Agreed. In the past I’ve noted that corn eaten at dinner time tends to end up floating in the commode in about 14 hours. To be honest, I’m not a fan of The Mayo Clinic. More than once I’ve read dietary fat and salt shaming advice that they either published or endorsed.
Totally agree with you.
Yep, I was blown away by how profound the effect is on I/G ratio when (SAD) carbs are eaten in conjunction with protein. It was 20 times higher than when eating LCHF.
I really don’t think it’s as simple as that, Paul. Masterjohn does go into it. INTO it. 
Here too I’d say it’s not as simple as that. People have also not gotten fat in that condition (even on diets that we would consider stratospherically high in carbohydrates), and even when we add in a calorically adequate diet. The common example (as with Dr. Fung) is people eating fewer meals, perhaps even primarily just one big meal per day, tending not to snack or be ‘constantly grazing.’
Well, if the energy balance is positive, then it certainly fits with what I’ve been saying, and with what Chris Masterjohn, Roy Taylor and many others say. If it’s not - and this would be the case with isocaloric diets or the calorically inadequate one you mentioned - then it’s going to be much harder to get into the vicious cycles of increasing insulin and insulin resistance. I’m not saying it never happens - I wonder how often it does.
I would strongly dispute that one. We can never get away from the energy balance. Not that that’s all to consider - later on, when and if insulin resistance is a fact, then the differing glycemic indices of food play more of a part. But earlier - regardless of our ‘macros’ - if we don’t increase liver fat, liver insulin resistance (which I think comes earlier than IR in muscle tissue, for example), if we keep the liver homestatic as in going both ways with storing glucose and bringing it back out in equal measures, rather than mostly storing it (as happens with positive energy balance), then from what I’ve seen increasing average blood sugar and insulin levels and resistance are usually not the problems.
Some of this is from Chris Masterjohn. Some is from Roy Taylor.
75 minute video, a long one - I know, but that’s one of the first places I remember seeing stuff along these lines.
A shorter one - Dr. Taylor starts his explanation of the sequence of things at 1:55.
I’d say that’s probably the beginning of it, as with most of us. Exceptions would be genetic insulin resistance - enough of it and the vicious cycle would begin on its own. Later on, when hormonal regulation is screwed up, then I think things are more generally as you say, Paul - things are tipped toward fat-storage, more hunger, etc.
But prof Taylor and his 800 cals a day Newcastle Diet likes to get people into ketosis… (His method is starvation rather than carb cutting) They measured for ketones during his trial.
After 12 months he’d got 46% of the participants T2 reversed and recently announced that after 24 months it was down to 36%.
So losing a lot of weight through starvation to get into ketosis isn’t especially sustainable (no shit sherlock!).
I say I IF, and I usually have an eating window of anywhere from 1 hour to 4 hours per day, with random occasions of 5-6 hour eating windows. But the time varies day to day. Sometimes I only fast 20 hours. Sometimes, I fast for 26 hours (I’ve not yet done an extended fast… I"m working on it, but admittedly, I’m a little hesitant at this point).
Would what I do technically be IF or TME?
Mark, for sure - and I’ve always looked askance at that approach, if only because it’s a perfect example of “calorie restriction.” I do think he got surprisngly good results - especially in the shorter term. Longer term, it gets more unsustainable, and people going back toware their previous way of eating would tend toward their previous bad state without it being surprising.
I brought Taylor up because he posits that it’s positive energy balance that kicks it all off - and we were looking for a ‘first cause’ - high insulin or insulin resistance, etc. Then there’s Chris Masterjohn, who makes a pretty good case for us storing fat - but only under certain conditions, not just “high insulin.”
I like Taylor’s explanation - that it often takes a long time (a common experience) and that it’s things working hand-in-hand as far as bad cycles, like increasing insulin resistance meaning higher insulin levels.
And obviously it would work the other way too - higher insulin making for more insulin resistance; the way the body develops tolerances and gets diminishing returns from things, often. Whatever the exact sequence is for a given person, I’d say that comparatively very soon it’s bad things reinforcing each other.
This whole 800 calorie thing is a bad concept (edited out some other descriptive words).
A 4 foot 10 inch slightly overweight female might see this as a moderate calorie reduction or maintenance.
A 6 foot 6 inch overweight male would provoke starvation in the body.
Sorry, can’t pick a calorie level.
“Positive energy balance” is just the new way of saying CICO… and is still as stupid as CICO ever was…
I disagree Mark. We never get away from the energy balance. The thing that doesn’t work well as far as calorie-cutting as a weight-loss strategy is that people have a lot of trouble keeping to that - because of lack of satiation, metabolic slowdown etc. Those things don’t mean the thesis is wrong, however - heck, it has to be correct, i.e. there isn’t any true ‘magic’ or voodoo at work, and everything ends up being accounted for, among metabolism, storage and excretion.
Chris Masterjohn is fairly new to me, but I think he makes a lot of good points, in with the massive amount of data and concepts he presents.
Robert, I agree - at least relative to some other things. The ‘Fast-Mimicking Diet’ is much the same - I’d say that outright fasting or hardcore ketogenic eating is preferable, depending on what one is after.
I do wish we had a good idea of how long it takes metabolism to decline on calorie restriction…
And you are very welcome to… however it also doesn’t mean you are right. or that “CICO” or the “energy balance” theory is right either. Until you are in control of your hormonal responses to food - satiety, hunger etc then you won’t be in a position to lose weight. It’s all very well for Ted Naiman to say that 1000 cals of doughnuts will have the same effect on the body as 1000 cals of steak but as anyone who has eaten both will tell you your body reacts very differently. So in purely mathematical terms the calories (which are of course a simple measure of energy and tell us absolutely zilch about how the body will put them to use) theory may be correct (although I still remain to be convinced) but in terms of whether you can possibly only eat 1000 cals of doughnuts before getting ravenous in 2 hours or eat the steak and feel satiated all day will have an enormous impact on what you may or may not eat for the rest of the day.
This is where the pure mathematical theory falls apart and those who adhere to it become ridiculous.
I am sure it is different for different people but I’ve heard a doctor’s podcast where 3 months was mentioned as a good timeframe but, when patients got over zealous and kept themselves on a low calorie diet for 6 months - they ran into trouble. Dr. Fung mentions 6 months as the usual “bounce” point on a calorie restricted diet.
I think that alternating fat calories on a weekly basis might be better (especially to avoid the metabolic slowdown problem). After being well into Keto / fat-adaptation, fast or drop fat calories a lot for part of the week to burn some of your body fat. Then, back to Keto. Don’t abuse the mechanism and get the pound-of-fat-off-per-week rate that is more likely to have long term success (without a bounce).
Robert, from what I’ve seen, by 5 or 6 months slowing metabolism should be expected. The experience of ‘Biggest Loser’ contestants, and the guys in Ancel Keys’ Minnesota Starvation Experiment demonstrate that. If Fung is in line, all the more evidence.
3 months sounds good to me - I wondered if it was even as long as that. Beyond a couple weeks I suspected a minefield might be lurking. Now we have @Don_Q Nick’s friend who goes down as much as 400 calories when fasting, versus eating, and that’s certainly in opposition to any blanket pronoucement of increased metabolism after 4 days of fasting.
I am conservative and like the weekly approach but, if you want to do something longer term and think 3 months is okay - I’d still stick with 2.
My logic would be that I don’t want have the metabolic slowdown problem so, even if I thought 3 was “safe”, 2 would avoid even the beginnings of that trend.
And, I would even cut is shorter if I felt bad trying to keep up with a moderate exercise plan.
(This applies to calorie restriction - fasting is a different game.)
Mark, I think there are different cases. I’m looking for stuff that is always true, or things that are qualified properly so as to be true as stated. Railing against “CICO,” etc., is to be already assuming facts not in evidence, as well as to be denying some science.
“Not believing in calories” may be reflective of many people’s experience. But there is still no ‘magic’ going on. We’re 96+% made of Carbon and 3 of its buddies, and when we speak of weight loss or gain, it’s all right there.
I am not at all saying that 1000 calories of this will always have the same effect as 1000 calories of that - of course not. From just a couple days ago, in this very thread:
In the case of somebody who already wants to lose weight/fat, then very often I would agree with what you quoted above - it’s insane to rely on caloric monitoring (I take this to mean restriction), and eating multiple meals (as opposed to fewer). We know that this has an extremely poor track record - no argument there.
This is one case - where hormonal disruption is already present. There are other cases where the doughnuts and the steak have the same effect, or close enough to not matter - witness the people who stay the same weight pretty much no matter what they do and eat, for their whole lives.
For many of us - agreed. No argument there. When we narrow it down to people who are interested in ketogenic eating because of issues with their bodies, then I’d say the difference between the doughnuts and the steak will be overwhelmingly present and meaningful.
For many others, it’s not going to be that way, at least to a point in their lives. Until I was 28 or so, it didn’t seem to matter much at all, if any, and @CarlKeller Carl made it into his 40s before he started gaining weight.
Not to say that hormonal disruption hadn’t started before that - I’d assume that in both our cases it did. Carl mentioned the average person asking, “Why am I fat?” There are different cases there. We were talking about the origin of things, high insulin versus insulin resistance, etc. At the very least I would say this is not settled concretely, especially when we consider people as a whole.
I think that Drs. Tayor and Masterjohn make a very good case that it is simply a positive energy balance that often sets us out on the path to obesity, hormonal disruption, etc.
How do you see that the mathematics can actually be “wrong”? If there is ridiculousness here, it’s in the failure to realize that there are different cases. The science and mathematics are saying, “This is happening” - be it weight gain, loss, or no change. To make the vast leap to “CICO is stupid for weight loss” does not necessarily follow.
Again, I’m not debating that caloric restriction is necessarily a good thing for weight loss in all cases - of course it is not. Yet even in the cases where it is not, it’s not because “CICO is wrong, worthless, ridiculous,” etc., it’s because people can’t maintain a negative energy balance.
So stop talking about a measure of energy when you really are referring to food? A steak is a steak & bread is bread… one satiates the other creates hunger… calories are irrelevant so why can’t we just stop mentioning them at all.
Because it’s simple… food/appetite is nothing to do with maths… absolutely nothing.
I think this is correct for a fat-adapted long-maintaining Ketoer that truly understand the underlying concepts and has great satiety signaling.
But, that is not what rolls into the newbie section nor is it likely to be the people here asking questions - many are months or years away from that situation.
People that casually read these pages can end up downing butter coffees, fat bombs, whiskey, dark chocolate etc. at the beginning of a planned 100+ pound weight loss. Others fall back to calorie restriction mode while eating from a Keto foods list and are likely going to bounce.
So, in the real world, people need to use Keto calculators or ask questions on the forum and supply their eating details when they are losing too fast or not at all or gaining. A common part of this language needs to be calories. Eating too many hyper-palatable Keto snacks or calorie restriction issues are hard to uncover if we only discuss “eat fat to satiety” or just focus on macro percentages.
Mark, this is one case - where the difference in satiation makes a difference. That’s not always the situation. Calories are never irrelevant - even when hormonal disruption is a fact, and we have energy going into fat storage rather than being consumed by the metabolism, resulting in weight gain, it’s still a matter of the energy balance, there with calories/atoms/molecules being stored rather than ‘burned.’
Moreover and again - from what some doctors and researchers say, it’s at least worth looking at positive energy balance as the thing that starts many people on the path to obesity, etc. And later on - regardless of the exact individual case, this is the most basic explanation of why the fat gain is occurring.
That’s not true at all - food is mostly protein, fat, or carbohydrates, and the math is there all the time, unchanging and settled to a degree greater than almost anything else we’ve been talking about. Any individual appetite phenomenon doesn’t affect that at all.
Mark 
During a fast read-through, I didn’t see anything I really disagreed with, except for the tangential approach which doesn’t really take on the reality of energy balance. Putting “calorie” and myth" in the title is over-the-top, IMO, but he does qualify things by saying his usage of ‘myth’ doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not true."
More later. 
