This will be my last post before we arrive at our new home in Tennessee and get an internet connection.  If we have online access at hotels along the way, I’ll check comments.  In the meantime, please be patient if your comments don’t show up for a few days.  I’ll get to them when I can.

The other option would be to let all comments go through unmoderated.  If you’ve ever had a blog, you already know why I won’t do that:  the comments section would be filled with ads for Viagra, male “enhancement” pills, and countless other junk products.

Some scam artists pushing these products try to be clever about it and use web crawlers that leave what appear to be genuine comments, with a web address for the user’s handle.  Some of the crawlers are even programmed to pick up the title or some phrases from the blog post.

So just for fun, before I shut down the computers and pack them, I thought I’d share some choice selections (including the spelling errors, but minus the web addresses; I’m not going to advertise for them), along with the title of the post or page where they showed up.  The comments are in italics; my comments on the comments aren’t.

(Jimmy Moore’s Blogiversary, Part Two) you got some good points, but i’m not truly convinced of this. and i got to much confusion in my life at this moment to spend longer on it. i’ll check back to see your postings….

I can see why you wouldn’t be truly convinced about Jimmy Moore’s blogiversary.  He puts out so much material, I’m not sure he’s actually human.  I plan to check his pulse when I finally meet him on the low-carb cruise next March.

(Stretching The Truth) Hi, I just got my third tattoo, it’s a dragon tattoo on my right arm. I took the design from a cool site. It is a tattoo gallery of more than 3 thousands tattoo designs. After a couple of days looking at the tattoos I finally decided on this red dragon. The design was really high quality and the artist tattooed me with no problems. My friends liked it and I thrilled with the outcome.

Yes, I know tattoos are all the rage right now, but here’s some advice: it’s not good to make your generation’s fashions permanent.  Imagine my limited career opportunities today if I’d had a pair of purple bell-bottoms bolted to my legs in high school.  You may look cool now, but when you’re 50, you’ll probably end up as a dishwasher on a shrimping boat.

(Health Prevention) I don’t follow what was just posted.

That’s because it was clear and to the point.  I didn’t realize we had government employees reading the blog.

(Jane Brody’s Cholesterol Headache)  Can you get a hangover when your awake?

If you had a hangover and you weren’t awake, how would you know?   Jane Brody may have a theory about that, but trust me, it will be wrong.

(Weekend Bonus:  King Corn) I’m not sure if i agree with the Rex non potest peccare “Blog Archive.” This topic conslusion, there are so many opinions ..which to beleive?

Well, as a libertarian, here’s my opinion:  The king most definitely can do wrong.  If the king isn’t sleeping, he probably is doing wrong.  The idea that “the king can do no wrong” brings up bad memories of Richard Nixon and his “If the president does it, it’s not a crime” defense.

(Jimmy Moore Interview With Dr. Malcolm Kendrick) You were given some good points, but i’m not really convinced of this. and i got to much confusion in my life at this moment to spend some more time on it. i’ll check back to see your postings.

I’m not convinced Jimmy Moore actually interviewed Dr. Malcolm Kendrick either.  The whole thing sounded too smooth, too informative, too fun to be real.  Dangit, now I’m confused.

(2Blowhards Interview) This is absolutely perfect. Thanks a lot, I’ve been looking for something like this for a long time.

I suspect you’re just one of thousands who spent a lot of time looking for something like my interview with 2Blowhards.  There’s a huge worldwide demand for interviews with unknown rookie filmmakers on arts-and-politics web sites, but sadly, very little supply.

(Calorie-Count Menu Laws - A Load Of Bologna) Hi, I’m from Italy and I have published, it is about pizza bologna, check it.

My wife and I spent our honeymoon in Rome, and we couldn’t find pizza bologna anywhere.  Man, were we disappointed.  I raised hell with our travel agent about it.  I hope your book inspires the Italian chefs to get their act together and start putting bologna in all their creations.

(Fried Food Is Tasteless) I want to say thank you to the post author. I have found this information interesting and very useful, because a have common problems with fungal infection and this way i may solve my problem with health. Thanks again, God bless you!  Best Regards, Kelly.

I knew foods fried in vegetable oils are bland and can cause inflammation, but I didn’t know they cause fungal infections.  Glad I could help.

(And the Lap Band Played On) Yep - I would agree with that.. Thanks for the line.

Feel free to use my line about lap-band surgery any time.  Chicks will find you irresistible.  I’m married, so I’m glad someone will get some use out of it.

(Real Food by the Well Done Chef)  I don’t buy what you just said.

I understand.  Jason warned me that that his recipe for chicken stock is highly controversial.  His in-laws haven’t spoken to him in years, ever since he proposed the recipe at a family reunion.

(Michael Jackson) I am making a report on hiv testing men. Your topic Fat Head Michael Jackson helps me a lot. I have been looking for the information last Saturday but cannot find any.

I could’ve sworn I deleted the paragraphs about HIV testing in my Michael Jackson post.  I should stop my habit of posting after midnight; my editing skills decline pretty seriously.

(Stretching the Truth) är jag helt överens med mig själv.

Strange coincidence … that’s exactly what I said the first time I drank bourbon.  I was 15, and a friend of mine had a key to his neighbors’ house to water the plants while they were out of town.  We stole some bourbon from his mother’s liquor cabinet, let ourselves into the neighbors’ house around midnight, and drank the entire bottle on their screened-in back patio.  After my friend managed to extinguish a fire I ignited on my pant leg when I dropped a cigarette onto the exact spot where I’d slopped some bourbon, I tried to say something like, “I love you, man, in a strictly heterosexual way, of course,” but it came out “är jag helt överens med mig själv.” He said he understood and felt the same way about me.  Then he threw up.

(A Swat at PETA) I want to say thank you to the post author. I have found this information interesting and very useful, because a have common problems with fungal infection and this way i may solve my problem with health. Thanks again, God bless you!  Best Regards, Kelly.

Well, I can see where the vegan diet PETA pushes might cause a fungal infection, but I really thought you had it nailed with the fried-foods connection.  I hope the remission is permanent this time.

(Michael Jackson) When looking for an online dental insurance finder, it is always a good idea to approach companies that have a good reputation and track record in the dental benefits industry. Doing this can ensure that you obtain a reputable dental insurance service.

That was actually my first thought when Michael Jackson died: maybe he didn’t have good dental insurance and was seeing an inferior dentist.  A good dentist would have looked inside his mouth and said, “It looks like you’ve been eating a lot of biscuits.  That’s really bad for you.  Hey, did you know your dark fillings all turned white?  How did that happen?” If only …

(Weekend Bonus:  King Corn) You were given some good points, but i’m not really convinced of this. and i got to much confusion in my life at this moment to spend some more time on it. i’ll check back to see your postings.

I’ll try to clarify: my wife and I watched this movie and I liked it.  You’re just going to have to believe me on that one.  In the meantime, I’d suggest you take a few days off, go somewhere quiet, and try to work through all that confusion.

(Real Food by the Well Done Chef) Hi there, I found your blog via Google while searching for first aid for a chicken coop and your post looks very interesting for me.

My articles about first aid for a chicken coop draw unbelievable traffic.  I’m thinking of starting a separate blog dedicated to all the ways a chicken coop can be injured, how to distinguish between serious and non-serious chicken coop injuries, how to apply a tourniquet to a chicken coop, and when you should take a chicken coop to the hospital.

(Bonus Footage:  Frankenstein Fats) On the injured, not mean successful? Why yourself Ask, to da computerman Best Answer of, importance of this.With the federal-aid Phuket Properties, to its popularity consume relatively a.closed shoulders.

I tried to warn you that eating too many processed vegetable oils is bad for your brain.  You’ve got no one to blame but yourself.

(Michael Jackson) I want to say thank you to the post author. I have found this information interesting and very useful, because a have common problems with fungal infection and this way i may solve my problem with health. Thanks again, God bless you!  Best Regards, Kelly.

Kelly, I’m no doctor, but I seriously doubt my opinions about Michael Jackson will have any therapeutic effect at all.  You really should stop reading my blog and go get that fungus looked at by a professional.

Before I go, I want to mention how much fun I’ve been having with this blog.  After finishing the film and taking a much-needed breather, I realized there was still so much I wanted say, so I’m saying it.  Plus I look forward to reading the comments and insights from all of you.  You’re the conversation I enjoy with my morning coffee.

See y’all in Tennessee.  (I have to get used to saying that.)

Best,
Tom

A couple of readers sent me links to this article, titled “Why You Should Get Over Your Fear of Carbs.” Naturally, it’s all about the wonders of carbohydrates — you know, the only macronutrient we eat more of now than we did 30 years ago.  Boy, we sure got slim and healthy in the meantime, didn’t we? 

Here are some excerpts:

Combine carbs with a protein. Combining a protein with a carb not only fills you up, but it lowers the overall glycemic index (the GI, a popular way to measure the speed that carbs enter the bloodstream in the form of glucose or blood sugar).

Of course combining a carbohydrate with a protein lowers the overall glycemic index!  That’s because most protein foods have a low glycemic index.  Newsflash … diluting scotch with water lowers the overall alcohol percentage, too.

If the choice is between a large plate of pasta or a small portion of pasta and some meat, the pasta-meat combo will have a lower glyemic index.  But here’s a better option:  skip the pasta and eat your meat with a salad or some green vegetables.  Then you won’t have to worry about the glycemic index.

Eat carbs more often!  While the conventional approach to dieting teaches you how to omit meals, the smarter approach is to make sure you do not miss meals. And it gets better. Eating a carb-protein meal 4 times per day rather than 3 helps keep blood sugar levels stabilized.

Well, yeah, after the carbs you had at your last meal spike your insulin and lead to a drop in blood sugar, eating again will in fact raise your blood sugar.  That’s why people who eat sugar and starch end up craving between-meal snacks.  Eating those snacks is treating the symptom, not the cause … kind of like the drunks who keep drinking to avoid a hangover.

Research has demonstrated that regulating blood sugar levels regulates hormonal secretions which results in optimal fat burning.

Which is exactly why you shouldn’t be eating carbs and sending your blood sugar on a roller-coaster ride, you (expletive deleted … another expletive deleted … wow, that one surprised even us censors)!  If you skip the carbs, your body will make blood sugar from protein on an as-needed basis, which keeps it naturally regulated.

Not only this, but carbs must be present in the system for the chemical process of fat-burning to work.

I’m trying to find the perfect word to describe my reaction to this one … got it:  AAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!  What the heck is she basing this on?!  Carbs raise insulin, and insulin blocks the fat-burning process.  When you burn carbs for fuel, you also release the glycerol molecules that combine with fatty acids to form triglycerides — the only form in which fat can be stored in your adipose tissue.

If you believe her, try this interesting experiment:  don’t eat anything for two weeks.  See if the total lack of carbohydrates in your system prevents you from burning any fat.  By the way, I knew some body-builders in high school and college, and every Jack one of them went on a zero-carb diet to get cut before a tournament — and it worked.

Eat carbs at every meal.  Believe it or not, this is a healthier approach because you will stabilize blood sugar and prevent the urge to binge later. Skipping carbs at a meal almost always leads you to make up for it later; usually in the form of late-night cookies.

At the risk of repeating myself, what the heck is she basing this on? Skipping carbs at a meal means you’ll produce less insulin and enable your body to burn fat for fuel.  You’ll be less hungry, not more.  I sometimes go eight hours without eating after a fat-and-protein meal because I’m just not hungry.  Even the fat-phobic “eat your grains” nutritionists admit that people on low-carb diets usually end up eating less.  That’s why they came up with the “Sure, you’ll lose weight, but you’ll die of a heart attack” defense.

This is because the brain needs the glucose from carbs for fuel and if it doesn’t get more within 4 or 5 hours, your body has no choice but to break down lean body tissues (like muscles) for fuel.

Hmmm, I guess that explains how I managed to gain several pounds of muscle after starting a weight-lifting regimen while skipping carbs almost entirely. 

The brain does in fact need some glucose.  But it doesn’t need to get any of it from dietary carbohydrates.  Your body can easily convert dietary protein to glucose as needed.  And of course, your brain will happily run largely on the ketones that are produced when you burn fat for fuel.  So eat your protein and fat, and don’t worry about your brain treating your muscles like a 24-hour diner.

Eat carbs late at night. Yes this is just as important as the rest of your meals. And go ahead and eat dinner even if it is late. Starving yourself or skipping meals slows the metabolism and let’s face it — it isn’t fun to starve!

Everybody sing along:  sugar in the morning, sugar in the evening, sugar at supper time.  Eating carbs all day long — including late at night — is how we became a nation of type II diabetics.  And restricting carbs is the most effective way to treat type II diabetics.  Many can even live without insulin injections if they give up the carbs.

She’s right in saying that starving yourself will slow your metabolism.  But skipping the carbs isn’t starving yourself — and eating too many carbs stores calories as fat, which starves your cells of fuel even if you have eaten.  That’s why people eat more these days; they’re storing too many calories.

Don’t overdo it at one time. Your body isn’t a cash register. It doesn’t add up your total at the end of the day. It only cares how much you eat at a single meal. If you eat one entire large deep-dish pizza, your body converts the carb overload to fat storage. However if you only eat two light slices now and two slices for dinner 4 hours later, you won’t overload the bloodstream with glucose at one time, thus you will keep your fat-burning going.

Okay, let’s see … 1) carbs turn to glucose and overloading the bloodstream with glucose leads to fat storage, but 2) without carbs, you can’t burn fat.  Somebody with a degree in biochemistry please explain to me how these two statements can both be true.

Yes, I agree that overloading the body with carbs will cause a major insulin spike and signal the body to store fat.  If you’re going to eat 300 grams of carbohydrates in a day, by all means, spread them out.  But feeding your body a cup and a half of sugar over the course of a day simply isn’t necessary. 

The author is, of course, a professional nutritionist.  But there’s hope:  I scanned the comments posted in response to her article, and a lot of people called her on this nonsense.  Nutritionists are still feeding us a load of bologna, but plenty of people are simply refusing to swallow it anymore.

On Tuesday, July 28th, I’ll be interviewed by Dr. Kimberly DeOre on Doctor Radio on the Sirius network.  I’m due to call in at 9:30 a.m. Eastern.  (That’s 6:30 a.m. in California.  I should’ve moved to Tennessee a month ago.)

I haven’t seen any questions, so I don’t know the exact topic, but I’m pretty sure she’s not going to ask my opinion on whether the Cubs can win their division this season.

It’s a busy week, so I decided to put together some extra video footage from my interviews instead of writing a full post.  This series of clips deals with sugar and starch, and how they’re pretty much the same.

We covered this territory in Fat Head pretty extensively, but not everyone who reads this blog has seen the film, and I believe it’s a message that bears repeating early and often — like voting in Chicago.  My wife tells me she knows other mommies from her mommy group who won’t give their kids candy, but believe a lunch consisting of jam sandwiches with a side of fruit is just great — it’s lowfat, you see.

When I went through all the interview footage during editing, I of course had to choose from among many takes … I usually asked the same question a few different ways to make sure I’d have plenty of choices.  So it’s kind of fun (for me at least) to hear the medical experts offering different explanations of the same ideas.  Enjoy.

 

I’ll be spending a chunk of this week in Tennessee looking for a house, since it now looks as if we’ll finish up our house sale and hit the road within two weeks.  I probably won’t have time to write another post this week, but I’ll check comments as often as I can.

Some time ago, I recommended checking out Jason Sandeman’s Well Done Chef! web site.  Jason is a talented writer and a real chef who believes in real food.  In addition to writing about food and issues related to food, Jason has quite a few recipes available on his site.  Nothing like free lessons from a pro.

He recently offered to write an occasional  guest column for the Fat Head blog, including instructions on how to prepare real food.  I think it’s a great idea, because I sometimes receive emails from people asking for specific suggestions.  I don’t have much to tell them, other than mentioning some low-carb cookbooks my wife uses. 

Jason’s timing was also perfect (shouldn’t a chef have good timing?) because I usually write one of my bi-weekly posts on Thursday nights, and I’ll be away in Santa Barbara this Thursday.  Drs. Mike and Mary Dan Eades are hosting a Fat Head night: a showing of the film for a group of their friends who haven’t seen it yet, followed by a Q & A with the writer/director.  I’ll try to remember to snap some pictures.

So I’m stepping out, and Jason is stepping in.  Here’s his guest column:

Curing Franken Stock! How to Make Your Own Chicken Stock

You might be thinking to yourself that you would like to make something out of that magazine you saw at the dentist’s office. Perhaps you need to make rice, and are reaching for that Uncle B’s Rice-A-trocious and have a gnawing sense inside you that all is not good. Perhaps you might even go as far as to look at the ingredients in the can:

Chicken Stock, Chicken Fat, Salt, Autolyzed Yeast. Mono-sodium Glutamate, Dextrose, Hydrolyzed Wheat Gluten, Corn Oil, Flavoring and Hydrolyzed Soy and Corn Protein.

Sounds just like what Grandma used to make, right? Here, a little information:

Autolyzed wheat: Basically dead yeast cells whose enzymes are broken down into easier to digest components. It is also known as a flavor enhancer akin to MSG.

Monosodium Glutamate: There have been so many reports railing against the evils of this additive. What most people do not know is that it naturally occurs in nature. For instance, seaweed has a lot. Does it belong in chicken broth? Only if you are trying to pass off water as something “wholesome and nutritious.” Modern MSG is manufactured through fermentation of sugar canes and starches.

Dextrose: Where else can you find corn byproducts in your food?

Hydrolyzed Wheat Gluten: This byproduct of wheat is used to give “body” to the product, disguising the thin, insipid nature of the broth. Nice!

Corn oil: Another by-product (way of getting rid of) of corn. Do we need it? Certainly not. We have to keep those farmers employed though, so we may as well put it in there.

Flavoring: What does this mean, anyway? Do we really want to know?

Hydrolyzed Corn Protein: One would say that this is a synonym for “MSG”. We definitely need more to make this taste anything like broth.

Hydrolyzed Soy Protein: Well, we have done everything else to fill the “need” for corn, so now we are onto soy! See, this by-product adds “texture” to the broth. Yum.

The reason this is available to the general public is that the manufacturers are doing us a favor. See, you do not know how to make the real stuff, so you must buy the canned stuff. I even get Kraft™ magazine which tells me to use the stuff. 

I am here to change that for today.

There is good news about this and bad news. Let’s do the bad first, shall we? You will not be able to make this in 5 minutes. It is going to take a while, at least 4 hours. 

That is not so bad though, is it? Set aside a Sunday morning to start this, and then we get into the good news:  This is so easy, that an 8-year-old can do it, given the directions below. Once you start the process, you can let it happily simmer on the stove for the given time, and have great results. People will be flocking around your house to see what you are cooking that smells like Grandma’s did on a Sunday.

You will also have way more than a 10.5 oz (300 mL) can, and you can freeze it for when you need it next. You will be breaking free of Franken-Foods.

Let’s get started.

Chicken Stock (Broth)
Makes 1 gallon (4 liters)

Ingredients:

• 2 chicken carcasses cut into 1 inch pieces
• cold water to cover
• 1 onion, peeled, sliced into quarters
• 2 ribs celery, chopped coarsely
• 1 knot of ginger, halved
•  1/2 bulb garlic
• 4 bay leaves
•  1 bunch thyme
• 20 peppercorns

Directions:

1. Wash chicken pieces in plenty of cold water; drain.
2. Place into pot and cover with cold water.

 

3. Place over medium-high heat and bring to the boiling point.
4. Reduce heat to a gentle simmer (the lowest your stove will go!) and leave to simmer for 4 hours.

5. Skim the top of foam and scum. (These are impurities, and you will not like them anyway!)

 

6. After three hours of gentle simmering, place onion, celery, ginger, garlic, bay leaves, thyme and peppercorns on the top.

 

 

 

7. Simmer for another hour, skimming when necessary.
8. Remove from heat and let the pot rest for 15 minutes so the bones can fall to the bottom.

9. Ladle the stock out through a fine strainer into a container. You may choose to use cheesecloth. Give yourself a star if this is the case.

 

10. Cool the stock completely.
11. Refrigerate and use within 4 days, otherwise pack it up, label it and freeze for up to 6 months. 

After you have that, there is no reason to go back to the Franken Stock. Your dishes will automatically be better with them.  

If you ever come across a recipe that calls for a can of stock, then you can use this interchangeably. You will notice the difference.

Last week I pointed out several flaws in how researchers gathered data for the NIH-AARP Diet and Health Study, which has generated a slew of scary headlines such as Animal Fat Linked to Pancreatic Cancer.  

I also mentioned that even without those flaws, observational studies can at best only produce statistical associations. They don’t prove cause and effect … although you wouldn’t always know that from the headlines.

When people mention that obesity is associated with Type II diabetes and therefore must cause diabetes, I’ll sometimes reply that gray hair is also associated with diabetes and suggest we start giving Grecian Formula to everyone to prevent it.  That usually generates a reply along the lines of, “Come on, that’s ridiculous.  A lot of people develop diabetes when they’re older and happen to have gray hair.”

That’s the good news:  people don’t confuse an association with a cause when it’s obviously ridiculous.  The bad news is that if an association isn’t ridiculous, researchers often do believe they’re seeing cause and effect – especially if the association confirms a pre-existing bias.

Since observational studies produce so many alarmist headlines, I thought it would be a worthwhile exercise to recall just how spectacularly wrong a theory based on a statistical association can be.  This is a real-world example that generated a lot of headlines back in the day.

For decades, heart-disease researchers have known what while women certainly do develop heart disease, they typically develop it later in life than men … usually after menopause.  Naturally, this got the white-coat crowd wondering if female hormones – particularly estrogen – might protect against heart disease.  The theory seemed to make sense:  men don’t produce as much estrogen as women, and women don’t produce as much after menopause.

In the 1960s, men were given estrogen as part of a large clinical trial called the Coronary Drug Project – but that arm of the trial was stopped early because the men taking estrogen began dying from heart disease at a higher rate than men in the control group.  So the theory was adjusted:  estrogen appears to protect women from heart disease, but not men.

Then a major observational study gave the estrogen theory some real traction.  For 15 years, the Harvard Nurses Health Study had been tracking the diets, health habits and disease rates of more than 120,000 nurses.  When researchers pored over the mountains of data produced by that study, they found a startling statistic:  women who took estrogen had a 40% lower rate of heart disease than women who didn’t.  And women who continued taking estrogen were less likely to suffer a heart attack than women who took it for awhile and then stopped.

You can imagine the research papers and the headlines that resulted.  There calls among researchers and doctors alike to start prescribing estrogen to all post-menopausal women who had risk factors for heart disease.  More cautious researchers called for a controlled clinical trial before estrogen was given out like heart-healthy candy, and were criticized for it.  How could they, in good conscience, deny this obvious wonder drug to millions of women while waiting for long clinical trials to play out? 

A  pharmaceutical company, Wyeth-Ayerst, eventually funded the clinical trials – hoping, of course, that estrogen would be shown to prevent heart disease.  More than 16,000 women were randomized and enrolled in the study.  For five years, half received estrogen and half received a placebo.

The results were hardly what Wyeth-Ayerst had expected:  The women taking estrogen developed heart disease at a higher rate – 30% higher, in fact.  They were also more likely to suffer a stroke … another cardiovascular disease.  Later clinical trials confirmed the bad news.

The experts were flabbergasted.  The statistical correlation in the Harvard Nurses Study couldn’t have been more convincing:  women who took estrogen were far less likely to have a heart attack.  And it couldn’t have been fluke –  there were too many subjects involved.

So what happened?  Nobody can say for sure, but some researchers at the time offered an explanation that makes perfect sense:  the women in the Harvard study who took estrogen were more concerned about their health.  That’s why they took a hormone replacement in the first place. 

In other words, estrogen didn’t create healthy nurses, but health-conscious nurses did take estrogen.  Meanwhile, the health-conscious nurses were less likely to develop heart disease … for any number of reasons.

This really isn’t all that surprising. In clinical trials, people who religiously take their pills tend to have better health outcomes than people who don’t.  And guess what?  It doesn’t matter if the pill they’re taking is the actual drug or the placebo.  The difference is in the people, not necessarily in the pill. 

Some people care about their health.  Some people are lackadaisical about health.  Researchers call them “adherers” and “non-adherers.”  I have my own, more colorful labels.  The point is, we’re talking about different kinds of people, and that difference can produce statistical correlations in observational studies that have little if anything to do with the true cause and effect.

Think about the estrogen studies again for a moment: we now know that estrogen doesn’t prevent heart disease and in fact can make it worse.  And yet in a large, observational study, taking estrogen was associated with a steep reduction in heart disease – almost certainly because health-conscious women were more likely to take it.

Now think about some of the alarmist headlines and health-nanny propaganda you’ve read over the years, and ask yourself what’s really going on.  Here a few examples I came up with:

Does a diet high in saturated fat cause cancer and heart disease?   Nope.  But since saturated fat has been demonized for 30 years, health-conscious people probably eat less of it.

Does giving up meat make you healthier?  Nope.  But most people who become vegetarians are probably health conscious.

Do whole grains prevent diabetes and cancer?  Hell, no.  But they’re less likely to cause those diseases than white-flour products, and health-conscious people are more likely to choose them.

Does watching Fat Head at least three times give you a high IQ?  Uh … no.  But I’d like to think there’s a strong statistical correlation.