Posted on 04/03/2012 8:40:17 PM PDT by chessplayer
Unfortunately, Lustig doesn't understand how it all works in the body. And that's quite an indictment against someone who professes to understand biochemistry like Lustig does.
First of all, Lustig blames fructose for just about every health problem society faces, but offers nothing in the way of legitimate scientific evidence to support his claims. He sounds like he knows what he's talking about. He doesn't. Early in your video, Lustig claims that alcohol is a carbohydrate. It isn't. He also claims that alcohol and fructose are metabolized in the same manner. That's a bizarre statement coming from anyone who claims to understand biochemistry. Lustig also claims that fructose is a toxin. Wrong again. The liver easily converts fructose to glucose just like it has being doing for humans for thousands of years.
Lustig has an agenda. I don't know what that agenda is, but he sure doesn't sound like a guy who knows what he's talking about. He doesn't deserve the credibility so many are eager to assign to him.
I’ve been a racist all my life. I think the Human Race comes first. All others take a distant second.
That's nice.
Now ...
Do you want to put a gun to my head (or have a government agent put his gun to my head) and try to force me to do the same?
Put a gun to your head? Nope. Have the government force people to eat like I do? Nope.
I don’t eat wheat because it makes me physically ill (probably an allergy), and do not sugar because then I can’t lose weight. If I eat a donut, not only do I experience indigestion but I gain a pound. My doctor has told that is impossible but hey! My scale doesn’t lie, so I haven’t eaten a donut in forty-one years.
The Frist Amendment was intended for political speech, but it works just as well to warn people about things out in the marketplace that could harm them. Ultimately, the individual is responsible for the health and well being of him/herself. Government as nanny should be unnecessary.
Are those located in the Health Food section?
That's most unfortunate ... millions of your neighbours eat XXXXXX and metabolize it without any difficulty whatsoever.
Government as nanny should be unnecessary.
Not "should be". "Is".
When folks start ranting on about XXXXXX being "poison" ... those who are inclined in the direction of "nanny state" tend to start trying to get XXXXXX banned ... and those who hear "poison" and think in terms of phosgene, organophosphates, or heavy metals are inclined to go along with the nanny-state crowd.
Jus' sayin' ...
I have only ever seen them for sale in vending machines.
** Breaking News . . . Birth is Fatal . . . details at 11
The whole reason government started regulating what goes into our mouths is because of products laced with poison and radioactive elements. Some people will sell anything to make a buck, even items that kills their fellow human beings.
All you have to do is look at what China markets in its products. Killer drywall, anyone?
You bet. Luckily, it takes more than 70 years to kill you.
So ...
True or False: Fructose and Phosgene are equally hazardous to human health.
Take your true and false question and ram it you know where.
So what if I don’t eat wheat and sugar. It is my free choice.
Yes, the dose makes a difference as does exercise & one’s general health. Although in addition to fructose, most fruits also contain varying amount of sucrose, as well as glucose.
So, for example, for those who suffer from fructose malabsorption, some researchers have suggested getting your ‘natural’ sugar from eating fruits that contain equal or less fructose than glucose. For instance, stone fruit, berry fruit or citrus fruit.
I never said that fruit and honey were bad. The crux of that argument is that everywhere you get Fructose in nature it is accompanied by Fiber, which is the only known antidote to Fructose. When we consume Fructose in artificial circumstances, eg as HFCS added to prepared foods, it is devoid of the necessary fiber to neutralize the damaging effects. That is what makes it a toxin. It is a toxin when consumed without fiber.
The reason fiber is stripped from most prepared/packaged and fast foods is because fiber lessens the shelf life and lengthens the time necessary to cook it which is bad economics for the people who sell prepared foods and who sell fast food. But, when you strip the fiber and the fat out the food tastes more bland. So, HFCS is added to improve flavor.
The body does indeed break HFCS into Fructose and Glucose via an enzyme in the stomach, but the problem is that 1) HFCS is apx 90% Fructose and only 10% Glucose and 2) only 20% of Glucose is metabolized by the liver leaving 80% for other processes, but 100% of Fructose is metabolized by the liver. Only the liver can metabolize Fructose. Since the purpose of the human liver is convert glucose to glycogen, to produce bile to break down fats, and to filter foreign substances that can’t be metabolized by other processes, this is the basis for the assertion is Fructose is a toxin.
He goes on to show that the average person is consuming 15% of his/her daily caloric intake from Fructose (particularly HFCS) as it is in all kinds of pre-prepared food, fast food and packaged ready-to-eat foods. We have been told to lower fat intake so much, so many foods are “low fat”. When you take the fat out of foods it tastes worse, and HFCS is added to make it taste better. HFCS (and all sugars) also masks the taste of salt. The average person in America consumes over 140 lbs of sugar (glucose, fructose, sucrose et al) each year.
Anecdotally, we as a society have gotten fatter, we have higher rates of heart disease, and higher rates of diabetes. We have been told to reduce fat intake, and we have reduced fat intake, yet we are sicker than ever in these diseases. There is a clear correlation between the increase in sugar intake and the increase in Cardiovascular and Metabolic diseases (diabetes, heart disease, and dislipidemia etc, where we know Diabetes leads to increased risk of heart attack and stroke). To me this is a clear link between sugar and the heart. When “they” told us to reduce fat intake, the substitution of Fat for Sugar may have been seriously detrimental. Hence this thread. It is possible the “fat = heart disease” studies are flawed because many of those studies did not control for sugar intake.
He mocks the idea that we can realistically burn away fat. Yes we can, but its obscenely inefficient. 30 minutes of cardio work burns the calories of 1 cookie. Its impossible really to burn calories. Exercise is good for increasing the metabolism which speeds up the process of burning Glucose, so it is a net plus but doesn’t really help us lose weight very much. Conversely he argues that it isn’t strictly the calories that cause fat, but the substrate that the calories come from. For example you can get 120 calories by eating 2 slices of bread, from 1 shot of Makers Mark, or 1 glass of OJ. If you have the OJ you get lots of Sucrose. Sucrose is half Fructose and half Glucose. He claims this is worse than the other two options in terms of creating and storing fat.
Unlike Glucose, Fructose metabolizes into (among other things) Uric Acid. (This is discussed at around the 1 hour mark in the video if you are so inclined). Uric Acid causes Gout and Hypertension. But as it relates to fat, he claims, and backs it up with studies, that Fructose metabolizes in a way, unlike Glucose, that it causes de novo lipogenesis (new fat cell creation). Tests comparing high dose Glucose consumption results in less than 2% additional fat, whereas the same calories taken in as Fructose ends up as over 30% fat. And in a study where high amounts of Fructose were added to a diet vs a control group, by day 6 Triglyceride levels doubled, there was a 5 fold increase in denovo lipo genesis (new fat cell creation), and insulin resistance doubled.
The science behind this, he asserts, is that Glucose consumption metabolizes and partially ends up as tyrosine-irs 1. Fructose, via the same process, ends up as serine-irs1, which is inactive. It sits in the liver and raises liver insulin resistance, forcing the pancreas works harder where insulin creation increases, forces energy to be stored in the fat cells and reinforces a negative feedback loop where the brain can’t tell you that you are full.
He claims Sugar and Ethanol both metabolize the same way, except that Ethanol has an effect on the brain (you get drunk) and sugar doesn’t. I don’t recall hearing him state that that Ethanol is a “Hydrated Carbon” (carbohydrate). The basis for saying that Ethanol is a Carbohydrate is based on a rudimentary definition of Carbohydrate that states a carbohydrate is a molecule composed of only Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen where Hydrogen exists in a ratio of 2:1 or more relative to Oxygen Ethanol is Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen where Hydrogen is 2:1 or more than Oxygen. The Hydrogen is bound to the Carbon instead of the Hydrogen (as far as I know - just a keyboard chemist here). I don’t really know why he mentions that - it is almost in passing. He is really trying to compare Ethanol metabolisis to Fructose matabolisis.
Now I agree, he is sometimes sloppy in that video, he will occasionally interchange the word Fructose with the word Sugar, especially when he claims Fructose is essentially not a carb but actually is essentially a fat. So as an interested third party, curious why I can’t shed these excess 30 lbs despite well over a year on a low cal diet, (I quit smoking 6 years ago, went from 190lbs to 240lbs on a 6 foot frame) if you have any special knowledge or expertise that disputes these issues I am interested to hear it.
Apologies for the long post, but I edited my original post and now want to clarify where I am coming from - since you asked “where do you people come up with” these ideas. :-)
“You do not need refined sugar to survive.”
That is true. You also do not need:
Hamburgers
Beer
Pizza
Scotch
Cigars
Luxury cars
Sports cars
Motorcycles
Designer clothes
Cookies
Chocolate
TV
Music
Flowers
Jewelry
Carpeting
A nice soft pillow
Holidays
Phones
Ice cream
Get the idea?
I have no intention of surviving with only what I “need”.
I intend to LIVE as much as I can. Not merely survive.
And I am not about to let a nosy busybody “expert” do-gooder tell me otherwise.
“I intend to LIVE as much as I can...”
Diabetes runs on both sides in my family. I don’t need refined sugar, period, and I am allergic to wheat.
Get the idea NOW! I intend to LIVE, period, and don’t give a damn what anyone else does or doesn’t do.
My understanding is that fasting levels are closer to 100-150 and after a meal may shoot up a hundred points. The body’s endocrine system nicely controls the glucose levels. Even while fasting, the glucose levels may vary by 50 mg/l due to endocrinal secretions into the bloodstream.
If it is never below 150, then you probably need some medication to avoid burning out the pancreas.
Obviously reducing fat intake is healthy, so long as sugar isn't used as a substitute for fat, to add taste. Unfortunately, a few "low-fat" products such as low-fat yogurts, in Australia at least, focus on reduced-fat labels (e.g. 70% less fat or non-fat) for marketing purposes, but don't mention that fat taken out has been replaced by adding sugar. They have high sugar content, so won't really help you lose weight, nor are they 'healthier'.
The other point, HFCS is not widely used in Australia and in for example soft drinks. Instead we use cane sugar - here it is thought that when the body turns HFCS into energy, it creates too-high levels of the unhealthy triglyceride fats in the process. So, even though too much sugar is not good for us, the body seems to handle it better than HFCS.
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