> Economic hardship during the Second World War forced the government to institute food rations, and limits on sugar were not lifted until 1953, years after the war ended.
> The researchers found that the people conceived during the sugar limitations had a 35% lower risk of diabetes and a 20% lower risk of high blood pressure than people conceived after the rationing.
Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.
I don't know why this has to be about men and strength and cycles of violence. I think this is about value extraction. During times of plenty, we structure our economy to maximize the value, and in our current policy that means putting sugar in everything. It's what makes the most money. We don't factor in the cost, and we don't value the alternatives. We turn sunlight in to sugar in to human fat, because it makes the most money.
In war, scarcity and changes in spending priorities mean the economics changes and we don't get as much money in the sunlight->sugar->human fat chain, so we make less human fat.
I don't think this is a good idea, but I do think it is what we are doing.
But really my philosophy of it is not the important thing here, I offer it merely because, respectfully, I don't agree with your framing.
Or, hear me out on this crazy idea that might just work?. What if instead of wishing for hard times so that we can have "hard men", what if instead of all of that which you know must include a lot of suffering and death in order to make the hard men... What if istead of all of that we just stop putting sugar into every freaking thing?.
Crazy idea I know!, but it just might be crazy enough to work!.
I don't know about you but I enjoy the demonstration of accelerationism as a motivating philosophy. It's really dry satire, but it's hard to read it as anything else. Also, who are you to judge those that want their men to get hard?
Type 1 or Type 2? It took me one minute of additional research to determine that this is related to Type 2 diabetes, yet the author didn't even bother to mention. This is lazy journalism motivated by maximizing clicks.
how does defining the type or not of diabetes make this any less/more lazy on the journalist? if you have either type, you are considered diabetic, one that has diabetes.
Type 1 is an autoimmune disease. Type 2 is a gradual loss of the ability to produce insulin. The final destination might be the same but the causes and journeys are very different.
It's lazy because it is not relevant data for people with Type 1 diabetes, yet the article implies that it is. It is implying that eight million people with type 1 diabetes may have it because their mom ate too much sugar, while the article is actually targeted towards the 537 million people with type 2 diabetes. Those of us with type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease, are so tired of being lumped in with the vast majority that destroyed their body with lack of exercise and poor diet.
It is obvious to someone that knows that there are 2 types of diabetes that the article talks about type 2 while people that doesn't know it thinks of diabetes as type 2.
Over 90% of diabetes is type 2: it's the classic metabolic disease. Noting down the exact type adds complexity to be honest. The are other forms, such as type 1, MODY or even insipidus and explaining all of them is another topic and they are comparatively rare. It's a bit of a stretch to call out the journalists work ethic as lazy. That said once specifying "type 2" wouldn't hurt but it's not necessary either.
As a T1D, I strongly disagree. The confusion of the “types” profoundly impacts public opinion, which is significant downstream (funding, employment bias, etc.).
for those who don't know diabetes, this would be like publishing an article titled "Dementia risk soars for adults who repeatedly slammed their head into a wall as a child"
...and doesn't clarify that the study has absolutely nothing to do with alzheimer's / is only talking about blunt force trauma-induced damage
I had a sweet tooth as a kid. I treat candy and ice cream like a drug addict does. It can't be in the house, I won't even let myself have some on special occasions. There is a circuit in my brain completely broken by this; evil.
Bitters take away the sweet tooth, such as grapefruit (especially organic), bitter tea or natural bitter drops. Eat a grapefruit after dinner and you cravings should be severely limited.
I have the same reservations, and not just about dietitians but also other scientific disciplines. Many dietitians are first and foremost businessmen selling various supplements. Whether the supplement is necessary, effective or even harmful is less important.
I would not be at all surprised. There are some varieties of apple that can make you fat if you overeat them. Figures they'd try to do the same to other fruits.
Another one is brussels sprouts. They used to be a lot more bitter, but that has been largely bred out. It has made them way more popular, but part of me wishes it had not changed.
Believe there was a zoo that started feeding monkeys with "modern" bananas and had to revert back to the old traditional banana, because the monkeys were getting diabetes.
That's interesting. I thought gros michel bananas are actually sweeter than cavendish, not the other way around? They're otherwise closely related, IIRC.
I wonder what they will come up with after cavendish fails?
Sure, that is technically correct, which as they say is the best kind of correct.
But as a practical matter, getting enough calories from granny smith apples to get fat is not feasible. On the other hand, you might have a shot if you developed a hankering for honeycrisps. More sugar, less fiber, way less protein.
Incidentally green apples are the only ones I still enjoy either raw or cooked, because they aren’t sickeningly sweet, and they store decently so they are on hand when I want one.
> Incidentally green apples are the only ones I still enjoy either raw or cooked, because they aren’t sickeningly sweet, and they store decently so they are on hand when I want one.
Color has little bearing on nutrition, but I assume you mean "granny smiths" here which renders your comment understandable.
> But as a practical matter, getting enough calories from granny smith apples to get fat is not feasible.
Sure, that's exactly what Big Apple wants you to believe.
> On the other hand, you might have a shot if you developed a hankering for honeycrisps. More sugar, less fiber, way less protein.
This seems equally ridiculous to me—who wants to eat more than two honeycrisps in a sitting? And that's seriously pushing it, especially compared to basically any other sugary food (including, say, juice and rice). At least use "apple pie" to make this believable.
Yes, the industry sweetens everything and removes bitterness. Organic grapefruits however are significantly more bitter – especially to modern tastebuds – than regular ones sold in the supermarket. Getting used to high-quality organic fruits and vegetables can be quite a culinary journey.
Varieties of fruit are created through thousand year old techniques and won't be limited by an organic label. Humans are getting way too good at it, though. :-)
Obviously ask your doctor, but it would be more accurate to say that it interferes with most medication, with just a few that it does not.
Grapefruit knocks out key metabolizing agents in the gut that is responsible for breaking down a lot of organic molecules. For this reason, the vast majority of medications are given out in relatively large dosages in order to survive the intestines and get to the bloodstream. But if you eat grapefruit, you get that full dosage in your blood.
For some medication that doesn’t matter. Usually for prescription meds that is the exception. For most prescription meds, getting 5X the blood dose can range from debilitating to lethal.
If you take a daily pill, imagine what might happen if you swallowed a week’s worth at once. If that gives you pause, don’t mix with grapefruit.
I'm not that far gone, but I am very selective about when I buy ice cream, because my fat ass will just eat it all within 2-3 days. Cannot have it around regularly.
Some people are just wired differently. I can buy a box of cookies or pint of ice cream and eat a little bit and be completely happy. My wife otoh, eats all of it. We talk about it and she can't understand how I can have a single cookie and be happy. I would feel sick if I ate the whole box.
Incidentally, this is how I am with alcohol (Drinking a single beer or two makes my unhappy. I'm ok with not drinking, but when I start I usually drink a lot). I don't have this problem with sweets, though.
For me, sugar is the worst drug. Like, actually the only drug that is hard to not binge on and/or get off of. I must be 100% off of it for a few weeks and then I'm good, I don't crave or think about it. But if I take one row of chocolate or piece of cake, my brain will find ways to binge on a loooot more in the next period.
Yeah I have to keep sweets as a treat that requires me to go out for. I don't keep any sweets, including ice cream, inside the house. The temptation is too strong.
I wonder if this is due to the effects of eating this as a child or if eating that was as a child built in habits and it's the long term effects of eating this way that had an impact.
For example, if someone at a lot of candy as a kid but stopped as an adult, how do their odds look?
Can’t Type 2 diabetes be reversed with a change in diet? That’s at least possible. I’d also think someone who avoids sugar as an adult would be at a far lower risk. It might be good to start avoiding sugar at any time regardless of past habits.
"What predicts drug-free type 2 diabetes remission? Insights from an 8-year general practice service evaluation of a lower carbohydrate diet with weight loss "
"Methods Advice on a lower carbohydrate diet and weight loss was offered routinely to people with T2D between 2013 and 2021, in a suburban practice with 9800 patients. (...)"
"Results (...) Remission of diabetes was achieved in 77% with T2D duration less than 1 year, falling to 20% for duration greater than 15 years. Overall, remission was achieved in 51% of the cohort. (...)"
Anyone know what they mean by a lower carbohydrate diet? Maybe I just missed it but I couldn't find any details on that in the paper.
Americans tend to take things to extreme, so if you tell an American diabetic that a low carb diet might put them in remission there is a good chance they will take that to mean no carbs or very low carbs that is a lot of work to follow. Most won't be able to stick to it.
My personal anecdote is that my T2D went into remission when I changed my diet so that less than 40% of my calories came from carbs. I didn't actually try to lower the amount of carbs, just what percent of calories came from carbs.
If calories stayed the same that would also lower the amount, but I didn't actually try to keep calories the same. For example if I wanted a sandwich that would have been 50% calories from carbs they way I would have ordered it before, I would order it with double meat or with regular mayo instead of light mayo. Those changes would increase the calories without changing the amount of carbs, which would lower the percentage of calories from carbs.
It turned out with the percentage of carbs lowered the food seemed to satisfy me more, and so I ended up naturally snacking less or eating smaller portions. The result of that was that I did end up reducing calories and so my carb amount, not just my carb percentage, did go down.
That was 9 years and I've had no trouble keeping to the 40% of calories from carbs goal ever since.
BTW, the reason I picked 40% is that it is trivial to calculate from the information on the nutrition label. Take the calories on the nutrition label and multiply by 1/10 g carb/calorie and that is the number of grams of carbs that would result in 40% of the calories coming from carbs.
For example a couple days ago I had a sausage/egg/cheese/english muffin breakfast sandwich that was 380 calories, 24 g carbs, and a bowl of cereal that (with milk) was 350 calories, 51 g of carb.
So for that breakfast sandwich the 40% point would be 38 g of carbs. It only had 24 g so was under by 14 g. The milk and cereal at 51 g was over its 35 g 40% point by 16 g. That means overall my breakfast was over the 40% point by 2 g. It's easy to keep a running total throughout the day of how many grams of carbs I'm over or under and make adjustments on later meals if I need to bring it down a bit.
20% calories from carbs would be almost as easy if it turns out 40% is too high to work for someone. Just divide calories by 20 instead of 10, or divide by 10 and then divide by 2.
I've heard the people behind Mastering Diabetes [1] talk about diabetes in general. The authors of the book are diabetics with advanced degrees they put into this topic.
I've known diabetics who changed their diet and no longer had type 2 diabetes after awhile. They did this from a medical program designed to treat it.
This was fascinating to learn about ways of handling diabetes that was more than drugs.
Because healthcare and health insurance isn't about creating more health and reducing sickness. Remember, we instantiated a healthcare system and industry in an environment and structure which rewards investment, capital growth, and rent-seeking. It's the same conflict of interest dating apps have with their customers. Remember, you are on a human farm and all of this is a system of getting you to do something to get satisfaction or survive, and that your EV is [even just a little] negative so that the aggregate of your life actions, and the aggregate of all your neighbors' life actions, generally produces a positive EV for the administrative class (cream to skim).
The healthcare system can easily settle to a local Nash that increases revenue at the expense of our original goals.
65 comments
[ 4.1 ms ] story [ 112 ms ] thread> The researchers found that the people conceived during the sugar limitations had a 35% lower risk of diabetes and a 20% lower risk of high blood pressure than people conceived after the rationing.
Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.
Turns out it wasn’t just about grit.
In war, scarcity and changes in spending priorities mean the economics changes and we don't get as much money in the sunlight->sugar->human fat chain, so we make less human fat.
I don't think this is a good idea, but I do think it is what we are doing.
But really my philosophy of it is not the important thing here, I offer it merely because, respectfully, I don't agree with your framing.
Crazy idea I know!, but it just might be crazy enough to work!.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinsulinemia
Good journalism is hard.
Strongly disagree. Metabolic-syndrome diabetes is so different from autoimmune diabetes that it should really have a different name.
...and doesn't clarify that the study has absolutely nothing to do with alzheimer's / is only talking about blunt force trauma-induced damage
The dietitians I trust document their dietary advice week after week by curing various ailments and diseases through scientific treatments (and they never recommend specific products): https://www.ndr.de/fernsehen/sendungen/die-ernaehrungsdocs/r...
Another one is brussels sprouts. They used to be a lot more bitter, but that has been largely bred out. It has made them way more popular, but part of me wishes it had not changed.
I wonder what they will come up with after cavendish fails?
Is there any food that won't make you fat if you overeat them? Generally "overeating" is what makes you fat.
But as a practical matter, getting enough calories from granny smith apples to get fat is not feasible. On the other hand, you might have a shot if you developed a hankering for honeycrisps. More sugar, less fiber, way less protein.
Color has little bearing on nutrition, but I assume you mean "granny smiths" here which renders your comment understandable.
Sure, that's exactly what Big Apple wants you to believe.
> On the other hand, you might have a shot if you developed a hankering for honeycrisps. More sugar, less fiber, way less protein.
This seems equally ridiculous to me—who wants to eat more than two honeycrisps in a sitting? And that's seriously pushing it, especially compared to basically any other sugary food (including, say, juice and rice). At least use "apple pie" to make this believable.
Grapefruit knocks out key metabolizing agents in the gut that is responsible for breaking down a lot of organic molecules. For this reason, the vast majority of medications are given out in relatively large dosages in order to survive the intestines and get to the bloodstream. But if you eat grapefruit, you get that full dosage in your blood.
For some medication that doesn’t matter. Usually for prescription meds that is the exception. For most prescription meds, getting 5X the blood dose can range from debilitating to lethal.
If you take a daily pill, imagine what might happen if you swallowed a week’s worth at once. If that gives you pause, don’t mix with grapefruit.
Sweetness is more rewarding for rats than cocaine. [1]
[2] https://www.addictionhelp.com/sugar/withdrawal-symptoms/
In humans, sugar withdrawal symptoms are comparable to those of opiods withdrawal, often lasting much (up to 10 times) longer.
For example, if someone at a lot of candy as a kid but stopped as an adult, how do their odds look?
https://nutrition.bmj.com/content/early/2023/01/02/bmjnph-20...
"What predicts drug-free type 2 diabetes remission? Insights from an 8-year general practice service evaluation of a lower carbohydrate diet with weight loss "
"Methods Advice on a lower carbohydrate diet and weight loss was offered routinely to people with T2D between 2013 and 2021, in a suburban practice with 9800 patients. (...)"
"Results (...) Remission of diabetes was achieved in 77% with T2D duration less than 1 year, falling to 20% for duration greater than 15 years. Overall, remission was achieved in 51% of the cohort. (...)"
Note: most read paper in BMJ history according to https://bmj.altmetric.com/details/140757393
Americans tend to take things to extreme, so if you tell an American diabetic that a low carb diet might put them in remission there is a good chance they will take that to mean no carbs or very low carbs that is a lot of work to follow. Most won't be able to stick to it.
My personal anecdote is that my T2D went into remission when I changed my diet so that less than 40% of my calories came from carbs. I didn't actually try to lower the amount of carbs, just what percent of calories came from carbs.
If calories stayed the same that would also lower the amount, but I didn't actually try to keep calories the same. For example if I wanted a sandwich that would have been 50% calories from carbs they way I would have ordered it before, I would order it with double meat or with regular mayo instead of light mayo. Those changes would increase the calories without changing the amount of carbs, which would lower the percentage of calories from carbs.
It turned out with the percentage of carbs lowered the food seemed to satisfy me more, and so I ended up naturally snacking less or eating smaller portions. The result of that was that I did end up reducing calories and so my carb amount, not just my carb percentage, did go down.
That was 9 years and I've had no trouble keeping to the 40% of calories from carbs goal ever since.
BTW, the reason I picked 40% is that it is trivial to calculate from the information on the nutrition label. Take the calories on the nutrition label and multiply by 1/10 g carb/calorie and that is the number of grams of carbs that would result in 40% of the calories coming from carbs.
For example a couple days ago I had a sausage/egg/cheese/english muffin breakfast sandwich that was 380 calories, 24 g carbs, and a bowl of cereal that (with milk) was 350 calories, 51 g of carb.
So for that breakfast sandwich the 40% point would be 38 g of carbs. It only had 24 g so was under by 14 g. The milk and cereal at 51 g was over its 35 g 40% point by 16 g. That means overall my breakfast was over the 40% point by 2 g. It's easy to keep a running total throughout the day of how many grams of carbs I'm over or under and make adjustments on later meals if I need to bring it down a bit.
20% calories from carbs would be almost as easy if it turns out 40% is too high to work for someone. Just divide calories by 20 instead of 10, or divide by 10 and then divide by 2.
I've known diabetics who changed their diet and no longer had type 2 diabetes after awhile. They did this from a medical program designed to treat it.
This was fascinating to learn about ways of handling diabetes that was more than drugs.
[1] https://www.masteringdiabetes.org/book/
What is "lactating people"?
Which is weird, because once you get diabetes, the cost is even more than the cost of GLP-1 as a preventative measure.
The healthcare system can easily settle to a local Nash that increases revenue at the expense of our original goals.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle...