Good Calories Bad Calories Book Report/Synopsis

[TromboneAl]

One word book report: Wow.

If you consider the obesity epidemic to be one of the world's top problems, then this (Good Calories Bad Calories by Gary Taube) is one of the most important books of the century. Having made that extravagant claim, I'll now tell you that you should not read this book, for two reasons.

Two Reasons Why You Shouldn't Read this Book

First Reason: it's really long. It's 600 pages of detailed, thought-requiring information. Although it's well written, it is a list of most or all of the research done on obesity in the last 150 years, with a discussion of what's right or wrong with each study. You have to pay attention, remember the names of researchers, and follow logic. Yuck. There were a few chapters that I skimmed through, but it still took me about a month to read it (a little at a time). If you have to read the book, I'd recommend reading the first four chapters, then chapters 19-24 and the epilogue. Read the epilogue first.

Second Reason: If you read this book, you are going to believe something that opposes what most people believe, and what health authorities tell us. Namely, you will believe that the obesity epidemic is not caused by eating too much or exercising too little, it is caused by a metabolic disorder that is in turn caused by prolonged consumption of carbohydrates. You will understand that the government's advice to eat a low-fat diet (and, in consequence a high-carbohydrate diet) is what has caused the dramatic increase in obesity over the last 20 years.

This means that every time you see a news report on how the government is going to require that schools serve more carbohydrates, you'll be annoyed. The food pyramid will depress you. You'll have to bite your tongue when people explain how they are improving their diet by cutting down on meat, and eating lots of grains (what I've done for the last 20 years). You'll be irritated every time you hear someone say "It's nothing more than calories in calories out." You'll pity the morbidly obese whose diets are just making things worse for them.

Ignorance is bliss -- stay away from this book.

I'll break the review into three parts. Part I summarizes the most important point of the book (carbohydrates cause obesity), Part II explains why health authorities don't believe this important point, and Part III describes how the book is relevant for us.