Whitten Ari - The Low Carb Myth: Free Yourself from Carb Myths, and Discover the Secret Keys That Really Determine Your Health and Fat Loss Destiny

The Low-Carb Myth

Free Yourself from Carb Myths, and Discover the Secret Keys That Really Determine Your Health and Fat Loss Destiny

By: Ari Whitten

ariwhitten.com

&

Dr. Wade Smith, MD

www.qangl.com

Published by Archangel Ink

Copyright 2015 Ari Whitten and Wade Smith

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If youre reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

1) "Carbs spike insulin, and insulin makes you fat!"2) "Carbs spike insulin, which causes diabetes!"3) The Paleo diet is all about eating a low-carb, high-fat diet since it is a scientific fact that our ancestors didnt eat many carbs.4) "Fats are the preferred source of fuel by the body, not carbs. Carbohydrates are not even essential nutrients. We have 'essential fatty acids' (i.e. fats) and 'essential amino acids' (i.e. proteins) but there's no such thing as 'essential carbohydrates'therefore they are less important.5) Eating a low-carb diet turns you into a fat-burning machine. Instead of burning sugar, youre burning fat, which will make you lean in no time!Debunking the Low Carb Mythology About Insulin and Body FatnessWhy the Carbohydrate Hypothesis of Fat Gain Is WrongInsulin does not cause fat gain, and lowering insulin does not accelerate fat lossEven With All Their Carbohydrate Avoidance, Low Carbers Are Still Spiking Insulin!Carbohydrates do not block the burning of body fat any more than eating protein or fats doesDo Carbs Make You Fat Because They Make You Hungry and Lazy?Carbs turn into body fat? Hardly! But dietary fat does so rather easily.The Real Test: What Happens When You Put Overweight People On Low-Carb Diets vs. Higher Carb Diets?But What About Those People Who Have Lost Weight Eating Low-Carb?So how in the world do low-carb diets work for fat loss?But what about the studies that do show superior weight loss on low-carb diets?Do Populations That Eat High Carbohydrate Diets Have More Obesity?Debunking the Carbohydrate Theory of Obesity SummaryThe Critical Role of Food Reward / PalatabilityFat vs. Carbs: Which is the Most Fattening?How does the fattening effect of sugar compare to fat?A World Where Low-Carbers and Fruitarians are Both Lean!Well maybe the real culprit making us fat is sugar?What about non-calorie controlled studies? Does sugar make you fat because of food reward?Its not about the sugar itself--the effect is dictated by the package the sugar comes inSo what happens when people consume high sugar diets in the form of less palatable foods (either whole foods like fruit, or bland tasting, high-sugar beverages)?Does eating carbohydrates cause insulin resistance?In cultures undergoing a diabetes epidemic, is that skyrocketing of diabetes incidence paralleled by increased carbohydrate consumption?Maybe its not carbohydrates per se but high glycemic sugary carbs that are causing diabetes?Fructose and How It Compares to the Insulin-Resistance Inducing Effects of a High-Fat DietWhat happens if you administer a high-carbohydrate diet to people with type II diabetics?So what really causes insulin resistance and type II diabetes?Did our ancestors eat low-carb diets of mostly meat, salads, and nuts and seeds like the Paleo people claim? A Breakdown of Different Diets of Traditional Populations What is the Bodys Preferred Source of FuelFat or Carbohydrates? Ketosis is NOT our default stateWhat is our preferred fuel?The Myth That Carbohydrates are Not EssentialBeing in a State of Fat Burning Does NOT Mean Youre Burning off Body Fat!

Foreword

Many years ago, I asked a wise, older friend of mine why he talked so much about food with other people. He told me, Everyone likes to eat, and talking about what you like to eat makes people happy. Instead of talking about topics that everyone argues about, I stick to food, which keeps the conversations friendly. How things have changed! In this day and age, discussions about what we should eat and why are as controversial as politics and religion. There are so many opinions with many individuals quoting scientific studies and many touting their own self-study, which is usually based on suffering through deprivation diets and poor food choices. The state of discussion regarding food, health, and diet has escalated to a frantic level of opinion, bias, and name-calling that can only mean one thing: there is a lot of money in getting people to follow a specific diet philosophy! Consider also that in the million or so years of hominid and human evolution, we are currently in the first epoch of time when humans need to read books in order to figure out how to eat and live a reasonable life. Why is this so? The reasons are varied and include the availability of information via the internet, a media-promulgated obsession with physical appearance, and the current concept that all of us can live to be 105 without disease if we just do everything right.

On the other hand, the plethora of diet research and health informationeasily available to consumersis enabling global changes in eating habits and improved lifestyles that hopefully will manifest in lowered rates of obesity, chronic disease, and disability. The problem is that so much of what is quoted as science is often misquoted, misunderstood, or is not really good science. As a physician, scientist, scientific editor, and writer, I can share with you that the insider view of science is that you have to read each study carefully and somewhat objectively because most of what gets published is not very definitive. What you cannot and should not do is read and believe only that which supports your thesis or opinion. Many of the current philosophies regarding diet and health use scientific data to justify conclusions that simply are incorrect once you read the data carefully. In many cases, the data is not all wrong, but the conclusions of whichever diet gurus book you are reading are overblown. This phenomenon in medical editing and publishing is known as making strong conclusions that are supported by weak data. A relevant example in the diet world is the concept of low-carbohydrate diets being genetically suited to humans due to the fact (actually not a fact, in any manner) that humans prior to about 10,000 BC ate very little starch. This particular assumption has tremendous, romantic, noble savage imagery, especially in the chaos of modern Western cultures. The corollary to the Paleo assumption is that prior to human agriculture and grain eating, humans mostly looked like Olympic decathlon athletes and lived long satisfying lives without the torture of chronic disease. Since no hunter-gatherers in todays world look like Olympians or live longer than other groups, the main data to support these suppositions is the fact that human genomes have not changed more than one percent in 15,000 years. Therefore, whatever we were 15,000 years ago must be what we should be now! This type of fact manipulation serves the mythological need of humans to look at the distant past as a source of mystical truth, but drawing conclusions with such little data and such few facts is NOT science.

I have spent many years as a competitive athlete, coach, physician, and researcher observing the effects of diet and health practices on human performance and, most importantly, on human health. As an orthopedic trauma surgeon, I have been particularly concerned with rehabilitating patients after severe injury and helping them to find balance in their lives. The ongoing influence of diet books, diet trends, and various experts is unmistakable and not entirely positive. Based on research and experience treating patients, I began offering the advice to eat as if you owned an organic farm next to an ocean. Eat what you could grow, catch, or kill, but most important, eat what you like and what makes you feel well. However, more often than not, the patients or athletes we were counseling were trying to carbo load and eat low fat in the 70s and 80s; and in the 90s, 2000s, and on, they are experimenting with low carb or Paleo. Neither of these approaches stands up to the test of time or to scientific analysis. The low-carb approach is the most insidious and dangerous, however, due to the complexity of science surrounding human hormones and the ease with which the public can be impressed with out-of-context scientific quotes.

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