The new AAP recommendation from what I understand is that kids age 12-24 mo with a family history of heart disease / high cholesterol and/or who are overweight should be put on 2% milk instead of whole milk, because obviously dairy fat is evil. The recommendation for skim milk for everyone over age 2 remains the same. All this despite the fact that whole milk has been linked with brain development, and that young kids need a calorie dense diet AND there is absolutely no such thing as an overweight one year old. The press release I read did very little to hide that they are essentially encouraging a diet for babies.

It would be nice if the recommendation was to help kids eat more foods, but sadly that is not the impression I got.

Arwen: “So, would it be fair to say people could differ in rate of burn (within a range) via:
Digestive efficency…
Metabolic efficency…
Mitochondrial efficiency for intercellular energy gack…
Muscular/Bio-mechanical efficiency for how well we transfer that into movement….
Other stuff I’m not thinking of…..”

Pretty much. A lot of this is determined by genetics, and by how healthy a given part of the system is at a particular point in time (eg. you might have trouble assimilating food at the gut level for a variety of reasons). Appetite, on the other hand, is hormonal; it’s controlled by a complex feedback loop that responds to blood levels of nutrients, insulin usage, and stored energy usage. I think this is why people who diet end up stabilizing at a higher weight than their original stable point: the organism sees that its reserve was insufficient to weather the period of starvation, therefore it makes more storage. But I can’t back that up with published research.

As for the offers of guest-posting, I am incredibly honored. This could easily turn into a 10-page college paper, research-wise at least, and right now I have obligations to be met that preclude such research… But thank you. That did wonderful things for my ego. :D

As far as this: “Tyson de-beaks their birds?! HOLY FLIPPIN TORPEDO NUGGETS”

and that’s just (one aspect of brutality against) chickens….you may want to look into how pigs, cows, lamb, and turkeys are mistreated in CAFOs also.

Y’all, if you’re going to eat meat, or dairy, or soymilk and tofu,
just do your research. We all owe it to ourselves to be educated consumers. If you want to eat meat, super, but watch the videos about factory farming first, and THEN decide if it’s for you. If you’re still okay with it, awesome. If not, make your choice, find an alternative source, or give it up altogether. Ditto with tofu and soymilk. Understand that it most likely contains GMO soybeans and contains phytoestrogens. If that’s cool with you, drink up. The food industry does a REMARKABLE job of divorcing the final product – that goes into your mouth – from it’s original source. This is done purposefully and consciously. Because in a case like Tyson, they are readily aware that if more people knew about their inhumane practices, less people would be eating chicken. They’re not going to tell you the truth, so it’s our responsibility to seek it out.

Like how Tari got to the bottom of the 3,700kcal figure and it’s true meaning.

This is perfectly said.

This comment really has no purpose but to say I missed this site while I was on my hiatus. Keep up the great comments, I’m learning a lot from this thread. :)