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Is a Calorie Just a Calorie?
Many of us agree that experts generally cause more trouble than they are worth. The views they espouse often have more to do with ideology than with the subject matter about which they are expert. At the same time their expert status, often being based on some species of “science,” gives them a form of immunity to criticism, and immediately identifies their critics as Neanderthals (or worse, conservatives). Sooner or later, however, though it is often very much later, experts who base their views on ideology are defeated by actual facts, and if they are not entirely routed they will at least have to fall back into a more rearward trench.
The Progressive experts who in the 1970s foisted upon Americans the new dogma that low-fat diets are the means to prevent heart disease and cancer have been driven for a decade from their forward positions, and back into less substantial breastworks. As I pointed out in an earlier post, the latest rationale our dietary experts offer for insisting we continue avoiding at least saturated fat (if not all fat) is to fight global warming. (You may think this is not a very defensible position to be fighting from, but it is not as astounding as it first may seem, global warming being ultimately responsible for all of mankind’s ills.)
I would now like to point out another aspect of our dietary experts’ battle against dietary fat which you may not think can possibly have an ideological aspect, but which nonetheless does: The idea that a calorie is just a calorie.
A calorie is just a calorie, and whether we gain or lose weight is simply determined by the number of calories we eat compared to the number we burn off. So if we want to lose weight all we need is our Fitbit or Apple Watch to track calories in and out, and a bit of willpower.
Our national dietary experts (and not coincidentally, companies like the ones that make Fitbits and Apple Watches) very much like the idea that a calorie is a calorie. This idea has two virtues. First, it is true. Net calories, when you account for caloric intake, metabolism and exercise, determines whether we burn or store fat.
Second, it supports the idea of low-fat diets. Since fat contains 9 calories per gram compared to 4 calories per gram for carbs and protein, it is obvious that to maintain a healthy weight we should avoid fat. This rationale, in fact, was the original fall-back position of the McGovern Dietary Panel in 1977 when it was pointed out to them that there really wasn’t any evidence that a strict low-fat diet would improve cardiovascular outcomes. Well, the panel decided, while we’re proving we’re right about heart disease at least people will stop gaining weight by cutting back on fat.
To reiterate, the “all calories are alike” position is as follows: All we have to do to maintain a good weight is assure that, on average, we are taking in no more calories than we burn. Calories in, minus calories out, equals calories stored or lost. It’s a simple equation, simple thermodynamics. And this simple fact dictates that fat, with its high caloric density, should be avoided. Case closed.
But here’s the thing. While a calorie is indeed a calorie when it comes to how much energy you get when it’s burned, the form in which we take in our calories still makes a big difference in the outcome of that simple equation.
Human physiology interposes itself on straightforward thermodynamics. We might even consider that a chief characteristic of life itself is to rearrange straightforward thermodynamics (in particular, by reducing local entropy). So we are not simply absorbing the fat, protein and carbs we eat, burning what we must and storing the rest. Our bodies treat the food we eat not simply as a source of energy, but also as a source of information about our environment. And thus, our physiology changes and adjusts according to what we are putting into our mouths. These changes, again caused by what kind of food we’re eating, have a significant impact on how much fat we store, and how much we end up weighing.
Here are just a few examples:
- It costs more energy to digest protein than fat or carbs – this is the thermal effect of metabolism – so protein yields fewer usable calories per gram.
- Foods with a high glycemic index (generally, simple carbs) cause a large spike-and-drop in insulin levels. The insulin spike assures that lots of calories get stored as fat. The subsequent precipitous drop in insulin causes ravenous hunger a couple of hours after a high-carb meal. So we eat a bag of Oreos, and repeat the entire cycle.
- Some foods cause satiety much more than others. It is much easier to consume lots of calories by eating cookies, donuts and chips than it is by eating lots of eggs, meats, beans, and whole fruit.
- Eating protein suppresses the appetite (over and above any effect on immediate satiety). This is probably why people on low-carb diets often end up eating fewer calories without really trying to.
- Eating fructose (even as opposed to glucose) tends to stimulate the appetite, possibly by stimulating the hunger hormone ghrelin.
These illustrations make it clear that, while net calories indeed equals what we take in minus what we burn, what kind of food we choose to eat effects this simple equation in far more ways than merely the calorie count contained in that food. Food is data, and our bodies adjust to the data we give it by suppressing or stimulating our appetite, adjusting food absorption, and altering our metabolism.
Our national food experts have fought this idea because it implies that (and indeed helps explain why) a low-fat, high-carb diet is not good for us, and leads to obesity and heart disease – the opposite of what they have promised. “A calorie is just a calorie” on the other hand indicts fat, and justifies the increasingly bankrupt position that we should avoid it at all costs.
Who would have thought that “a calorie is a calorie” is just another Progressive slogan?
Published in Science & Technology
Worthy!
If “moar bacon!” is what I was supposed to get from that, then well done. Otherwise, I’ll need to read it again and adjust my hopes.
Thanks for the great post!
I recently read Good Calorie, Bad Calorie and Why We Get Fat and What to do About it by Gary Taubes and it was life changing. (You can also find a few of his talks on YouTube if you’re not interested in reading the books.) My husband and I have given up breads, pasta, grains, and sugar. (Although we do allow ourselves the occasional treat.)
We had done Atkins in the past, and allowed ourselves to feel guilty about submitting to a fad diet. The science as explained by Taubes shifted the entire paradigm of how we viewed nutrition.
It is, in fact, what you’re supposed to get from that. The only thing I’d add is to ensure your bacon is uncured. Apart from that, bacon is high-fat and moderate protein. Exactly what the (modern, correct, non-bought-and-paid-for-government-carb-lobby) doctor ordered.
Cultural side note: I used to seriously wonder how my fatty-red-meat-eating German-American relatives didn’t drop like flies over many generations before we “knew” how bad red meat, fat, cholesterol, etc. were for you. I don’t wonder anymore.
Concur on the different calories generate different effects motif.
I would submit, too, that different people will process various types of calories differently. So there is no straight up “right” diet for all individuals. Instead, it’s an individual responsibility to figure out where on the dietary bell-curve one plots.
Hand-in-hand with the blinkered dietary guidance is the Body Mass Index, which in my humble opinion is just as great a canard. I take it a little personally–though I know I shouldn’t–because I rate as morbidly obese under the BMI protocols.
Kiss my…grits.
Yes, Taubes is very good and he deserves a lot of credit for bringing the low-fat scam to light. Also excellent is The Big Fat Surprise – why butter, meat and cheese belong in a healthy diet, published last year by Nina Teicholz. She nicely describes, among other things, the intransigence of the expert class when faced with contradictory truths.
Don’t forget to consume some eggs and whole-fat milk with your uncured bacon. Even the vaunted dietary experts are now OK with eggs, and they mutter about saturated fats in dairy possibly being good for us. (Leaving aside, of course, the global warming aspect of animal products.)
Yes, the BMI is quite problematical. It can be somewhat useful for estimating the risk levels for a large population, but quite inaccurate for many specific individuals. A person’s calculated BMI is far more often too high rather than too low.
You may have heard that last week the CDC publicized a new risk calculator that purports to tell us our “heart age,” and with it produced a paper saying that on average Americans’ hearts are much older than their physiological age.
Aside from the bogus and arbitrary nature of any supposed heart age calculator, they managed to base this one on a risk calculator that relies largely on BMI, which will (in my opinion) tend to yield higher risk estimates – and thus, on average, higher “heart ages.” Thus, mission accomplished.
I hear they get paid for doing this stuff. By us.
A Simple observation in support…
Only certain bio-chemical options are on the table when consuming carbs.
Only certain bio-chemical options are on the table when consuming proteins.
Only certain bio-chemical options are on the table when consuming fats.
I’ve been saying for years that there’s no great secret (and certainly no “get rich quick” schemes): a balanced diet, moderate sized meals, and exercise will serve people pretty well.
Now if only I’d start taking my own advice……
This video by Peter Attia was particularly helpful to me a few years ago.
No, calories aren’t a useful measurement for food. Calories measure heat, not how much fat your body will store based on a particular food intake, which is overwhelmingly determined by your hormones.
I struggled for years with weight. Weight loss was difficult even with rigorous dieting and exercise.
Basically it all boils down to the fact that eating fat does not make you fat, and there was never any good reason to suspect that it did.
Luke,
Thanks for this fun video. It makes an important point that, I think, is nearly universal but often misunderstood.
Namely, whenever the Central Authority endorses any side of any scientific question and renders policy based on that endorsement – whether it’s low fat diets, the benefits of trans fats, the need for a universal low-salt diet, the idea that the universe is geocentric (here, of course, there was a different Central Authority), or the truth of global warming – not only are we reasonably likely to get the wrong answer, but also (thanks to the Central Authority’s ability to mete out great rewards and severe punishments, and thus determine who the experts will be) it becomes nearly impossible to figure out what the right answer really is.
So the definition of settled science is: the Central Authority has adopted it. And anyone who says otherwise is no expert; he/she is a heretic and deserves the heretic’s fate.
Great explanation. I have two comments:
1: You are going to get a visit by the PC gestapo if you don’t stop using the term “global warming.” The correct term is “climate change.” This is very, very important, because people might start to question “global warming” if the globe doesn’t warm for 10-15 years. On the other hand, what could ever undermine a belief in “climate change”?
2. You write: “Human physiology interposes itself on straightforward thermodynamics.” What a fantastic sentence. Seven words that explain not just nutrition, but all of human history.
The beauty of St. Peter’s and the Taj Mahal? “Human physiology interposes itself on straightforward thermodynamics.”
Neil Armstrong standing on the moon? “Human physiology interposes itself on straightforward thermodynamics.”
Indeed, good sir.
edit:
[On the McGovern Report… the mere title already makes me chuckle…
I did watch a video of the entire event of which mere clips are included in.
They go around the table to each expert and highly regarded scientist; all of whom say that we do not have enough information to make any conclusions, or offer any official advice.
And, having gone ’round the table McGovern speaks last, and says little more than: Well, We’re doin’ it anyway! ]
Or, as the saying goes, “isocaloric does not equal isometabolic.”
Ian Spreadbury prefers the term “acellular carbohydrates” and links them to localized dysbiosis, inflammation, and obesity:
Calories in vs out is the major determinant of weight loss. But most people desire fat loss rather than just weight loss. You don’t want lose valuable muscle mass. So the dietary quality and exercise regimen will help push your weight loss towards fat loss.
So is there a correlation between the low fat diet scam and the climate change scam?
First time anyone ever accused me of being terse.
In this post I have tried to steer clear of making overt political statements. But since you bring it up, endorsing the candidacy of Men of Action, candidates who might be inclined to make momentous decisions with long-lasting ramifications, based merely on deeply held (for the moment, at least) gut feelings, might not always be the way to go.
Here’s [my favorite] part of Ricochet…
While I happen to be on the other side of that fence(for the moment, at least)… I like the cut of your jib, on that. Well put.
Luke,
I appreciate that. For the record I may be softening on the Man of Action a little bit. Watching the impotence of the Republican Congress is what’s doing it.
no
some calories stimulate fat accumulation, others do not
This makes me happy. I’ve been doing it right all along . . . .
The only problem is, it’s hard to find the whole milk any more in the grocery store. You have to weed your way through the soy milk, the coconut milk, the rice milk, the almond milk, the low, and the no, fat versions of all of these, and then when you find the actual MILK milk, you have to sort out the fat-free, the 1%, the 2%, the fortified with who-knows-what milk, and finally, on your hands and knees, at the bottom of the rack (at least, in my grocery store), you MAY find a few bottles or cartons of relatively unadulterated whole milk.
I think I’m going to buy a cow.
One tends to see that…a lot…everywhere…
Our children were raised on unpasteurized raw milk during the ’70s in California, before the “experts” more or less shut down Altadena Dairies. The certified herds were maintained to much higher standards than the competition. Eventually the politicians won out and that was the end of raw milk.
Our kids were extremely healthy.
I think lots of the contradictory information resolves itself when one considers what the animal products that we consume were themselves fed. Corn-fed beef has a ratio of omega 6 to omega 3 fatty acids of more than 10:1. It is believed that a ratio of not more than 4:1 is a healthy ratio. Grass fed beef has a ratio under 4:1. This goes a long way toward explaining the ‘French Paradox’. Even farm raised fish and chicken… Raised on corn and corn based products …can have ratios in excess of 10:1.
So its not just what you eat, but what you eat, ate.
You forgot goat milk, which is what my wife uses. The stuff is really expensive, although it is whole milk. And goat milk is naturally homogenized.
Yeah, if I could figure out a way to hide a couple of forbidden dairy goats in my backyard (subdivision restrictions), I’d be all over it.
I’d go easy on the milk because it is quite carby, but I find a few ounces of 2% milk to be a good choice because it provides a daily shot of vitamin A, which is virtually impossible to get any other way (whole milk isn’t fortified). A balanced meal of cheddar melted over three eggs and bacon is a great way to start the day.
Thanks for the excellent OP presentation and smack down of our federal health overseers.
Excellent column!
and this is my favorite sentence: