Acai Berry Hype

And Hype in General

Surfing the Internet for Weight Loss Supplements…

turns up an overwhelming number of sites extolling the virtues of the acai berry.

A review of the most recent 100 posts turned up only four that suggested using the acai berry as an effective weight loss product was a scam.

Read about those here…

Scammed by acai-berry site? You may be able to get money back - acai berry I recently wrote about the rash of scammers offering ‘free’ trials of acai-berry weight loss products. Today we learn that some of those taken in by these shady dealings stand to get a little of their money back, …

$350000 for acai berry drink customers - NextAdvisor Daily - A couple of weeks ago, Joe blogged about the acai berry and the outlandish claims made about its supposed health benefits. Yesterday, Arizona’s Attorney General.

Açai of relief | MNN - Mother Nature Network - You can’t browse the Internet without running across at least one: giant banner ads touting miraculous weight-loss and cure-all elixirs made from the exotic South American açai berry. This staple of the Amazon, a small blueberry-like …

I looked up acai berry (or just acai) and weight loss at the National Library of Medicine. Twenty-two papers appeared and not one had anything to do with weight loss. This means that no study has ever been completed and submitted to a reputable medical or scientific journal on the results of a study of acai berry and weight loss.

I’ve not been one to be a proponent of using references from the literature in my weight loss books; I received so much flak on this that in subsequent books, I caved under the pressure.

My arguments against this are simple:

• most people could not read the papers anyway
• most people won’t even get the papers
• few people have the training and background to do a pro/con on what they read
• the literature can be very biased, i.e., that cholesterol and fat cause heart disease
• you’d have to do exhaustive research to find out  that isn’t true because the journals rarely published the articles that debunked this theory (for more info read on this site and search “cholesterol myths”)

But you should be able to have at least one double-blind study so even if an author did not provide a reference, then one could do a search on it at the National Library of Medicine (pubmed).

I’m amazed at the vast number of people who convince themselves of these ideas. We’re moving very rapidly into the Age of Delusion.

The Internet Hype About the Acai Berry and Weight Loss Shows Just How Scary the Internet Can Be

How do people actually get to the truth anymore? It’s very difficult, if not impossible.

If Acai Berry Did Work There Must Be a Mechanism of Action

Now, it’s well-known that weight loss (fat loss) is purely a function of calories in vs. calories out. If you type in weight loss anywhere, say Twitter, you’ll discover that people and even the self-appointed weight loss experts have no clue about this basic fact. They conjure up all kinds of thoughts but always dance around this basic fact.

Wonder why we’re all so fat — you couldn’t find the truth if you were standing on it.

Confusion reigns supreme.

For our friend the berry, the most bizzare claims are conjured up:

• removal of toxins in the colon
• the power of the anti-oxidants
• appetite suppression
• removal of cellulite
• on and on it goes
• my favorite is that it increases your metabolism

That idea, of course, is the major hypester used by all the weight loss scam artists that abound in nature.

Folks, You Can’t Change Your Metabolism. And if You Believe You Can Then You Must Believe in Levitation

As a scientist, I have to ask what does this miracle berry do? It must somehow affect calories in vs. calories out.

If it doesn’t do that, then it’s not any good for weight loss.

What’s the Major Cause of Weight Loss Failure?

It’s Confusion

Even with all the competing weight loss plans and methods, people simply don’t know what to do to succeed.

HOW is that possible, surely these methods, the endless number of them, must work?

No, they really don’t because at the base of it, they’re just plans.

They don’t teach you HOW your body works; they don’t provide a roadmap.

I’m Going to Teach You How Your Body Works

So You Can Permanently Succeed With Weight Loss and Control

Look, I’m no different than anyone else. I grew up in 1950’s America and I got fat in 1950’s America. I was so embarrassed by being fat and getting stretch marks across my chest muscle’s skin that I never took my T-shirt off when I was a lifeguard.

I spent decades trying to solve the issue of what to do about controlling my body.

I even suffered through the process of getting a PhD in physiology and biochemistry at the Temple University School of Medicine in Philadelphia.

There really weren’t any answers there, but what I learned gave me the power to put the answers together. I researched endlessly and I learned all the intricacies, all the steps.

There really was no textbook of weight loss. Sure, there’re plenty of books but none ever summed it all up, put in all the steps, it was just piece meal.

There are, of course, all the books and programs in what I call the “Marketplace.”

But, that’s marketing — an attempt to get their hand in your wallet.

They don’t care if you succeed, it’ll just be more money for them when you fail.

Has Anyone Ever Taught You How Weight Loss Actually Works?

The answer is NO, or you wouldn’t be overweight. If you knew HOW to do it, then you’d only be fat if you didn’t do what you had to do. If that’s the case, then you shoulder the responsibility.

I ask people all the time, “How does weight control work, what are the rules you need to know?”

It’s very interesting that no one has ever been able to answer the question correctly.

Oh, they come up with all kinds of answers but they’re never correct.

There’s Only One Way to Lose Weight

WOW!

What do I mean by that? You mean to say the answer is simple?

“You mean it’s not complicated, not some overwhelming, complex set of problems that I have to deal with?”

As I describe on this site and in my writing, there’s only ONE way to lose and control weight and that’s to balance the calories you eat with the calories you burn.

But Weight Watchers says not to pay attention to calories and Nutri-System says to use the “scientific” Glycemic Index and eat the “good carbs” and stay away from the “bad carbs.” And someone else says to do this and that — blah, blah, blah.

It’s not true.

Well, you just learned something about all these plans and you just learned about all the other plans that are out there too. It’s all hogwash. If they don’t talk about calories as the only way to lose weight, then they’re wrong.

If you follow plans and don’t learn HOW to do it, you’ll never succeed.

It’s all about controlling calories. That’s it — Nature’s Law, the Law of Thermodynamics.

Guys, this is not my idea, it’s your body’s IDEA. I’m not making this up.

Think about it. There are Laws in Nature, like gravity. You jump up in the air and you’ll come down. How many times out of a 100?

100.

Why You Continue to Get Snookered

Since you don’t know HOW to lose and control your weight, the marketers continue to feed on your lack of knowledge. Unfortunately, you’re not armed with the knowledge-base needed to weed through the claims

Lets look at some of the leading Internet ads:

• Top 5 Weight Loss Pills (the pills don’t work)
• Lose 30 Pounds in 30 Days (how could anyone fall for that?)
• Quick Weight Loss (the quickest way is to eat nothing, can’t go any faster than that)
• Lose Weight Fast Now (and I’ll teach you how to fly)
• 30 Pounds in 3 Weeks — No Diet (the only way this might happen is if you starve yourself and even if you do, you won’t lose weight that fast, it’s not possible)

This is just a portion of the nonsense you hear about weight loss.

Now, if you go the medical route (they know it’s about calories), they’ll try to convince you to go low-fat. But, that won’t work either. In my books, I’ll teach you the basics you need to know to get around all of this misinformation.

I’ve taught you the FACTS about Calorie Balance. I’ve taught you that there’s only ONE WAY to lose weight. No one is different, NO ONE is ABOVE the LAW.

Now, that being said, there are many things that get in your way in following the LAW.

For example, look at the diet composition — the type of food you eat.

I can tell you without reservation the best choice is low-carbohydrate. I’ll give you more details on another page.

Look at Some of the Amazing Facts I’m Going to Teach You in My Books

• The Energy Balance Equation: the most important issue you need to know
• Understanding Metabolic Rate and How It Can’t Be Changed (selling you on the idea that you can change your metabolic rate is one of the main scams used today)
• How Weight Loss Affects Body Composition (this section teaches how to optimize fat loss and minimize muscle loss)
• The Effect of Dieting on Metabolism
• How to Use Biology Rather Than Willpower to Beat the Odds Against You
• What Adjustments You Have to Make While You’re Losing Weight
• The Power of Eating the Right Type of Food
• Carbohydrate-to-Fat Conversion
• Why Low-Fat Diets Don’t Work
• The Complete Scoop on the Low-Carb Diet and How You Can Use It to Your Advantage
• Why the Atkins’s Low-Carb Diet is Fatally Flawed
• Dietary Control of Appetite and Hunger
• How the Body “Burns” Food Calories
• The Cholesterol Myths
• The Importance of Physical Activity
• Description of the Exercise Prescription
• How Much Physical Activity Do We Need to Lose Weight and Maintain the Loss
• Putting the Program Together and Dr. Ellis’s 100/100 Plan
• The Science Underlying Dr. Ellis’s Weight Loss Program
• Focusing on the Major Issue Related to Weight Loss

My Plan is Not Really My Plan — It’s the Body’s Plan

Yes, that’s right, it’s the BODY’S PLAN. Since weight loss is dictated by one thing and one thing only, and it’s been that way since day one, this is pretty simple to do. I just gathered all of the information needed about HOW to apply it that was spread all over the place.

This isn’t marketing, this isn’t another IDEA or BELIEF system, it’s the SCIENCE of weight control.

This is the first time ever that everything you need to know about weight loss has been compiled in one place. It took decades to gather and analyze the thousands of research papers that’ve been published over the years.

I also had to overcome all the marketing and false ideas to arrive at the needed conclusions.

Make no mistake, this is a competitive arena and big bucks are thrown at weight loss. If I didn’t think I had something unique, something that no one had ever done before, I wouldn’t have entered this brutally difficult market. I can’t play with the big boys.

Free yourself and make the small investment in my books, they’re a complete source of information on weight loss and control, diet information for health and sports performance, training, and anti-aging.

Weight Gain is at Epidemic Proportions

With All the Endless Ideas and Opinions of “Experts” and Marketers, You’d Think the Weight Problem Was Solved By Now

There must be a solution — there has to be a solution, an answer?

But, maybe not.

Or, is it just that the 65% plus overweight (obese) population has no willpower, no personal resolve?

People just fail to take personal responsibility?

I just don’t buy that, I think it’s impossible that such a large percentage of people can’t do what has to be done.

We know people can lose weight — we see it all the time: on TV, on the cover of People Magazine.

But, we scientists also KNOW that 95% of these people regain all the weight they lost, plus even more.

The TV and magazine writers ask these “weight losers” what methods they used to lose the weight. Each often follows a different plan. We know that there are a lot of plans out there that, obviously, work because some people do lose weight.

But, a Question Arises that Needs an Answer:

Is There Some Common Denominator to All the Plans that Do Work?

Is there some underlying physiological factor that’s common to every person who loses weight? Now, if that’s the case, maybe, just maybe, we have the solution.

Is anyone looking for the common ground? I can’t see that many have done so. They never did it for me when I was fat — I just kept trying different plans.

Question #1: Is losing weight and keeping it off one of the most complex problems in the world — one that requires all of these different plans and methods for weight loss?

Or…

Question #2: Is losing weight and keeping it off one of the simplest things in the world — one that has only one solution that works for everyone?

I Needed to Solve this Problem for My Own Desperation

I got very fat at the age of twelve, very fat. My nickname in the eighth grade was “Fat Ass.” Not a good time psychologically to be tapped with a moniker like that!

I was desperate, I needed answers and I needed them fast.

At age eight I’d been introduced to muscle building by my Dad.

But, he was gone by age twelve, so I turned to the muscle magazines of the day.

I clinged to the written words contained within those magazines by what I perceived to be the experts.

Then I grew taller and the little Fat Ass was no more. And, since I was strong, because I lifted weights, I was a real good athlete.

My new model, however, was not one of “I don’t want to be 5 X 5,” but, I wanted to be lean and muscular. My initial goal was to have the veins in my arms show. OK, I achieved that goal.

Then, I just kept upping the ante — I wanted my abs to show. So, like everyone else, I tried all the plans. But, I never reached my goal. I figured the muscle magazine experts just didn’t know exactly HOW to do it even though many did do it. But, they really couldn’t teach someone else HOW to do it.

Now, I barely got through school, I was a jock and didn’t care for the books.

At age 23, I came up with what then (and even now) seemed like a preposterous idea: I’d go to graduate school with the plan of getting a doctorate. Would not be an easy task.

The other notion I held strongly was that the PhDs in graduate school would have the answers I so desperately needed, and I know that the vast majority of people hold the same belief.

Why did I believe this? Because the muscle mag guys failed me and someone must have the answers.

Boy, was I wrong about thinking the PhDs had the answers too.

In my failed efforts to get answers, I finally figured out that I’d have to find the answers on my own. I began doing very advanced experiments on myself and when I asked questions of the PhDs (my own PhD professors) about the outcome of my experiments, they’d have no answers for me.

Turned out I was doing experiments that scientists hadn’t even looked at yet. I’d gotten that far ahead of my time. Gradually, I began to figure things out.

Well, I finally did get those abs, but couldn’t hold them.

That was the next learning ground: what did I have to do to keep them, or, if I lost them, how could I get them back?

Graduate school took fifteen years because I had to work.

And as I learned physiology and biochemistry, I’d get side-tracked and read research papers in an effort to get my answers.

I learned that what I wanted to know was not in a textbook and pieces were spread all over the place in an endless number of independent research papers.

An example: I found out, in contrast to what the majority of research scientists said, that to build more muscle, I’d need to eat more protein. It was also argued that if one ate too much protein that he’d ruin his liver and kidneys.

I had to chase down the answer to that. It wasn’t true, but they never bothered to actually research the facts and find the truth. I did because I needed to.

now, more protein equals more meat and that meant more fat and cholesterol

had to track that one down too

found out in 1980 that we’d been lied to on that issue ever since the story broke in 1953

even now, in 2008, it’s still believed by the mainstream that fat and cholesterol are health hazards

don’t believe me that they aren’t?

just search “cholesterol myths” and start doing your research, you’ll be stunned by what you’ll turn up!

I Know What I’m Talking About Here is “Contrarianism” to the Max, but Only the Facts Matter to Me and to You!

Alright, that gives you a small taste of what I went through to find out how to lose and control my weight.

For decades I ran through a gauntlet of misinformation, false ideas, dead-ends, and just plain lies.

It was no easy task.

It’s even harder today, particularly because of the Internet as more and more “annointed” experts and talking heads appear every day.

As I found out, the supposed experts (doctors and PhDs) are mostly clueless and what you don’t know, that I know, is that “weight-loss science” is largely based on belief systems and not facts.

I know because I’m part of the brotherhood. I describe all these details in my There’s No Fountain of Youth book.

The next major group that screws you up are the marketers: this group is made up of book writers, weight loss program companies, writers of articles for magazines, supplement sellers, and the muscle-head crowd such as personal trainers.

Can You Actually Lose 30 Pounds in 30 Days as the Marketers Claim?

You can only lose 30 pounds in 30 days if you don’t eat anything, and most of that loss will be water weight.

Quit being duped, learn how to do it the right way, the optimal way.

It’s time to answer some of the questions I posed above.

Weight loss is not complex, in fact, it’s one of the simplest things on the planet, it’s guided by one simple rule, the Law of Thermodynamics: Calories Rule.

There are many who want to argue this and I’ll talk more about the Calorie Theory on another page.

Now, that being undeniable, many things affect this rule and you’d better understand every one of them if you want to succeed. I do and I wrote them all down for you in the multiple books that you need to read if you want all the answers that took me 50 years to compile.

Here’s my answer to the question about failure to lose weight: people just don’t know HOW to succeed.

They’ve been bombarded with so much nonsense that there’s no chance to succeed. Marketers want to keep it going so they can keep turning a profit. Others who are sincere in trying to provide answers just don’t know enough.

It took me decades to learn this.

Why Did I Bother to Write Books on Weight Loss and Control?

It’s so competitive and the chance of getting through all the noise is slim.

The answer is that I just got to the point where I knew that I piled up all this valuable information and I knew that others had not because I’d looked at and had done everything out there. I knew where all the holes and flaws were.

So, as you read my work, you’ll learn how to do it, the facts and all the facts.

There is ONE and only ONE underlying principle and we are all beholden to it. But, there are many pitfalls to following the ONE rule and I’ll teach them all to you.

No matter what you want to do with your body: just lose your belly or get abs or improve sports performance, I teach you what you need to do.

I’ll put on a set of blinders for you so that you can’t be suckered by all the misinformation and lies that surround this topic.

Our bodies work by a set of rules, physiological and biochemical, that cannot be broken.

Learn the rules and you cannot fail, unless you learn them but don’t live by them.

The Theme of this Site and My Work is that There is Only One Way to Lose Weight

You Must Eat Fewer Calories than You Burn

There can be many different ways to try to create a calorie imbalance between energy input (eating) and energy output (calorie burning), but creating the imbalance is the only thing that works for everyone. We are all the same.

There are, however, many ways to up-end the apple cart and failure to create the imbalance is the result.

This is exactly what I’m going to teach you:

everything that blocks or impedes the creation of a calorie imbalance

how to optimize the process of creating the imbalance

how to overcome blockages to creating the imbalance

how to overcome hurdles during the process

how to get rid of all the false belief systems people hold in their heads about why what they’re doing to lose weight isn’t working — and this may be the biggest reason for failure

This unearthing of the Solution is what makes this site and my work unique — this is not yet another diet plan — the endless introduction of one plan after the other because there’s so much weight loss failure.

We don’t need any more plans, we need to understand the answer — HOW it works.

Then, we finally become Empowered.