Product Description

In this groundbreaking book, the result of seven years of research in every science connected with the impact of nutrition on health, award-winning science writer Gary Taubes shows us that almost everything we believe about the nature of a healthy diet is wrong.

For decades we have been taught that fat is bad for us, carbohydrates better, and that the key to a healthy weight is eating less and exercising more. Yet with more and more people acting on this advice, we have seen unprecedented epidemics of obesity and diabetes. Taubes argues persuasively that the problem lies in refined carbohydrates (white flour, sugar, easily digested starches) and sugars–via their dramatic and longterm effects on insulin, the hormone that regulates fat accumulation–and that the key to good health is the kind of calories we take in, not the number. There are good calories, and bad ones.

Good Calories
These are from foods without easily digestible carbohydrates and sugars. These foods can be eaten without restraint.
Meat, fish, fowl, cheese, eggs, butter, and non-starchy vegetables.

Bad Calories
These are from foods that stimulate excessive insulin secretion and so make us fat and increase our risk of chronic disease—all refined and easily digestible carbohydrates and sugars. The key is not how much vitamins and minerals they contain, but how quickly they are digested. (So apple juice or even green vegetable juices are not necessarily any healthier than soda.)
Bread and other baked goods, potatoes, yams, rice, pasta, cereal grains, corn, sugar (sucrose and high fructose corn syrup), ice cream, candy, soft drinks, fruit juices, bananas and other tropical fruits, and beer.

Taubes traces how the common assumption that carbohydrates are fattening was abandoned in the 1960s when fat and cholesterol were blamed for heart disease and then –wrongly–were seen as the causes of a host of other maladies, including cancer. He shows us how these unproven hypotheses were emphatically embraced by authorities in nutrition, public health, and clinical medicine, in spite of how well-conceived clinical trials have consistently refuted them. He also documents the dietary trials of carbohydrate-restriction, which consistently show that the fewer carbohydrates we consume, the leaner we will be.

With precise references to the most significant existing clinical studies, he convinces us that there is no compelling scientific evidence demonstrating that saturated fat and cholesterol cause heart disease, that salt causes high blood pressure, and that fiber is a necessary part of a healthy diet. Based on the evidence that does exist, he leads us to conclude that the only healthy way to lose weight and remain lean is to eat fewer carbohydrates or to change the type of the carbohydrates we do eat, and, for some of us, perhaps to eat virtually none at all.

The 11 Critical Conclusions of Good Calories, Bad Calories:

1. Dietary fat, whether saturated or not, does not cause heart disease.
2. Carbohydrates do, because of their effect on the hormone insulin. The more easily-digestible and refined the carbohydrates and the more fructose they contain, the greater the effect on our health, weight, and well-being.
3. Sugars—sucrose (table sugar) and high fructose corn syrup specifically—are particularly harmful. The glucose in these sugars raises insulin levels; the fructose they contain overloads the liver.
4. Refined carbohydrates, starches, and sugars are also the most likely dietary causes of cancer, Alzheimer’s Disease, and the other common chronic diseases of modern times.
5. Obesity is a disorder of excess fat accumulation, not overeating and not sedentary behavior.
6. Consuming excess calories does not cause us to grow fatter any more than it causes a child to grow taller.
7. Exercise does not make us lose excess fat; it makes us hungry.
8. We get fat because of an imbalance—a disequilibrium—in the hormonal regulation of fat tissue and fat metabolism. More fat is stored in the fat tissue than is mobilized and used for fuel. We become leaner when the hormonal regulation of the fat tissue reverses this imbalance.
9. Insulin is the primary regulator of fat storage. When insulin levels are elevated, we stockpile calories as fat. When insulin levels fall, we release fat from our fat tissue and burn it for fuel.
10. By stimulating insulin secretion, carbohydrates make us fat and ultimately cause obesity. By driving fat accumulation, carbohydrates also increase hunger and decrease the amount of energy we expend in metabolism and physical activity.
11. The fewer carbohydrates we eat, the leaner we will be.

Good Calories, Bad Calories is a tour de force of scientific investigation–certain to redefine the ongoing debate about the foods we eat and their effects on our health.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #30447 in Books
• Published on: 2007-09-25
• Released on: 2007-09-25
• Format: Deckle Edge
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 640 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781400040780
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Taubes's eye-opening challenge to widely accepted ideas on nutrition and weight loss is as provocative as was his 2001 NewYork Times Magazine article, What if It's All a Big Fat Lie? Taubes (Bad Science), a writer for Science magazine, begins by showing how public health data has been misinterpreted to mark dietary fat and cholesterol as the primary causes of coronary heart disease. Deeper examination, he says, shows that heart disease and other diseases of civilization appear to result from increased consumption of refined carbohydrates: sugar, white flour and white rice. When researcher John Yudkin announced these results in the 1950s, however, he was drowned out by the conventional wisdom. Taubes cites clinical evidence showing that elevated triglyceride levels, rather than high total cholesterol, are associated with increased risk of heart disease-but measuring triglycerides is more difficult than measuring cholesterol. Taubes says that the current U.S. obesity epidemic actually consists of a very small increase in the average body mass index. Taube's arguments are lucid and well supported by lengthy notes and bibliography. His call for dietary advice that is based on rigorous science, not century-old preconceptions about the penalties of gluttony and sloth is bound to be echoed loudly by many readers. Illus. (Oct. 2)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post

In 2002, science journalist Gary Taubes published an article entitled "What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie?" He argued that reputable scientists were coming around to the idea, advanced by diet gurus like Dr. Robert Atkins, that carbohydrates, not fat, are the ultimate dietary villain. If so, he wrote, "the ongoing epidemic of obesity in America and elsewhere is not, as we are constantly told, due simply to a collective lack of will power and a failure to exercise. Rather it occurred . . . because the public health authorities told us unwittingly, but with the best of intentions, to eat precisely those foods that would make us fat, and we did."

The article helped revive the low-carb craze. Bread vanished from restaurant tables, and "dieters" began ordering steaks with a side of bacon. Many lost weight and became believers, but many did not, and the conventional wisdom on how to lose weight shifted only slightly.

In Good Calories, Bad Calories, Taubes tries to bury the idea that a low-fat diet promotes weight loss and better health. Obesity is caused, he argues, not by the quantity of calories you eat but by the quality. Carbohydrates, particularly refined ones like white bread and pasta, raise insulin levels, promoting the storage of fat.

Taubes is a relentless researcher, shining a light on flaws in the scientific literature. For example, he charges that when scientists figured out how to measure cholesterol in the blood, they became "fixated on the accumulation of cholesterol in the arteries as the cause of heart disease, despite considerable evidence to the contrary."

He also reveals how charismatic personalities can force the acceptance of unproven theories. For instance, nutritionist Jean Mayer persuaded Americans that exercise leads to weight loss when in fact, writes Taubes, exercising may increase hunger and calorie intake. According to a 2000 review of the medical literature, "some studies imply that physical activity might inhibit weight gain . . . some that it might accelerate weight gain; and some that it has no effect whatsoever." Yet the latest government dietary guidelines, released in 2005, recommend 60 to 90 minutes a day of moderately intense exercise and a low-calorie diet to achieve weight loss. Once again, Taubes shows, conventional wisdom wins out.

Good Calories, Bad Calories goes a long way toward breaking the link between obesity, gluttony and sloth by demonstrating that genes, hormones and chemistry play as much of a role in weight gain as behavior does. Taubes's tales of lame science and flawed laboratory tests are at times brilliant and enlightening. But they can also become repetitive and wearying. In the end, the most compelling case Taubes builds is one against stark dietary advice of any kind; nothing simple can capture the complex reasons for the epidemic rise in obesity. H.L. Mencken once said, "There is always an easy solution to every human problem -- neat, plausible, and wrong." Taubes cites this quote in his book; he, and all of us, would do well to remember it.

Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

From Booklist
Noted science journalist Taubes probes the state of what is currently known and what is simply conjectured about the relationship among nutrition, weight loss, health, and disease. What Taubes discovers is that much of what passes for irrefutable scientific knowledge is in fact supposition and that many reputable scientists doubt the validity of nutritional advice currently promoted by the government and public health industry. Beginning with the history of Ancel Keys' research into the relationship between elevated blood-cholesterol levels and coronary heart disease, Taubes demonstrates that a close reading of studies has shown that a low-cholesterol diet scarcely changes blood-cholesterol levels. Low-fat diets, moreover, apparently do little to lengthen life span. He does find encouragement in research tracking the positive effects of eliminating excessive refined carbohydrates and thus addressing pernicious diseases such as diabetes. Taubes' transparent prose brings drama, excitement, and tension to even the most abstruse and clinically reserved accounts of scientific research. He is careful to distinguish the oft-confused goals of weight loss and good health. Given America's current obsession with these issues, Taubes' challenge to current nutritional conventional wisdom will generate heated controversy and create popular demand for this deeply researched and equally deeply engaging treatise. Knoblauch, Mark

Customer Reviews

Your Mother Was Right And So Is Taubes
Gary Taubes reviews the medical research of the past 50 years to establish that the connections between fat and cholesterol and heart disease have never been proven and that, on the contrary, the case that unrefined carbohydrates are responsible for obesity and the so-called "diseases of civilization" has been made by the very studies that have been used to defend the "fat" hypothesis. His review of the research is exhaustive. He does not claim that exercise does not improve muscle tone and overall health. Rather, he argues that exercise is not a a "cure" for obesity, and may even make some people fatter, because they eat more of the wrong foods after exercising.

Taubes writes that the rule to follow is the same one that your mother taught you: starch and sweets make you fat. The solution is to center your diet around protein and non-starchy carbs such as green vegetables and berries, and not to worry about fat so much as unrefined flour, rice and other processed foods. (As one reviewer below points out, "bad" calories may include meat, fish and poultry that has been fed a diet of highly-processed grain. Buy grass-fed, and read labels: much of the canned and prepared food that you buy, including some yogurts, contains sugar and food additives made from corn (corn syrup, citric acid, etc.))

Anecdotally, after reading Taubes's 2002 article in the NYT, I realized that I had started gaining weight -- put on twelve pounds, and gone from a size 6 to an 8 or 10 -- precisely when I had changed my diet in the late 1970s to conform to the "new wisdom" regarding fats and carbohydrates. Exercise -- running and yoga -- had helped me to hold the line at 12 pounds, but could not take off the added weight. My husband, for whom I had assiduously prepared low-fat, high-carb meals for years, was 25 pounds overweight, despite daily exercise. Although I had tried The Zone, and lost weight, I was scared to switch permanently to what my doctor warned me was a dangerous diet. So I'd switched back to low fat/high carb, and back came the 12 pounds.

Then, last year, we began cooking with Julia Child's "Art of French Cooking" and, rather than getting fatter, I actually lost -- yes, lost -- weight eating all those butter-sauteed veggies and creamy quiches. When I once again became concerned about eating too much fat, and returned to a low-fat/high carb diet, back came the weight.

Finally, 8 weeks ago -- before reading Taube's book -- I decided that low carb (meaning low starch) had proven itself to me twice over, and that I was going to do what worked. So I ate protein (eggs, fish, chicken, dairy), organic greens and other low-starch veggies, and tossed the rice, bread, potatoes, and sugar. I didn't worry about the fat and cholesterol in eggs, swiss cheese, whole-milk yogurt or almonds; that fat kept me full, and I wasn't eating tons of such foods (who could?), just enough to feel satisfied.

I have lost 8 pounds since July. I feel great. I am not hungry. I no longer have the digestive problems that I used to describe as a "sensitive stomach." Moreover, having recently bullied my husband into giving up sugar, white rice, potatoes and all but multi-grain bread, I am certain that his weight will soon come down as well.

In short, my mother (who was not sick a day in her life until she died -- still trim -- at age ninety, and whose cooking kept my father alive until the same age) was right, and so is Gary. Listen to your stomach, watch your scale -- and read this book.

Sorely needed because it finally puts low-fat vs. low-carb to rest.
I'm a researcher by trade. Not a medical researcher, but an analyst nonetheless and I have been waiting for a very long time for this kind of work to come out. This isn't advocacy whatsoever. It's a look at what everyone says, and what the science says, and the politics that led us to ignore the science. The research level is staggering and evidence so overwhelming that portions of the book are downright infuriating.

I personally found reading the one-star reviews here interesting because there is not a single, negative review here that remotely suggests the reviewer actually read the material.

On to my own rating, here's what I think you should know when considering this purchase:

This is unlike any book you've ever read on the subject of diets. It is not a diet book. It is not a lifestyle book. It is not an advocacy book. It is a look at the science that has been ignored as our country has rolled toward the low-fat religion and what the consequences of this have been. It is a look at how and why overwhelming science and evidence was ignored.

Society has needed someone to do what Taubes did here -- to strip away what is popular, to dig into claims and recommendations, and see what the EVIDENCE shows us for claims on both sides of the diet argument. It will give you clarity where there has never been any, while explaining why it has been absent.

If you are looking for a book that lays out a diet plan and recipes and sample meals and such, this is not for you. This is a work of scientific journalism, not a diet plan.

On a final note, it is noteworthy that there have been no real rebuttals to this work whatsoever from the "experts" and "authorities" who have, because of politics and money and cowardice, advocated dietary guidelines that have driven our society into our miserable states of health and obesity.

That silence is shame.

Great info, fascinating history, a new view on why we gain weight over time
This book is an impressive review of the science and the politics behind our ideas about good nutrition and healthy diets. Taubes took 5 years to write this, and says it wouldn't have been possible without the ready access to original resources that the Internet makes possible. It does indeed have an incredible amount of information about the subject.

One of the sad and infuriating themes of this book is that much of the currently accepted wisdom about healthy diets has a political basis, that recommendations were made and marketed before the science was solid, or in many cases before the science was even done. The people pushing their ideas strongly believed that they were doing the right thing, that their recommendations would save lives and wouldn't hurt anyone. Unfortunately, as the science gets better and better, it looks like they were wrong -- they may have helped a small percentage of people, but at the expense of greatly increased risk of diabetes, heart attacks, strokes, and cancer for large numbers of us.

Taubes opens his book by reminding us of the "diseases of Western civilization", that diabetes, high blood pressure, heart attacks, and cancer were relatively unknown in the third world until they adopted a more Western diet. Albert Schweitzer didn't treat many cases with these problems when he started practicing in Africa, but at the end of his service was seeing a lot of them, as local diets changed during his practice.

One hypothesis for why a typical Western diet is so unhealthy is that we eat a high level of refined carbohydrates: sugars, white flour, polished white rice. Taubes does an excellent job of supporting this hypothesis.

The basic model is that refined carbohydrates are absorbed very quickly by the gut and result in large blood sugar (glucose) spikes that require large insulin surges to keep blood sugar in a healthy range. Over time, many people develop metabolic problems and are not able to cope with these repeated glucose surges and keep their blood sugar under control. As average blood sugar and insulin level levels go up, they cause a cascade of increasing metabolic problems, leading to higher weight or obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, inflamation, and increased risk of heart attack, stroke, cancer, and dementia.

Taubes looks at a number of other explanations for "Western diseases".

* Cholesterol and saturated fat. This theory was championed by Dr Ancel Keys, who succeeding in turning it into dogma. The idea was that people with extremely high total cholesterol (265 and up) had higher risks of heart attacks, so lower cholesterol must be good for everyone, even though only a very small percentage of people have total cholesterol over 265. Eating saturated fat increases total cholesterol, so it must be bad. Eating polyunsaturated fat reduces total cholesterol so it must be good. Eating less saturated fat means that you need to make up the calories that were coming from it, so you needed to eat more polyunsaturated fat or reduce fat and eat more carbohydrate (e.g. a "low fat" diet).

The problem with Keys' theory is that further research did not support it: the epidemiological studies showed a modest risk of increased heart attack for men with total cholesterol over 240, and no increased risk for women. Low levels of cholesterol, under 160, are associated with increased risk of cancer, so you don't want to get too low. High levels of polyunsaturated fat are associated with increased risk of cancer, so you don't want to eat too much polyunsaturated fat.

Cholesterol is carried around in your blood in small globules of fat and cholesterol with a protein backbone, known as "lipoproteins". These globules range in size from very large (VLDL for very low-density lipoprotein) to medium sized (LDL for low-density lipoprotein) to small (HDL for high-density lipoprotein). When you get a blood test for total cholesterol, what is really measured is the cholesterol carried in all of these different sized globules.

It turns out that lipoprotein globule size is correlated with heart attack risk. Having more HDL is good (so your total cholesterol can go up and you have a lower risk of heart attack, if the increase comes from HDL). For LDL, there is a wide range of sizes, and the large ones are innocuous (e.g. "pillows floating around in your blood"). The smaller LDL particles are indeed correlated with an increased risk of heart attack. So if your total cholesterol goes up but it is because you have more large LDL globules, that is fine. If it goes up because you have more small LDL globlues, that is bad. But when you get a total cholesterol number, you have no way to tell which is which.

Eating saturated fat does increase total cholesterol, but it increases the large LDL particles, which appears to be harmless. Eating more carbohydrate increases the small LDL particles, which is likely dangerous. So saturated fat doesn't appear to increase risk of heart attack, but eating high carb diets might.

* Fiber. The theory that low fiber was the problem with Western diets was advanced by Dr Denis Burkitt, and held sway for quite a while. It was gradually disproved, and today the science is that fiber helps with constipation, but that's it.

* Overabundance and lack of willpower. This theory is that the various problems of a Western diet stem from an overabundance of good things, and our lack of willpower to resist them. As a result of our gluttony and overeating over time, we gradually put on weight, leading to the various Western health problems.

This theory is also called the "a calorie is a calorie is a calorie" theory of weight gain and resulting metabolic dysfunction.

Taubes makes an overwhelming case that weight problems are due to metabolic dysfunction, not the other way around. The obvious cases are people with diabetes type I, whose pancreas doesn't make insulin at all. These people cannot put on weight without insulin injections. On the other side of the spectrum, heavier people have higher-than-average insulin levels. People who eat diets that lower their average insulin levels lose weight without being hungry (e.g. low-glycemic index diets or extremly-low carb ketogenic diets such as Dr Atkins).

Also, eating high-carb diets makes you hungry, and makes you want to eat more, and makes it very hard to lose weight or stay at a lower weight. Eating a low-glycemic-index diet, you lose weight and are not hungry (where most people go wrong is to gradually add back in more refined carbs, which are literally addictive, increasing dopamine levels in the brain, and give you a craving for more and more once you eat any). It is also interesting that the only way to get normal rats to put on weight is to feed them more carbs, less fat and protein.

So, all in all, it looks like it is the highly refined sugars and carbs that cause us to gain weight.

The book has a lot of useful information about where the current science stands, and led to a lot of new threads for me, to try to figure out how to be healthier and feel better.

I did have some issues with it, however.

* Taubes doesn't discuss one of the major difference between Western and other diets, which is the level of omega-3 polyunsaturated fats. The Western diet is significantly deficient in omega-3s, with too much omega-6 fats. Research shows that DHA (an omega-3 fat) is a critical part of having insulin work as it should, so over time the typical Western DHA deficiency could be the mechanism that starts the cascade of damage from insulin resistance to higher average levels of insulin, higher average blood sugar, higher levels of damage with time, etc.

* There is recent research that shows extremely low carb (ketogenic) diets such as Dr Atkins increase methylglyoxal levels. Methylglyoxal is extremely reactive, and could cause much more rapid aging on a long-term ketogenic diet than on a glucose-based metabolism. So my take is that you shouldn't be in ketosis by choice.

* I think Taubes is too hard on some of the people involved in this story, and doesn't appreciate how hard it is to recognize bias at the time. From our vantage point, it is easy to point fingers. I think a lot of the people he talks about had reasonable, defensible perspectives at the time. Where I do think Taubes is right is when he protests that they shouldn't have been so sure that their recommendations would do no harm. Recommending major changes in everyone's diet is not something that should be done without stronger evidence!

* Taubes doesn't seem to appreciate some of the value of epidemiological studies, and overrates the value of controlled studies, which have their own risks and errors.

* I would have liked the history and the current science to be more clearly separated. As it is, you have to wade through a lot of history to get a clear picture of where we are today.

All in all, though, it is absolutely outstanding, fascinating and highly recommended!