How much do you weigh?

[ETC]

I'm not suggesting people flat-out starve themselves for weeks on end. There is an in-between somewhere.

It's physically impossible for your body not to lose weight if you burn off more calories than you intake.

Actually there is its called keytosis but that only seems to happen in extreme dieting (idiots) but your second point is pretty much bang on less cake = less weight (usually)

[Adrock]

Watch the Gary Taubes video and he highlights decades old research showing impoverished people who are fat and unhealthy but obese because of the diet they are eating. They certainly aren't eating too much food, there wasn't enough food to eat too much. They were just eating completely the wrong stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTUspjZG-wc - I've not read his book but I'd like to.

[Super Grover]

9st 3lbs as of Thursday morning.

I'm fortunate enough to have one of those metabolisms that lets me eat what ever I want, how much as I want, without ever having to worry about putting weight on.

I do a fair bit of walking and running, so that kinda helps too.

[egparadigm]

Watch the Gary Taubes video and he highlights decades old research showing impoverished people who are fat and unhealthy but obese because of the diet they are eating. They certainly aren't eating too much food, there wasn't enough food to eat too much. They were just eating completely the wrong stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTUspjZG-wc - I've not read his book but I'd like to.

Very interesting video! Watched the whole thing (while eating a massive bowl of pasta!) Not to discredit the Atkins diet (by all accounts it works too), but not sure about the idea that high levels of carbohydrate intake is almost the only cause of fat generation. Certainly, I have quite a high level of carbohydrate intake – possibly higher in my weight losing/low weight-maintaining diet than when I was 17st.

I particularly enjoyed his point that energy in vs energy out tells us not a thing about why.

[Adrock]

That idea seems to be quite well scientifically fleshed out if you believe what Taubes is saying. The mechanism for storing fat occurs when bloody sugar levels are high, which only happens in response to carbohydrate in any significant manner. I think thats a generally accepted biological fact.

I think the carbs that are gonna cause most damage are simple carbs. Basically the highly processed sugar rich products cause the worst blood sugar response which in turn would create more fat depositing. So if you're avoiding all of that kind of stuff but still eating carbs in terms of pasta and potatoes you'll be better off than somebody munching on chocolate bars and drinking full sugar coke. Also I think recent research is suggesting some sweetners also illicit a similar insulin response as sugar, so that'd mean those aren't good either. I've seen it stated in quite a few places that people who eat sugar as opposed to sweetner actually feel full up quicker and eat less when compared to the amount eaten by people using sweetner. Which could also lead to you becoming overweight. So essentially sweet foods should be avoided or at least strictly controlled.

Still, I've generally been low carb for the last six months or so and have been perfectly happy. I do tend to have the odd weekend or evening where I indulge in chocolate but I've not put any weight on since I lost the initial amount. I also intend to stick with how I'm eating indefinitely and I will also plan to get stricter with my indulgences in the future.

As an aside, I avoid wheat products where I can now because of gluten. I've found it affects my stomach enough to give me unpleasant side effects which I thought were just 'my normal' all my life till I stopped eating it for a while. Many people have some kind of problem with gluten, no matter how minor, because we simply cant digest it.