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Comment by jdavis703 | Hacker News Reader

Sugar is not the primary problem. I eat copious amounts of sugar (probably too much). This ranges from refined sugar in sweets, lots of fruits, juices and even soda. I've been vegetarian for over a decade now, and my BMI Is 23.5, my body fat percentage is 14.5% and my blood sugar level is still considered in the good range for preventing diabetes. I don't think the problem is sugar, the problem is living a sedentary life style, and perhaps even eating lots of processed red meats.

My point being, a war on sugar is the wrong way to battle the obesity crisis. Get people to eat more fruits and veggies and to spend more active time outdoors.

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My dad smoked for 50 years until quitting in his 70's. Now, at age.80, he's still healthy as a horse. However, I wouldn't draw a conclusion from an anecdotal data point and say cigarettes aren't a health hazard.

Now I'm curious, why did he quit? Smoking regular cigarettes with foam-filters kills me fast, but smoking organically grown tobacco without additives and filters doesn't seem to do much harm from my experience. I'm pretty sure we're not being told the whole truth about tobacco.

He had some type of surgery on his sinuses. He also had high blood pressure showed signs of heart arrhythmia. Nothing out of the ordinary for a person his age.

>but smoking organically grown tobacco without additives and filters doesn't seem to do much harm from my experience.

Get an x-ray or ct scan of your lungs. Or get your VO2max tested. Quit for a month and try testing it again. I assure you, you'll see a difference just from your airways and nasal passages not being inflamed.

I'm pretty sure the radiation would do more harm. I'm not saying it's healthy, I'm just saying it's not the same thing as the crap the research is based on. And I have quit for longer periods without seeing much difference.

Do you know the difference between anecdotes and science?

Here's some science then. Based on analyzing food groups controlled with total calorie consumption, it was found that meat availability is most highly correlated with obesity: https://bmcnutr.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40795-01...

So you are saying that when you eat the same amount of calories, meat is better at getting you fat? How does this debunk the problems with sugar in your view?

Note that it studies meat availability, not meat consumption.

You get more likely fat by looking at meat?

Besides that, I agree that meat is a superior food compared to sugar and it will get you more easily fat, if compared on calorie by calorie base.

But this does not say anything about the addictiveness of sugar or the health problems that come from overconsumption (diabetes, etc).

Will say, most people can control their meat intake (some not), but most can not control how much sugar they consume. Especially if it is omnipresent and hidden in many foods you might not suspect.

  meat... will get you more easily fat if compared on calorie (for) calorie (basis)

I think that's exactly wrong. I can think of no mechanism by which, say, 1000 calories of excess fat+protein would cause more net fat gain than 1000 calories of excess carbohydrate.

How about if one results in you later consuming fewer calories than the other by affecting the production (and reception) of leptin, insulin, and maybe a dozen other hormones?

Yes, that's exactly the point -- meat/fat have much higher satiety than carbohydrate and less effect on insulin.

Please don't post snarky dismissals to Hacker News, regardless of how wrong someone else is or you feel they are.

This sort of comment is pure regression to the mean, which is not what we want HN to be.

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