Politics, Religion and Diet.

Three subjects that people love to argue about, as they are about beliefs ;-)

Human population vs Year.

 

Politics:

In Palaeolithic times, there weren't many people living on this planet. People hunted and gathered their food, and had relatively non-hierarchical, egalitarian social structures. According to archaeologists, violence in hunter-gatherer societies was ubiquitous. Approximately 25% to 30% of adult male deaths in these societies were due to homicide, compared to an upper estimate of 3% of all deaths in the 20th century. The cause of this is near constant tribal warfare: "From the !Kung in the Kalahari to the Inuit in the Arctic and the aborigines in Australia, two-thirds of modern hunter-gatherers are in a state of almost constant tribal warfare, and nearly 90% go to war at least once a year." However, due to the extremely low population back then, extremely few people were killed in absolute terms. Then, around 10,000 BC, some bright spark/bulb invented agriculture...

Fast-forward a few thousand years to the time of Genghis Khan. He came to power by uniting many of the nomadic tribes of north-east Asia. The Mongol invasions resulted in wholesale massacres of civilian populations. His descendants went on to stretch the Mongol Empire across most of Eurasia by conquering or creating vassal states out of all of modern-day China, Korea, the Caucasus, Central Asian countries, and substantial portions of modern Eastern Europe, Russia and the Middle East. Many of these invasions repeated the earlier large-scale slaughters of local populations. However, due to the low population (around 300 million), few people were killed in absolute terms. Then, around 1,600 AD, some bright spark/bulb invented government...

As mentioned in How did we get to where we are today? Part 2., the invention of liberal government encouraged the exchange of ideas and entrepreneurship. Monarchies taxed people, but their bureaucracies stifled entrepreneurship, so the French and the Chinese invented loads of stuff that never saw the light of day. We Brits got lucky. As a result, the Industrial Revolution created wealth out of dirt, which led to rapid economic growth and rapid population growth. The Green Revolution led to more rapid population growth.

Fast-forward to the 21st Century. Warfare has killed millions of people. Rulers have killed hundreds of millions of people (the vast majority by totalitarian & authoritarian regimes), according to Anarchy Begins at Home: The Blog Series Part 6 – Democide. However, due to the extremely high population, only approximately 5.6% of the total population have been killed by rulers. That's what I call relative peace.

EDIT: I don't want a system where entire populations can be slaughtered by armies led by a charismatic leader. I also don't want a system where the poor & underprivileged are "free" to die in poverty. Some people scrounge off Social Security, but the amount of money scrounged by them pales into insignificance compared to the amount of money scrounged off the rest of us by the wealthiest people on this planet.

 

Religion:

I'm not religious. I have no problem with people believing in God, as long as they have no problem with me not believing in God. A thought experiment that you may find interesting is God's Debris, by Scott Adams.

 

Diet:

Read the rest of my blog, dammit!

In other news...
Mum is now in a coma, but her breathing is regular.

Failure to communicate, civil wars and dim bulbs.

Hat-tip to marie (who's a very bright bulb indeed!) for the following video.


Whaz so civil 'bout war anyway?

The reason why I'm writing this is because there's (un)civil war on the internets between various "camps".

At any given moment:-
There are people who function physically & mentally at their best on VLC/Keto diets.
There are people who function physically & mentally at their best on LC diets.
There are people who function physically & mentally at their best on MC diets.
There are people who function physically & mentally at their best on HC diets.
There are people who function physically & mentally at their best on VHC diets.
As people's circumstances change, they move to a different category.

If you don't understand what I wrote above, you are a dim bulb.
If you think that insults can offend me, you are a dim bulb.
If you think that agreeing 90% with someone makes me an ass/arse-kisser, you are a dim bulb.
If you think that I'll take insults from you without retaliation, you are a dim bulb.
Sadly, due to the Dunning–Kruger effect, dim bulbs are too dim to know that they are dim bulbs!
If you are offended by anything that I wrote above, I don't care.

In other news...
Mum's condition has deteriorated to the point where she is unresponsive and no longer has a swallow reflex. It's just a matter of time before she dies. I've been prepared for this for quite some time.

Global Wealth Inequality - What you never knew you never knew.

Hat-tip to Johann Hari for the following video.


Wow, just wow.

How to lose body-fat healthily, Part 2.

Cont'd from How to lose body-fat healthily.

Remember the spoof video below?


I think that I've made it pretty damned clear in this blog that conscious Eat Less, Move More (ELMM) often fails, if the food eaten doesn't suit the person. There's also a brouhaha brewing over what the Paleo Diet is, as there's no one Paleo Diet. So, here's my suggestion for a "Healthy Eating" pamphlet.

Side 1: Base your diet on minimally-refined animal & vegetable produce. Manufactured food products can be eaten as occasional treats.

Side 2: If eating "X" makes you feel unwell, stop eating "X". If eating "X" makes you feel drowsy followed by hunger, you probably have Insulin Resistance.

See Insulin Resistance: Solutions to problems. for ways to reverse Insulin Resistance.

Doctor, every time I do *this*, it hurts!

The correct response is either:-

1) Go to hospital and get that broken finger fixed, or
2) Stop doing *that*!

There seem to be a lot of people out there who are having problems with wheat gluten (gliadin), casein and other proteins. As Matt Lalonde said in The Science Behind the Paleolithic Diet, some proteins are harder to digest than others.

Here's a hard to digest protein:-


It's raw albumin (egg white protein). As mentioned in As sure as Eggs is Eggs....., raw albumin is poorly absorbed, compared to cooked albumin. To digest the above protein requires peptidase enzymes (pepsin, trypsin and chymotrypsin) to break the peptide bonds. This has to be done from the outside inwards, so a large, heavily-folded protein takes a long time to break down into individual amino acids. Cooking albumin changes the 3-D structure - this is called denaturing. Cooked albumin digests much faster than raw albumin, which is why it's much better absorbed. Cooked proteins are generally faster to digest than raw proteins, unless they're burned to a crisp on a barbecue!

In a person with a healthy gut, partially-digested proteins are not absorbed, as the molecules are too large to pass through the tight junctions in the small intestine. They just ferment, producing malodorous wind. In a person with impaired gut permeability, partially-digested proteins pass through the loose junctions and get into the blood, provoking an immune response. This is not good, so Keep 'em tight.

People who suffer ill-effects after eating certain proteins may either have the wrong genes (e.g. coeliac disease), or have impaired gut permeability. The former isn't fixable but the latter may be. In the meantime, if eating "X" hurts, don't eat "X"!

The Comfy Chair?

Because nobody expects...


I'm writing this post lounging like a lounge-lizard on a comfy three-seater sofa. When I'm driving from A to B, I'm sitting in a comfy chair. Basically, I have a cushy life. I go for a walk in the evenings and I go to many music events, but as I'm (a bit of) an information junkie, I spend many happy hours on-line, lounging on my sofa. My bad.

Thanks to technology and energy, many of us have labour-saving devices and horseless carriages. Therefore, many of us don't burn much energy from doing hard physical work and from having to walk everywhere.

Therefore, to maintain energy balance, many of us have to eat little food energy to maintain a reasonable weight and body composition. To get all of the vitamins*, minerals, fibre/fiber etc required for good health from little food energy requires the consumption of foods with high nutrient densities. You know where this is going, don't you?

*Except for Vitamin D, which requires sensible sun exposure between the end of March and the end of September when your shadow is shorter than you are.

If you enjoy irony, see What Did You Expect? Coca-Cola's Newest Anti-Obesity Ad Blames Chairs, Not Coke.

P.S. According to the BBC TV series "QI", the Spanish Inquisition gave thirty days notice of their arrival. Therefore, according to "QI", everybody expected the Spanish Inquisition!

P.P.S. As a cushy life results in muscles burning carbohydrate at a low rate, sedentary people are better-off eating less carbohydrates. See 10 Rules New Low-Carb Dieters Should Follow.

Use and abuse of technology and energy.

Take a look at the picture below.

Samsung Galaxy S vs iPhone 4

Using technology and energy: Oil, ores, minerals and sand are turned into plastics, metals, ceramics and glasses. The latter cost and are worth more than the former. Using more technology and energy: Plastics, metals, ceramics and glasses are turned into smart-phones, computers, TV sets, cars, planes, musical instruments, w.h.y. The latter cost and are worth more than the former. Creating gizmos creates wealth and increases value.

Take a look at the picture below (hat-tip to Beth Mazur).

You know who is really leaning in? Little Debbie. We have enough crap to eat. Dial it back a little.

Using technology and energy: Produce are turned into crap-in-a-bag/box/bottle (CIAB). The latter cost more than the former but are worth less, as nutritional value has been reduced. Creating CIAB creates wealth but decreases value.

I would like there to be more production of gizmos and less production of CIAB.

Musings on the Paleo Diet.

Would you ask the man below for advice on how to give up alcohol?

I recently read Patients less likely to trust and listen to overweight doctors, which mentioned Mark Sisson. Sisson and Robb Wolf are good representatives for the Paleo Diet. Some are bad representatives for the Paleo Diet due to poor physical condition or abrasive personality.

The Paleo Diet gets flak from scientists like Marlene Zuk and Christina Warinner and it was criticised in The Paleo Diet (hat-tip to Melissa McEwen).

The thing is that people don't need to eat a Palaeolithic diet to be 90% free from degenerative diseases. A mere 150 years ago, Mid-Victorian Brits who didn't die in childhood managed to live to a ripe old age, as cheap sugar imports, junk food, labour-saving devices and horseless carriages hadn't yet been invented.

Just Eat Real Food.

Everyone is Different, Part 3.

Cont'd from Everyone is Different, Part 2.

Hat-tip to Bill Lagakos, whose article Missing: 300 kilocalories reminded me of the following graphic from Effects of Dietary Composition During Weight Loss Maintenance: A Controlled Feeding Study.

Lo and behold, even when subjects are bribed to stick to the diets that they are provided with, the effect of eating those diets varies hugely.

So, people like ItsTheWoo and Petro Dobromylskyj (yes, I have to copy and paste the name from his site every freakin' time!) rave about how awful carbs are, while people like Go Kaleo and Matt Stone rave about how awesome carbs are.

Everyone is different for a number of reasons, some of which are unchangeable and some of which are changeable. We can't change our birth weight, what our mums ate when we were in the womb or the chemicals that we were exposed to in the past. We can't change our genes, but we can change the expression of our genes by changing diet, activity and even supplementation. See Influence of Vitamin D Status and Vitamin D₃ Supplementation on Genome Wide Expression of White Blood Cells: A Randomized Double-Blind Clinical Trial.

Continued on Bray et al shows that a calorie *is* a calorie (where weight is concerned)

How the Mid-Victorians Worked, Ate and Died.

Hat-tip to Prof. Tim Noakes, who recently tweeted the above study.

See How the Mid-Victorians Worked, Ate and Died.

"The crude average figures often used to depict the brevity of Victorian lives mislead because they include infant mortality, which was tragically high. If we strip out peri-natal mortality, however, and look at the life expectancy of those who survived the first five years, a very different picture emerges. Victorian contemporary sources reveal that life expectancy for adults in the mid-Victorian period was almost exactly what it is today.
.
.
From 1875 on and especially after 1885, rising imports of cheap food basics were increasingly affecting the food chain at home. Imported North American wheat and new milling techniques reduced the prices of white flour and bread. Tinned meat arrived from the Argentine, Australia and New Zealand, which was cheaper than either home-produced or refrigerated fresh meat also arriving from these sources. Canned fruit and condensed milk became widely available.

This expansion in the range of foods was advertised by most contemporaries, and by subsequent historians, as representing a significant ‘improvement’ in the working class diet. The reality was very different. These changes undoubtedly increased the variety and quantity of the working class diet, but its quality deteriorated markedly. The imported canned meats were fatty and usually ‘corned’ or salted. Cheaper sugar promoted a huge increase in sugar consumption in confectionery, now mass-produced for the first time, and in the new processed foods such as sugar-laden condensed milk, and canned fruits bathed in heavy syrup. The increased sugar consumption caused such damage to the nation’s teeth that by 1900 it was commonly noted that people could no longer chew tough foods and were unable to eat many vegetables, fruits and nuts [26]. For all these reasons the late-Victorian diet actually damaged the health of the nation, and the health of the working classes in particular.

The decline was astonishingly rapid..."

See also Who Lives Longest? (h/t to Melissa McEwen)

Everyone is Different, Part 2.

Cont'd from We are not all the same.

A long, long time ago...


I learned that Everyone is Different, thanks to a study by Julia H. Goedecke, Alan St Clair Gibson, Liesl Grobler, Malcolm Collins, Timothy D. Noakes and Estelle V. Lambert.

Well, stone the flamin' crows! Timothy D. Noakes' name just popped up in Alan Aragon's article 2013 NSCA Personal Trainers Conference: Looking Back at my Debate with Dr. Jeff Volek. Dr. Noakes has had problems with his blood glucose level and has adopted a very-low-carb/ketogenic diet.

What also caught my eye in Alan Aragon's article was (Note: TTE = Time To Exhaustion):-
"However, the authors’ conclusion is misleading since 2 of the 5 subjects experienced substantial drops in endurance capacity (48 and 51-minute declines in TTE, to be exact). One of the subjects had a freakishly high 84-minute increase in TTE, while the other increases were 3 and 30 minutes."

I expect that the subjects with 84 and 30 minute increases in TTE would be praising ketogenic diets, whereas the subjects with 48 and 51 minute declines in TTE would be cursing them and the subject with 3 minutes increase would be "Meh". Vive la difference!

Also note that sprint capability...remained constrained during the period of carbohydrate restriction. As mentioned in It's all in a day's work (as measured in Joules), exercise above a certain intensity (~85%VO2max) burns significant amounts of carbs, no matter how fat-adapted someone is.

Cont'd on Everyone is Different, Part 3.

Nothing to report, so...

...here's a YouTube video of me singing "The time of my life" by Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes, backed by Jukebox at the Falkners Arms in Fleet on 1st February 2013.

EDIT: As the old video got deleted, I have replaced it with one produced on 5th February 2014 at the Tickled Ivory Piano Bar in Guildford. 

Kelloggs Special K Cracker Crisps.

At home, I watch TV on my lap-top with ad and script-blocking plugins. As a result, I don't see any adverts on commercial TV, YouTube etc.

While visiting mum today, the TV was set to a commercial channel. During an ad break, there was an advert for Kelloggs Special K Cracker Crisps, with the following tag-line (emphasis mine):- Introducing New Special K Cracker Crisps, the deliciously moreish savoury snack that you can feel good about.

A serving (21 crisps weighing ~23g) provides only 95kcals. A box contains 100g which provides 413kcals. I wonder how many people will be able to stop after eating 21 of these crisps?

Walkers salt & vinegar crisps contain the following ingredients:- Potatoes, Sunflower Oil (25%), Rapeseed Oil, Salt & Vinegar Seasoning, Salt & Vinegar Seasoning contains: Flavouring, Dried British Vinegar, Salt, Citric Acid, Sugar, Potassium Chloride, Yeast Extract.

Kelloggs Special K Cracker Crisps S & V contain the following ingredients:- Tapioca Starch, Dried Potato, Wheat Flour, Salt & Balsamic Vinegar Seasoning (Lactose {from Milk}, Sugar, Acidity Regulator {Sodium Diacetate}, Salt, Flavourings (contains Barley), Sea Salt, Citric Acid, Balsamic Vinegar Powder, Rapeseed Oil, Dried Tamarind Extract, Yeast Extract, Black Pepper, Stabiliser {E450a}, Antioxidant {E304}), Sunflower Oil, Maize Flour, Oat Fibre, Salt, Emulsifier (E471).

With food engineering like that, I'm sure that they'll sell like hot cakes. Here's my opinion on how the fight against the obesity epidemic is going...

Just say "NO". There's more to sunlight than Vitamin D3.

Just say NO?

Hat-tip to Richard Nikoley for posting the following video by Richard Weller, which I am posting as an embedded YouTube video rather than a Vimeo one, as YouTube gives me fewer problems.



Take-away message: Deaths from heart disease are 100 times higher than deaths from skin cancer (because the vast majority of skin cancers are benign).

On burning, storing and recomposing.

Burning

I couldn't resist!


On my adventures around the interwebs, I've noticed the following:- "Humans aren't Calorimeters. Therefore calories are irrelevant to humans." While I agree with the first sentence, I don't agree with the second one.

Calorimeters burn (oxidise) foods at high temperatures with a flame using oxygen, which produces carbon dioxide, water (depending on what's being burned) & heat energy.

Humans burn (oxidise) foods at 37ºC with enzymes , charge transporters etc using oxygen, which produces carbon dioxide, water (depending on what's being burned), mechanical energy & heat energy.

As both oxygen & carbon dioxide are gases, these can be measured by a respiratory gas analyser, to establish the rate of burning and what's being burned at any instant. See It's all in a day's work (as measured in Joules). When resting, burning occurs at a rate of ~1kcal/minute and, as it's measured while fasted, ~0.11g/min of fat is burned, & ~0.01g/min of carbohydrate is burned. Also note that a lot of mechanical energy can be produced, which can increase the rate of burning by a factor of seventeen.

In conclusion, humans burn (oxidise) foods, though not with a flame, and they can produce mechanical energy in addition to heat energy. The rate of burning and what's being burned at any instant can be measured.

Storing

When we eat food, it's digested and absorbed. As a digested meal is absorbed, it appears in the blood as glucose, triglycerides & amino acids. These then disappear from the blood due to burning and storage.

Fig. 1 Extended effects of evening meal carbohydrate-to-fat ratio on fasting and postprandial substrate metabolism

Fig. 1 above shows the effects of a 100g Oral Glucose load (▪▫) or a 40g Oral Fat load (●○) on blood glucose level over a period of 360 minutes. Note that subjects are resting during the 360 minutes. As the 100g Oral Glucose load produces a large insulin response (See Fig. 2 below ▪▫), fat-burning is temporarily reduced.

Fig. 2 Extended effects of evening meal carbohydrate-to-fat ratio on fasting and postprandial substrate metabolism

Therefore, ~1kcal/minute resting burning rate is derived ~100% from carbohydrate. Therefore, carbohydrate-burning rate is ~0.25g/min. At this rate, it would take ~400 minutes to burn 100g of glucose. If less than 100% of energy is derived from carbohydrate, it would take longer. However, it actually takes ~180 minutes for blood glucose level to fall from maximum to minimum. Therefore, some glucose from the Oral Glucose load is stored (mostly as glycogen in muscles and liver).

Fig. 3B Extended effects of evening meal carbohydrate-to-fat ratio on fasting and postprandial substrate metabolism

Fig. 3B above shows the effects of a 40g Oral Fat load (●○) on blood triglyceride (fat) level over a period of 360 minutes. Note that subjects are resting during the 360 minutes. As the 40g Oral Fat load produces no significant insulin response (See Fig. 2 above ●○), fat-burning is unaffected.

Therefore, fat-burning rate is ~0.11g/min. At this rate, it would take ~364 minutes to burn 40g of fat. If less than 100% of energy is derived from fat, it would take longer. Everyone is Different. shows the variation in % of energy from fat at rest. However, it actually takes 180 to 240 minutes for blood triglyceride (fat) level to fall from maximum to minimum. Therefore, some fat from the Oral Fat load is stored (as fat in adipocytes), even though there is no significant insulin response.


Therefore there are times when stuff is stored (anabolism) and there are times when stuff is withdrawn from stores (catabolism). If more stuff is stored than is withdrawn over a period of time, weight goes up, and vice-versa.

Recomposing

After doing intense exercise e.g. sprinting, resistance training with weights etc, muscles become very sensitive to insulin. Therefore, if intense exercise is done just before stuff is stored, amino acids & glucose are preferentially stored in muscles rather than adipocytes. This increases muscle mass relative to fat mass.

If non-intense exercise is done at times when stuff is withdrawn from stores, this maximises the amount of fat withdrawn from adipocytes and minimises the amount of amino acids withdrawn from muscles. This decreases fat mass relative to muscle mass.

It's therefore possible to increase muscle mass at certain times and decrease fat mass at other times, while keeping overall mass relatively constant i.e. it's possible to gain muscle and lose body-fat without being in an overall caloric deficit.


See The Energy Balance Equation, for more information.

Not exactly rocket science, is it?

If Paul (astrophysicist) Jaminet met Jack (neurosurgeon) Kruse ;-)

The paleo diet was recently ridiculed as a food fad in Natural’s Not In It. It also came last in a US News Best Diets survey.

Ways of eating such as very-low-carbohydrate, low-carbohydrate, low-reward, paleo, primal, ancestral, just eat real food etc discourage the consumption of manufactured food products and encourage the consumption of produce. If a large percentage of the population stop filling their shopping baskets with manufactured food products and start filling them with produce, who suffers? Not exactly...

This is why the food manufacturing industry tries to ensure that the population gets the best nutritional and dietetic advice that money can buy. See also New study: Big Food’s ties to Registered Dietitians.

While libertarians and anarchists moan about freedom from government interference, the food manufacturing industry has the freedom to crap all over the aforementioned diets and influence people to buy manufactured food products. Morbidity is also very profitable for healthcare and drug companies.

I think that I've now flogged this particular horse to death!

It’s the Calories, Stupid.

I thought I'd mark my return to blogging by taking the piss out of a certain Diet Doctor for his post It’s the Insulin, Stupid, who takes (and tweaks) Fig 7A from Hyperinsulinemia Drives Diet-Induced Obesity Independently of Brain Insulin Production.

At first glance, Fig 7A looks like a CIH believer's dream come true (apart from the words "High Fat Diet").

Hyperinsulinemia → Obesity.

Obesity is caused by too much insulin. Game, Set and Match to insulin.

Not so fast! Let's take a look at the rest of Fig 7.

Figure 7. Revisiting the Current Model of Obesity and Type 2 Diabetes(A) The most widely accepted model of the pathogenesis of obesity and type 2 diabetes posits that a high-fat diet leads to obesity and insulin resistance (there is debate about the relative order and causality of these). In this widely held view, insulin resistance then leads to hyperinsulinemia, which is followed by β cell exhaustion, and then type 2 diabetes. The accepted model is incompatible with our results that put the insulin hypersecretion genetically upstream of obesity.(B) Our data support a model whereby insulin levels must be kept low to maintain energy expenditure in white adipose tissue via the expression of Ucp1. Our data do not address the order of subsequent events after obesity (outside the yellow box), such as insulin resistance and/or type 2 diabetes, since they were not observed in our studies. In other words, the effects of insulin gene dosage on obesity are independent of sustained changes in glucose homeostasis or insulin resistance.

↑ Peripheral Hyperinsulinemia → ↓ Uncoupling Proteins (WAT) → ↓ Energy Expenditure → ↑ Obesity.

Obesity is caused by a reduction in energy expenditure in these mice. Game, Set and Match to The Energy Balance Equation. It’s the Calories, Stupid. In these mice, energy expenditure is strongly influenced by insulin levels. In humans, not a lot. In humans, insulin can act as a stimulant or a sedative.

I'm not an insulin denier as is obvious from my other blog posts. I'm still restricting my carbohydrate intake to ~125g/day from whole foods.

I'm not a food reward denier. I've been using food reward principles to lose weight.

This post will probably annoy some people. Before wasting your time writing a comment, please read my Moderation Policy.

Adipocyte Hyperplasia - Good or Bad?

The answer is "It depends!".

The above plot is from Fig. 4 of Cytokine-mediated modulation of leptin and adiponectin secretion during in vitro adipogenesis: Evidence that tumor necrosis factor-α- and interleukin-1β-treated human preadipocytes are potent leptin producers and shows that leptin secretion from adipocytes increases non-linearly with increasing culture period.

As adipocytes fill, there's insignificant leptin secretion up to a certain level of fullness. Above that level of fullness, leptin secretion increases non-linearly. What this means is that reducing adipocyte fullness by x% reduces leptin secretion by more than x%.

If adipocytes become full due to a chronic caloric excess, there are two possibilities.

1a: If there is continued caloric excess, no preadipocytes are converted into adipocytes. There is no additional storage capacity available for excess nutrients, so they remain in circulation. T2DM has developed = bad.

1b: If there is subsequent caloric deficit, adipocytes start to deplete, storage capacity becomes available and T2DM goes away (if beta cells haven't been destroyed). The low number of fairly full adipocytes secrete sufficient leptin, so metabolic rate is high and hunger is low = good.
EDIT: This is the principle behind the DiRECT protocol.

2a: If there is continued caloric excess, pre-adipocytes are converted into adipocytes. This is adipocyte hyperplasia. There is additional storage capacity available for excess nutrients, so T2DM doesn't develop = good.

2b: If there is subsequent caloric deficit, adipocytes start to deplete. However, there are more adipocytes than in 1b, so for a given fat mass, adipocytes are less full than in 1b. The higher number of less full adipocytes secrete less leptin than in 1b, so metabolic rate is lower and hunger is higher than in 1b = bad.

Adipocyte hyperplasia is good for preventing T2DM as fat mass increases, but bad for metabolic rate and hunger after subsequent fat mass loss. Children are growing, so have adipocyte hyperplasia. Adults aren't growing, so have less/no adipocyte hyperplasia. Therefore, adipocyte hyperplasia during childhood will result in some protection from developing T2DM, but life-long misery due to increased hunger and reduced metabolic rate after subsequent fat mass loss. This is why I believe that children need to be protected from the persuasive marketing of manufacturers of CIAB (Crap-in-a-Bag/Box/Bottle).

See Beradinelli-Seip Syndrome – stick that in your pipe and smoke it and read the comments to see why adults with insufficient adipocytes are highly likely to develop T2DM. This is why Asians who remain skinny in childhood (so have no adipocyte hyperplasia) have a high risk of developing T2DM. Sumo wrestlers are Asians who become fat in childhood (so they have a lot of adipocyte hyperplasia) so they have a lower risk of developing T2DM.

According to Adipocyte Turnover: Relevance to Human Adipose Tissue Morphology:-
"Occurrence of hyperplasia (negative morphology value) or hypertrophy (positive morphology value) was independent of sex and body weight but correlated with fasting plasma insulin levels and insulin sensitivity, independent of adipocyte volume (β-coefficient = 0.3, P < 0.0001). Total adipocyte number and morphology were negatively related (r = −0.66); i.e., the total adipocyte number was greatest in pronounced hyperplasia and smallest in pronounced hypertrophy. The absolute number of new adipocytes generated each year was 70% lower (P < 0.001) in hypertrophy than in hyperplasia, and individual values for adipocyte generation and morphology were strongly related (r = 0.7, P < 0.001). The relative death rate (∼10% per year) or mean age of adipocytes (∼10 years) was not correlated with morphology."

If you want to remain slim, high fasting serum insulin due to hepatic and/or muscular insulin resistance and/or chronic overconsumption is bad.

Hyperinsulinaemia and Insulin Resistance - An Engineer's Perspective.

Another techie post.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_feedback_amplifier

There's been some arguing discussion over whether Hyperinsulinaemia (HI) causes Insulin Resistance (IR). My answer is...Yes and No.

HI increases IR, long-term. See Downregulation and upregulation: The Insulin Receptor and Insulin oscillation.

HI doesn't increase IR, short-term. How can I claim this? The above diagram represents a Negative Feedback (NFB) control system, which is how Blood Glucose is regulated.

"Input" represents Glucose from digested sugars and starches. The arrow pointing at AOL represents Blood Glucose (BG). The triangle containing AOL represents pancreatic beta cells. "Output" represents Insulin Secretion (ISec). More BG = More ISec.

The box containing ß represents three things that work in parallel to reduce Blood Glucose.
1) The Liver. More ISec = Hepatic Glucose Production rate decreased.
2) Muscle mass. More ISec = Glucose intake to Muscle mass rate increased, via Glu-T4.
3) Fat mass. More ISec = Glucose intake to Fat mass rate increased, via Glu-T4.
The three things aren't of equal strength, but they provide overall negative feedback.

If overall negative feedback is halved due to doubling of overall IR in the above three paths, ISec doubles. If you don't believe me, see Idealised Negative Feedback Inverting Amplifier using an idealised op amp on WolframAlpha. Double the value of resistance 2 (the negative feedback resistor R2). and the output voltage on the inverting amplifier doubles from -10V to -20V.

The idealised Negative Feedback Inverting Amplifier using an idealised op amp on WolframAlpha is interesting in that an idealised op amp (the triangle with + and - inputs) has infinity gain and ±infinity voltage on its power supplies. As a result, there is zero volts (output voltage divided by infinity) between the idealised op amp's + terminal and its - terminal. If the idealised op amp's + terminal is connected to 0V (a.k.a. "Earth"), its - terminal is at 0V (a.k.a. "Virtual Earth") and has zero variation, whatever the input voltage. An actual op amp has a voltage gain of ~140dB (~10,000,000), so an output voltage of -10V can be achieved with a voltage of 1uV (one millionth of a Volt) on its - terminal.

If pancreatic beta cells had a zero threshold and infinity gain like an idealised op amp, BG would be zero and have zero variation with varying Glucose input. Pancreatic beta cells actually have a positive threshold and low gain, so BG is positive and varies slightly with varying Glucose input.

If ISec becomes zero (as in type 1 diabetes), there is zero negative feedback and BG increases. The same thing happens to the voltage on the idealised op amp's - terminal if its power supplies are 0V instead of ±infinity.

If ISec becomes insufficient (as in type 2 diabetes), there is insufficient negative feedback and BG increases. The same thing happens to the voltage on the idealised op amp's - terminal if its power supplies are limited to ±5V.

Having established that ISec is proportional to overall IR, what would happen if overall IR was proportional to ISec? If ISec doubled, overall IR would double, which would double ISec, which would double overall IR, ad infinitum. ISec would increase to maximum instantly. THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN. Therefore, IR doesn't increase in proportion to ISec, short term.

Long-term, increased ISec increases IR for a variety of reasons, one of them being that increased ISec increases the rate at which cells fill with glycogen. Once full of glycogen, cells must down-regulate their intake by down-regulating Glu-T4 and Glu-T2 (fat and liver cells also up-regulate their output of stuff) or burst.

Reduce your IR by addressing all of the factors in Insulin Resistance: Solutions to problems.

Chris Highcock emailed me a link to Muscular strength and markers of insulin resistance in European adolescents: the HELENA Study.

Weird Filters.

Here's a weird picture.

From http://cstrips.bitstrips.com/MVGHP_6XV9.png

Why is it that some people see the world through weird cognitive bias filters? It makes discussion with them impossible, as what I write is remixed with weird filters into something completely different. They then argue against something completely different, not what I wrote. This is the classic Straw Man argument.

Here are some examples of remixing with weird filters, taken from Insulin, the Un-dead and coffin nails.

1) ""A" is..." is remixed into "I believe that "B", "C", "D",..."Z" do not exist".

2) ""A" is caused by "B"" is remixed into "A is only caused by "B"". This is similar to 1).

3) "As cells are emptied (of glycogen)..." is remixed into "Once cells are completely emptied (of glycogen)...". The "As" at the beginning of the sentence signifies an ongoing process. Next time, I'll write "As cells are depleted (of glycogen)..." EDIT: Rewritten using c/p'ed text.

4) The statement "eating too much and moving too little" is remixed into "Gluttony and Sloth". Gluttony and Sloth are conscious actions. Eating too much due to ravenous hunger and moving too little due to lethargy/sleepiness are unconscious actions. Anybody who thinks that I mean/insinuate the former rather than the latter is an idiot/insane.

Having remixed what I wrote into something completely different, I am then accused of intellectual dishonesty. Oy!