to eat more than you really need.

And then there's fructose, which the body can't deal with like glucose or galactose and has to get the liver seriously involved. A significant portion of fructose gets turned into fat while being metabolized by the liver via a similar mechanism that metabolizes alcohol. Alas, no buzz. But guess what sucrose (table sugar) is made of?

So yes, kcals in/out but please let's give the body a little more credit for having really annoying ways to knock you off your path to the ideal body weight and size.

So DNL is pretty common in humans?

On the other hand carbs jack your insulin, which tells the body excess energy is available and to do something with it. Well if you aren't using it for activity, the next trick is to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles for instant future use. But once muscle glycogen has been topped off, those carbs have gotta go somewhere because they can't keep floating around in your bloodsteam. So nature made it very easy to turn excess carbs into fat. So easy in fact that your body only has to expend 4.4 calories of energy to transform 100 calories worth of carbs into fat stored in fat cells. (For a comparison, it's slightly easier to store fat as fat at 2.2 kcal/100, and a lot harder to store protein as fat at 30 kcal/100.) If you're eating foods high in carbs but not feeling full, you're induced to eat more than you really need.

And then there's fructose, which the body can't deal with like glucose or galactose and has to get the liver seriously involved. A significant portion of fructose gets turned into fat while being metabolized by the liver via a similar mechanism that metabolizes alcohol. Alas, no buzz. But guess what sucrose (table sugar) is made of?

So yes, kcals in/out but please let's give the body a little more credit for having really annoying ways to knock you off your path to the ideal body weight and size.

So DNL is pretty common in humans?

On the other hand carbs jack your insulin, which tells the body excess energy is available and to do something with it. Well if you aren't using it for activity, the next trick is to replenish depleted glycogen in the muscles for instant future use. But once muscle glycogen has been topped off, those carbs have gotta go somewhere because they can't keep floating around in your bloodsteam. So nature made it very easy to turn excess carbs into fat. So easy in fact that your body only has to expend 4.4 calories of energy to transform 100 calories worth of carbs into fat stored in fat cells. (For a comparison, it's slightly easier to store fat as fat at 2.2 kcal/100, and a lot harder to store protein as fat at 30 kcal/100.) If you're eating foods high in carbs but not feeling full, you're induced to eat more than you really need.

And then there's fructose, which the body can't deal with like glucose or galactose and has to get the liver seriously involved. A significant portion of fructose gets turned into fat while being metabolized by the liver via a similar mechanism that metabolizes alcohol. Alas, no buzz. But guess what sucrose (table sugar) is made of?

So yes, kcals in/out but please let's give the body a little more credit for having really annoying ways to knock you off your path to the ideal body weight and size.

So DNL is pretty common in humans?

HINT: The really short answer to that is a two letter word.

No, but "common" is also a pretty vague word. DNL facilitates additional weight gain. Fat is easier to store.

Unless you're telling everyone that because DNL isn't "common", then consuming 4000 kcals of carbs everyday will keep a 5'7 120 pound woman as thin as a rail because carb to fat storage just isn't "common" enough to be a source of weight gain. But then that would defy kcals in/out which everyone seems to agree is the biggest factor of all.