You quotes from mainstream sources certainly indicate that the nutrition science community is familiar with the diverse factors that can lead to obesity—but that’s not surprising and wouldn’t be surprising to Taubes. The issue has never been that the mainstream refuses to recognize that heredity, medications, hormones and altered metabolism can contribute to individuals being overweight. The issue is that these facts contribute almost nothing to the medical and nutrition authorities response to individuals trying to lose weight or to the world’s growing obesity problem more generally.
You’ve found plenty of quotes from Taubes in which he doesn’t really make that distinction. We can agree he is guilty of using hyperbolic language to make his point and avoids equivocating to make his writing sound better. If he wants to avoid being read uncharitably by you in the future he should stop that.
After talking about how mainstream sources do take things other than calories in—calories out into consideration, and linking to someone (Guyenet) who seems to have actually taken these other things seriously in his consideration of the causes of obesity; you make Taubes’ point for him by concluding that we should actually be talking about akrasia.
I’ve lowered my pre-series credence for the position that “Taubes is right about how low-carb diets work” due to the Guyenet piece. My credence for “Low-carb diets are more effective for losing weight than calorie counting” remains high. As does “Sugar and other easily-digestible, low-fiber carbohydrates—not over-eating, portion-size or lack of exercise—are the primary causes of the ‘obesity epidemic’ in the Western world.”
You quotes from mainstream sources certainly indicate that the nutrition science community is familiar with the diverse factors that can lead to obesity—but that’s not surprising and wouldn’t be surprising to Taubes. The issue has never been that the mainstream refuses to recognize that heredity, medications, hormones and altered metabolism can contribute to individuals being overweight. The issue is that these facts contribute almost nothing to the medical and nutrition authorities response to individuals trying to lose weight or to the world’s growing obesity problem more generally.
You’ve found plenty of quotes from Taubes in which he doesn’t really make that distinction. We can agree he is guilty of using hyperbolic language to make his point and avoids equivocating to make his writing sound better. If he wants to avoid being read uncharitably by you in the future he should stop that.
After talking about how mainstream sources do take things other than calories in—calories out into consideration, and linking to someone (Guyenet) who seems to have actually taken these other things seriously in his consideration of the causes of obesity; you make Taubes’ point for him by concluding that we should actually be talking about akrasia.
I’ve lowered my pre-series credence for the position that “Taubes is right about how low-carb diets work” due to the Guyenet piece. My credence for “Low-carb diets are more effective for losing weight than calorie counting” remains high. As does “Sugar and other easily-digestible, low-fiber carbohydrates—not over-eating, portion-size or lack of exercise—are the primary causes of the ‘obesity epidemic’ in the Western world.”