Good Calories, Bad Calories, by Gary Taubes

Yes, I'm following her posts in this thread.Personally, I have increased the proportion of carbs (but not sugar) in my diet, and lost a little weight. Well, okay, that's mostly a matter of reducing fat.To some extent, I think the parties are talking past each other.As best I can see, there are two issues with weight gain. One is the metabolism issue. The other is the psychological issue (what causes you to eat too much). And Molbiogirl is mostly talking about the first of those, while the others are more concerned about the second.

Mostly the fiber carbs.I don't much like things that are too sweet. That is a problem with fiber carbs. I eat them, and still feel hungry. So I have some coffee to try to delay further eating until the fiber carbs begin to digest enough that the hunger goes away.It's a bit off topic, but I wonder about artificial sweeteners. I have mostly avoided them. If I have a soda with sugar or similar sweetener, it does increase satiety. But artificially sweetened sodas seem to act as appetizers, and encourage more eating. Yes, that was my impression.

I normally brown bag for lunch at work.I typically take a few slices of bread, and some fake cheese slices. The "fake cheese" is actually a soy product. I make a couple of sandwiches out of that. Then I finish up with a couple of bananas.It's high carb, low fat, some vegetable protein.I still feel a bit hungry after eating, but that soon goes away.Last week, I forgot to bring the brown bag. So I went to the local McDonald's for a hamburger and fries. This was likely high fat, high protein, high calory.After eating the hamburger and fries, I felt extremely hungry. I managed to resist eating anything else, but that was hard.My suspicion is that it is that feeling of hunger that drives people to eat more. Counting calories doesn't work, because if people feel hungry enough they will "cheat" on the calory counting diets.To be clear, I am not suggesting that high fat, high protein encourage hunger. I think it far more likely that McDonald's spikes their food with something (it might be the salt) that increases the appetite. After all, they are in the business of selling food, and if they can get you to come back for more, that helps their business.My point: Forget about carbs vs fat vs protein. Concentrate on whatever it is that causes your appetite to spike. Avoid foods that make you feel hungry. Prefer foods that tend to reduce your appetite.