Gut Bacteria In Slim People Extract More Nutrients 212
Beeftopia writes "Researchers discovered that inserting gut bacteria from obese people into mice without gut bacteria led to the mice becoming obese. Gut bacteria from slim people inserted into the same mice did not lead to mouse obesity. The researchers concluded (abstract) that gut bacteria from the slim people were more efficient at extracting nutrients from food than those of the obese."
FIAF. (Score:4, Interesting)
This is a FIAF thing..
http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2007/12/fiaf-whos-fat-is-it-anyway.html [blogspot.com]
It's not that they're better at extracting nutrients, it's that they influence the body to expend more or less enery. The nutrient extraction is a side effect.
I do wish researchers would read the relevant literature before jumping to conclusions.
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Will the recipients of her gut bacteria be required to marry Lyle Lovett?
Re: FIAF. (Score:4, Funny)
Fuck Lyle Lovett, whoever the fuck that is. And fuck you too.
Isn't that what TechyImmigrant was getting at?
Re:FIAF. (Score:5, Funny)
Well the conclusion for non scientists is obvious. There's going to be a market to extract Julia Roberts' gut bacteria and reinject them into a bunch of fat one percenters for millions of dollars a pop.
Units are incorrect:
millions of dollars a poop.
Re:FIAF. (Score:5, Insightful)
yeah, i doubt the authors of the Science study above read any relevant literature at all.
Re:FIAF. (Score:4, Insightful)
You'd be surprised what kind of crap gets published in Science and Nature - and any other peer reviewed journal, for that matter. My favorite is lasers that don't actually lase. We see those all the time.
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You'd be surprised what kind of crap gets published in Science and Nature - and any other peer reviewed journal, for that matter. My favorite is lasers that don't actually lase. We see those all the time.
No, I wouldn't be surprised, I've seen it and lived it (including the non-lasing lasers you speak of!). Sad thing is that I'm about to reject a paper I'm currently reviewing not because of the science (which is sound) but because it's so poorly written as to be almost unreadable. The problem is that there are people who learn how to wave their hands really well and make lots of friends who help pass this tripe through the peer review process, and many decent scientists who don't write "too good."
[sigh]
Re:FIAF. (Score:5, Insightful)
You'd be surprised what kind of crap gets published in Science and Nature
certainly it's garbage compared to a blog post by a veterinarian.
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Better a vet with an encyclopedic knowledge of biochemistry than an anonymous coward.
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Better a vet with an encyclopedic knowledge of biochemistry than an anonymous coward.
At least anonymous coward posts are peer reviewed.
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Re:FIAF. (Score:4, Informative)
Gut bacteria feed themselves, not you.
More efficient or effective gut bacteria eat your lunch before you can.
While in our overfed society, having hyperactive gut bacteria keeping you thin would be good, fatties would be laughing in a major disaster, since they'd get to enjoy more of that roadkill dinner they scavenged, and they'd have longer reserves for the initial disaster and the ensuing survival training course.
Now if we could just toggle between two sets of bacteria, we'd have a pretty ideal setup!
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I do wish researchers would read the relevant literature before jumping to conclusions.
Good God, that type of thinking could alter not just research, but the very institutions that sponsor it as well!
Won't someone remember those brave souls that labor on... hoping for tenure and a nice comfy grant?
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Re:FIAF. (Score:5, Informative)
Check his citations. They're proper peer reviewed papers. His conclusions make sense and fit the data.
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Or just not waste time/effort on anon trolls.
Oh look the d word (Score:4, Insightful)
"However, the diet was also important for creating the right conditions for the lean twin's bacteria to flourish. A bacterial obesity therapy seems unlikely to work alongside a a diet of greasy burgers."
Guess what, proper diet still required. /surprise.
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lesson?
don't eat junk food. crap like soda acidifies your stomach more than it needs to and kills good bacteria
Re:Oh look the d word (Score:5, Funny)
lesson?
don't eat junk food. crap like soda acidifies your stomach more than it needs to and kills good bacteria
I'd suggest eating more beans and lentils, but we've already argued about global warming today.
Re:Oh look the d word (Score:4, Funny)
lesson?
don't eat junk food. crap like soda acidifies your stomach more than it needs to and kills good bacteria
I'd suggest eating more beans and lentils, but we've already argued about global warming today.
Don't forget about the latest "super-foods" like quinoa and the like. But I digest.
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Whate quinoa food is that?
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I have been telling farters that. They caused the global warming. :)
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PH of a very acidic soda = 2.522, PH of stomach acid = 1.35
Don't blame the soda for having an acidic stomach.
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PH of a very acidic soda = 2.522, PH of stomach acid = 1.35
Don't blame the soda for having an acidic stomach.
If you drink something acidic, the total acidity level of your stomach will be more than if you drink water.
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If you mix something less acidic with something more acidic the total resulting solution will be *less* acidic due to dilution. Your stomach however will produce some more acid in *extremely* short order to regulate it's pH so you don't... yknow... DIE.
Re:Oh look the d word (Score:5, Insightful)
PH of a very acidic soda = 2.522, PH of stomach acid = 1.35
Don't blame the soda for having an acidic stomach.
If you drink something acidic, the total acidity level of your stomach will be more than if you drink water.
That last statement is correct, but your stomach will still be less acidic than if you drank nothing, so it doesn't support the original statement that drinking soda makes your stomach more acidic as drinking anything less acidic than stomach acid will always make your stomach less acidic. There are a bunch of reasons why drinking lots of soda isn't a good idea, but acidifying your stomach isn't one of them.
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PH of a very acidic soda = 2.522, PH of stomach acid = 1.35
Don't blame the soda for having an acidic stomach.
If you drink something acidic, the total acidity level of your stomach will be more than if you drink water.
So acidity *add-up* ? ... Really ?
No. But volumes of liquid do ya dumbass troll. A can of acidic soda will vastly increase the overall impact of "acid in the stomach" because there's lots more of it than normal.
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PH of a very acidic soda = 2.522, PH of stomach acid = 1.35
Don't blame the soda for having an acidic stomach.
The stomach is not the interesting local of pH.
Further down the gut is where pH becomes an issue for sustaining
the bacteria mix in the gut. Poo does not exit at a pH of 3 or lower.
It is clear to me that the pH profile through the gut is important. Small
intestine bacteria is likely different from large bowel bugs.
As these bugs live and die they release "stuff" to be taken up by the
body and other bacteria. In addition the nutritional profile is modified.
Consider Vegemite and Marmite and note the folic
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And you're basing that on..... what? Maybe you're right, but I've never seen any evidence that suggests that this is true.
Sodas are bad for you because they contain ~32 grams of sugar per 12 oz can, AND people regularly drink several cans in one sitting. That much sugar is extremely bad for you. To learn why, watch this video. [youtu.be]
Dr Pepper Ten is cheaper than Dr Visit (Score:2)
Sodas are bad for you because they contain ~32 grams of sugar per 12 oz can
Dr Pepper Ten has less than one-tenth of that. I drink diet soda because it's cheaper than prescription stimulant or NRI medication.
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No? How about the very next paragraphs:
Keeping both sets of mice in the same cage kept them both lean if they were fed a low-fat, high-fibre diet. Mice are coprophagic, meaning they eat each other's droppings, and the lean twin's bacteria were passed into the mice which started with bacteria that should have made them obese.
However, a high-fat, low-fibre diet meant the mice still piled on the pounds.
Mind over Matter (Score:4, Funny)
I decide how much to eat and when, thus maintaining a healthy BMI and I get out and exercise frequently.
BTW it's Friday, time for my customary run to the beer fridge.
Re:Mind over Matter (Score:5, Interesting)
It isn't quite as easy as you might indicate.
I'm 40 and eat a better balanced diet than when I was 20. I exercise, but weight has gradually increased over time. I was at the bottom end of normal for what BMI charts say I should have been @ age 20. I am now about 15 lbs into the "overweight". My doc says I am fine because I have more muscle, but he wants me to hold the line.
I made some changes to exercise, working out 5 times a week in the morning and cutting out all soft drinks and after dinner snacking. I dropped 5 lbs in two weeks. i was hydrating a lot so it wasn't water that caused the drop.
After two weeks, same diet same exercise I dropped 5 more pounds in two weeks. I was feeling great. I was hoping for another 10. But guess what? Two months later, same diet same exercise I didn't drop a single pound. I am not sure how to explain it. It is like my body reached a certain point and compensated for the caloric drop by going into a lower metabolism rate.
When I was 20 I couldn't gain weight no matter what. Now, I know that 160# is a place that my body just doesn't want to drop below. I understand that I could increase exercise more or cut out even more food... but is it worth it?
I am convinced that BMI might be a guideline, but it isn't gospel. I can still run a mile at a good clip and keep up with the kids. What am I gaining by dropping into a somewhat arbitrary scale if I am healthy already?
I hit 190 and stay there (Score:2)
Re:I hit 190 and stay there (Score:4, Insightful)
even with 200+ miles on a bike a week I won't go below that.
Math doesn't argue, you're taking in what you burn in Calories. You are not keeping that weight on by inhaling too much air.
When I rode a road bike I was always around 165. Now I'm about 190, but don't get that level of aerobic workout anymore. But I remember well how much I ate and how I went to bed hungry so I wouldn't be towing a 5 extra pounds of lard up some of the California hills.
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Here is the simple solution:
1. Calculate what your TDEE is (not just your BMR), based on your level of activity. As you lose or gain weight, make sure you calculate your TDEE.accordingly.
2. If you eat more, burn more. As simple as that. It comes down to how anal you are (e.g. even if it's 2 am at night, I try and run off my excess calories for the day), but basically ~3500 calories = 1 lb.
3. So, now, if you're gaining weight, then, cut your calories until your weight is stable. Then decrease by ~500 calorie
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This. As long as you're in a caloric deficit, get enough protein (~1g/lb of lean body mass), and engage your muscles (I prefer to lift + rock climb + row), then you will shed the fat.
As long as you're engaging your muscles and giving them enough protein to recover, your body will simply burn the fat.
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BMI is a guideline, but it's a poorly applied one. The scale is designed for comparing nursing home patients who are completely sedentary. If you walk a couple miles a day you're officially too active for BMI to make much sense.
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BMI is a guideline, but it's a poorly applied one. The scale is designed for comparing nursing home patients who are completely sedentary. If you walk a couple miles a day you're officially too active for BMI to make much sense.
I have people trying to argue with me all the time, regarding how much BS the BMI calculation is when they are an NFL nose tackle, capable of benching 500 lbs, but the numbers can't distinguish them from a fanboi who dines on Cheetos and Pepsi morning, noon and night.
Total agreement, that's why Aerobic activity is included with BMI for a valid measure.
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If you really want to lose fat, supposedly strength training at ~80% your single rep maximum is the way to go. There's been some research that shows it's the most effective workout for weight loss. Depending on your current body type, you might add more muscle mass than you lose from fat, though.
Also, cut out as much sugar (particularly fructose containing sugars) [youtu.be] from your diet as possible.
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I seem to have hit the reverse effect. About 10-20 years ago, I put on quite a bit of weight, but my weight has been the same for years (~ 200 pounds and I am 6'0) , despite not worrying about what I eat and without a significant amount of exercise.
I don't understand what is going on, but I am very happy to not have significant weight gain for the past decade.
fat guys ... (Score:2, Funny)
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I think you might want to revisit your anatomy class.
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I think you might want to revisit your anatomy class.
To get tips on advanced sexual techinues?
That's why we have the Internet and Google.
Re:fat guys ... (Score:5, Funny)
Ayn Randius Greedatoria (Score:5, Funny)
So I'm chubby because I have socialist bacteria in me? I'm gonna hafta swallow a little Fox News TV for the buggers.
My new motto (Score:5, Funny)
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I'm not fat. I'm just more efficient at extracting nutrients than you.
Therefore you should eat less as your very efficient metabolism means you waste less
Good for you.
I have one of those darn inefficient metabolisms and eat like a chowhound without gaining a pound.
are you going to do anything with that 50lb sack of sugar?
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You might wat to brush up on the reading skills. Skinny people have the more efficient bacteria.
What other factors ... (Score:2)
Curious but not entirely unexpected. We are only beginning to understand the microbiome, but clearly it is important.
I wonder if cold weather might affect our gut bacteria too. I have unintentionally lost a good deal of weight in a short time in a cold, dry environment (at least 30 pounds in three months), but regained it when returning to a hot, humid climate. Of course, the cold weather also burned more calories - but I also ate a good deal more than usual. More notably, I note that people living in hot
Conclusion Makes No Sense (Score:3, Informative)
Parasites keep you thin. (Score:3)
It has long been recognized in farming that parasites keep animals thin. Same for people. Gee!
evolutionarily (Score:5, Interesting)
In evolution, one of the biggest threats to humans was starvation. So, what we consider a fat-causing problem these days probably used to be a big evolutionary advantage at some point.
Re:evolutionarily (Score:4, Interesting)
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Through most of human history, being plump was considered attractive. Food was hard enough to come by that most people were thin. Being fat meant you were well fed, and thus affluent. So people considered obesity to be attractive, thinness to be unattractive. The reversal came about only when average productivity increased to where nearly everyone could afford all they wanted to eat, and affluence was exhibited via other ways - like luxury cars, designer suits/dresses, rolex watches, Apple products, and current-gen 3D video cards. Well ok, maybe not the last one quite yet.
This is still true among North Koreans. Being told you have lost weight is considered an insult - that you're poor.
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Probably true for Summo wrestlers as well, but I don't know that for sure.
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This is a good point - we have to be careful about how we interpret observations. Science can be easily swayed by social norms, if we are not too careful.
Don't they have that backwards? (Score:2)
This only stands to reason that the gut bacteria from FAT people extract more nutrients from food and are more efficient, extracting more calories from that
Awesome (Score:3)
Wouldn't it be the other way around? (Score:3)
Is fatness a sign of inefficiency or efficiency?
If I went back 50 thousand years and saw two guys... a fat guy and a skinny guy... which would I assume was more prosperous? The association of fatness with poverty, ill health, etc is a modern association born of our great resources.
A man that needed 10,000 calories a day simply to survive could live in our society rather easily. However, 50,000 years ago he'd be a dead man.
Today, the standard of health is not what it was in our genetic past. That is not to say that the standard is wrong or that people that are skinny are TODAY healthier. However, implying that the fat people have less efficient digestive systems implies that somehow people are getting fat while extracting less from their food. Well... how did they get fat then?
Its possible I'm reading the wrong things into this and they're implying that the fat people NEED to eat more to get their base nutrition which leaves them with excess empty calories which leads to obesity. However, the experiment said they fed both sets of mice the same food. Which means Mouse 1 got fat on food X and Mouse 2 did not. Well where did those extra calories the skinny mouse got go if not into fat? Me thinks the little stinker pooped them out which doesn't seem like efficiency.
Possibly the solution here is to have a LESS efficient digestive system. Lots of dieting drugs effectively do that. I think there was one that made it hard for people to metabolize fat. It worked apparently... but had the unfortunate side effect of causing people to lose bowl control as an oily mess exploded from their rectums. I tried to put that both accurately and maturely... but... its not easy.
Look, I'm just pointing out the logical incongruity here of saying that a more efficient digestive system leads to a skinny mouse. That makes no sense.
In any case, great research... I await the bacterial transplants that will let us all eat like pigs while still looking smoking in our bathing suits.
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"However, implying that the fat people have less efficient digestive systems implies that somehow people are getting fat while extracting less from their food. Well... how did they get fat then?"
Think of the word "efficiency". The useful energy they get from their food is less than the thin people. Thus, there is a lot more "waste" - both fecal waste and unwanted things making it into the body but NOT being used for energy (e.g. fat).
It's not that they aren't eating the same things - it's that the thin pe
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"Think of the word "efficiency". The useful energy they get from their food is less than the thin people. Thus, there is a lot more "waste" - both fecal waste and unwanted things making it into the body but NOT being used for energy (e.g. fat)."
Except for what are they actually getting from the food that fat people aren't?
Do they have more energy? Are they using those calories for something? Because if they're just pooping the calories out that's not actually processing the food. That's just passing it thro
NOT NEW AT ALL. wake up dice! (Score:2)
No, I am not getting fecal transplant (Score:2)
No, I am not getting fecal transplant. Thank you.
Re:Hand Sanitizer (Score:5, Funny)
So you're the reason the bottle says "for external use only" on it...
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I'm thinking increasing usage of Hand sanitizer is killing our gut bacteria. Is there any correlation to this ?
I blame it on Jenny McCarthy.
Re:Hand Sanitizer (Score:5, Interesting)
No. It's antibiotics. Blaming it on hand cleaner is like running your AC, but complaining about how much charging your cell phone is running up your electric bill.
http://www.nbcnews.com/health/antibiotics-may-help-make-you-fat-studies-show-958812 [nbcnews.com]
Could antibiotics make you fat?
Two studies this week suggest that using antibiotics may save people’s lives, but could also change their metabolisms. Put together, the studies suggest that taking antibiotics might alter digestion to help people absorb calories from food they normally would be unable to digest.
Every human carries pounds of microorganisms that we couldn’t live without. They break down food and extract nutrients like Vitamin K for us. Antibiotics will kill some of these beneficial organisms, which is why so many doctors now tell patients to eat yogurt after taking a course of the drugs, to replace some of the good guys.
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There are any number of factors that could contribute to weight gain, but the most important of them all is poor diet.
As long as your diet is in order and you are active, your body cannot magically consume more than what you're putting into it. Calories in vs. calories out.
Ultimately, no matter what the other factors are, you are not going to gain weight by eating less. Sure, how your weight loss occurs, the distribution etc may vary based on genetics and other factors. But that it will occur is indisputabl
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many doctors now tell patients to eat yogurt after taking a course of the drugs, to replace some of the good guys.
As long as I remember, doctors always recommended to eat yogurt to rebuild the bacteria guts.
However, there are 2 big problems with yogurts:
1) they contain lactose, which is not as good as people believe. For example, if you have arthritis
2) some of them contain bifidus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bifidobacterium [wikipedia.org], and bifidus is used to fatten porks
To rebuild guts bacteria, I read on a french site that you need to eat:
1) less meat
2) less dairy products (but more goat's and sheep's milk)
3) more fruits, vege
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Studies show even taking antibiotics as a kid can make you fatter as an adult. You ever wonder why they give cattle antibiotics? I always thought it was to keep the cows from getting sick in the sorry conditions (factory farmed) cattle have to live in. May be some part of the equation, but they also do it to fatten them up:
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Could be any number of things... May be related to some bacteria symbiosis that is out of whack... Antibiotics could mess it up, or something that we usually don't consider infectious or harmful might decimate intestinal flora and leave us 'generally less healthy' to different degrees in each person.
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From my understanding of the article, more efficient gut bacteria convert food into forms more readily burned and less stored as fat.
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That's what I was curious about. Obviously, there's something more going on here, because it's not the amount of food you eat, or even the type, that determines if you get fat, it's what sort of surplus or deficit you're running after the food gets digested that ultimately matters.
And more efficient or less efficient bacteria would only dictate how much food you would have to consume to absorb a certain number of calories, not how much of it winds up being stored as fat.
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Obesity isn't supposed to be adaptive. Humans evolved during a time when we couldn't know when our next meal was coming and so we go to be very efficient at storing the excess fat. The problem is that people generally eat 3 times a day, or more, regardless of whether or not they're hungry. And when they do eat, they tend to eat more than what they need to survive.
In the conditions we evolved in, the effect over all is that we wouldn't wind up obese because we wouldn't get to over eat endlessly, at some poin
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Your body has no minimum requirement for nicotine. How would you do if you needed to smoke exactly 2 cigarettes a day, no more, no less.
I suspect you'd be doing a lot more of that backsliding and your misery would be increased manyfold.
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Hello, Drkstr1. Now you have. Over the last 10 years I ate very health and exercise extensively at one point for 3 years getting in 4.5 mile jogs 5x a week. and was still 5'10" 220lbs with a belly. I had found a drug at the time that helped get me below 200lbs (effedrin?SP?) but it was taken of the market (my conspiracy side says because it actually worked. sure a few unhealthy people couldn't handle it but...) I tried monitoring ketones for about 5 years. It helped but the weight still came and the s
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Congratulations! I knew if I kept reading I would sooner or later find someone with fingers jammed into their ears singing "LA LA LA LA, I'm better than they are because they're fat" and you are the first! Honestly I'm surprised I had to scroll down this far to find it.
You see, some people have other things to do.
So good for you that your free time, personal interests and gut bacteria aligned in your favor, but you might want to can that 'lazy' talk. Consider, Sammo Hung is also fond of the martial arts and
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Actually, no. Laziness and/or lack of discipline is the reason for being over weight.
So which are you then? lazy or undisciplined (martial arts fail?)
The opening to your previous post certainly sends a different message than you intended. I agree that healthy is quite possible even for someone who is deemed overweight. Personally I have always been overweight, even when I used to have time to bicycle 10-20 miles a day (easily exdhausting friends who were near their ideal weight and so deemed 'healthy').
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Here's a clue: [rant deleted]: you eat too much and never exercise.
To quote the article:
Mice with the obese twin's bacteria became heavier and put on more fat than mice given bacteria from a lean twin - and it was not down to the amount of food being eaten.
Next please....
Read the paper, it's not just correlation (Score:2, Insightful)
By careful work with mice, their experiment does indeed demonstrate causation. It was a very clever series of experiments, which is probably why it was accepted into the journal Science. Step back a bit and think: how likely is it that reviewers for Science--probably some of the world's top scientists--missed something as basic and as obvious as correlation != causation?
By the way, this subject seems to generate an angry, viceral reaction for you. Why is that? Does your self-worth revolve around feeling
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i am slightly overweight. i live a sedentary lifestyle. i feel pretty good about myself because i don't feel the pressure to conform to some arbitrary comicbook idealisation of what "looks healthy".
and i don't feel the need to belittle people living another lifestyle.
you have good self control? good for you. now go work on stuff like "respect" and "not being a douchebag about things" because that's where you are sorely lacking.
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Buy some yogurt?
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I was joking, I meant the bacteria *in* the yogurt, not necessarily after you eat it.
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Stardocking.
Google it.
Is that a new show on SyFy?