MGTutoring.com. A Rational Perspective on Education.

August 26, 2011

Bad Nutritional “Science”

Filed under: Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Logic,Science — Administrator @ 10:38 am

I don’t know if “Fatty foods may cause cocaine-like addiction” (by Sarah Klein, Health.com, March 28, 2010 2:42 p.m. EDT) is incompetent reporting, or incompetent “science,” but it’s fundamentally flawed and incompetent somewhere.

So they feed rats a diet that is not species-appropriate, and the rats develop health problems? Anybody with even slight knowledge of biology, nutrition, and evolution could tell you that.  I wonder what the actual diets were. I’d like to see that. Or is this stuff, “bacon, sausage, cheesecake, frosting, and other fattening, high-calorie foods,” appropriate and typical for rats? I cannot imagine that they evolved on that stuff. Have they had time to evolve to adjust to such foods?

Bacon is very different chemically from cheesecake and junk food. So is sausage. So why are they classified together? The body would respond to these things differently.

What’s more, they conflate “containing fat” with “causing fat.” And they draw conclusions about fat consumption based on feeding fat along with sugars and other crud. It’s impossible to tease out causes the way this study was done, or at least according to how it was reported. If A, B, C, D, E, F, and G, create a certain effect, how does one know A was the cause? Or B?

It would be interesting to see the actual study report. Was this bad “science” or bad reporting?

No wonder American health is bad and getting worse!!

August 19, 2011

Sugar is Bad?

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Science — Administrator @ 12:18 pm

Gary Taubes writes in “Is Sugar Toxic?:”

On May 26, 2009, Robert Lustig gave a lecture called “Sugar: The Bitter Truth,” which was posted on YouTube the following July. Since then, it has been viewed well over 800,000 times, gaining new viewers at a rate of about 50,000 per month, fairly remarkable numbers for a 90-minute discussion of the nuances of fructose biochemistry and human physiology.

Lustig is a specialist on pediatric hormone disorders and the leading expert in childhood obesity at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine, which is one of the best medical schools in the country. He published his first paper on childhood obesity a dozen years ago, and he has been treating patients and doing research on the disorder ever since.
…
If Lustig is right, then our excessive consumption of sugar is the primary reason that the numbers of obese and diabetic Americans have skyrocketed in the past 30 years. But his argument implies more than that. If Lustig is right, it would mean that sugar is also the likely dietary cause of several other chronic ailments widely considered to be diseases of Western lifestyles — heart disease, hypertension and many common cancers among them.

© 2011 The New York Times Company

Read the rest. Interesting article, food for thought — and action. And, like Dr. Emily Deans says in “Do Carbs Make You Crazy?:”

What have I learned from Gary Taubes and Peter and Kurt?  Don’t believe anyone.  Look it up your own self, and see if it makes sense in the context of physiology and evolution.

August 17, 2011

DNA Components From Space

Filed under: Animals,Biology,Science — Administrator @ 1:01 pm

In “NASA: DNA Found on Meteorites Indicates Life May Have Originated in Space” (The International Business Times, August 9, 2011 12:51 PM EDT), they say:

Researchers from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greebelt, Md., report evidence that ready-made DNA parts could have crashed to the surface on objects like meteorites, and then assembled under Earth’s early conditions to create the first DNA.

The discovery was made using samples from 12 carbon-rich meteorites, nine of them from Antarctica. The team extracted small fragments of the meteorite and ran them through a process to determine their structure. What they found was adenine and guanine. These are two of the nucleobases needed to make the rungs of DNA’s spiral ladder (in addition to thymine and cytosine, which were not present in the sample).

© Copyright 2011 The International Business Times Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Department of Chemistry at Duke University discusses some of the past experiments, like the Miller-Urey experiment, that have been done regarding producing amino acids from simple compoungs:

In 1953, Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey, working at the University of Chicago, conducted an experiment which would change the approach of scientific investigation into the origin of life.

Miller took molecules which were believed to represent the major components of the early Earth’s atmosphere and put them into a closed system.

The gases they used were methane (CH4), ammonia (NH3), hydrogen (H2), and water (H2O). Next, he ran a continuous electric current through the system, to simulate lightning storms believed to be common on the early earth. Analysis of the experiment was done by chromotography. At the end of one week, Miller observed that as much as 10-15% of the carbon was now in the form of organic compounds. Two percent of the carbon had formed some of the amino acids which are used to make proteins. Perhaps most importantly, Miller’s experiment showed that organic compounds such as amino acids, which are essential to cellular life, could be made easily under the conditions that scientists believed to be present on the early earth. This enormous finding inspired a multitude of further experiments.

(more…)

August 11, 2011

Nutrition, ADD/ADHD, & Autism

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Psychology,Science — Administrator @ 9:53 am

Children with Starving Brains: A Medical Treatment Guide for Autism Spectrum Disorder by Ms Jaquelyn McCandless might be a good book — not one I have read or had recommended, though. Amazon says:

Product Description

Children With Starving Brains is a message of hope in the midst of a worldwide epidemic of autism, ADD and ADHD. This is the first book written by an experienced clinician that gives a step-by-step treatment guide for parents and doctors based on the understanding that ASD is a complex biomedical illness resulting in significant brain malnutrition. Genetic susceptibility activated by “triggers” such as pesticides and heavy metals in vaccines can lead to immune system impairment, gut dysfunction, and pathogen invasion such as yeast and viruses in many children. Dr. McCandless, whose grandchild with autism has inspired her “broad spectrum approach,” describes important diagnostic tools needed to select appropriate treatment programs. Her book explains major therapies newly available and identifies safe and effective options for parents and physicians working together to improve the health of these special children.

About the Author

(more…)

August 9, 2011

Fighting Autism, ADD/ADHD & Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Education,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Psychology,Science — Administrator @ 2:46 pm

The book The Myth of Autism: How a Misunderstood Epidemic Is Destroying Our Children by Dr. Michael Goldberg sounds good. I have not read it and have not had it recommended to me, but it sounds like it is on the right track and full of good information. To find out more about him, read Dr. Goldberg’s bio on Facebook, watch the 8-minute video of his on YouTube, and read the interview of Dr. Goldberg on the Website The Autism Connection!.

On Amazon, the book is described as follows:

Experts agree that America is in the midst of a disturbing epidemic of what has thus far been diagnosed as autism. In just thirty years autism diagnoses have risen from 1 in 5,000 children to 1 in 110, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But in the history of our society there has never been an “epidemic” of any developmental or genetic disorder—it is scientifically impossible. So what is this mysterious affliction known as “autism,” and how can we stop it? Dr. Goldberg and his colleagues illustrate why autism cannot be genetic, but is a symptom of a treatable neurological disease that attacks the brain’s immune system. Readers will come to understand:

• Autism is not psychological or developmental, but a medical disease.
• Autism is caused by a dysfunction in the neuro-immune system and often by secondary neurotropic viruses that impact the neuro-immune system and brain.
• Illnesses such as autism, ADD/ADHD, and chronic fatigue syndrome all have different “labels” but are actually variations on the same thing: neuro-immune dysfunction syndromes (NIDS)

(more…)

August 1, 2011

Robb Wolf on Health & Nutrition

Filed under: Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Science — Administrator @ 11:35 am

Rational Public Radio has a nice interview of Robb Wolf. Some good points are around -33 minutes, around -28 minutes, around -25 minutes, and around -23 minutes. Highly recommended. They describe the interview as:

We caught up with fitness guru Robb Wolf to talk about America’s weight problem. In addition to writing the bestselling book “The Paleo Solution” he is also the co-host of the “Paleo Solution” podcast.

He explains why government lies are to blame for the obesity epidemic. It turns out that following the government sponsored “food pyramid” is just about the worst thing you can do.

Next, Robb clues us in on what a healthy diet actually looks like. The answer is pretty shocking, it’s almost diametrically opposite to the conventional wisdom.

©2011 RationalPublicRadio.com

July 19, 2011

Some Dangers of Conventional Health Advice

Filed under: Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Science — Administrator @ 10:34 am

In “Hope Warshaw’s Pepsi Challenge,” Tom Naughton writes:

In my last post, I commented on a reply from Hope Warshaw  — the diabetes educator (ahem, ahem) — to a reader of this blog in which she pooh-poohed his “experience of one” with using a low-carb diet to manage diabetes.

The same reader emailed me that he conducted an “experiment of one” in recent days to compare his blood sugar after drinking a 12-ounce Pepsi versus eating some of the foods Hope Warshaw recommends for diabetics.  Take a look:

Food                                   Carbs    BG before    BG at 60 mins
12-ounce Pepsi                   42 g          89                    156
Oatmeal, milk                     40 g          113                   163
Whole wheat bread            48 g           93                    141
Whole wheat toast, milk    36 g         103                    173

Perhaps those numbers don’t look scary to you, but they do to me.  Here’s what Chris Kresser of The Healthy Skeptic wrote about post-meal glucose levels awhile back:

Even the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists is now recommending that post-meal blood sugars never be allowed to rise above 140 mg/dL. Unfortunately, less informed groups like the ADA haven’t caught up with the science.

The consequences of this are severe. Nerve damage occurs as blood sugar rises above 140 mg/dL. Prolonged exposure to blood sugars above 140 mg/dL causes irreversible beta cell loss (the beta cells produce insulin). 1 in 2 “pre-diabetics” get retinopathy, a serious diabetic complication. Cancer rates increase as post-meal blood sugars rise above 160 mg/dL.

July 12, 2011

The Importance of Mathematics: An Example

Filed under: Logic,Mathematics,Philosophy,Science,Technology — Administrator @ 9:22 am

The Lake Peigneur salt dome drilling disaster, which you can read about on Wikipedia and see on YouTube (and on EducatedEarth.com), demonstrates the importance and truth of the dictum “measure twice before you cut once.”

June 27, 2011

Cholesterol, Health, and How Science Should Be Done

Filed under: Biology,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Logic,Science — Administrator @ 12:12 pm

Chris Kresser of The Healthy Skeptic interviews Chris Masterjohn about cholesterol and health: The Healthy Skeptic Podcast — Episode 11. Mr. Kresser said:

This week we’re glad to welcome Chris Masterjohn to the show. Chris is currently pursuing a PhD in Nutritional Sciences with a concentration in Biochemical and Molecular Nutrition at the University of Connecticut. He writes a blog called The Daily Lipid and is also a frequent contributor on the Weston A. Price Foundation’s blog.

I consider Chris to be one of the foremost experts on the topic of cholesterol and its relationship to heart disease. In this episode, we discuss (among other things):

  • the history of the cholesterol-heart disease connection
  • misconceptions around diet vs. lipid hypothesis
  • finding middle ground between cholesterol skeptics and proponents of the lipid hypothesis
  • the LDL receptor and familial hypercholesterolemia and what they can tell us about cholesterol and CHD in normal populations

Copyright © 2011 The Healthy Skeptic

The interview clarifies the role and importance of cholesterol to our health and proper functioning, and gives a good analysis of the science and history of cholesterol research. So the interview is a good way to learn a bit about how science should work and about how we should analyze “scientific” reports.

June 24, 2011

Diet For Health & Learning: A Simple View

Filed under: Biology,Child Development,Education,Exercise, Health & Nutrition,Parenting,Science — Administrator @ 3:17 pm

Paleo Based Diet/Lifestyle Houston, Tx has a nice, simple, basic presentation of paleo. Check it out. Good for your body, good for your brain.

You might also want to check out their post Starving Cancer — and, in that vein, check out the Primal Parent‘s blog post Intermittent Fasting — Is It Safe For Children?. An excerpt:

Intermittent fasting is almost like a silver bullet against disease and aging. Without any alteration to the types of foods one eats, intermittent fasting has the power to increase longevity and quality of life by reducing brain insulin signaling, lowering triglycerides, fighting cancer cell rejuvenation, stimulating the production of growth hormone, and kick starting cell repair and waste elimination. (Note that calorie restriction produces many of the same affects but is widely shunned. Read more about this in my article about the science behind calorie restriction.)

Despite its many benefits, however, people often dismiss it, thinking they can’t handle the gnawing hunger. Without a doubt, fasting can be challenging for people eating an average modern diet, but it’s actually pretty easy once you’re already benefiting from the metabolic advantage of a reduced carb diet. When our bodies are efficient fat burners we don’t experience the “blood sugar blues” and barely notice the temporary caloric deprivation at all.

Intermittent fasting actually gives me an energy boost. Skipping a meal makes me sharper and more alert. It seems counter-intuitive but ghrelin, the hormone that makes us feel hungry, “enhances learning and memory” while at the same time makes us ready for action. J. Stanton reveals the brighter side of ghrelin in this short article.

As parents, we inevitably wonder if we could offer the amazing benefits of intermittent fasting to our children without harming them in the process. The answer is, yes, actually, we can.

© 2011 The Primal Parent. All Rights Reserved.

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