Are low-carb people close-minded, just like some vegan people seem to be? Are we all caught up in group thinking?
Here’s a great blog post on the subject:
Authority Nutrition: Confessions of a Biased Low-Carb Zealot
I mostly agree with it, but I have a few minor objections:
Calories
Here’s a couple of quotes from the post and my comments:
The energy content of the food we eat, vs. the energy content we expend… this is what determines whether we gain or lose fat (fat = stored energy).
It’s called the first law of thermodynamics and isn’t even debatable.
I think this misses the point. The offending word is “determines”.
Obviously there’s a first law of thermodynamics and it’s just fine. Anyone who disputes it is probably crazy. But this law says nothing about what determines whether we gain or lose weight.
Having a negative or a positive caloric balance are just synonyms to losing or gaining weight. It says nothing about the cause.
Stated differently: A positive caloric balance is not the cause of weight gain. A positive caloric balance is the same thing as weight gain.
More: Why Calorie Counters are Confused
The reason low-carb diets work so well for weight loss is that they reduce appetite and cause an automatic restriction in calories (making calorie counting unnecessary, in many cases).
This is probably the most important factor. But it’s also possible that low-carb diets, under certain conditions, can increase calorie expenditure.
Bias
Apart from my nitpicking above I think this is a great post. We must always question our own thinking because we’re all biased and our minds plays tricks on us.
I’m reading “Thinking, Fast and Slow” at the moment. It’s a fantastic book for anyone who wants to understand why other people make stupid decisions. Sometimes we might even catch ourselves doing it, but that’s a lot harder. Therefore we should listen to others and be open to discussion, to weed out our own mistakes.
What do you think? Are low-carbers close-minded? What’s the biggest mistake that low-carbers do?
