@mstandridgedds great review Matthew.
You may want to review the sentence “What Taubes does do is gives thorough evidence that very few others, even leading experts in the respective fields, have before.” which I don’t think reads well.
I’m glad to learn about the book The Gluten Lie.
Thanks
These health-topic books by journalists like Taubes and Teicholz are setting a new high standard for such works. They have both been criticized, often ruthlessly, for not being doctors but I think it is becomming obvious that it is a strength rather than a weakness.
I am listening to a Joe Rogan show #904 on YouTube and it sounds very much like what you heard. Not very familiar with the interviewer but the program lasts over 2 hours and so far it is very good. Gary Taubes is a great writer and speaker, so much research, so much truth. And so refreshing. I would recommend this interview to everyone.
I’m glad that The Guardian is giving Gary Taubes some recognition at last.
Years ago, I tried to get them interested in “Good Calories, Bad Calories” (“The Diet Delusion” in the UK), but got almost no response. To be fair, one columnist, who seemed to have done something like low-carb off his own bat with some success, did reply in a friendly way, and promised to read the book, but I never heard back. I don’t know if they ever reviewed it, but if they did it must have been done in a low key way, because I didn’t see it, and I was reading the paper every day at the time.
Taubes and Nina do what most doctors won’t: educate themselves on the research into what actually optimizes health.
Taubes also has a good understanding of what constitutes the scientific method, and what does not.
Not earth shattering, but a simple mainstream start.
http://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/2017/03/24/how-to-quit-sugar-for-good.html
I know this is an old thread, and probably none of these people are here, but Gary Taubes had an email today from Substack, but you had to sign up to read all of it.
In the part I could read, he was examining the Japanese and Chinese argument about “but they eat a lot of carbs!” He said his argument was in The Case Against Sugar, where he said sugar was bad due to fructose, whereas the people eating a lot of carbs were eating non-sugar like rice.
Anyone here read that book, and what is his argument?
I have it in my list of things to buy, but I just bought 5 books, one of which is the short-story/novella The Count of Monte Cristo. And I read something like 15-30 minutes a night. Not sure when I can get to The Case Against Sugar.
Ergh. Doesn’t help that he’s sooooooo long winded. I can get this from my library. If I make it through, I’ll let you know.
Edit: the summary position is this: common thought is that to the extent sugar is to blame for chronic disease, it’s because it either supplants nutritious food in the diet which creates malnutrition, or simply adds calories, which creates obesity. Taubes. Lustig et. al. contend that there is something specific about sucrose and hfc metabolism that cause the problems, it’s not a lack of dietary nutrients or overabundance of calories.
That’s as far as I’ve gone, apparently the next 1000 pages 
will illuminate this specific problem and, hopefully, how ingesting sugar is different from ingesting refined non-sugar carbohydrates. I assume I’m in for a repeat lecture on the problematic metabolic path of fructose.
I hear ya!! I think about that a lot. Beat my head against the wall with a whole lot of fantasy health information until 50+ years of age. So much damage done. I often wonder, “what if” for so many things in life. But I know, we can’t go back, only forward. And it’s too late to change some things.
I will say that the beginning of the book is providing a very interesting history of added dietary sugar; pre 1200 it basically didn’t exist for most European people except as a rare treat in honey. I also didn’t know that honeybees didn’t exist in the new world until they were imported by colonists, therefore highly concentrated fructose wasn’t a natural part of the diet for early indigenous peoples of the Americas at all. No biochemistry yet, which is fine by me.
An interesting correlation: the industrial revolution utterly transformed the sugar industry. “By the 1920s sugar manufacturers were producing as much sugar in a day as they could produce in a decade in 1820.” In other words it went from a rare luxury item to a household staple. And perhaps not coincidentally, this is when diabetes was first observed as something beyond the rarest of flukes.
I totally agree — sugar really can sneak into our diets more than we realize, and cutting it out or reducing it makes a noticeable difference in energy and overall health. One thing that’s helped me stay on track is keeping active throughout the day. Even short calisthenics sessions at home make a huge difference for energy levels and focus, and help balance cravings.If anyone’s looking for some easy-to-use gear, the calisthenics equipment set from BetterMe is great: https://store.betterme.world/collections/calisthenics-equipment. It’s perfect for short daily workouts and really supports healthy habits alongside better eating.
Thanks for the input all and especially @kib1.
@Ava_Carter Good question. It’s tough. It’s similar to avoiding PUFAs (polyunsaturated fatty acids) – very difficult, because cheap oils are in pretty much (near) everything that’s packaged. For instance, my store has olives that are in…sunflower oil (high in PUFAs). I used to get certain anchovies until I realized they were packed in sunflower oil.
On the other hand, my intake of sugar is really low. Basically, only in chocolate, and I’ve been using 70% chocolate to make some desserts. Not zero sugar, but low.
But to do that, you have to avoid most/all packaged products (other than chocolate bars). For lunch today, I had beef and ham in a broth I made from beef stock and that came from pressure cooking the beef. I had protein and some other stuff in water. Zero sugar.
Tonight, we’ll have beef strips (can’t remember which beef we bought), and I’ll have those. I’ll have one 4 ounce “cup” of the chocolate dessert, which is made from 70% chocolate. Low added sugar, but not zero.
But you really have to read labels, avoid most/all prepared foods, buy meats, prepare them yourself, etc.
I have a daughter going to college, and I went there to visit. I would have very hard time eating there (though if it’s only “sugar”, pizza doesn’t have much “sugar” in it, but causes terrible blood sugar for me). Everything is carb loaded, though not everything is sugar-loaded. Sandwiches, for instance, have bread and the like, but not that much sugar.
This is where I get confused – Assuming that sugar = evil, how evil are things like pizza, sandwiches in tortillas, sandwiches in bread, oats, etc.? Also those cause me high blood sugar, and I’m freaking starving after eating most of them including oats, but they aren’t “sugar”.
Depends who you ask and how much they care. My added sugar consumption in 2024, including artificial sweeteners, could probably be measured in tablespoons. I admit, in 2025 more like … Maybe 2 pounds.
So far it looks like Taubes is specifically targeting fructose not bound with fiber. 50% of sucrose is fructose, even higher percentage for hfc. Apparently most non-sweet concentrated carbs - rice, even wheat flour - break down to primarily glucose, not as problematic (?) We’ll see.
Oh, another tidbit, who could have guessed … The sugar industry funded a lot of university research in the early 50’s, page from big tobacco, to “know all there was to know about sugar” (and get ahead of any negative spin on it.). “Among other researchers supported by the sugar industry during the war years… a lifelong supporter of the industry” … Everyone’s favorite villain, Ancel Keys at the University of Minnesota. It wasn’t specifically stated that he personally received a grant, but it’s certainly implied he wasn’t Just messing around falsifying results re sat fat to promote a personal theory. He was Groomed in both carb positivity and data manipulation by big sugar. Nice.