Consuming any carb will raise your blood sugar, but complex carbs & carbs with fibre are a little better.
Agreed, but "a little better" is like how snorting cocaine is "a little better" than injecting heroin. Carbohydrates should be enjoyed as sparingly as incredibly expensive scotch - it's a treat food, not a staple food. The problem we've had as a society is that our government authorities have essentially been recommending a high-blood sugar diet for the past 40 years.
I'm in total agreement that a high-sugar diet is a health time-bomb
That bomb already exploded. With the demonization of dietary fat, cholesterol, and animal protein in the 70s, the entire US population has essentially been moved to a high-sugar diet for the past 40 years. That wheat bread? That orange juice? That oatmeal? Dumps into your bloodstream as sugar. The rise in obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and other chronic diseases over the past 40 years can be laid at the feet of the high-sugar diet (aka, the low-fat diet).
Type 2 diabetes is caused by the consumption of food that raises blood sugar levels, period. If you're a Type 2 diabetic, move to a seriously low-carb diet, and you'll see your need for insulin treatments disappear.
Nope, not at all. Fresh fruit is terribly overconsumed, and there are detrimental health effects because of it. The problem is, we've decided that the "all natural" high fructose genetically spliced and modified apple is the pinnacle of "healthy" (seriously, apples you pick up at the grocery store are franken-fruit that don't breed true - wild apples are a whole different animal).
Back in the day, fresh fruit was a *treat*. Things were in and out of season, and once the fruit was gone, it was a long wait until the next crop. Today, you can get a mango any time of the year in Minnesota. Our bodies simply weren't meant to handle this amount of fresh fruit.
The truly healthy diet? Mostly fat and protein, mostly from animals, and some non-starchy veggies put in for flavor. Low glycemic berries if you must consume fruit.
HFCS is evil. Causes obesity, cancers, diabetes, heart disease and other chronic diseases. Why? Because it raises blood sugar levels, which raises insulin levels.
What else raises your blood sugar?
Whole wheat bread? Check.
Orange juice? Check.
Oatmeal? Check.
The problem at this point is that only HFCS is blamed, when in fact, any consumption of any object that raises your blood sugar levels is going to lead to chronic disease. The problem, of course, is that many of these things have been touted as "healthy" for the past 40 years.
And you wonder why we've had an obesity epidemic since the 70s....
Well, I said *after* digestion, but to be perfectly technical, it's not nearly as much time as you think. Besides barley, your grains and cereals all have GI values over 50 if not higher. Some "complex" carbs are even worse than plain table sugar, which clocks in at 65+/-4! Compare that to whole wheat/whole meal bread at 75+/-2, or brown rice at 68+/-4.
You're basically arguing that someone who does nothing more than strength training (ie: practically never gets onto a bike, into the pool, onto the soccer field, etc) could compete with an athlete who does so regularly.
Not at all - I'm specifically saying that sports require practice of the *sport* itself, and that someone who does not actually practice the *sport*, whether or not their regular exercise routine is a typically "cardio" or typically "strength" training.
What I am saying is the following:
a) typically "cardio" workouts give you health benefits through the same mechanism that slow strength training does b) typically "cardio" workouts give you these health benefits much less efficiently; c) typically "cardio" workouts as well as typical high-speed strength training come along with a certain amount of injury risk that is not as present during slow strength training.
Given the vast amounts of money involved in many sports, I'm sure that trainers and players would be chomping at the bit if there were dramatically better methods they could use.
To a certain extent, I agree, however, since slow strength training is probably never going to be as "efficient" as doping and performance enhancing drugs, they probably leapfrogged over that:)
Do you have some examples of medal-winning athletes (in cardio-heavy events, obviously) who only do strength training and never do cardio ?
Let me understand the question - would this include medal winning athletes of cardio-heavy events, who practice their "cardio-heavy" sport regularly, but on the side don't do *additional* cardio, but instead do *additional* strength training?
Examples of athletes competing at a high level in these sorts of fields who basically only use weights a gym would be a good start.
Again, just to clarify - this is in *addition* to doing their actual sport, right? So if I find a swimmer that practices swimming 8 hours a day, and when in the gym only does weight lifting but not a treadmill, that would be sufficient?
An article on Phelps indicates that he does strength training out of the pool, but doesn't put a number on his cardio (although he mentions the dangers of running):
"Phelps does other typical strength trainings, 3 times a week with 1 hour each session, but those trainings focus in building his muscle endurance and flexibility in addition to improving his stroke power. With such a powerful and long stroke, when others have to take 12 strokes, he probably cover the same distance with only 8 strokes.
As for cardiovascular exercise, Micheal Phelps relies on stationary bike because running is too much hazard for his knees. Believe it or not, Phelps often tripped and fell often when he run. Rumor said his flexibility in his knees and ankles, though enhanced his performance in pool, results in some loss of stability on land."
It's often neglected by time-crunched athletes in favor of their primary activity, but it's essential -- not only for performance but to build strong bones, says Torres. She's moved away from heavy weights to workouts that rely on her own body weight, but those can be just as tough. One of her favorite variations on a pushup is to do it with her hands on a bar at hip height and her legs on an inflatable Swiss ball. Yowza."
You are explicitly ruling out "cardio". That doesn't leave much else other than strength training, which ultimately boils down to either lifting (/pulling/whatever) weights, or some substitution for weights, be it an immovable object or your own body.
That's true, but the point being made is that "cardio" is simply inefficient strength training. We're not talking about lifting weights for reps, or weight maximums, we're talking about using weights to exhaust your slow, medium and fast twitch muscles within about 60-90 seconds.
I feel reasonably confident that people whose entire lives revolve around some form of physical activity, are training for said activity in the most efficient manner possible, and have whole teams of other people making sure of that.
There are lots of areas where our "experts" have gotten it wrong, and continue to get it wrong due to plain old social inertia. Although you're entitled to your confidence, I think it's misplaced. If anything, the best sports trainers have found the most "efficient" path to be doping and other performance enhancing drugs, and you know, that might be even better than what I'm advocating, but I don't see sports team trainers as particularly dedicated to the proposition that they should be using the scientific method to critically examine their hypotheses.
No, a cyclist doesn't train by running marathons - but he does improve by cycling, which is almost entirely a cardiovascular workout.
My point here is that his training by cycling is training a skill, and that the improvement to his cardiovascular health as a result of it is not an efficient result. It takes more time, involves more danger, and in the end, improves physical condition by the same mechanism as strength training.
The point to take away here is that a cyclist is a good cyclist because he cycles, not because he has done a cardiovascular workout. Similarly with the other sports you mentioned. The question you have to ask yourself is whether or not "cardio" is a singular skill which can be trained on that crosses over to skill in those multiple sports - can a cyclist be a great runner simply because they cycle? Can a runner be a great soccer player simply because they run?
Now, I agree, you can get some strength benefit, and therefore some health benefit, from the classic "cardio" routine of cycling, soccer, running, etc. However, this strength benefit also comes with significant risk, and is less strength benefit than can be found with slow strength training.
Well, for starters, we're not just talking about lifting weights - we're really talking about a specific, safe way to lift weights in order to have the most efficient exercise.
Second, just because people who excel in sports don't necessarily go about training in the most efficient way isn't a point against finding an efficient way to exercise.
Third, for all your other examples, swimming, cycling, and soccer, you'll note that they spend the bulk of their training time *doing their sport*. Swimmers don't improve their cardio by doing aerobics classes, and cyclists aren't out there running marathons, and soccer players aren't just spending hours on treadmills. There is a difference between *sport* and *exercise*.
The trick here is that running is a skill - having good cardiovascular health may be trainable by slow strength training, but the skills of running require practice, not just muscle.
Now, if you like running, by all means, keep on running. But as all real runners know, it's a dangerous sport - injury is not just common, it is expected. If you want exercise with less risk and greater reward, there really isn't anything better than slow burn training.
You got it almost right. Both HFCS and wheat, sugary fruits and starchy vegetables turn into blood sugar almost immediately after digestion. The problem is not just one particular brand of glucose/fructose is to blame - all of them are.
If you wanted to subsidize something healthy, subsidize bacon.
Part of the problem here is that our government recommends a particularly unhealthy diet, which causes people who attempt to do the "responsible" thing to suffer from obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases.
When our authorities are recommending 6-8 servings of cereals and grains, which nearly instantly turn into blood sugar after digestion, which drives up insulin levels, and causes the "diseases of civilization", how can you blame fat people who follow those guidelines when they get sick?
Somewhere along the way, government is going to have to fess up to causing the 40 year epidemic of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and cancer in this country...or people have to learn to do the truly "responsible" thing and ignore the government.
Well, I wasn't great, but I was good - don't underestimate the willingness of people to do things that are very hard:)
That being said, true "exercise" is strength training, pure and simple. The myth of "cardio" is silly on its face - no matter how many laps you run around the track, your lungs don't grow additional alveoli, and your heart doesn't hypertrophy. The only things we have control over are our consciously controlled muscles, and as we improve their strength, they process O2 more efficiently and place less load on the lungs and heart. Running, aerobics, and other "cardio" exercises can help improve your muscle strength, but they're very inefficient.
The trick to strength training is 30 minutes a week of Slow Burn Fitness. It's a shame that they don't just publish a pamphlet on it (obviously the guy wants to make money, so he sells a $17 book), but truthfully, if you exercise efficiently, 30 minutes is all you need.
Historical evidence shows that the transition to agriculture, while allowing for a stratification of society, specialization, and higher population densities, was quite deleterious to human health:
Fat accumulation is driven by insulin, insulin is driven by blood sugar, and blood sugar is driven by carbohydrate intake. The actual, physical cycle of energy here is very well defined. The myth of obesity being a matter of calories and calories out has no such biomechanical model to point to - the naive view that fat cells only accumulate fat when there is an excess of calories in the bloodstream has been falsified by every study ever done on both animal models and humans.
This is conservation of energy, not subtle epidemiology.
Except the human body is not a simple mechanical engine - using a naive conception of conservation of energy just doesn't apply.
A solid with one end placed in a vat of hot water will eventually conduct this heat to its other end - this is basic physics, dependent on the conductivity of the material. Use a human instead of a solid, with their feet in hot water, and you won't see this heat conduct to the forehead.
Obesity is a side effect of high insulin levels coupled with insulin resistance (which differs over time and between individuals), and insulin levels are primarily governed by dietary carbohydrate intake.
I eat easily 5000 calories a day, sit on my ass, and don't gain a pound. My body knows well enough to excrete any excess calories, and doesn't accumulate fat because I'm not eating carbs and my insulin levels are kept low.
I used to believe this was a simply conservation of energy thing, with more exercise and less food being the answer, but I was wrong.
The science behind fat accumulation (http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216) is pretty clear - fat cells accumulate fat under the influence of insulin (insulin resistance varying between individuals and over time). Insulin is excreted by the body in response to blood sugar levels. And blood sugar levels are spiked with the consumption of carbohydrates.
Turning a hormonal problem into some sort of behavior problem misses the boat. Obesity is not about being lazy, or overeating - those statements give us no insight as to the cause, and serve as tautology. A skinny person who plays playstation all day, and eats nothing but krispy kreme without gaining a pound isn't labeled as "lazy" or "overeating" because the label goes with the *effect* not the action.
Until the government admits that their low-fat, high-grain dietary advice for the past 40 years has been the cause of the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases, we're simply shooting ourselves in the collective foot.
Chinese is actually composed of a set of radicals, and a few "radicalless" forms, but mostly composed of the arrangement of radicals.
Yes, I'm familiar with that - Mandarin was my attempt at a second language:) Unfortunately, without a phonetic alphabet (which they do sortof have now with pinyin, albeit with ambiguity), literacy is a much harder challenge than in languages that have phonetic alphabets. Even when you know all the radicals, you simply cannot look at a new strange pictograph and know how it is supposed to be pronounced, or even what it is supposed to mean. This becomes even more challenging for mastering sciences and technology, which depend heavily on new words - deciding on a new pictogram is much more difficult than simply using a phonetic alphabet and sharing your new word with others.
Languages if taught early do not interfere in the education or the limited time to study a language/etc.
That might be true for spoken language, but I think literacy becomes much more difficult the more complex the alphabet, with pictograph literacy the hardest. When I hear about some of the guys from India at work, and the multiple languages they've had to master, with Sanskrit alphabets of a complexity I can only boggle at, I shudder in my boots.
However, despite your assertions of a benefit to a standard language, there are numerous nations in the world that demonstrate that multiple languages can be accommodated just fine.
I've always wondered about that - it seems that places where people either have pictograph based languages, or where they generally learn multiple and very unrelated dialects, are generally at a severe disadvantage to those places that have a single, standard language. All of the people from those countries who come to the US are generally the best and the brightest, and learning multiple languages or pictograph based languages doesn't seem to have thwarted them from their goals, but I can't help but think that the time spent trying to master a difficult set of pictographs, or learn a wide variety of languages, takes away from time you could spend mastering something else.
I haven't bothered to google scholar it, but I'd bet that standardized language correlates with at least some measures of economic and national success.
I am still free to hold the assertion that doing so would be the best ethical choice.
Well, depending on what other ethical choices you're entertaining:) It's better than a sharp stick in the eye, but it might not fare so well against choosing to give everyone a mansion, a pony and an ipod for free:)
After all, the only thing making SAE more useful is that AAVE is rejected.
Now that's an interesting assertion. I'd posit further that if the roles were reversed, and it was AAVE that was "standard" and SAE that was lower socioeconomic class slang, you'd probably see the same issues with peer pressure and the denigration of education coming from the lower socioeconomic class.
I'm also certainly allowed to take the position that the more ethical choice is to stop expecting SAE to be spoken by everyone, and adapt to fit AAVE in without their change.
Except that there is utility to having a standard language, whatever the choice is. Having an unspecified and dynamic street slang "standardized" and adapted to will only create yet another dynamic street slang that is associated with socioeconomic class, as a way to show that someone is "genuine" and loyal to their class.
Although it might be fun to think about what the world would be like if we didn't judge people by their speaking or writing ability, the simple fact of the matter is that someone who isn't proficient in the standard language cannot perform in society the way someone who is, can. It may be more ethical to give someone a customer service job even though they can't speak the language, but will they be successful? We could further push the ethical bar by providing training materials for all customers so they can learn the slang of the non-standard customer service rep, but would that work?
In any case, as ethical as it may be to adopt and adapt to various forms of slang and dialect, I don't think it absolves the poor ethics of peer pressure denigrating education and keeping people from escaping the bonds of poverty and violence associated with socioeconomic class.
The point I'm making is that accents in the UK vary by region, not by ethnic group.
I think I see what you're saying - even the rich people in Liverpool speak with the same accent as the poor people.
In the US, it's not so much by ethnic group as it is socioeconomic status. "Gangsta" is popular across ethnicities, but generally limited to a certain socioeconomic class (rich rap stars being a notable exception).
"Clearly individuals are better off learning the language of power, but that should never justify the connotation that the language of power is "better". "More useful" perhaps, but I would categorically reject any depictions of an ethically or aesthetically superior position.
Fair enough. I'd also go so far as to assert the inverse as well - we should categorically reject any depictions of SAE being ethically or aesthetically inferior.
Demanding that a subculture learn SAE, is the same as demanding that every subculture of America be, or at least practice Christianity.
Now, that's a stretch. It might be the same as demanding that every subculture of America learn about Christianity, Bible history, and the various sects and factions, but learning a language is not nearly the same thing as practicing a religion. Conflating the two doesn't help make your point.
I think the real ethical problem is when subcultures denigrate the attempts of their peers to rise above their current socioeconomic status with education, thereby denying social advancement where it is arguably the most needed.
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Agreed, but "a little better" is like how snorting cocaine is "a little better" than injecting heroin. Carbohydrates should be enjoyed as sparingly as incredibly expensive scotch - it's a treat food, not a staple food. The problem we've had as a society is that our government authorities have essentially been recommending a high-blood sugar diet for the past 40 years.
That bomb already exploded. With the demonization of dietary fat, cholesterol, and animal protein in the 70s, the entire US population has essentially been moved to a high-sugar diet for the past 40 years. That wheat bread? That orange juice? That oatmeal? Dumps into your bloodstream as sugar. The rise in obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and other chronic diseases over the past 40 years can be laid at the feet of the high-sugar diet (aka, the low-fat diet).
If you really want to get into the gory details about the digestive process and path, check out this lecture: http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216
Type 2 diabetes is caused by the consumption of food that raises blood sugar levels, period. If you're a Type 2 diabetic, move to a seriously low-carb diet, and you'll see your need for insulin treatments disappear.
Nope, not at all. Fresh fruit is terribly overconsumed, and there are detrimental health effects because of it. The problem is, we've decided that the "all natural" high fructose genetically spliced and modified apple is the pinnacle of "healthy" (seriously, apples you pick up at the grocery store are franken-fruit that don't breed true - wild apples are a whole different animal).
Back in the day, fresh fruit was a *treat*. Things were in and out of season, and once the fruit was gone, it was a long wait until the next crop. Today, you can get a mango any time of the year in Minnesota. Our bodies simply weren't meant to handle this amount of fresh fruit.
The truly healthy diet? Mostly fat and protein, mostly from animals, and some non-starchy veggies put in for flavor. Low glycemic berries if you must consume fruit.
HFCS is evil. Causes obesity, cancers, diabetes, heart disease and other chronic diseases. Why? Because it raises blood sugar levels, which raises insulin levels.
What else raises your blood sugar?
Whole wheat bread? Check.
Orange juice? Check.
Oatmeal? Check.
The problem at this point is that only HFCS is blamed, when in fact, any consumption of any object that raises your blood sugar levels is going to lead to chronic disease. The problem, of course, is that many of these things have been touted as "healthy" for the past 40 years.
And you wonder why we've had an obesity epidemic since the 70s....
http://www.mendosa.com/gilists.htm
Well, I said *after* digestion, but to be perfectly technical, it's not nearly as much time as you think. Besides barley, your grains and cereals all have GI values over 50 if not higher. Some "complex" carbs are even worse than plain table sugar, which clocks in at 65+/-4! Compare that to whole wheat/whole meal bread at 75+/-2, or brown rice at 68+/-4.
Not at all - I'm specifically saying that sports require practice of the *sport* itself, and that someone who does not actually practice the *sport*, whether or not their regular exercise routine is a typically "cardio" or typically "strength" training.
What I am saying is the following:
a) typically "cardio" workouts give you health benefits through the same mechanism that slow strength training does
b) typically "cardio" workouts give you these health benefits much less efficiently;
c) typically "cardio" workouts as well as typical high-speed strength training come along with a certain amount of injury risk that is not as present during slow strength training.
To a certain extent, I agree, however, since slow strength training is probably never going to be as "efficient" as doping and performance enhancing drugs, they probably leapfrogged over that :)
Let me understand the question - would this include medal winning athletes of cardio-heavy events, who practice their "cardio-heavy" sport regularly, but on the side don't do *additional* cardio, but instead do *additional* strength training?
Again, just to clarify - this is in *addition* to doing their actual sport, right? So if I find a swimmer that practices swimming 8 hours a day, and when in the gym only does weight lifting but not a treadmill, that would be sufficient?
An article on Phelps indicates that he does strength training out of the pool, but doesn't put a number on his cardio (although he mentions the dangers of running):
http://munfitnessblog.com/how-michael-phelps-managed-to-break-so-many-swimming-world-records-one-after-another/
"Phelps does other typical strength trainings, 3 times a week with 1 hour each session, but those trainings focus in building his muscle endurance and flexibility in addition to improving his stroke power. With such a powerful and long stroke, when others have to take 12 strokes, he probably cover the same distance with only 8 strokes.
As for cardiovascular exercise, Micheal Phelps relies on stationary bike because running is too much hazard for his knees. Believe it or not, Phelps often tripped and fell often when he run. Rumor said his flexibility in his knees and ankles, though enhanced his performance in pool, results in some loss of stability on land."
Here's another cite from an olympic swimmer:
http://www.ihavenet.com/olympics-5-Lessons-for-Over-35-Athletes-From-Olympic-Swimmer-Dara-Torres.html
"Do strength-training
It's often neglected by time-crunched athletes in favor of their primary activity, but it's essential -- not only for performance but to build strong bones, says Torres. She's moved away from heavy weights to workouts that rely on her own body weight, but those can be just as tough. One of her favorite variations on a pushup is to do it with her hands on a bar at hip height and her legs on an inflatable Swiss ball. Yowza."
That's true, but the point being made is that "cardio" is simply inefficient strength training. We're not talking about lifting weights for reps, or weight maximums, we're talking about using weights to exhaust your slow, medium and fast twitch muscles within about 60-90 seconds.
There are lots of areas where our "experts" have gotten it wrong, and continue to get it wrong due to plain old social inertia. Although you're entitled to your confidence, I think it's misplaced. If anything, the best sports trainers have found the most "efficient" path to be doping and other performance enhancing drugs, and you know, that might be even better than what I'm advocating, but I don't see sports team trainers as particularly dedicated to the proposition that they should be using the scientific method to critically examine their hypotheses.
My point here is that his training by cycling is training a skill, and that the improvement to his cardiovascular health as a result of it is not an efficient result. It takes more time, involves more danger, and in the end, improves physical condition by the same mechanism as strength training.
The point to take away here is that a cyclist is a good cyclist because he cycles, not because he has done a cardiovascular workout. Similarly with the other sports you mentioned. The question you have to ask yourself is whether or not "cardio" is a singular skill which can be trained on that crosses over to skill in those multiple sports - can a cyclist be a great runner simply because they cycle? Can a runner be a great soccer player simply because they run?
Now, I agree, you can get some strength benefit, and therefore some health benefit, from the classic "cardio" routine of cycling, soccer, running, etc. However, this strength benefit also comes with significant risk, and is less strength benefit than can be found with slow strength training.
Well, for starters, we're not just talking about lifting weights - we're really talking about a specific, safe way to lift weights in order to have the most efficient exercise.
Second, just because people who excel in sports don't necessarily go about training in the most efficient way isn't a point against finding an efficient way to exercise.
Third, for all your other examples, swimming, cycling, and soccer, you'll note that they spend the bulk of their training time *doing their sport*. Swimmers don't improve their cardio by doing aerobics classes, and cyclists aren't out there running marathons, and soccer players aren't just spending hours on treadmills. There is a difference between *sport* and *exercise*.
Here's an article that might help better explain what I'm trying to get across:
http://www.enotalone.com/article/24633.html
The trick here is that running is a skill - having good cardiovascular health may be trainable by slow strength training, but the skills of running require practice, not just muscle.
Now, if you like running, by all means, keep on running. But as all real runners know, it's a dangerous sport - injury is not just common, it is expected. If you want exercise with less risk and greater reward, there really isn't anything better than slow burn training.
You got it almost right. Both HFCS and wheat, sugary fruits and starchy vegetables turn into blood sugar almost immediately after digestion. The problem is not just one particular brand of glucose/fructose is to blame - all of them are.
If you wanted to subsidize something healthy, subsidize bacon.
Mod parent up. Obesity is a sign of malnutrition, not overnutrition.
Part of the problem here is that our government recommends a particularly unhealthy diet, which causes people who attempt to do the "responsible" thing to suffer from obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases.
When our authorities are recommending 6-8 servings of cereals and grains, which nearly instantly turn into blood sugar after digestion, which drives up insulin levels, and causes the "diseases of civilization", how can you blame fat people who follow those guidelines when they get sick?
Somewhere along the way, government is going to have to fess up to causing the 40 year epidemic of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and cancer in this country...or people have to learn to do the truly "responsible" thing and ignore the government.
Well, I wasn't great, but I was good - don't underestimate the willingness of people to do things that are very hard :)
That being said, true "exercise" is strength training, pure and simple. The myth of "cardio" is silly on its face - no matter how many laps you run around the track, your lungs don't grow additional alveoli, and your heart doesn't hypertrophy. The only things we have control over are our consciously controlled muscles, and as we improve their strength, they process O2 more efficiently and place less load on the lungs and heart. Running, aerobics, and other "cardio" exercises can help improve your muscle strength, but they're very inefficient.
The trick to strength training is 30 minutes a week of Slow Burn Fitness. It's a shame that they don't just publish a pamphlet on it (obviously the guy wants to make money, so he sells a $17 book), but truthfully, if you exercise efficiently, 30 minutes is all you need.
Carbohydrates are not necessary for glucose in your body - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis
Historical evidence shows that the transition to agriculture, while allowing for a stratification of society, specialization, and higher population densities, was quite deleterious to human health:
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/low-carb-diets/nutrition-and-health-in-agriculturalists-and-hunter-gatherers/
Fat accumulation is driven by insulin, insulin is driven by blood sugar, and blood sugar is driven by carbohydrate intake. The actual, physical cycle of energy here is very well defined. The myth of obesity being a matter of calories and calories out has no such biomechanical model to point to - the naive view that fat cells only accumulate fat when there is an excess of calories in the bloodstream has been falsified by every study ever done on both animal models and humans.
Except the human body is not a simple mechanical engine - using a naive conception of conservation of energy just doesn't apply.
A solid with one end placed in a vat of hot water will eventually conduct this heat to its other end - this is basic physics, dependent on the conductivity of the material. Use a human instead of a solid, with their feet in hot water, and you won't see this heat conduct to the forehead.
Obesity is a side effect of high insulin levels coupled with insulin resistance (which differs over time and between individuals), and insulin levels are primarily governed by dietary carbohydrate intake.
I eat easily 5000 calories a day, sit on my ass, and don't gain a pound. My body knows well enough to excrete any excess calories, and doesn't accumulate fat because I'm not eating carbs and my insulin levels are kept low.
I used to believe this was a simply conservation of energy thing, with more exercise and less food being the answer, but I was wrong.
Watch the following lecture before replying: http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216
The science behind fat accumulation (http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216) is pretty clear - fat cells accumulate fat under the influence of insulin (insulin resistance varying between individuals and over time). Insulin is excreted by the body in response to blood sugar levels. And blood sugar levels are spiked with the consumption of carbohydrates.
Turning a hormonal problem into some sort of behavior problem misses the boat. Obesity is not about being lazy, or overeating - those statements give us no insight as to the cause, and serve as tautology. A skinny person who plays playstation all day, and eats nothing but krispy kreme without gaining a pound isn't labeled as "lazy" or "overeating" because the label goes with the *effect* not the action.
Until the government admits that their low-fat, high-grain dietary advice for the past 40 years has been the cause of the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases, we're simply shooting ourselves in the collective foot.
Stop eating carbohydrates. Its simple.
Is Tennessee South enough for you?
I am a black person.
Yes, I'm familiar with that - Mandarin was my attempt at a second language :) Unfortunately, without a phonetic alphabet (which they do sortof have now with pinyin, albeit with ambiguity), literacy is a much harder challenge than in languages that have phonetic alphabets. Even when you know all the radicals, you simply cannot look at a new strange pictograph and know how it is supposed to be pronounced, or even what it is supposed to mean. This becomes even more challenging for mastering sciences and technology, which depend heavily on new words - deciding on a new pictogram is much more difficult than simply using a phonetic alphabet and sharing your new word with others.
That might be true for spoken language, but I think literacy becomes much more difficult the more complex the alphabet, with pictograph literacy the hardest. When I hear about some of the guys from India at work, and the multiple languages they've had to master, with Sanskrit alphabets of a complexity I can only boggle at, I shudder in my boots.
I've always wondered about that - it seems that places where people either have pictograph based languages, or where they generally learn multiple and very unrelated dialects, are generally at a severe disadvantage to those places that have a single, standard language. All of the people from those countries who come to the US are generally the best and the brightest, and learning multiple languages or pictograph based languages doesn't seem to have thwarted them from their goals, but I can't help but think that the time spent trying to master a difficult set of pictographs, or learn a wide variety of languages, takes away from time you could spend mastering something else.
I haven't bothered to google scholar it, but I'd bet that standardized language correlates with at least some measures of economic and national success.
Well, depending on what other ethical choices you're entertaining :) It's better than a sharp stick in the eye, but it might not fare so well against choosing to give everyone a mansion, a pony and an ipod for free :)
Now that's an interesting assertion. I'd posit further that if the roles were reversed, and it was AAVE that was "standard" and SAE that was lower socioeconomic class slang, you'd probably see the same issues with peer pressure and the denigration of education coming from the lower socioeconomic class.
Except that there is utility to having a standard language, whatever the choice is. Having an unspecified and dynamic street slang "standardized" and adapted to will only create yet another dynamic street slang that is associated with socioeconomic class, as a way to show that someone is "genuine" and loyal to their class.
Although it might be fun to think about what the world would be like if we didn't judge people by their speaking or writing ability, the simple fact of the matter is that someone who isn't proficient in the standard language cannot perform in society the way someone who is, can. It may be more ethical to give someone a customer service job even though they can't speak the language, but will they be successful? We could further push the ethical bar by providing training materials for all customers so they can learn the slang of the non-standard customer service rep, but would that work?
In any case, as ethical as it may be to adopt and adapt to various forms of slang and dialect, I don't think it absolves the poor ethics of peer pressure denigrating education and keeping people from escaping the bonds of poverty and violence associated with socioeconomic class.
I think I see what you're saying - even the rich people in Liverpool speak with the same accent as the poor people.
In the US, it's not so much by ethnic group as it is socioeconomic status. "Gangsta" is popular across ethnicities, but generally limited to a certain socioeconomic class (rich rap stars being a notable exception).
Fair enough. I'd also go so far as to assert the inverse as well - we should categorically reject any depictions of SAE being ethically or aesthetically inferior.
Now, that's a stretch. It might be the same as demanding that every subculture of America learn about Christianity, Bible history, and the various sects and factions, but learning a language is not nearly the same thing as practicing a religion. Conflating the two doesn't help make your point.
I think the real ethical problem is when subcultures denigrate the attempts of their peers to rise above their current socioeconomic status with education, thereby denying social advancement where it is arguably the most needed.