I got an interesting comment the other day on my entry which explained why I have begun writing in this blog again after over a year of being away from it. I decided it would be a good idea to, not just respond to the commenter, create a post out of the comment for the benefit of my readers to sort of dive into some interesting ideas that the comment touched base on. The below writings were originally a comment on my entry: What Brought Scott Out of Slumber?

Missi of MissisMusings.com writes:

Hi Scott…just started reading your blog today. Love the way you write and your article on Pavlina. You have a lot of great points in this post but I wanted to point out that science, while very useful, can’t PROVE anything. It serves only to disprove. We can’t know anything for certain. There have been many failures of the scientific method which I won’t go into here, but consider that even though a scientific theory may have several experiments to back it up, it takes only ONE counter example to disprove a theory. The BCS theory of superconductivity was confirmed over and over again for 25 years, but in 1986, just one experiment disproved that theory. Looking forward to reading more.

Missi,

In regard to your point about the scientific method and how one counterexample can disprove an entire theory – I’d argue that in many cases that is correct. That is what is so great about science, in addition to the fact that many times it will also take hundreds of different slight variations to confirm or disprove any theory and one of those slight variations may be the thing that finally breaks it. This is part of the beauty of science and one of the things that I will probably argue a lot throughout this blog in the coming weeks is that society is just not paying enough attention to scientific theory or to the idea of skepticism.

I would love for you to go into the “many failures” of the scientific method because as far as I can tell there are only a few. For example, there is no way that the scientific method can fully account for subjective experience. Other times we might lack instrumentation or instrumentation that is valid and reliable for measuring some particular item or thing. Of course, the scientific method is also responsible for every single technology and set of concepts that has allowed us to advance and progress in our quality of living throughout history. We would not have electric lights, cars, refrigerators, ergonomic chairs and keyboards, indoor plumbing, water heaters, 99.9% effective antibacterial soaps, and loads of other handy accessories in our daily lives if it were not for the scientific method.

Now, obviously if we are going to get into the deepest, simplest, most direct point of the philosophy of sorts behind empiricism we would come to the conclusion that when it comes down to it – we really cannot know anything for certain, as you said. But if I understand you correctly, I assume that what you mean by that statement is that ultimately we cannot know anything, only that we are perceiving our reality and even our perception of that reality may not exist as we know it, or even exist at all. But I think that by taking this approach and leaving that as your final conclusion for the extent to which science can benefit humanity we would probably end up robbing ourselves blind – as we did not consider the better alternative of applying a bit of rationalism to this whole idea.

So what if we cannot know anything for certain in its ultimate, end all finality? Who cares? The point is that we can come to conclusions which can help us determine if we are headed in the right direction with different things by using logical, rational, and even empirical arguments. Perhaps one of the most beneficial fields of science might be biology and the discovery of genetics from people like Gregor Mendel or Elizabeth Blackburn and her discovery of the telomere. If we can understand the very stuff from which we are made, this mysterious stuff that is now not so mysterious known as: deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and how to ensure that we can take care of this fantastic body of ours by catering to the enzymes, proteins, cells, and various other components that run it then perhaps we could live to see another few decades, or, as some are even trying to claim now: another ten decades.

Science is the beginning of possibilities and not only is it a place from which we can draw our inspiration it is also a place through which we can mold and sculpt new dreams. More importantly: science, to me, is a way in which we can actually find practical solutions to make some of those incredibly fantastic dreams come true. Finally, I must say that I would have to disagree that science cannot “prove” anything or that it can only “disprove” things. In fact, it proves through every experiment conducted that when an experiment is performed in a particular way certain events happen. If the experiment can be replicated over and over again with the exact same results then we can usually conclude that it is reasonable to assume that if those same events were to repeat themselves in the same fashion in the future we will be able to predict what will happen! Perhaps you meant something different by proof, maybe relating to theoretical or conceptual constructs.

Thank you so much for writing, Missi! Remember that many of these ideas I may have expanded upon in a bit more detail than might be personally necessary for you – this was to ensure that my readers also got a lucid description of what it was I was actually talking about!

Thanks,
Scott

Do you hate exercise? Sometimes, I do too. Most of the time I am one of those people who makes the excuse that I “do not have time” for exercise. Obviously, there is no real excuse and if you really want to exercise more you will but when it comes down to it exercising without changing your diet is really not going to get you any results, and changing your diet to just anything is really not a simple enough solution. If you really want to lose weight you have to also really want to be healthy.

I am going to tell you in easy terms how to do this by eating alone but I will also give you a small hint as to where to go with your exercise habits as well at the very end of this article. But let’s begin! I hope you’re taking notes.

First things first: take your vitamins every day. If you are like most people, your daily diet consists of modern foods that have been robbed of their naturally high nutritional intake. Your very first task to compensate for this could easily be to take a daily multivitamin and some nutritional supplements. I take a normal Centrum which you can get from virtually any grocery store.

• B-Vitamins unite! The B Vitamins are so ridiculously important to you and your activities throughout your waking day that I would even argue that even going a week without them is devastating in ways you probably cannot imagine and unfortunately are not even visible. One study even found that people had highly reduced brain volume after not getting a good intake of Vitamin B12 (Vogiatzoglou et al. “Vitamin B12 status and rate of brain volume loss in community-dwelling elderly.” Neurology. 2008. 71:826-832). I would highly recommend taking Vitamin B1 (Riboflavin), B6, and B12 supplements every day.

• There are good fats and bad fats for you. Omega-3’s are good, omega-6’s are bad. Pick up a Fish Oil supplement to get your daily intake of Omega-3 fatty acids.

• CoQ10 is another good one which will aid visual function.(Blasi MA, Bovina C, Carella G, et al. Does coenzyme Q10 play a role in opposing oxidative stress in patients with age-related macular degeneration? Opthalmologica. 2001 Jan-Feb;215(1):51-4).

Some simple rules that if you follow them, you will be just fine… Eating healthy is not actually as complicated as the media makes it sound. I will prove it to you if you want to try my approach. Essentially, all you have to do is…

• Do not eat anything that has anything but natural sugars (this means no sugar from anything but normal fruit). We have an obscene amount of sugar flooding our diets from modern food companies and the way that food is delivered. This means not drinking sodas. Ever. It also means no pies, cakes, cupcakes, whip cream, or when drinking your coffee sweetening it with sugar. If you absolutely MUST add sugar, I’d recommend trying out adding natural, real sugar (like “Sugar in the RAW”) and brown sugar. But really? You get enough natural sugars from everything you eat, especially fruits like oranges and apples. Oh, but on top of that – if you are to eat bread, eat less than one serving. Bread, or anything made from flour, is essentially sugar. Yes, sandwiches are bad for you.

• Eat a high protein diet. Your body can manufacture certain kinds of fats that it can burn off and various other things it might need but it has no real way to produce protein. Protein is in stuff like steak, chicken, turkey, ham and any kind of meat. Remember what I said about vitamin B12 – just a side note – you can only get your B vitamin intake naturally by eating red meat. The best source of protein anywhere? Eggs, eat LOTS of eggs!

• Fat does not make you fat. Do not worry about fat, but NEVER eat trans fat. Trans fat is sort of like eating plastic: it never fully breaks down, it’s artificial, and it kills you. On the other hand, normal fat, even saturated fat, you do not even have to worry about if you follow the other rules presented here! That means you can eat those giant, juicy, delicious pieces of meat and stuff that vegetarians hate so much and you will never have to regret it! And for vegetarians, see my last bullet point here.

• Drink lots of water. More than any other fluid that you could drink, drink more water than anything else. For stuff that is caffeinated, drink purely black tea or black coffee – do not add sugar. Water is essential. In fact, the majority of every single one of our bodies is composed of water anyway so always keep plenty of drinking water around.

• Do not count calories. If you’re eating the right foods – calories simply do not matter. When I first cut out all of the excess sugar from my own diet and began eating an enormous amount of eggs, meat, cheese, and vegetables I had a ravenous hunger I had not experienced in a long time. Interestingly, it was probably because I had dramatically dropped my blood sugar in a short amount of time and I ate more than ever. Even as I did, I got thinner and skinnier. Calories do not make the difference – the right food does.

• Forget about including corn as a “vegetable.” In fact, corn is actually more like a grain. It just is not that good for you and it sort of could be equated to the evil of eating sugar. High fructose corn syrup, which is in virtually every soda (again, do NOT drink sodas EVER), is in a variety of products and it is going to make you fatter and more unhealthy.

• When all else fails eat a low carb diet with low sugar and high protein. When it comes down to it the three main rules I am mainly trying to get across are:

• • Eat low carb.
  • Eat low sugar.
  • Eat high protein.

Think Atkin’s diet (cutting out carbs) where you eliminate bread, chips, crackers, and other items with high carb content because it is essentially the same as sugar. In regard to the more obvious things with actual sugar: getting rid of anything with sugar like sodas, syrup, cake, pie, ice cream, brownies, and so on. I know, I know, sugar is delicious but so is fat! Remember that there is nothing really that wrong with fat provided you are consuming a low carb, low sugar, high protein diet. It has been scientifically proven (and from my own experience) that your body will burn high amounts of fat if you consume a diet that follows these rules.

• And finally: do not be a vegetarian. Human beings, or homo sapiens, are omnivores. They need meat. Stop acting like we did not evolve and grow into existence on anything other than an omnivorous diet. We didn’t. Science shows it, the academic scholars agree, vegetarianism does not work as a sustainable diet. You are better off eating things like eggs and steak mixed in with vegetables, fruit, and just a tiny little tad of grains and sugars (again, less than 1 serving a day for the grains and sugars).

But hey, I should also make a brief side note: I even break my own rules from time to time. Every once and a while, I admit that I will eat ice cream, order pizza, and eat a piece of key lime pie. Fortunately, it hurts me less if I stick to these other rules.

Here is an example of what I typically might consume in a day following my rules.

MEAL 1 OF DAY:

• 2 Fried Eggs, Over Medium
• Orange Juice
• Supplements: Centrum Multivitamin
  • Chromium picolinate 200mcg
  • CoQ10 200mg
  • Fish Oil 1000mg
  • Vitamin C 500mg
• 4 Strips of Bacon

“BRUNCH”:

• Water
• Apple or Orange

MEAL 2, LUNCH:

• 12 Thin Slices of Ham
• Cheddar Cheese
• Cup of Milk
• 1 Can of Green Beans

MEAL 3:

• ½ of a Turkey Leg or 1 Chicken Breast or Steak (Medium)
• 1 Can of Sliced Carrots
• Water

Hopefully this will give you a good start. Looking at the layout of my typical meals and food throughout the day you might be a bit awe struck by realizing how much food you may be consuming that resembles nothing of this! In fact, in this example I might actually try throwing in a couple more eggs. Some people prefer eating eggs completely uncooked by themselves: not me. I like to cook all my food for the most part!

Follow a diet similar to this one and I promise you will see some results, both in your health and in your weight. But what do we do for exercise with this kind of a diet? A hint I will give you is that you should NOT be doing cardio. I repeat: do NOT do cardio! Instead, you want to do short burst, high intensity workouts which burn off whatever carbohydrate energy you may have in your system and then stop – this will program your body to burn whatever fat you have. Doing cardio while consuming a high carb diet is only going to make you miserable and probably will not get you good results.

I look forward to hearing the experiences of bloggers and other readers who may actually try this sort of approach!