Talk:Low-carbohydrate diet

Low Calorie Diet

Why does Low Calorie Diet redirect to this page? Shouldn't it redirect to caloric restriction or a similar article? It's quite possible to be on a calorie restricted diet that includes carbohydrates.

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Some points:

Critics observe that alternative (e.g. high protein) diets

Not taking about alternative diets here, taking about low-carb. Low-carbohydrate diets are high-protein by definition, no?

High protein and/or high fat. Cheese Sandwich 03:29, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

These objections are accommodated by vegan and living foods diets.

what has this got to do with low-carb/high protein diets? -- Viajero 22:29, 8 Feb 2004 (UTC)

1 Low-carbohydrate diets are not necessarily high-protein, e.g. raw food diets, fructarian diet, a whole range of other ones leave out high carb without necessarily substituting high protein. High veg or high fruit or a mixture plus nuts and seeds would not be high protein. There are more things in food than protein and carbs. 2 Well, the vegan diet answers the animal protein objection, the living foods diet (=greens and beans plus nuts, seeds) answers the high protein problem. Hope this makes sense. I value your views.

TonyClarke 23:58, 8 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Tony, my understanding is the following: Atkins (and Zone too?) depend on the consumption of less than ~10 gms of carbohydrates per day. Under this regime, ketosis (fat burning) takes place, regardless of caloric consumption, and a person gradually loses weight. In practical terms, that means eating animal protein and salads; this is what is listed on their daily menus.

Vegan, raw foods, and similar diets aren't necessarily low-carbohydrate by definition. Vegans eat grains, vegtables, fruits, nuts, no? Keep in mind that fruits are also large sources of carbohydrates in the form of simple sugars (fructose, etc), which is why they are not allowed under Atkins. Now, it is indeed possible that some of these diets prescribe lowered amounts of starches for one reason or another, but I think that strictly speaking the term "low-carb" diet should apply solely to Atkins-type regimens. -- Viajero 18:06, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

In the edit I'm currently doing, I'm removing the high protein labels. Low carbohydrate means low carbohydrate, not high anything. Calories can come from four sources: carbohydrate, fat, protein and alcohol. In an isocaloric (equivalent-calorie) diet, "low carbohydrate" simply means you raise one or more of the other three. So "high protein" isn't any truer necessarily than "high alcohol"--though, granted, many of the popular low-carb diets achieve the reduced carbs by raising protein. They don't all, though, which is why I'm removing it.

Btw--Viajero, your understanding is more or less right, though the specifics are wrong (for instance, Atkins starts at 20g of what are called "impact carbohydrates," not 10g. TreyHarris 07:02, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

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Latest Rewrite

Hi, Stevertigo.

I don't understand the latest edit!

1. It inserts a chunk of advocacy into the intro.
2. It removes the "arguments in favour" heading, which (to my mind) impairs the article's even-handedness. For some reason, it replaces this heading with "Differences between popular low-carb diets", which describes one or two of the sentences but not the rest of the section, which (again) is straightforward advocacy.
3. It inserts the food industry section in between the mistitled pro section and the correctly titled contra section. Why interrupt a balanced argument with an unrelated aside?
4. One problem with placing the contra section last is that it ends up propounding a criticism ("Environmental impact") that the pro section has already rebuffed. That doesn't work too well on either side: the final contra section winds up looking pre-empted and redundant, while you're left with no idea what the pro section is "responding" to.

Also (not a criticism, more a query): it appears to sport a couple of sawn-off sentences as though it was saved prematurely. Correct?

I think it would be a better idea to integrate your new content into the old structure.

chocolateboy 03:41, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

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I think it might be better, if it were. But its not. The article as it stands is POV against something, whithout first explaing what the thing is. Except for extremely controversial subjects, we dont split articles into neutral splits (neutral, pro, and con). We write articles with neutral explanations of proponent claims and critical claims as counterpoint on specific issues by their order of importance, not by advocacy. This article as it is now removes anything material what the term means; explain what it means before going into criticism of what it is. Ill let you do the restoring/rewriting or otherwise I will do it. I dont take offense to edits and corrections, but in general Im one of those who consider reverts to be lazy, to be used only for vandalism and not for corrections. Articles are always in flux, so there can be no way of claiming that the previous version is the way its always going to be. I agree with some of your criticisms, but together or in part, they fail to justify reversion in place of actual editing. Thanks, -SV 00:29, 2004 Jul 22 (UTC)

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Hi.

The article as it stands is POV against something, whithout first explaing what the thing is.

How so, when it states in the intro that "it is generally agreed that low carb diets can work" and then goes on to explain that under "these dietary regimes, carbohydrates are replaced by increased consumption of proteins or fats"? That looks to me like (qualified) acknowledgement of the diet followed by a summary of "what [ it ] is".

Except for extremely controversial subjects, we dont split articles into neutral splits (neutral, pro, and con).

Low-carb diets (30,600) are (at least) as controversial as the GNU/Linux naming controversy (4490). The latter article is split into arguments for and arguments against, as is the Atkins Diet article.

This article as it is now removes anything material what the term means; explain what it means before going into criticism of what it is. Ill let you do the restoring/rewriting or otherwise I will do it.

Fair enough. I'd like to integrate your new material into the previous structure (or a similar structure). I was hoping that the rv would prompt you to do it :-) I do think the old version is a better holding page, though, even if only because it doesn't suffer from the problems outlined above.

chocolateboy 01:04, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

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How so, when it states in the intro that "it is generally agreed that low carb diets can work" and then goes on to explain that under "these dietary regimes, carbohydrates are replaced by increased consumption of proteins or fats"? That looks to me like (qualified) acknowledgement of the diet followed by a summary of "what [ it ] is".-CB

Thats not good enough. And your not addressing what I said about the proper structure of an article. As it is, its not well structured. 1. Get to the science of it first. Explain the way its supposed to work, the things they all have in common, and then get to the criticized areas, not forgetting to mention the basics: For most people carbs boost insulin. Insulin directs fat storage, among other things. Boost insulin= unhealthy. Vegetable carbs good, grain/sugar carbs bad. 1/4 of people dont need to worry about carbs and can go hog nuts with the chocolate etc. The problem with the controversial aspects in general are that a lot are industry related, and just as if a study came out definitively saying that eating chicken caused cancer and bad breath, the poultry biz would dispute that and therefore it would loosely qualify as controversial. Even if someone came around with the Holy Grail, vendors and experts on record praising the previous fountain of youth will tend to be successful in convincing people that the Grail is a fad. So, separate legitimate controversy, and what its actually saying, from the other. -SV

Except for extremely controversial subjects, we dont split articles into neutral splits (neutral, pro, and con). Low-carb diets :(30,600) are (at least) as controversial as the GNU/Linux naming controversy (4490). The latter article is split into arguments for and arguments against, as is the Atkins Diet article.-SB

Rather than compare this article to a controversial case, take a look at how a good article is written. -SV

This article as it is now removes anything material what the term means; explain what it means before going into criticism of what it is. Ill let you do the restoring/rewriting or otherwise I will do it.

Fair enough. I'd like to integrate your new material into the previous structure (or a similar structure). I was hoping that the rv would prompt you to do it :-) I do think the old version is a better holding page, though, even if only because it doesn't suffer from the problems outlined above. chocolateboy 01:04, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"I was hoping that the rv would prompt you to do it :-)" Yes, well this is basic deletionist and reversionist dogma and its wrong: it just pisses people off. Why then wouldnt I start my "rewrite" by reverting back to what I wrote? ;) Regards. -SV 15:25, 2004 Jul 22 (UTC)

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Firstly, I would prefer it if you'd quote my comments in your replies instead of inlining your responses and reformating (and accidentally miscrediting (SB?)) my comments.

Thats not good enough.

It's a start, and it certainly contradicts your complaint that the article doesn't explain "what the thing is". Of course, the material you added would enhance that explanation (though I don't think it belongs in the intro, which, by definition, should be a short overview).

The problem with the controversial aspects in general are that a lot are industry related

So? There are vested interests on both sides of the controversy. When is that not the case? I don't see how that changes the fact that it is a controversy.

Rather than compare this article to a controversial case, take a look at how a good article is written.

GNU/Linux naming controversy is a good article: it's a featured article. The Atkins Diet article looks good to me as well. If you think it sucks, then surely it's easier to fix it than it is to flame it?

Why then wouldnt I start my "rewrite" by reverting back to what I wrote? ;)

Because the criticisms above still apply, and because you're too much of a gentleman! You know that by not reverting my revert the onus is now on me to integrate your new material :-) I'm working on it now... chocolateboy 16:04, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

) - Im looking at it now - will read in full later. But at a glance, the first thing an article should do is say what 'it' is: since this is a process, it means 'how the thing works.' I will add that at top. The sections might be a bit tight, but theres room for expansion. -SV

NPOV

Currently, the anti-low carb diet section has a "Response to criticism" section, and the pro- section does not. This should be fixed. --pile0nades^{talk | contrib} 01:01, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ketosis

Is ketosis harmful to one's health? Maybe the headaches are just temporary until one is accustomed to this metabolic state. Are there any animals living in ketosis? What about carnivores? --DenisDiderot 00:23, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Ketosis has not been shown to be harmful, and is in fact a normal bodily process which breaks down fat into ketones to provide energy. Cells can use ketones for energy as readily as they use glucose or alcohol. Excess ketones are excreted in urine.

It is generally believed that many early humans in hunter-gatherer societies routinely survived for months at a time with essentially no carbs in their diet.

The general purpose of a low-carb diet for weight loss is to promote ketosis. Many people claim that low-carb diets don't work because they do not reduce their carb intake enough to enter ketosis. Reducing carbs by 50% or even 75% from a typical US diet will generally not induce ketosis, which is why the Atkins induction phase limits carb intake to 20 grams per day. After induction phase, one gradually increases carb intake to find one's own ketosis threshold.

Many people confuse ketosis with ketoacidosis, which definitely IS harmful, as it breaks down lean tissue (muscle, etc.). If you are in reasonably good health but have excess fat, a low carb diet will put you into ketosis, not ketoacidosis. --Brouhaha 03:44, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

If ketosis was routinely observed in wild animals, the assumption about the hunter-gatherer societies would sound much more convincing. So is this the case? Once I heard about ketosis (not ketoacidosis) being harmful to cats, so a moderate low-carbohydrate diet was best for them.

As far as I know, Atkins doesn't propose to stay on ketosis forever but only in the beginning phase, in order to change the metabolic state of the body. I understand that the critical carbohydrate threshold in the last, enduring phase of the Atkins diet is related to the beginning of weight gain, not to the end of ketosis. Paleodiet proponents similarly propose to stay just above ketosis. --DenisDiderot 08:08, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

cleanup tag (March 1, 2006)

Current article smacks of unprofessionalism (but is fairly well-written). Here is why:

I know commonly culture right now equates "low carbohydrate" with packaged diets like "Atkins, Zone, etc." But this should not be a page about "low carb diets" in the pop culture sense. I'm not saying we should necessarily get rid of info about these packaged "diets". However, the article focus should be about lower carbohydrate intake from a medical standpoint (i.e. diet: "a way of eating" not diet: "a way to lose weight").

This issue became really apparent when I was looking up PCOS, which links here.

I would recommend putting references about pop culture diets into one section and keeping it there. That would go a long way to sorting out this problem.--geekyßroad^{. meow?} 06:44, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The article is also somewhat lacking in content and is a bit too one-sided in focusing too much on Atkins and company. SouthernComfort 02:20, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Arable land and low carb

"Advocates of the diet counter environmental criticisms by arguing that the majority of grain farm land was formerly poor quality pasture " Umm... doesn't matter. Animals are not so efficient they can turn marginal land into more energy vs. growing crops on the same land. And, at any rate, the majority of meat you'll buy in a grocery store has had significant inputs of grain and other crops that could be eaten by humans directly, especially pork and chicken.

Most grains and corn fed to farm animals for meat are not fit for human consumption.

How about some using name-tags here? My impression was that the vast majority of calories fed to farm animals in the US came from grains and corn that are indistinguishable from the further processed products sold in supermarkets, mostly soy and oats and corn -one would have to weigh the efficiency of processing the products in factories versus processing the products through livestock in factory farms. People once habitually ate pigs' feet and cows' tongue and brains and other meat parts that are now fed back to cows and other animals. After the calories the cows burn just living, most of that energy is now lost. Does anyone have any statistics about the percentage of cows (in America, globally, etc) who get any/some/most/all of their nutritional needs from pasture? I would think that very few American cows get any significant portion of their calories from pasture, but I have nothing to back that up. --Zachbe 23:11, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

PCOS and low carb

As a low-carb diet is a fundamental way of treating PCOS, should it not be mentioned in this article? AFAIK, LC is also used in treating some forms of epilepsy, in the form of a ketogenic diet. -Yupik 10:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

VLCD (Very Low Calorie Diet)

Is VLCD the same as Low-carbohydrate diet? Because there is no article about VLCD. There is now. Should VLCD be mentioned in this article, or should we make a completely new article about VLCD (in case it's a different diet)?

Here is some information about the VLCD diet ---Majestic- 02:35, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

They're not the same thing, as some VLCDs can be quite high-carb, although not all of them are. A new article should be created for these. -Yupik 20:09, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, I have already started the VLCD article. ---Majestic- 20:16, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

This section should be deleted completely from this article. For starters when I and many others i know (and there are many as i compete in bodybuilding) eat a low carb diet much of the protein consumed comes from protein supplement powders which have no effect on the animals. Most who follow a low carb diet who dont exercise intensely eat very few calories and most come from fat as it contains 9Grams per calorie. I think it makes a very trivial difference in animal protein consumed. -Dyl

Scientific Studies

I added a formal section on scientific studies related to low carb diets. In particular there is a new study in the NEJM published just a few days ago that basically establishes that the diet is safe (beneficial) over the long term. I think it is better to have a "neutral" section on the scientific evidence rather than putting this stuff in the pro/con arguments sections.

This still needs clean up. I simply tried to add some scientific background here. --Mcorazao 05:48, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I Read through the scientific studies section with great interest, and it is good that such information can now be found at wikipedia. However, I am not sure if such a long list of studies is propriate in a "low carbohydrate diet" article. It may be possible to have an entirely new wikipedia article that deals with low carbohydrate diet studies, however. As it is now, the article gets too long, in my opinion. You can add a "main article: low carbohydrate diet studies" etc.

Also original scientific studies, unless extremely important, may not belong in a wikipedia article like this. Review studies may have more interest.

Starting the section with a general summary of the research, as found for example in authoritative school books such as "Modern nutrition in health and disease" (2005) etc may be an idea. Information about how many studies have been undertaken and so on, may be interesting - in my opinion it is quite strange that so few studies have been undertaken, considering the widespread usage of such diets in US and worlwide; also quite strange that some of the studies finding beneficial effects is from countries such as Italy, Quwait etc.. (And that conclusions of studies sometimes seem to be presented in a slightly distored and biased way in media and scientific journals).

Anyway, thanks for your dedication to improve/expand this article.

Jakobat 09:52, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I appreciate the comments. I agree that the article is getting a bit long (and is currently a little incoherent). I honestly have been intending to do more edits so what I added is somewhat of a work-in-progress (the previous version was pretty incomplete so I figured I wasn't making it worse).

By way of explanation, my thinking regarding the studies was the following. With most topics you would simply state the consensus opinion of the scientific community and cite references in the footnotes. Unfortunately with this topic (specifically the efficacy and safety of these diets) there is no good "consensus" and there is no source that can be truly considered authoritative (in the sense that nobody credible would dispute it). There have been "review studies" (I cited one) but even these I'm not sure can be regarded as authoritative. I felt like in order to "objectively" give the reader the authoritative info it was somehow necessary to show a sampling of the studies instead of just saying "some studies say this and some say that" with a bunch of footnotes. In other words, it feels like if I try to summarize all of the research myself I am injecting bias no matter what I say unless I make the summary extremely vague. But maybe you're right that a separate "studies" page is the way to go. I do think, though, that the original scientific studies have to be used in the absence of accepted authorities (i.e. the research is still too new). Presumably some day the controversy will be settled and then a more conventional way of citing and utilizing the research makes sense.

In any event, please do feel free to reorganize anything I've written as you see fit. --Mcorazao 22:54, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Major revisions

I did a major rewrite of the first several sections basically trying to make this more complete. I need more citations than I have so far. Please comment on the rewrite and I hope I have not offended anybody whose work I've altered. --Mcorazao 05:18, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

You seem to have added a large section about myths; I didn't check whether you wrote it yourself or merely moved it around in the article. But as it is now it is not NPOV: it mentions claims by unspecified critics followed by a rebuttal while it is not clear whether there is any debate or whether these are strawman arguments against low-carb diets. In any case, I did some copyediting because the section headings ("Myth: low-carb diets only do XYZ") were not encyclopedic. I don't know much about low-carb dieting so I won't be arguing over whether the mentioned facts are correct or not. Han-Kwang 22:31, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the help!

The myths and misconceptions section is new. Can you be more specific about what is not NPOV in this section? In other words, is it just the phrasing you're objecting to or the content? I'm not sure about the "debate" you're referring to. The point of this section is not debate. This section simply lists some common questions and misunderstandings I've found repeatedly in various places (in some cases perpetuated by critics, in some cases just "urban legends" of sorts). It is simply intended as an FAQ sort of section ("FAQ" doesn't seem very encyclopedic which is why I didn't phrase it that way). But the point is not to argue about who believes what. The point is simply education on this topic (i.e. "in case this is what you thought here are the facts").

I added this specifically because these are common questions and yet it seems like there is no good way to clarify these points in other parts of the article (i.e. these are things that might easily be misunderstood in such a short article especially if the reader already has the misconception before reading the article).

In any event, if you have a better idea on organization please feel free to do it.

--Mcorazao 04:47, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Hankwang, I've attempted to neutralize some of the statements in the misconceptions section by trying to reduce implications of controversy. Please let me know if this is along the lines of what you have in mind.

Also, some of the editing that you did IMHO made the section a little less clear. Among other things by combining some sub-sections it is a little less apparent what the point was. The original intention was to have quick bullet items to address specific questions rather than turn it into a general discussion. Also, the way the new section titles are written it is a little less clear what question is being answered. I have not edited to address any of that but I'd request that you look more closely at your edits and revise a little.

Thanks.

--Mcorazao 16:29, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

I admit that I am rather skeptical of the merits of low-carb diets, and we probably agree that it is a controversial topic as evidenced by the "arguments for/against" sections. But I'll try to be objective about the presentation of the facts. The original "myths and misconceptions" section read as if it was taken straight from a pro-low-carb website. It is much better now that you removed most wordings such as "Some critics claim that...". I still have problems regarding NPOV with sections Exercise and Carbohydrate intake today and in the past. The way I read this section they would fit better in the controversy section.

The FAQ format that you had in mind is not appropriate for Wikipedia: Wikipedia articles should not list FAQs. Instead, format the information provided as neutral prose within the appropriate article(s). Maybe it's best to change the section title (now "misconceptions") into something else and remove all references to people believing otherwise. Han-Kwang 00:41, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Hmmmm, well, I guess I'm not sure quite how to organize this to address your concerns. In a general sense the right thing to do is to simply incorporate all this info into appropriate places in other parts of the article. The reason I didn't do that is

1) Brevity - For some of this info, in order to put it in other parts of the text and not have it just sound randomly inserted I'd have to dramatically expand the discussion in those other sections (i.e. talk about a lot of other things to make it a complete discussion). I think that would be too much detail for an encyclopedia article.

2) Clarity - The specific point of this section was to address misunderstandings that some people have in a direct fashion rather than bury it in the middle of the article.

I'm not quite sure how to remove any hint of a controversy without watering the section down so much that it no longer serves its purpose (I think the way the section is at the moment it is already a bit overdiluted). I'm not sure what, then, to do with the section (other than delete it. But I think that would leave out some important info that a typical reader might be looking for).

--Mcorazao 05:18, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I found a couple of counter examples to the arguments above.

Common_misconceptions_about_HIV_and_AIDS

Mathematics#Common_misconceptions

These are exactly the sort of thing I was trying to model in this section (the first one looks very much like what I originally had). And I do not see any suggestion that these sections/articles are inappropriate.

Please comment.

--Mcorazao 19:49, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

regarding introduction

It is written in the introduction that: "These diets specifically are intended to reduce carbohydrate consumption to the point that ketosis (burning fat instead of sugar for energy) is induced." Ketosis is a state where the body makes glucose (and other components) out of fats, and is a condition that the majority of the low carb diets try to avoid. The exception is the ketogenic diet, sometimes the atkins diet and also the inuit diet (which usually implies light ketosis). The Optimal diet, The Schwarzbein diet, South beach diet etc, does not cause ketosis, and in the case of "The Optimal Diet" carbs are recommended to be increased to the point where ketosis is absent.

It is true that the body when adapted to using fats as the main source of energy, will require much less carbohydrates, however. The minimum carb requirement to avoid ketosis is typically about 0.5-1.0 g per kg body weight / ideal body weight, more if physically active. Proteins may also be converted to carbohydrates without ketosis happening (as the body tries to avoid ketosis). It takes about 2 grams protein to make 1 gram glucose. The long term serious side effects of children using the ketogenic diet, may indeed be a testimony that ketois, particularly heavy ketosis, should be avoided as much as possible. Jakobat 15:23, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm, I'm honestly not too familiar with the Optimal Diet or the Schwarzbein Diet so I'll take your word on those. Regarding the others, at minimum the diets I am familiar with (e.g. the South Beach diet, the Atkins Diet, ProteinPower, Suzanne Somer's Diet, etc., etc.) do explicitly try to reduce carbohydrate consumption sufficiently to induce full ketosis, at least initially. South Beach, though, does tend to raise carbohydrate consumption in later stages to the point that ketosis is probably broken. From what I know of most others they do tend to allow raising carbohydrates later in maintenance stages to the point of creating a milder ketosis but not necessarily to eliminate ketosis altogether (to some degree this is a matter of definition since there is not precisely a clean break between producing ketones and not producing them).

In answer to your specific statement about the definition of ketosis, this is not technically correct. Ketosis, strictly speaking, has nothing to do with creating glucose. What you are referring to is gluconeogenesis. Generally when ketosis occurs so does gluconeogenesis but they are independent processes. Ketosis refers specifically to the body's going into full production of fatty acids and ketones to fuel the cells.

The concern I was specifically trying to address is the fact that many of the low fat diets and recommendations today could be described as low carbohydrate and vice versa (there is some convergence happening). In particular, the low-GI/low-GL diets are in some sense literally synonymous with low-carb although, in practice, they not really the same thing. So the question, then, is what should really be the differentiator? In other words, should the low-carbohydrate page be gotten rid of altogether in favor of just having a page for every diet individually? I think the answer is no. There is enough commonality out there that the term still has some relevance but I think for this article to be meaningful the definition has to be restricted.

In the absence of any formal body to define the term, I'll argue that the term "low carb" has, by default, come to mean "Atkins-like" (even if that arguably is a misnomer) in the sense that it refers to diets that are at least mildly ketogenic (i.e. regardless of whether any particular author says this or not, the diet can be considered "low carb" if its recommendations tend to cause ketosis). So any diet that does not fall in that category, even if its carbohydrate recommendations are lower than many other diets, should not be called "low carb".

--Mcorazao 17:04, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

One other note: The dangers you refer to regarding ketosis are highly debated. This article is not supposed to weigh in on the debate, merely at most describe the debate and the basic issues. This is what I have attempted to do in the article. Point being, whether a diet that is ketogenic is dangerous or not has no bearing on whether it belongs in Wikipedia or not. If you feel that the article is not sufficiently clear in elucidating the issues please do make appropriate edits.

--Mcorazao 22:31, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Here's another source about ketosis which mentions gluconeogenesis and why the former reduces the need for the latter: http://www.sportsnutritionsociety.org/site/pdf/Manninen-JISSN-1-2-7-11-04.pdf ...And hey, I don't know where else to put this, but where are the citations for Dr. Atkins supposedly deriving his diet from anecdotal evidence? Because I've got one of the earlier editions of his book (pre-1999) and he cites sources and studies out the wazoo. Maybe it's true in the first edition of his Diet Revolution book but it's surely not true later on.

--Dseilhan

Yes, you're correct. Ketosis has nothing to do with creating glucose. I just read a 2003-article about ketogenic diets, which contain some information you may fint interesting to improve the article: http://www.waynerad.com/NutritionReviewsKetones.pdf. I really dont have time to make much edits to the low carb article, but appreaciate the improvements you have made recently.

In the mentioned article, it is stated that:

"A low-carbohydrate diet is not necessarily a ketogenic diet. This is particularly true of diets with unrestricted content of meat and other protein-rich foods. Heinbecker reported in 1928 that Baf. Island Eskimos subsisting on their usual diet of meat (virtually the only source of carbohydrate in their food was the glycogen in seal muscle) showed minimal ketonuria. (As a reference point,muscle glycogen concentration in resting humans on a mixed diet is approximately 14.4 g/kg.) It is unlikely that these very small amounts of glycogen could have accounted for the absence of appreciable ketonuria. A much more likely explanation is that the glucose derived from catabolism of ingested meat protein was sufficient to prevent ketosis. McClellan and DuBois fed two human volunteers “carbohydrate-free” diets high in meat content (an Eskimo-type diet) for many months in a metabolic ward setting. Their findings led them to conclude that, in persons subsisting on diets very low in carbohydrate, ketosis varies inversely with the quantity of protein eaten. This occurs because approximately 48 to 58% of the amino acids in most dietary proteins are glucogenic. For every 2 grams of protein consumed in a carbohydrate-free diet, somewhere between 1.0 and 1.2 grams are potentially convertible to glucose. Therefore, to obtain a degree of hyperketonemia (approximately 2–7 mM/L) believed to be therapeutically effective in certain important medical conditions such as epilepsy, patients must rigorously restrict protein as well as carbohydrate intake37 and, when possible, increase their level of physical activity."

I think this explains my points/concerns more clearly: a low carbohydrate diet and a ketogenic diet is not necessarily the same, and therefore it is misleading to start the article out by defining a low carb diet as a diet that involves ketosis.

In some countries, particularly in Europe, there are other diets considered "low carb" that has greater popularity than the Atkins diet.

There s some confusion about GI/GL diets and low carb, unfortunately. Some claims that the South Beach diet is not a low carb diet at all. If this article is only about the Atkins diet, then there s no point having such an article, because then all the information could be moved to the wiki article about the Atkins diet.

I disagree with this point. One could similarly make an argument that if there were an article on "Aviation" and one on "Aviation in the United States" they should both be merged into "Aviation in the United States" because this practice started in the U.S. and aviation around the world is not that different from in the U.S. This would be a wrong attitude to take. The right thing to do is to make an "Aviation" article that describes this practice in the broadest sense (although still specific enough to be meaningful) and then make the latter article discuss more specifically what is unique in the U.S (if there is enough that is unique to make this a useful discussion). --Mcorazao 20:20, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

A definition of a "low carb diet" is, I agree, difficult, but there exist a dozen diets that typically uses only about 40-100 gram carbohydrates daily, they are all called "low carb" diets. This constitutes only about 10-20% of energy as carbohydrates, compared to the "normal" diet that contains about 50-60% of energy as carbohydrates. See for example: www.lowcarb.ca/atkins-diet-and-low-carb-plans/schwarzbein-principle.html. However, a diet with 25% or 30% of energy as carbohydrates may not really be called a low carb diet, but I don t know any diet that specifically recommends such amounts.

I mentioned the point about the possible dangers of the ketogenic diet just as a curiosity that may be discussed in an article like this. As this is a discussion page, I didn t find any problem with such a statements (but wouldn t have written the same in a wikipedia article).

84.244.81.86 19:03, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

For now I've removed the mention of ketosis in the introduction. I do still think that the introduction needs to be more specific in what it is defining so as to distinguish it from other diets (i.e. in some sense most diets today could to some degree be called "low carb" if we define this in the loosest sense).

--Mcorazao 02:53, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Atkins

See, the problem with the medical community and people who don't take the time to educate themselves is that they don't understand the Atkins diet. Your body does not need white flour, rice, sugar etc...to live! Dr. Atkins advised 20 grams of carbs for the first 2 weeks only. This is to rid the body of sugar cravings and break any food addictions. Plus it is a great jumpstart to pump up your metabolism. Dr. Atkins was a huge fan of eating your veggies, green leafy high nutrient veggies (sorry, french fries is not a vegtable). Read the book. EDUCATE YOURSELF It makes sense. If you're poor check it out at the library. People who judge without facts are fools. P.S. It's funny how diets like Atkins are supposed to be bad, yet you feel great while following the diet....interesting! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jmc31006 (talk • contribs) 23:47, 19 March 2007 (UTC).

Much of the current article seems to be loosely founded, unsourced criticism of Atkins and his Atkins Nutritional Approach. Atkins apparently started his diet from one published in JAMA when he was getting out of med school, with much of his subsequent work founded on nutrition literature, clinical testing and observation about metabolic syndromes / insulin resistance long before these were on most doctors' radar. One book that may considerably broaden the view of Atkins' nutritional range is his Vita-Nutrient Solution book. It is surprisingly orthomolecular in nature.--I'clast 22:38, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Re-writes

I re-wrote some sections, the scientific section I removed most of the information as unsourced, added or completed citation templates and added some qualifications to where the diets have been tested and found useful. The Johns Hopkins work I expanded the citation template a little bit, and re-wrote a bit too, and added back to the scientific studies section with a bit more of an explanation. It's not really low-carb, it's almost no-carb, all fat. WLU 17:12, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Avg Life-expectancy is no argument in this

Criticizm of the 'average age of ...' argument. The average life expectancy coefficien is extremely useless in most areas outside demografic research or social sciences. Like the BMI (body mass index) it comprises too many variables which are not related to the topic of interest (in case of BMI bodywheight is measured without taking into account the fat:bone:muscle tissue ratio - so that Arnold Schwarzenegger in his prime time is rated the same as Mr. Fat Guy as long as their body-height & wheight is the same)

The life expectancy measure includes child & infant death, death by accident (as being eaten by an wild animal, which intuitively might have happened more often in early stages of human development, than it is now), illnesses not related to nutritional or other important factors of life. It includes war, death through natural catastrophies... (endless list as long as it is a cause of death related or not to dietary habits and the respective effects) Additionally regarding early civilisations LE is a very, very crude estimate based on the investigation of the more or LESS abundantly existing skeletons. I would therefore prefer to have this argument erased My educational background: Mag.(between Master and Ph.D.) in Biology (genetics & neurobiology) Thx Mercurio.montague 01:19, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree it's a poor argument. Also, without sources it amounts to original research. Since no-one has disputed Mercurio's argument in 2 months, I'll delete it.

CJGB (Chris) 19:21, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Merge

Since an editor is proposing that Medical research related to low-carbohydrate diets be deleted, it may be that some of the material in that article can be merged with this article,Dreadstar † 08:40, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

The material in both articles needs to be cleaned up. I'd also suggest checking both articles for WP:NOR, it looks like there may be some original research in them. I haven't looked at the article size, but it may be that merging them will cause readability and article size issues, so this may actually be an article spinout rather than a POV fork. But I'll leave that up to the regular editors of these articles! Dreadstar † 09:02, 8 November 2007 (UTC)