Gary Taubes and the Big Fat Lies

In 2002, award-winning science journalist Gary Taubes wrote an article that appeared on the cover of the New York Times Magazine, titled "What if it's all been a big fat lie?" In it, he questioned the hypotheses that eating a diet low in fat was helpful for weight loss, or in fact, healthy at all. He discussed an alternative hypothesis, which had recently been revived by Dr. Robert Atkins with his New Diet Revolution, and was then gaining in popularity, at least among American dieters: that restricting carbohydrate was more effective -- and more healthful -- than restricting fat, or even total calories. He made much mention of "Endocrinology 101": insulin is used to store fat, and eating carbohydrate causes the body to secrete insulin. This article led to the book deal that made possible Taubes's 2007 masterpiece, "Good Calories, Bad Calories."

Shortly before, Taubes had written an article for Science magazine, The soft science of dietary fat, that covered some of the same ground.

Here are links to these seminal articles, and as many of the published responses to them as I can find. If you know of more, please let me know via the comments field.

The soft science of dietary fat
(Click here to view as pdf)
by Gary Taubes
– Science magazine, March 30, 2001

What if it's all been a big fat lie?
by Gary Taubes
– New York Times Magazine, July 7, 2002

Big Fat Fake: The Atkins diet controversy and the sorry state of science journalism.
 by Michael Fumento
– Reason magazine, March 2003

An exercise in vitriol rather than sound journalism
by Gary Taubes
– Reason online, March 2003

Gary Taubes tries to overwhelm the reader with sheer verbiage
By Michael Fumento
– Reason online, March 2003