Debunking the Myth of Intermittent Fasting

Video: https://www.tiktok.com/@distilledscience/video/7526671459075312926

Transcript

Let's play science or suss. Dave Asprey just posted. A new study shows that one big meal torches 38% more calories than six small meals, which will supercharge your fat burning. This may be a new reason why intermittent fasting works really well. He calls himself the father of biohacking, which is supposed to be all about using science to take charge of and improve your health, which I'm theoretically all about. Let's rate his science skills using the claim framework. Dave has sold many products on the assumption that intermittent fasting is healthy for everyone. The study he twice calls new was published in 1991. Language. He uses hype terms that imply a large practical effect. Also, saying this will supercharge fat burning implies that the study results are extensible to his audience. The study had only seven healthy young women, eating either a single 750 calorie shake all at once or in six parts spread out over three hours. They measured the thermic effect of food, i.e. how many calories your body burns to digest what it eats. Assumptions. He assumes that these results will scale to all genders, ages, body types, and to full one meal a day diets. Impact. Technically, they did find that the big meal burned 38% more calories than the small meal. But that was just 58 versus 42 calories for a grand total of 16 more calories burned. That's like five raisins. They only measured five hours from the start of eating, but digestion normally takes five to six hours, so that wouldn't even fully cover the small meals. And they didn't measure physical activity. Evidence. Many more recent studies that kept people in chambers for full days and measured their energy expenditure found no impact of meal frequency on calories burn. And other recent meta-analyses have found that the biggest impact of intermittent fasting or meal timing in general is not on how many calories you burn from a given number, on how it impacts your appetite. And that varies a lot with the individual, so choose what works best for you. Final verdict?

Additional notes

The question is… did Dave actually LOOK at even the abstract of the study, or do we think he saw someone posting about it on social medial, liked the fact that it supported his existing beliefs, and decided to repost it as his own 📚 CITATIONS ”New” Study he references– from 1991: DOI: 10.1093/ajcn/54.5.783 Studies on people in chambers measuring full energy expenditure and NOT finding single large meals to be superior: PMID: 8383639 DOI: 10.1093/ajcn/54.5.783 DOI: 10.1017/S0007114507877646 Meta analyses on meal timing and intermittent fasting doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.42163 DOI: 10.1186/1550-2783-8-4 #science #health #factchecking #nutrition #fasting #intermittentfasting #biohacking #debunking #stem

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