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What's Causing the Rise In Obesity? Everything.
Mr_Blank writes "We all know — because we are being constantly reminded — that we are getting fat. Americans are at the forefront of the trend, but it is a transnational one. Apparently, it is also trans-species: Over the past 20 years, as the American people were getting fatter, so were America's laboratory macaques, chimpanzees, vervet monkeys and mice, as well as domestic dogs, domestic cats, and domestic and feral rats from both rural and urban areas. Researchers examined records on those eight species and found that average weight for every one had increased. The marmosets gained an average of 9% per decade. Lab mice gained about 11% per decade. Chimps are doing especially badly: their average body weight had risen 35% per decade. What is causing the obesity era? Everything."
Clearly it's terrusts, comnusts and peeders.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Very simply food manufacturers removed the fat in the 70's and replaced it with huge amounts of sugar. The problem with sugar is the brain doesn't see it as nutrition thus it doesn't suppress your appetite when you eat sugar filled foods.
Aliens are fattening us up for the slaughter...
*It's not what you can do for the Dark Side but what the Dark Side can do for you!*
I heard something called 'mehth' can make you slim!
... it makes you heavier
The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness.
So the excuse for Americans to get fatter is that they managed to fuck off all the species living on their soil with them? I though that would be seen as an aggravating factor, not an excuse.
Write boring code, not shiny code!
That title goes to Mexico. So cheer on, someone else has you beat on this.
Om, nomnomnom...
The article is so much more in depth than "it's sugar" or "it's excess calories", and reasons away these as just one of the growing body of hundreds of possible causes and proven links to obesity. Hence why this article is titled "What's Causing the Rise In Obesity? Everything." Any pithy "It's this one thing [someone] did [somewhere]" comment is highly ignorant.
whales also have Obesity they die with out it.
A link to a sociology blog and a hipster blog?
What is this shit?
Late late nights, Games, Beer and doing fuck all about it for years. But they are symptoms of depression and wanting escapism. A knee injury doesn't help. Also, a dumb sense of being able to lose a few KG with magic when I finally get the motivation to put the effort in. But Skyrim and Arkham Asylum have to take some blame, they should have sucked more so I could put them down.
Thanks for asking.
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more data should be required before we make such a broad spectrum 'everything is getting fat because of everything' claim, which is absolutely as absurd as it sounds. In the cases of laboratory controlled animals, im willing to venture a sedentary and stressful lifestyle has accumulated their girth.
in the case of people, we've stopped eating real food entirely for both convenience and lack of nutritional education. Some of us work odd hours or multiple jobs and just dont have time to cook. places like wendys offer a reasonable facimile of food but the ingredients list for even a hamburger bun starts to look more like the back pages of an organic chemistry lab book. Most 30somethings like myself havent the slightest idea, nor care, about how to cook their own food outside of a cardboard box and boil-point water. And packaged food companies agree this is the way it should be. There is no more home economics, we emerge from primary education with no more than an understanding of hunger and satiation.
I also think its a cultural thing. Jamie Oliver, for all the work hes done in targeting childhood obesity and healthy eating, still cooks an alarming number of recipes that youd never think to serve the majority of a populus thats overweight. This holds true for most chefs, celebrity or not. Browned butter and whole cream are still entirely acceptable additions to most semi-casual and upscale dining experiences despite the well proven fact theyre killing us. There are only four meats we readily consume on a daily basis yet theyve replaced hundreds of vegetables in nearly every meal of the day. Many adults simply avoid healthy vegetables like onions, tomatoes or broccoli alltogether, picking from their meal and instead focusing on pasta or meat.
articles like this that just throw in the proverbial towel arent helping. We need competent nutritional education and responsible industry to start offering food that is both nutritious and healthy. Yet as with most industries the change often comes from the consumer, and its often met half-hearted and begrudgingly.
Good people go to bed earlier.
The problem isn't that obesity runs in the family; it's rather nobody runs in the family!
The earth is moving toward enlightenment, to a new era, to a higher vibrational state. And so we need less food, but it's never been as cheap and abundant as it is now. No wonder it's hard not to put on weight. This is the age of aquarius and all, doncha know.
When I was in a student exchange program in the U.S. (St. Louis, Missouri) we stopped at a diner for breakfast on the way to some friends and I ordered waffles, expecting to get something like this. What I got instead was three 30cm diameter waffles stacked on top of each other with sweet cream in between and marmalade and powdered sugar on top. I didn't even manage to eat a quarter of that and felt really bad to my hosts for wasting so much food.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM Sugar, the bitter truth.
Also
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/heresthething/2012/jul/02/
(transcript)
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/heresthething/2012/jul/02/transcript/
Just try, for 2 weeks - see just how hard it is.
.. less of everything.
As I sit here at 6:00 AM, half an hour before sunrise, eating breakfast? Perhaps daylight savings time is a stupid idea.
The author obviously has his pet topic, which is that it's not anyone's fault that anyone is fat. Sorry, but I've lived around too many fat people. They eat. They eat a lot. Honestly the author goes on far too long about "it's not their fault" and doesn't spend too much time discussing "why".
I can buy that there's something in food these days that may cause people to become heavier than they otherwise would become. But I don't buy the fact that this mystery chemical has made a nation of blobs. It may be a contributory factor, but it's not why obesity happens.
Frankly, I think that companies like McDonald's have successfully hacked the human brain and created foods that people just can't say no to. It's not all of us, I get nauseous eating McD's more than once a week (the smell outside the restaurant is enough to drive me away) but there are plenty of us who are wholly unable to resist. And by "unable to resist" I mean exactly that - your conscious mind might know it's bad, but you just can't help yourself because the food is so delicious. That this "flavor" is a bunch of old, tired cows mixed with industrial chemicals is beside the point. You've been hacked - you could say no, but you really don't want to. The idea of living without McD's for the rest of your life is repellent, a life hardly worth living at all.
I live overseas, and I've seen this myself with the locals and foreigners alike. The locals freaking love McD's and KFC. There's nothing like it in their cuisine and some of them (not all) just can't stop going there. Especially kids. Then, there are foreigners who upon discovering the local (awesome) food spit it out and won't eat anything but Western food. Seriously, I've known people who have lived locally for years and who every day eat nothing but Subway, Starbucks, McD's, KFC, Papa John's, Pizza Hut, etc. If I suggest we go and get a bowl of noodles or other local stuff and I receive a wide-eyed, "You eat that shite, mate? It's garbage!"
Look no further than the closest thing he makes to a hypothesis: "being poor is stressful, and stress makes you eat, and the cheapest food available is the stuff with a lot of âempty caloriesâ(TM), therefore poorer people are fatter than the better-off." Stop right there at the "stress makes you eat" part. WTF man? No it doesn't. Maybe it does FOR YOU, perhaps FOR SOME, but it's hardly universal.
Conclusion: the guy wanted to write 4,700 words to get his name in print and support his pre-existing political views, not because he had something insightful to say.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
A rise in eating too fucking much. There isn't anything mysterious about this
Ignoring your link to the advert! You should read the article. The article is questioning the "rise" in obesity (in America is 1 in 3) in seeming contradiction of Bloomberg’s thermodynamics.
Your advert might make the point "You're fat because you are stupid" in what you may think is clever because its offensive (gives you a feeling of superiority), but it excuses the underlying factors. That is not to say you should eat sensibly and exercise and underlying factors should be used as an excuse for being fat.
Gut Bacteria. You will notice that it occurs in Locations and then it happens by those with contact with humans. All in all, that indicates a single source, rather than 'everything'.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
bush!
What is this shit?
Better than an article about the iphone being the colour GOLD!....maybe
Now snout down in the trough, piggy, or else it gets the hose again...
Julian Simon pointed out, in the late 1960s, that humanity (and, presumably, any animal group depending on humans) has a history of continuous improvement.
EVERY generation has had a better standard of life than its forebears. That includes food, so it is unsurprising that we class ourselves as 'fat' now. We are also, if anyone's interested. considerably TALLER (on average) than earlier generations. But no one seems to mention that. Because it isn't seen as bad.
That was the other point Julian Simon made. He showed that, although everything was getting better all the time, people did not want to believe it, and continuously produced stories warning that civilisation was deteriorating, and that collapse was just round the corner. In the 1970s It was overpopulation - we were going to run out of food by the 1990s, and mass starvation would cause global wars. We have had a succession of scare stories ever since - none of which have been true.
An 'obesity epidemic' sounds like just another one of these...
can somebody condense it down to a 120 word paragraph?
i think it is High Fructose Corn Syrup, they put it in almost everything, cookies, crackers, sodapop, non-dairy-coffee-creamer, prepared packaged foods, sauces, it might be just a few tablespoons per serving but over the course of the day you eat about a cup of that stuff everyday
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Now America is the lard of the free
What's Causing the Rise In Obesity?
No?
Or is it under Godwin's jurisdiction:
What's Causing the Rise In Obesity? Hitler
Either way there's clearly no individual responsibility in it, we'll just blame everything.
While this is hardly the sole culprit, in 1998, the the National Institute of Health adopted a new definition of overweight. That is responsible for at least part of the increase shown since that time.
I thought there was a virus that makes mammals produce more fat cells. Did I dream that?
Convenience is the cause. Today we have more done for us than ever before, so we do less.
The life I lead today is quite probably the easiest life ever lived:
I get up. I sometimes eat breakfast. I get a 5 minute walk to work. I sometimes run to feel healthier. I sit for 4 hours. I eat my lunch. I sit for another 3 hours. I get another 5 minute walk home. I sit an hour. I microwave some food and eat it. I sit for another 8 hours. I lie down for another 8.
At no point do I have to:
1. Think
2. Exercise
3. Change
I am not attracted by instinct to want to do more than the above. Muscles atrophy and weight is gained, but I survive. I'm not blaming the above vegetative behaviour on instinct as some external, haywire control over my body. This is what I am. I am a human being and I strive for mediocrity and so do you.
As intelligent beings we want to abstract problem solving and control over systems to enhance our efficiency and minimise wastage. It's that same wastage we need to keep ourselves fit, physically and psychologically.
Want a "transnational" solution? Reinstate survival of the fucking fittest.
God i hate articles like this. Everything isnt causing obesity, lazyness is. Want to know why im fucking fat? Cus im fucking lazy and like to eat pizza while watching 4 episodes of TNG on Netflix. From people too lazy to go buy groceries ( i had someone tell me it was virtually impossible to buy groceries because they didnt have a car) to people being too fucking lazy to cook, or exercise even the slightest bit. You can eat whatever food you want, as many calories you want, if you burn it off you wont be fat, you might have other health complications but thats another story alltogether. Combined with people telling them that "its ok", "not your fault" and "out of your control" that make it worse. Obese people just go "oh its not my fault fuck it", stuff their faces with food, dont work out, baloon up, then shrug like they had no control over it. Its bullshit. People need to start accepting some personal responsibility for their actions.
You got marmalade at a diner in St. Louis? As in, jam with fruit peel in it? That must be a first. Are you sure it wasn't just jam? While I'm sure it can be done, finding marmalade at a diner in the American Midwest is still quite a feat.
Don't worry about feeling bad for wasting food. It's a common sentiment among those visiting the US. After one spends enough time shopping in a Costco or other bulk food warehouse, the feeling passes.
Personally I'm a bit tired of all of these media invented excuses. If you're overweight in almost all cases with very few exceptions it's YOUR fault.
You eat too much.
You eat crappy food.
And you likely have all sorts of psychological excuses to make the above two points plausibly not your fault in your own mind.
While going to college I worked as a cashier at a grocery store for a while and saw it all. Morbidly obese people coming in on Food Stamps or other government assistance because they were "Disabled" due to their weight, and using those funds to buy almost entirely junk food. And no small amount either. Cases upon cases of Soda, frozen chicken wings, etc... The ironic part was they seemed to feel he most guilty at the checkout and I, their cashier was their confessor. So they'd tell me all about how this was the "Diet" Swanson's family pack of salsbury steak yet they still couldn't lose any weight!!!
Too each their own, if you want to eat until you're 500lbs and die of a heart attack at an early age? If you think "Big is beautiful" or whatever the catch phrase is now... great! I'm cool with that. But lets not let people lie to themselves. Yes there may be a lot of environmental factors that make gaining weight easier now, and you may have some societal engrained habits that are hard to break, but the choice is still yours. There's no undiscovered bacteria that's going to make you obese even if eat salads all day (yes, I've had people tell me this was why they were over weight) It's a very simple process, eat less... a lot less, and you will lose weight. There is no such thing as big boned, you are not just a "big person" you can be as skinny as any person on TV if you want, although maybe not as attractive and successful, at least you wont die at 45.
Yes I realize that now every obese person with a Grande Mocha Cookie Crumble Frappuccino in their hand is going to mod me down this morning... but hey, I'll outlive you anyway, so mod away!
That's because nobody would ever say anything so ridiculous, since it's false. Processed and manufactured food bears almost no relationship at all to natural organic food except inasmuch as some of the pure chemicals that they both contain are identical.
The bulk of industrial processed food is completely different in structure, texture, in its overall nutritional balance, in its micro-nutrients, and in the many toxins it contains. And the bad processed food is accompanied by equally bad environmental byproducts of the industrial food and farming chemical industries, such as the widespread presence of glyphosate not only in our food but in our water and even air.
That we and animals in our environment are unavoidably being affected through ingesting a manufactured diet of chemicals is not an outlier theory, it would be a miracle if it were not happening. We know it is because our gut flora is a mess, and our lab animals show the same symptoms whereas in the wild they do not.
Any other reason is just BS.
Why yes, that put its definition of "overweight" in line with the world health organisation's. In other words, one could just as easily make the case that the NIH was in denial before. And if that wasn't enough, there's a recommendation to lower that boundary for Asians to "around 23". Go figure.
The thing is, though, that we're seeing more people, relatively as well as absolutely (the latter would figure given a growing population) with BMI well over that, since "obese" starts at BMI 30. And that definition didn't change.
It is true that BMI is not a magic number that tells you whether you're healty or not. So while there's a valid point to be made about BMI being problematic on various grounds, your attempt does not.
Maybe it was all the nuke testing done on the planet, seriously, 500+ nukes in the air and orbit and underground, cant be healthy can it.
Never in the history of the 4 billion years , has so much radioactive material been spread so far and wide.
Thanks a lot oldies who believed their govts and still do.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
I've been raising crops of dirt for about twenty years, and the complexity of the system is nearly beyond ken. Amazing stuff; I am certain that the true nature of our stomach flora is far from understood by most of these experts.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
Working hard to keep up the trend of obesity, sitting here eating a tub of lard and drinking a Coke, watching TV.
I blame the plow
Humans, like most animals, evolved in an environment where food was scarce. We're built to eat as much as we can handle whenever we can handle it, because back in the day we had no idea when our next meal would be. Sure, it might give us diabetes or other nasty problems, but starvation was more likely than obesity to kill us before we could reproduce.
That's somewhat different than, say, most dogs, who have no concept of appetite and will eat any food available regardless of whether their digestive tract can handle it.
I am officially gone from
I guess it's not too surprising how the "experts" here at /. are either completely dismissing the article or haven't even bothered to read it. Par for the course, I suppose. Some people are lazy and eat crap, this is true. But some of those people look fit as hell or are just skinny. Some exercise and follow a proper diet and are still overweight. To say that obesity is only caused by lazy over-eaters is to deny reality, all you have to do is open your eyes and take a look around. We've had articles for years mentioning the adverse affects of processed foods and chemicals ending up in our food and water, why is it so hard to believe them?
Did wild fish, wolves, foxes, lions... i.e. animals not relying on human-made food get obese? I didn't see any of those mentioned in the article. It seems the common thread is that obesity increased in the organisms eating food manufactured by humans and that food did change significantly over the last several decades.
The need to boost yield (weight gain) of food sources must have had a downstream biochemical side-effect of boosting the yields (weight gains) of anyone consuming such foods. For example growth hormones and antibiotics will cause weight gain in farm animals and in those eating them. That may be true for other types of food (non-animal) and other mechanisms, whether they were deliberately introduced to boost the production efficiency or merely empirically absorbed into the production practices (whatever works).
Every time I visit the US, I realize why everyone there is so big. Virtually all the food that's easily available is utterly unhealthy (mostly fat and sugar). And even in those cases when it's relatively normal food, then the portion sizes are anyway WAAAY too big. I can order a breakfast and get a meal that covers half of my daily intake.
If you order a coke, you'll get 0.5-1 liters. If you order a coke here, you'll probably get 0.25-0.4 liters.
I suppose if you live in the US, you might be blind to this.
And did they control for people leaving the horrible sweaty restaurant for somewhere with air con and establish the number of people in there was the same but they were ordering less?
"A restaurant on a warm day whose air conditioning breaks down will see a sharp decline in sales (yes, someone did a study). "
BS article. Science writer doesn't leave references. Wasted my time again.
Dudes and dudettes, you _are_ fat. And have been for a while. If anything is new, it's just that there seems to be more 'morbid' obesity.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
The TL;DR version is the rather less spectacular "The problem with diets that are heavy in meat, fat or sugar is not solely that they pack a lot of calories into food; it is that they alter the biochemistry of fat storage and fat expenditure, tilting the body’s system in favour of fat storage."
Yes, we've known that for a while.
Yep. Those lab animal's controlled diets really are changed by human plate diameter.
You can go over and fight it out in the corner with the ones who are convinced it's sugar (when we use more HFCS), or that it's HFCS, when many of the countries that have seen weight gain use more sucrose rather than HFCS.
And there's another corner for those who think it's TV (those lab animals watch so much of it) to fight with the crowd that thinks it's GMOs.
We've got lots of people in this thread who "know" what the cause is.
Unlike all of you, I don't "know" exactly what it is. So, I guess I can just watch all of you fight it out.
Not joking, it's how I survived college hahahaha!
Maybe Americans would slim down if (in addition to getting up off of our asses) we ate actual food and not some godawful chemistry experiment that tastes good.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
http://www.prevention.com/food/healthy-eating-tips/gmo-foods-linked-weight-gain
"As part of a long-term project studying the health effects of GM foods -- crops that have had their DNA modified to resist pesticides and drought -- researchers from Norway fed food containing GM corn to one group of rats and food containing non-GM corn to another group. Over the course of 90 days, the rats on the GM-corn diet grew fatter and ate more food than the rats on the non-GM diet. The researchers also noticed that rats got fatter when they ate fish that had been raised on GM corn."
What's the likelihood that Purina rat chow and Purina monkey chow (yes they exist) are made with cheaper GMOs? The article suggests also that food grown these days may be less nutritious in terms of micronutrients than in the past (due to depleted soils and different high-yield varieties of crops), and so creatures need to ingest more calories to get the same amount of needed micronutrients.
Another factor is "Supernormal Stimuli" of carefully crafted food to appeal in the strongest way to human desires like the American-style fast food you mention:
"Supernormal Stimuli: How Primal Urges Overran Their Evolutionary Purpose"
http://www.amazon.com/Supernormal-Stimuli-Overran-Evolutionary-Purpose/dp/039306848X
See also, "How to escape The Pleasure Trap!":
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
But I agree with the article's author when David Berreby writes: "The trap is deeper than that, however. The 'unifying logic of capitalism', [Jonathan C K ] Wells continues, requires that food companies seek immediate profit and long-term success, and their optimal strategy for that involves encouraging people to choose foods that are most profitable to produce and sell -- 'both at the behavioural level, through advertising, price manipulations and restriction of choice, and at the physiological level through the enhancement of addictive properties of foods' (by which he means those sugars and fats that make 'metabolic disturber' foods so habit-forming). In short, Wells told me via email, 'We need to understand that we have not yet grasped how to address this situation, but we are increasingly understanding that attributing obesity to personal responsibility is very simplistic.' Rather than harping on personal responsibility so much, Wells believes, we should be looking at the global economic system, seeking to reform it so that it promotes access to nutritious food for everyone. That is, admittedly, a tall order. But the argument is worth considering, if only as a bracing critique of our individual-responsibility ideology of fatness."
On stress and obesity, evolutionarily, eating more when stressed makes a lot of sense, because historically stress probably means you are uncertain about where your next meal is going to come from, so best to stock up now if you can, which means it is more likely you will survive to have and raise children later on.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
The parent appears not to know that we have a huge epidemic of obese 6-year olds. By his theory, I guess they're not doing enough jogging.
The woeful moderation to +5 Insightful suggests that the statistics of infant obesity aren't well known here.
Compelling rationalization for not eating less. Now, as an experiment to bolster your viewpoint go and try it, and see what happens, fatty.
So you find your anecdotes more convincing than a broad survey of years of peer-reviewed research. (The number of studies cited in TFA makes this a lot more than the author's "pet topic", as you say.) I hope you'll understand when I lean toward the scientists' side.
It seems to me that if obesity is primarily influenced by environmental factors rather than behavioral ones, thin people are no longer entitled to feel superior. That's obviously intolerable to some, so they reject the science.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
What's Causing the Rise In Obesity? Everything.
No, it's caused by "a few things" (there's an inexhaustive list of nine in one of the articles). It's not caused by earthquakes, or feathers, or sunspots, or Mars coming into alignment with Uranus. The author has severely underestimated the number of things that exist.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
STFU, eat less, do some exercise daily.
Processed Foods, lack of exercise and a general abandonement of traditional values (no, not religious). Six months spent on a farm eating foods unaltered by profit goals and working from dawn will do wonders for your figure.
End of Line.
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.. less of everything.
OK. I'm starting with less exercising. ;-)
Didn't they just discover that some of the plastics we use mimic the some hormones? Isnt it possible its really "in the water" this time?
Here is what is making people fat: (tl/dr: Sugar, cheap & plentiful fatty foods, sedentary lifestyle, stress and distracting entertainment)
Sugar - Everything is pumped so full of sugar its almost unbearable. Soda, juices candies are big sources of sugar. And that was a result of cheaper high fructose corn syrup which is added to make the food item more appealing. Just think of how much sugar in in the 2 to 4 cups of coffee you drink per day when you order it with some sweetener or flavor. You can't even buy a supposedly healthy fruit juice without it being loaded with as much sugar as a soda. I drink fresh brewed iced tea, either green tea with a bit of honey added or regular black tea both with fresh lemon. Very refreshing, a thirst quencher and good for you. I cut out soda a few years back though I do enjoy a Coke every now and then as a treat.
Low quality food - Animal fats and carbs. Two things that our body can use for nutrition but eat in too large of quantities. Our brains are also wired to enjoy savory foods through evolution to ensure we ingest enough protein. But we are overexposed to such foods and are over indulging in them as as a result. Food is cheap and plentiful in developed nations and bad food is the cheapest food. We have restaurants serving up boatloads of fatty foods loaded with carbs. Fast food is notorious for this because most of them are burger joints serving up fatty meat on a carb bun and carb fries soaked in more fat. And to top it off its cheap and fast. when you're stressed out, running around all day, have a deadline, boss harping on you, it can become overwhelming and eating can help relieve stress. So you run to McBurgerdys and pick up a triple bypass bacon cheese burger with a side of fat fries and wash it down with a tub of sugar water. Its too easy to get a hold of this junk. I am guilty of this along with many many others. I try to cook but too often am I distracted by stress to deal with it.
Sedentary lifestyle - We have many jobs where a worker sits in a chair all day. Once they return home they are burnt out by stress (see below) and plop down on a couch in front of the TV. The only time they may have free time is on weekends providing they aren't burnt out from family or partying. Life is way too fast paced and full of stress and problems.
Stress - Work, trying to make ends meet family etc all contribute to mental stress which slows people down. You escape by watching TV, playing Video games, surfing the web or some other hobby. Some hobbies involve exercise but for a majority, it doesn't. rush rush rush! go go go! now now now! This is mentality killing us. Then throw in the shitty economy where the cost of living is outpacing many peoples income.
Entertainment - We are at a point where entertainment is on demand and interactive. People get lost for hours watching TV, playing video games or surfing the web. Its too easy to plop in front of the TV or computer and be immersed in an alternate world where we can escape the daily stress of our lives. The real world sucks but video games offer an alternate world where we play a hero or are at the top of the gaming food chain. BOOM headshot! Take that bitch! Feels good doesn't it? Better than typing up TPS reports, meeting deadlines, hunting down bugs etc. Fuck work. That is why you have people who lose jobs, spouses and even their lives. The virtual world is better than the real world. And TV is the same thing, we follow an immersive story or laugh at jokes and gags which take us away from our stressful lives. Before Radio, TV and video games many people drowned their stress in alcohol at local pubs. People are always looking to escape.
The rise in obesity is primarily due to the rise in processed foods. Fat people may indeed eat a lot, but much more important is what they eat. They eat processed, artificial foods. A person who eats the same amount, but only all-natural whole foods, will not be nearly as fat, nor as unhealthy. A person who eats the same amount, only all-natural whole foods, plus a higher ratio of plant-based foods to animal-based foods, will be yet even thinner, and yet even healthier.
Or we can simply look to evolution. Human beings didn't evolve on processed, artificial foods, consuming meat and dairy at every single meal. We evolved on an all-natural, whole food, primarily plant-based diet supplemented with occasional meat.
I am so happy for the results of this.. now (if were lucky) we can get Mrs Obama to go complain at the lab animals about being fat instead of us.
Am I lying when I tell you that im telling the truth? Or am I telling the truth when I say that Im lying?
I'm losing fat actually. Get some exercise and cut out the high fructose corn syrup.
Screw going to a gym, just buy this book:
http://www.amazon.com/You-Are-Your-Own-Gym/dp/0345528581
Most people don't eat out more than once a week, yet they're overweight.
Citation needed. The data I see indicates most americans eat out 4-5 times per week.
Some people don't EVER eat at McDonalds or similar fast-food places, and yet they're fat, too.
A lot of people don't admit they eat at McDonalds and yet in 2010 the industry generated $184 Billion in sales. I think a lot of people who claim they don't eat at McDonalds are lying.
Food is what drives an increase in obesity.
Specifically the food industry increases portion sizes so you buy more, they make more money, you get bigger, have health problems, etc. As you get bigger you also require more food equaling more profit, a vicious cycle.
Proot Proot.
Damn, I seem to have put on a few pounds.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
There's an electrical code that prescribes what sorts of tape can be applied to wire. Sometimes one sees really bad kinds of tape on wires, for example masking tape, which is flammable. But it's not a common or widespread problem.
I think the collapse of the middle class has a lot to do with obesity. Where do we get your rewards? Sex, food, and the belief that your life is progressing. With incomes stagnant for decades, and ever-increasing pressures to produce more or GTFO, and then seeing the economy implode as it hasn't in generations, people are turning to food. What kind of food? The cheap, gratifying kind.
The difference between European and American women
The real explanation is the loss of predators. In the days of sabertooth tigers, we were a lot thinner and ran much faster. The big cats, along with sloth bears, dire wolves, and other large carnivores, solved our obesity problems.
Global Warming? Idiots. This is the start of the Ice Age. Mother Nature is fattening us up for the big freeze.
Wait, I got another idea. Ancient Alien Theorist say that Aliens are fattening us up for dinner. Their dinner.
But seriously, I know why I am fat. I eat a lot of junk food and get very little exercise.
Be seeing you...
Maybe the change is just good old evolution. Though it seems adverse to the survival of individuals, maybe it's benefiting the survival of these affected species.
That corn is so highly subsidized in the U.S. that it's in virtually everything we all eat. Or maybe it's because those same policies favor cheap, nutrient deficient foods and that INCLUDES animal feed.
Hold everything! What if the "g" is increasing rather than the "m" ?
For everything I ever type, please assume "(sp?)"
A simple hypothesis occurs to me: as the American people were getting fatter, American researchers turned more of their time and resources into investigating obesity. They started doing more animal research (of questionable ethics and usefulness, but that's another rant) into obesity, and so there were more obese lab animals.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
I've been 50+lbs OVER obese for much of the last 15 yrs.
I was an extremely fit athlete into my late 20s, even as I transitioned to an "office worker" - had a few intramural accidents and stopped being active.
The last 5 yrs, I've lost and gained the same 60 lbs over and over again.
I know how to lose weight. Workout and move a little more, eat many fewer calories, avoid packaged foods and dining out. Fresh veggies should be most of the food content - 50%+. 1 or 2 fruits and the rest with nuts and proteins.
That's really all there is.
For me, rice, fries, candy, chips, pizza are my trigger foods. Lots of trouble controlling portions with those. I've switched to brown rice - don't get as high off the carbs as with white rice. For the others, it is best to be away from home when having those. I avoid grocery shopping when hungry - that helps.
I know what needs to happen, but still can't make myself do it.
What humans and other animals have in common is the part of the brain that tells us that we should make sure that there's enough fuel for our bodies for the times when there's little fuel around that we could consume. I.e. we're hard wired to get obese if we have the chance to. Animals, if offered the chance, will go for it without a doubt, and the animal in us does the same. We just might feel remorse because we consider obesity ugly, but that part of the brain is by some margin weaker than the "I wanna survive" part.
Now, our body also has mechanisms that force us to stop eating when we're full. Another thing that's by no means a higher function of our superior human brain. By the time you're full, your body will tell you to stop eating. That message arrives with quite some delay, though. The reason for this is the way "normal" food works compared to processed food.
Go ahead and eat something unprocessed, and then try something processed, and you'll notice that eating something the way it grew is a lot more "work" and goes a lot slower. When you eat chicken wings or ribs, you will gobble down less meat per minute than you can do when eating chicken nuggets or hamburgers. You can't simply take mouth sized bites from a chicken wing, you nibble the meat off the bone instead of wolfing it down. Fruits and vegetables are usually easier, but even here you have to take care of seeds and shells, aside of the nutritional value vs. fiber content is usually a lot different and "better" from the body weight point of view. Fiber content is a big issue with processed food altogether, actually.
So my finger points to processed food. Animals (and, deep down inside, that's what we are) eat as fast as the food provided allows. The faster you can eat, the more you can eat before you're full. The more processed your food is, the more you can eat in the same amount of time.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The title to this thread is slightly dated. There have been articles in the news recently that the obesity rate among American children is no longer rising, but is leveling off.
Google News Search On Obesity Rates
Obvious conclusion, our bodies know that we've f**ked the planet, the atlantic conveyor belt is about to stop and an ice age is about to hit us any year now.
Survival of the fattest.
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
I'm a European living in the USA for half a year now. In Europe, I cook every day, usually with nothing but fresh vegetables, sometimes canned veggies, some herbs, and high-quality meat (no antibiotics or hormones are allowed in Europe). We bake our own bread, use olive oils and butter, drink plenty of wine, and generally feel healthy.
Here in the USA, some people don't even have a kitchen. The bread tastes horrible, spongy consistency and very sweet. People eat breakfasts that look more like dinner to me. Eating out 3 times a day seems the habit, not the exception. Go into a bar and everyone is chugging pint after pint of beer, often accompanied by liquor. My wife didn't want anything alcoholic, and she got a very confused look from the bartender, "so, a coke then?". People are walking around with large recipients of ultrasweet soda's or stuff that has to pass for coffee but tastes more like melted ice cream. The entire country smells like bacon. In Europe, people try to avoid eating fries more than once a week, here it is considered a vegetable, and I see people eating them twice a day.
I gained 30 pounds in 6 months here, and I know why. I also know that once I am back in Europe I will lose all of it without any effort or ever going hungry. In fact, my body craves all the veggies I am currently not eating, and even thinking about a nice veggie soup or ratatouille, and then looking down to a supermcfatburger with extra everything makes me want to trow up.
int main(void) {while(1) fork(); return 0;}
Eating. We're eating too much relative to our energy needs. We eat because we're bored. We eat because we're stressed. We eat to fit in with social situations. Family gatherings revolve around eating.
Our entire culture is basically centered on eating.
Its all the women on birth control pills. The hormones from these pills are expelled in the women's urine. This enters the water supply; our water processing doesn't remove this.
It could be that they animal kingdom knows something we don't. Maybe this planet of ours is going to be facing an environmental change soon and that the animals of this planet are getting ready for it in the only way they know how, pack on the pounds. Those who have stored fat will survive longer than those without.
There are man-made chemicals, that are everywhere, that when you (or other animals) are exposed to them, they will get fat. Even if you do not increase calorie intake, you will get fat.
For example, that HFCS that came in that nice squeeze bottle - it is the bottle that is making you fat.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesogen
Obesogens are foreign chemical compounds that disrupt normal development and balance of lipid metabolism, which in some cases, can lead to obesity.[...]Obesogens have been detected in the body both as a result of intentional administration of obesogenic chemicals in the form of pharmaceutical drugs such as diethylstilbestrol, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, and thiazolidinedione and as a result of unintentional exposure to environmental obesogens such as tributyltin, bisphenol A, diethylhexylphthalate, and perfluorooctanoate.[5][6] Emerging evidence from laboratories around the world suggests that other chemicals will be confirmed as falling under this proposed classification in the near future, and that there may be some serious biological effects due to exposure to these chemicals that still remain undiscovered.[5][6] Till now, 20 chemicals have been found responsible for making one fat
So where do you find these chemicals? Plastics. Plastics, not sugar, is making you fat.
The kicker is these chemicals produce the effect at very low levels because they are used as signaling mechanism (hormones). At high levels, they do not cause these problems! At high levels, the body notices that something is fucked up and ignores the signal (ie. the chemical)
And things like Biphenol A, all that crap that says "BPA free"? Well, they just have Biphenol S there now instead, which is probably even worse.
So, if you want no obesogens, stick with glass or stainless steel containers. No plastics. No clingwrap. Even then, you are surrounded as obesogens are in the food chain and in our daily lives.
http://dreamfilm.ca/just-what-are-obesogens/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2713042/
I spotted a logical fallacy immediately. Just because one set of people or animals weigh more than another set of people or animals does not mean that the first set is obese. Under the standards used to measure human obesity, I am obese. Yet my doctor tells me I should not lose any more weight since my body fat percentage is on the low side of 10% (which every reference I can find says is below ideal for my age).
I will say that everything I have read supports the idea that BMI (what is used for determining whether humans are overweight or not) is useful for determining whether or not a group of humans weighs more than they should (although it is clearly not as useful when applied to individuals). However, without some sort of study to determine if the increased weight in pets and laboratory animals represents those animals being fatter and/or unhealthier than previously requires significant additional information.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Yes, by a serotonergic selective 5-HT(2C) receptor agonist ...
which suppresses the appetite, at least for rats and humans, available now
at a pharmacy near you. [And stock available at a brokerage near you.]
Dunno the right dose for pets named Tubby, though
I'd say high efficiency methods of food production in regards to agriculture may have reduced uptake of micronutrients. Micronutrients are a bit odd as too much of those substances are considered toxic or as potential carcinogens, but too little and it really screws with metabolic processes. Government probably regulates them out of the food supply or completely neglects their importance when it comes to animal (mammalian?) biology.
Considering the possibility that mitochondria don't have the trace chemicals needed to process enough ATP or whatever, I'd suspect sugars that can't readily be used get stored in the body instead. So increased obesity (and possibly type II diabetes?) may be a side effect of a peculiar form of malnutrition.
This would also explain why it's happening in lab animals and pets that rely on human produced food, and not just humans.
Of course that's just a half-educated guess by some AC on the internet, so such a hypothesis is about as good as any other. Yet I'd say it's still worth researching if you're a biologist or a medical field related nutritionist.
the only logically conclusion is gravity is increasing :D
I've always said English was my second language. Had Romeo and Juliet been written in C, I might have understood it.
More food calories are available for less labor to much of humanity than ever before. This is a result of of modern capitalistic system with its emphasis on technological development. Obesity is an unintended negative consequence. For 99% of human history, people lived in societies where obtaining food was the major daily chore And food shortages were a periodic occurrence.
It is part of the human nature and capitalism system to think we are not really really wealthy and could get more. But realtive to previous eras we are extremely wealthy. The top 80% in the USA live btter than aristicrats 500 years ago.
Another truism is that in absolute numbers there have never been as many underfed people as there are now. But again that is relative to the huge population growth in recent centuries. If the the world's agricultural wealth could be more evenly distributed around the world, probably everyone would have more than enough calories and the opportunity beome fat. But society hasnt figured how to do this yet on a world-wide scale despite trying all kinds of political and economic systems.
I suggest anyone with a scientific mind to pick up a copy of "Good Calories, Bad Calories" by Gary Taubes. Absolutely dismantles the science behind the idea that saturated fats are bad for the human body. If you read this comment and you think I'm wrong without reading this book first, you're intentionally maintaining your own ignorance.
Or we could just stop eating sugars, grains, starches and other carbs and go back to a high saturated fat diet in order to obtain optimal health and body mass without the need for expensive drugs and the associated health consequences.
"We all know — because we are being constantly reminded — that we are getting fat. Americans are at the forefront of the trend, but it is a transnational one."
Mexico is now the fattest country:
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/mexico_weighs_in_first_place_as_H9SVnsADtIaVUjnLgwfTsL
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/09/mexico-obesity_n_3567772.html
http://metro.co.uk/2013/07/11/mexico-overtakes-america-as-worlds-fattest-country-3879512/
Procrastination; I'll think of a sig tomorrow.
Let's be honest; strip it all away and the key factor is lack of self control.
People know that things are bad for them; they just don't give a crap.
Its a very simple formula, eat whole natural foods, exercise an hour six days a week. Barring a medical condition you WILL lose weight.
Most of these studies are based on BMI which is not very reliable at all. It could be that people getting HEALTHIER are contributing to rise in BMI. If you work out regularly and have decent muscle mass, you will be considered "overweight" via BMI (even with 10% body fat). They really need to better define what overweight and obese is before pumping out more studies like this.
This may just be too obvious, but basically food, and the fact that it is readily available at a low cost is what is making people fat. For 99.9% of human history, availability of adequate caloric intake was a major problem. Eating too much and getting fat when food was available was an essential survival strategy, because winter was inevitably coming. The odds of living long enough to develop type II diabetes or heart disease was virtually zero. Food that is "bad" for us is also very high in those hard to find calories, that's why they taste good.
Now, our ability to produce and distribute food cheaply is unprecedented in human history. Food is cheap and easy to get in most countries. You don't have to chase buffalo through the plains or climb trees to get eggs. Even in the third world it's much easier than the paleolithic man hunting for a little meat or berries.
We are hard wired to get fat (at least some). We have to use the rational part of our brain to override our instinct to shove readily available food in our face.
Calorie restriction only works if you a) reduce your intake to the level you burn off now; and b) reduce it even further to compensate for the fact that your body isn't going to let go of the stored fat so easily and will lower the metabolic rate and gets rather more efficient at extracting energy from the food you eat.
So: you need 2000 calories and want to lose weight. You think a diet where you eat 1700 calories is 300 calories a day weight loss, right? Well, no, it really doesn't work like that. Your body is more complicated than that. You might even gain MORE weight by eating LESS, as your lower caloric intake might get overcompensated by your body resulting in an ever greater excess of necessary calories. Yay, eat less, get fatter.
What does help lose weight is NOT starving you body and eating enough calories that your body is functioning normally, but getting those calories from other sources. Less carbs and more fat (while staying at the same calorie count) does work.
TL;DR: Your body is not a simple reaction vessel in a chemistry lab. It's more complicated.
Even more TL;DR: Eat less carbs. Eat enough calories. You will lose weight.
with 24 hours availability and sugars,fat and salts added to everything.
that said, burn more the you eat, and you lose weight.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The alien surgeon general recommends not eating pasty white humans from the northwest continent. You can eat all the yellow ones you like from the eastern continent as they are much healthier for you. Though you may find yourself hungry again in just a few parsecs.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Delicious Dark Matter
Table-ized A.I.
Leah. I agree that Ellen`s article is cool, yesterday I picked up a top of the range Toyota from having earned $4140 this-last/month and would you believe, 10/k lass-month. it's by-far the nicest-work Ive ever done. I started this 3 months ago and straight away began to earn over $81.. per/hr. I use the details on this web-site,, http://www.wep6.com/ Go to website and click Home tab for more details.
Wire taps are not illegal.
Your citation is a survey, not a study. People are demonstrably HUGE liars about what it is they eat. The only thing a survey like that proves is what people say they eat, not what they actually do eat. We can however prove what people eat by looking at financial data.
And your opinion that EVERYONE eats at McDonalds all the time is completely baseless.
I never claimed everyone eats there all the time. But I have NO doubt whatsoever that most of the population eats fast food with considerable regularity. McDonalds (and the rest of the fast food industry) generated sales of about $600 per person in the US in 2010. That is about 100 meals per person per year which works out to about 10-15% of all meals consumed. That means on average you would expect an american chosen at random to eat at a fast food joint 2-3 times per week. On average that HAS to be true as we have the sales numbers to prove it. Now granted there are many people who don't eat fast food that often but any pretense that the majority of the population does not eat fast food on a regular basis is simply not supported by the available facts. The financial numbers don't lie about how often we eat out. People however do lie all the time to surveys regarding what they think they eat.
I'm not even counting traditional restaurants which account for a large percentage of meals consumed as well - typically 1-2 meals per week. Between that and fast food you easily get a result of people eating out 4-5X per week on average. Don't forget to count Starbucks/Dunkin Doughnuts coffee. That counts too.
One of the few posts addressing TFA; instead of typical rants on fat. Lab animals are usually fed pet food of some sort which is heavily processed stuff.
Processed food is not the same as natural food; we add and subtract things ignorantly as if it doesn't matter, forgetting that every decade a new fad hits as to what elements are good or bad to add/remove from our diets.
There are natural herbs without side effects but when the "active" ingredient is extracted and made into a concentrated pill it then affects many people differently. Because something in the natural form was missing from the processed one, but that was arrogantly and ignorantly excluded. Sometimes I wonder just how many science proponents actually understand science.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I had an incident that changed my body chemistry earlier in life and I started gaining weight and having mood swings etc. My weight would not stabilize and I am quite big now. I was told I have a hormonal imbalance but there is " no cure"... so that was of no help. And so after 20 years of this here is what I have picked up.
#1 The professionals don't know jack. They need to get over their egos and simply admit " We don't know". Most are simply guessing, or are prejudice and narrow minded leaving you with poor medical care. The diets make you fatter by messing up your system some more or setting you up with chemical laden prepackaged foods that probably have appetite interrupting chemicals like msg as flavor enhancers.
#2 diet and exercise will only take you so far if you have a thyroid , heredity or hormone issue. And NO it is not an excuse if and when you ever physically go through it you'll know.
#3 When I first gained weight it was rapid and still felt "different"... when we moved to a different city the food was different and setting up house took time so we ate fast food or in restaurants since the kitchen wasn't together yet... we learned firsthand the hard way... The excitotoxins are real and not some myth. These chemicals attack your brain and the way it sees and appreciates foods and makes you crave pizza or burgers like a crack addict. the entire family had different side effects but it was all bad, headaches body aches, rapid weight gain, appetite interruption, bloating, and cravings galore. The chemicals are BAD>... much more than you know.
#4 Much of Weight loss is in the mind NOT the food in and food out junk we have been taught... example excitotoxins.... they know it and are taking advantage of it. It is the hypothalamus, the interruption of the mind signals to the stomach letting you know you are full. Avoiding HFCS, MSG, Aspartame probably GMOS too will help with this. And these chemicals are in most things don't kid yourself. MSG is not Chinese food alone.. I found it under a different name in Almond Milk.
#5 Food has become practically poison. Eat Organic, no carbs if you can. White food and wheat seem to be really affecting people too.
#6 Insulin Resistance, there is more to be learned I heavily suspect there is massive fat storage due to this. Not even giving you the chance to burn it off, it just stores and stores. PCOS also goes undiagnosed in many woman..
#7 Bullying people doe not help. Understanding does. Ultimately everything we were ever told it a load of rubbish and every body is individual and has its own needs. We are not cookie cutter who need 1,200 a day some need more some less. Some people don't move due to their job and live a 600 calorie day. Knowing the truth with set us free. Continuing to believe their guesses and lies will not.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Oh, thank the FSM, I'm not responsible for my own weight.
Nom, nom, nom...
I blame some of it on portion control, at least in the US...
As a Canadian traveling in the US last week, I was constantly surprised by how much of everything you got on your plate. I certainly never left a table hungry, however I don't think I've ever left so much food behind so consistently, either. I'm of the old-school, "eat what's put in front of you, there are starving children in {third world country of your choice} that are going hungry tonight" philosophy, so I did my level best...but the portions still defeated me.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about getting more for (roughly) the same price...but it could be a major contributor to overall weight gain in the US, if people are actually eating that much on a regular basis without increasing their average activity level to compensate.
Now, that being said, it doesn't explain the higher-than-average obesity rate north of the 49th, so there certainly have to be other factors involved...but it could be a significant contributing factor.
"I love animals! Some are cute, others are tasty, what's not to like?" - Betsy Schroeder, Jeopardy contestant
Because 40 years of ag policies making carbs and starches the cheapest forms of foods have nothing to do with it. It costs more to eat a salad for a meal than it does to eat a Big Mac, and for anyone of limited means, that shit matters.
What's Causing the Rise In Obesity? Your inability to control what you put in your mouth?
Is it really that hard to understand?
"You are what you eat".
Next we will be blaming the Ozone layer for the rise of Obesity. Wake up lol
These articles are fat apologist bullshit. I mean, seriously? The rise in sugar consumption *isn't* related to the rise in obesity? This is just fat people trying to use 'science' to make excuses.
"Dude, pounds are so metric, fuck that." - Noah
Actually, we know about 2 things - fructose containing sugar and PUFAs. You can read about fructose spiking trygly which blocks leptin many places, but you haven't heard about PUFAs.
We eat 5x more PUFA today than we did in 1960 - it was bred into plants as it provides frost resistance.
The problem is it causes inappropriate insulin sensitivity - insulin, if you have been reading much, is the hormone that tells cells to store more fat - but there is a second control loop that operates at the Mitochondria level that is controlled by the FADH2:NADH ratios which are effected by the amount of PUFA in the diet. Feed equal calorie diets - one with lots of PUFA one with a normal amount - the PUFA group gets fat.
Very hard to avoid the huge load of PUFA in the western diet.
Too many carbs are making us fat - yes, it is as simple as that. Exercise is good for you. But don't expect to lose weight too. Cut out the sugar, Cut out the wheat Watch the weight fall, And be the envy of all!
Actually sugar would be cheaper than corn syrup if it was no longer subsidised. You can read about the gory details here. Maybe we should stop subsidising the local farmers for our own health?
oldhack: "Security is a waste of money until shit hits the fan. 5 minutes later, it becomes waste of money again. "
That's true -- or at least, it's close enough that I'll believe you -- but even with the current prices and subsidies, both sugar and corn syrup are cheap. The price difference doesn't really matter for most products.
Eat a balanced diet, Work out and making sure to stay active. It's not hard to stay healthy.
Otherwise à common denominator for all these is that food is contained in plastic, or perhaps, they all get antibiotics now and then?
Aspertame is Mono-SATAN....Wake Up !
If someone stays away from processed food then "miraculously" their weight starts to get normal and the body inflammation is also getting fixed. Check out the charts here: http://www.good.is/posts/chart-the-united-states-is-no-longer-the-fattest-country
Countries getting industrialized are getting fatter. It is because of processed foods.
I follow the Paleo lifestyle and incorporate some of the best foods available today. I stay away from the biggest poison to humanity today: WHEAT and its awful gluten crap. I minimize tremendously the consumption of grains and legumes. Primarily eat vegetables, meats and fruits... That's it. I am healthy as anyone can get. I am 50 and play soccer 9 hours a week and work out 5 times a week for 1 hour each time. Work over 40 hours and participate in mud runs, triathlons and marathons throughout the year.
I guess GP asked for a pathway because if it were just presence of Cl-, table salt could kill us.
(Sorry for posting anon, am on another computer today, and can't recall my login)
And as much as I have my own little pet biases, I make an effort to always remember this fact.
Because it's what good science is based on - making an extraordinary effort to DISPROVE ONE'S OWN ASSUMPTIONS/BIAS.
Something that is remarkably lacking in almost all pop-science/media article about science.
And, I daresay, in academia. Sure, it's still taught, but the importance is muted/obfuscated in favor of teaching things which are more expeditious towards finding employment.
I'm reminded of the racetam class of drugs. Never heard of them ? No wonder. They aren't available in the US, and countries where the FDA has a lot of pull, as the US FDA doesn't recognize drugs that are used to improve cognition in "normal, healthy individuals".
They are, however, available in many countries as they are an amino acid synthetic that is unusually non-toxic with few side-effects, been around since the 80's, and well researched.
Early on in the development of the racetams (Anaracetam, Piracetam, Oxyracetam), researchers tested them on squirrels in a section of forest.
Lab tests on other mammals didn't show any adverse effects, but when the squirrels got fat, the researchers were startled. How could they have missed such an obvious adverse effect, when they'd done everything possible to rule-out this ?
Well, upon closer examination it was discovered it wasn't the actual drug causing the obesity, per se.
What was happening was that the drugs worked perfectly. Squirrels don't recall where they hide ALL their gatherings normally. The racetams improved their cognition so well that they remembered more of their hiding places for their stored foods for the winter. They were getting fat because their cognition, their memory and recall, had improved. Not because the drugs had changed their metabolisms.
How does this relate to this current "news" about so many different lab animals in the industrialized world getting fatter ? I don't know. Nobody really does. What I do know is that the bulk of remarks here are irrelevant and biased, THAT much is obvious.
Am I surprised that rats in urban areas are fatter than ever ? Not really. Easily accessible foods thrown out that are denser in carbohydrates and other modern additives are hardly going to make rats lean and svelte. Am I surprised that the monkeys and other lab animals have been getting fatter and fatter ? Not really. How do you think those animals are fed ? Just take a look at the modern products sold to labs to feed these animals over the years. Purina "Monkey Chow" for example. Animals kept in cages, where they don't exercise, no real effort o imitate their natural environments. For that matter, look at most people in the US. Sitting in front of their TV's and computers all day, consuming foods that do not even remotely resemble anything in the past, including the "healthy" foodstuffs.
When you have cultures and societies that are "modern" which rely on advertising and the media, which are based solely on selling people crap they do not need, and convincing them otherwise, this is what you get. People who THINK they're intelligent and making "choices" which are engineered FOR them. And this is accomplished primarily by removing and managing doubt, creativity, curiosity, and skepticism.
Good luck to us all in the "modern" world; we're going to need it !
The alien virus is fattening us up. It is almost time 'to serve man' and other mammals...
Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company -- Mark Twain
anorexics and bulimics?
Just think/pray for the poor/hungry people before your dinner. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_percentage_of_population_living_in_poverty
Casteism
Can I get a low-fat summary? Sweet!
Maybe we're victims of our own food processing. Growth hormones are being used in all livestock and just as antibiotics can be absorbed why not these hormones?
Stop overeating, learn to drop the fork. I used to weigh nearly 300lbs. I currently weigh 170 at 5'11". Glandular problems resulting in the levels of obesity that we're seeing is exceedingly rare. It is a factor, but not a statistically significant one. The most crucial factor in obesity is overeating, and a complete lack of self control, period. If you're not physically active, realistically, you only need about 15-1700 calories per day, average. If you happen to engage in a lot of physically demanding sports, 20-2500, tops. As for animal obesity, corporate farms cage their animals, or coop them in environments where regular physical activity is severely hampered, pump them full of hormones, and overfeed them with cheap, quasinutritional filler food. Realistically, if you want to lose weight, east less grains, more fruits and vegetables, and avoid darker meats if possible. Sugary drinks aren't actually that bad, as sugar is never stored in the fat cells, and instead transcribed into the bloodstream (glucose reabsorption/reuptake).
Food quality.
I'd buy into plastics microwaved possibly causing cancer. . . but I think a 3k+ diet of carbs and corn syrup and sedentary lifestyle explains obesity much better than plastics and low levels of background radiation. It's not that tricky to figure, though it may be difficult to fix as a society. Heck, even as an individual having the discipline to get up during the day to walk, eat smaller portions, and get an actual workout in before or after work can be a challenge.
table sugar: 50% sucrose, 50% fructose
HFCS: 45% sucrose, 55% fructose
It's not really a big deal. Yes, you'll increase your fructose intake 10% if you eat the same quantity as "sugar", but HFCS tends to be considerably sweeter, so you'll probably be using less and at least partially offset the difference.
Can't remember the name of the documentary I watched but it reported that, despite it being sweeter than standard sugar, the big drinks companies put far more HFCS into their products than they need to.
problem with this. You have so many differing opinions, perspectives, insights, and understandings that we can all agree that our consumption of food is a part of the problem. The other part is that our activity level has greatly decreased as well. If you are running hard all day long in hard labor work, most of this doesn't matter...you'll burn what you eat. When I work hard, my appetite actually decreases...get too tired to eat.
jsut athnoer menagiensls ltitle psrhae for you to dcoede. Why do we wtsae our tmie dnoig tihs?
http://people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/
She presents her research on how RoundUp Ready foods (GMO) we eat poison our intestinal bacteria and cause all sorts of auto-immune problems. The pathway to obesity is one of them.