Because of that book, within 3 months I went from running completely out of breath after 2 minutes of running, to finishing a half-marathon in 2 hours. And during the prior 3 months, I had lost 15 kilos by following the "slow-carb diet" described in the book.
Reading it seemed to flip a switch in my brain: before, I would think of my body as something I had little control over, while after, I saw it as not only something I had full control over, but as something I could hack. I've also followed up on quite a few of the product recommendations in the book (e.g. Inov-8 trainers, Aqua Sphere goggles, etc), and have yet to be disappointed.
That said, the book does come with a heavy dose of Tim's pointless boasting, half-assed chapters (e.g. the polyphasic sleep or the baseball batting ones), and far more conjecture than a book of that sort should have.
In a similar vein, I'd recommend Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe.
Before SS, my martial arts instructor always chided me: "Crazybear, don't power through the disarm. There are lots of guys bigger than you. Get the leverage right."
Now he tells newbies: "Don't power through the disarm, it won't work on a guy like Crazybear. Get the leverage right."
It's a simple how-to guide to getting strong. Just follow the program he gives and you become stronger - it's time tested and works well for pretty much everyone. Be really careful with deadlifts, particularly if you have back issues.
And in a similar vein, I'd recommend both Practical Programming and 5/3/1. The first is great to get a more thorough understanding on what is learned on SS and help's you understand how to modify your routines for maximum gains. 5/3/1 Has in my opinion been one of the best plans for the moment you stall on SS and need something more advanced. This stuff builds not only your body, but your strength and does heaps for your confidence which I believe is as important.
Starting Strength was definitely my best book of 2011. I went from a reasonably out of shape cube denizen who strained at a 125 pound low bar back squat to a 300 pound low bar back squat in just seven months. Rippetoe makes it very clear how any idiot can pick up a lot of strength in a very short period of time. Great Book.
Absolutely. In fact, Starting Strength was the next book I picked up after the 4-Hour Body, and it was immensely useful and motivating. If I could still edit my comment to mention Starting Strength, I would.
I would hate to be involved in a community (academic or otherwise) that mocks what has been widely known to be a reliable source of information. Wikipedia, that is. Opinions on Tim Ferris vary greatly.
Pretty much every university professor I've had is hell-bent on wikipedia's destruction. I've even had professors threaten to fail people for using it as a reference.
While wikipedia does have some errors, most of the mistakes seem to come in the form of someone sabotaging a disliked celebrity or organization's page. In light of this, it seems to me that most of the topics a student would be likely to write about for a term paper wouldn't be affected. Universities should always allow students to use wikipedia for one of their references, but they should also hold students accountable for the information they take from it.
"Pretty much every university professor I've had is hell-bent on wikipedia's destruction. I've even had professors threaten to fail people for using it as a reference."
I know university professors who love Wikipedia. Some even give their students the project of writing new Wikipedia articles.
Using Wikipedia and using it as a reference are two very different things. I use it as a place to find great references and to get a synopsis on a topic, like an encyclopedia was meant to be used. Having lived in the former USSR and reading a lot of encyclopedias produced by the former USSR, I would never trust an encyclopedia alone, no matter who wrote it, without sources.
What he means (I think) is that it's only a surface understanding. You won't be able to hold your own in a serious conversation with experts on the topic.
Why would/should one be mocked and humiliated for not being able to hold their own in a serious conversation with experts on some topic?
If I want to learn about a topic, wikipedia is great. If I need more information, I can look elsewhere but many times I don't need to. And except for maybe a handful of topics, I shouldn't expect to be able to seriously converse with an expert. Why should that be the goal? I think the goal is to find the answer to your questions, and that's it.
On a similar note I'd nominate Good Calories, Bad Calories as my book. Ferris gets my back up, especially the received wisdom that others quote from him, but Taubes really opened my eyes to the fact I could change what I eat and feel ten times better.
Turns out Taubes just masquerades as a scientist - he's more like gladwell in his approach to writing - it _appears_ to be correct, but if you dig a little deep at all, you discover there isn't really much substance.
So - in that sense, "Good Calories, Bad Calories" was a great book for me in 2011. It showed me how easy it was for you to to be taken in by fraudulent writing. Lesson learned.
I'm starting to read more about the (s)low carb/paleo/primal diets. I'm genuinely interested in reading more critiques of this class of diets. Charlatan is pretty harsh. I'd say this article paints Taubes as a person who hit on something that works, but who also explains that success with a flawed theory. What else do you have on Taubes' charlatanery/debunkedness?
The opening paragraph of the article:
"I'd like to begin by emphasizing that carbohydrate restriction has helped many people lose body fat and improve their metabolic health. Although it doesn't work for everyone, there is no doubt that carbohydrate restriction causes fat loss in many, perhaps even most obese people. For a subset of people, the results can be very impressive. I consider that to be a fact at this point, but that's not what I'll be discussing here."
And later on in the article:
"I think it's likely that refined carbohydrate and sugar can contribute to obesity, but by what mechanism? Insulin is not a compelling explanation."
I don't see a charlatan exposed here.
Guyenet's critique reminds me of a saying I heard a while back: Sure it works in practice, but does it work in theory?
Guyenet is pushing the same idea that most of mainstream nutrition science pushes: playing with the composition of a diet may affect your willingness to stick with a diet.
This is pretty well known, and has a fairly simple mechanism. By imposing artificial restrictions on your diet (no carbs, no acidic foods, nothing brown to yellow in color), you reduce the amount of calories you can consume. I.e., where you previously saw "ooh, lemon cake, let me eat", you now say "no yellow food". Caloric consumption goes down, and so does bodyfat.
This is why basically all weirdo diets work in the short term.
The fact is that Taubes theories about insulin have been shown to be false. His theories that obese people retain more fat has also been shown to be false. His theories that obese people have a lower metabolic rate have also been shown to be false. He continues to push them in spite of this. That's the definition of charlatan.
Then based on his presentation, state what you think his hypothetical fat person and thin person are eating. Most people come away with a completely wrong idea.
I am flabbergasted to see Gary Taubes being named a charlatan, especially since Taubes has written a whole freakishly long response to Guynete's articles on his blog:
Um, that's a) not a response to the article I provided, b) focuses on a single inconclusive paper while completely ignoring the other 42 papers cited by Guyanet.
I agree that by itself, the one paper Taubes focuses on does not prove all that much. So what?
Taubes is using rhetorical tricks - in this case, throwing words at the reader, confusing the issue, and declaring victory, in an effort to prevent fanboys from catching onto him. It'll probably work, he'll probably make millions more selling books. Doesn't make him any less the charlatan.
Yep. For all its faults, that book has changed my life. For the sole reason that it convinced me to try slow-carb dieting. That led to reading more about low-carb diets, and from there to (so far) sustainable weight loss.
Because of that book, within 3 months I went from running completely out of breath after 2 minutes of running, to finishing a half-marathon in 2 hours. And during the prior 3 months, I had lost 15 kilos by following the "slow-carb diet" described in the book.
Reading it seemed to flip a switch in my brain: before, I would think of my body as something I had little control over, while after, I saw it as not only something I had full control over, but as something I could hack. I've also followed up on quite a few of the product recommendations in the book (e.g. Inov-8 trainers, Aqua Sphere goggles, etc), and have yet to be disappointed.
That said, the book does come with a heavy dose of Tim's pointless boasting, half-assed chapters (e.g. the polyphasic sleep or the baseball batting ones), and far more conjecture than a book of that sort should have.