[Gem]

Originally Posted by inavalan

All great points, and I fully subscribe to them.

What I'd like to add ...

There are also many health providers, and "scientists" that are incompetent. It is very difficult for a layman to sift the right from wrong health related information, as it is in any other domain.

Lay people cherry pick information that supports their preconceptions. This is often how 'diets' are marketed. Scientists real things differently because when a paper comes out, the findings are discussed. The methodological weaknesses are pointed out. It is compared with previous findings and questioned where things don't match. You see, science is a conversation rather than an answer, and when I started to eat a proper nutrition profile I was surprised that it closely matched what my grandma served up in a day. She was uneducated housewife, could barely read, but she knew what was best for nutrition. That was before the 'obesity crisis' blew up. She lived to 87, and her husband (a railway labourer), to 91.

To disseminate an useful message, one has to pick their battles.

The Pareto principle (also known as the 80/20 rule) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.

This means that we could achieve 80% of our health goals by applying only 20% of the principles of healthy living.

That's true.

There are many tweaks that can improve our health, but if we concentrated on the low hanging fruits we could achieve a dramatic turn for the better in the general population's health.

For sure.

It is like the golden principle of weight loss: eat less calories!

Calories is the energy, and energy=mass, so the calorie balance (energy in vs. energy out) is the bottom line.



I googled 'The most important factor in weight (fat) loss'. The first article said it's sleep. The second said genes, metabolic rate, 'eating patterns', exercise. The third said social support, 'nutrition' and exercise. The fourth said NEAT (non exercise activity thermogenesis), which only means non-exercise activity . The fifth said portion control.


None of them said 'calorie balance' and explained that means energy in ve. energy out, so a lay reader will sleep better, get confused by the second one, do some exercise, get their mates to support them, take the stairs for NEAT, and eat smaller portions (but more often) - but still take more calories than they expend!

All of the articles' main points are valid (though the content was not) , but none of these points are 'the most important factor! Not one said calorie balance is the critical factor.


In this way there is heaps 'information' (and I'm using that term in the loosest possible way) out there, and it's not 'wrong' in general, but it's what I'd call a misleading 'twisting of the truth'.

Whenever I write this, immediately I get comments that say, but you should it x because ... , you shouldn't eat y because ... , you should do that type of workout because ... , etc., etc., and the message is lost in the heap of information.

Indeed - and the articles I exampled above also illustrate your point.