#import2-demo

Emotional  .. 

1. "But your body needs carbohydrates!!"

This is a half-truth. Your body doesn't need carbohydrates, your body needs energy. The human body can obtain energy by oxidizing any of the following: carbohydrates, fat, protein, and alcohol. In fact, it's well-known approximately how much energy the body can obtain from each:

1g of carbohydrates yields: 16kJ (3.75 kcal)

1g of protein provides: 17kJ (4 kcal)

1g of fat provides: 37kJ (9 kcal)

1g of alcohol provides: 29kJ (7 kcal)

So, while it's true that the body can obtain energy from carbohydrates (indeed, most easily and efficiently, as well), it can just as readily get energy in various other ways. An important distinction should be made that low-carb diets are called "low-carb" for a reason. They are not "no-carb" diets (the induction phase of the Atkins' diet notwithstanding). Humans did not evolve with the sort of refined carbohydrates that we have at our disposal today. They evolved eating what they could find as hunter-gatherers until the advent of agriculture. A healthy (non-corrective) diet should have carbohydrates in it, but there is no need for the amount of refined carbohydrates that most people (particularly Americans) are inundated with daily.

2. "Eating low-carb can cause kidney/liver/*insert organ here* failure!!"

This is not true. There has never been one single study yielding such results, nor one single incident of organ failure due to eating low-carb. I've researched it a bit, and the closest I can find is a study done by the AKF that showed a correlation between high protein diets and a tendency towards marginal levels of dehydration in long-distance runners. Note that "high protein" is not the same as "low carbohydrate". The "high protein" diet they subjected the runners to was around 246 grams of protein a day, which is far in excess of even the average Atkins' dieters' intake.

3. "Low-carb diets make you lose weight, but you just gain it all back"

This one's easy. Lots of people go on low carb diets like Atkins' as a quick fix. You tend to drop a lot of initial water weight very quickly. Many people with no understanding of nutrition and absolutely no willpower go on this diet and lose that weight, and then go right back to their prior bad eating habits. This, coupled with the recent findings about the hormone ghrelin's post-diet impact on the body, makes it no surprise that they gain the weight back. Their diet didn't fail them -- they failed their diet. A low-carb diet requires a change in lifestyle. Anything less is a waste of time.

4. "Low-carb diets are bad for your heart/blood pressure/cholesterol" (also "Dr Atkins himself just had a heart attack!")

No study has ever shown that low-carb diets have a negative impact on your risk for heart disease, blood pressure, or cholesterol. In fact, quite the opposite. Several studies, including one by Gary Foster at the University of Pennsylvania, Sam Klein, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at Washington University in St. Louis, and Jim Hill, who runs the University of Colorado Center for Human Nutrition in Denver, have shown that low-carb diets have actually resulted in lower levels of triglycerides, in addition to weight loss. Published studies on the effects of low-carb diets are difficult to find, thanks largely to a complete lack of funding and cooperation by the NIH (surprise).

Dr. Atkins' heart attack was caused by cardiomyopathy, which was caused by an infection that spread to his heart. Neither his diet, nor any symptoms of heart disease were responsible for the attack.

5. "Ketosis is an unnatural, unhealthy state for the body."

This is one of the most popular, most annoying, and most completely false arguments against low-carb diets. This statement stems from a confusion of ketosis with "ketoacidosis", which are two very different things.

Ketosis is a natural process by which your body shifts from deriving energy carbohydrates to deriving energy from stored fat. Sensitive tests of ketone levels in the blood have shown that the body is in some state of ketosis every day, regardless of diet.

Ketoacidosis, on the other hand, is a dangerous condition most frequently found in insulin-deprived type-1 diabetics which results in a buildup of blood glucose and a subsequent extreme teardown of muscle and fat tissue.

The time is here again. Another iOS update, another frenzy and another blog post. Over the past few years every time Apple brings an iOS update, it brings along a lot of requested features and some great new capabilities to a great hardware device. Some love it, some hate it but nobody can ignore it. So lets cut to the chase. 1. Notification Center: This is a big one and a much needed one. Currently the notification system in iOS was a bit obtrusive. You were enjoying a great game of Angry Birds or writing a serious email and BOOM.... a pop showed up right in the middle of the screen with a message from some stupid marketing guy. You would have to pause whatever you were doing, read or dismiss the alert and then get back to whatever you were doing. This was not only a mood spoiler for me but sometimes distracted me from the important things. The new notification center fixes all this. Now there is a cool non obtrusive notification on the top of the screen and you can carry on doing whatever you were without being held up. There is a dedicated notification center screen which shows all your notifications from any app. This is one place you can see all your unread emails, messages, push notifications and other stuff. Also shows the local weather and stock updates in the current beta. A very welcome addition. (The notification center) 2. iMessage: Move over whatsapp. BBM your days are over. Thats what comes to mind when you first try out iMessage. So what's new here?

Auto Switch between iMessage and SMS. iMessage works on WIFI/EDGE/3G. When none are available it switched to SMS mode automatically.

When you type the number/name of a contact in the message app it will auto query if the the person is using an iOS 5 device. If they are and both parties are on a data connection, then ongoing messages will be through the iMessage system and will be FREE.

There is no need to add someone to an iMessage list as it auto detects the other users. Works seamlessly.

You can send any kind of media through iMessage. Video/Photo/Audio. Just about anything. All for FREE.

(The iMessage app. Notice it detecting the target user in the first pic) 3. Twitter Integration: iOS 5 brings Twitter integration and now you can tweet photos right from the photo app. Also twitter accounts are built into the system with the option of downloading the twitter app.

(You can now tweet pics directly) 4. Camera: The Camera app can now take pictures with the "volume up" hardware button. A much needed feature. Double tapping on the lock screen reveals a Camera icon which takes you directly to the camera app to capture those sudden moments in life.

(Notice the new camera button besides the unlock tab)

5. Photo editing: The built in Photo app now lets you edit your photos on the go.

You can rotate / crop photos

Do an Auto-Enhance

Red-Eye correction algorithm

6. Reminders: This new app brings the most missed feature in iOS. Now you can create new tasks and sync them with iCal. A complete and good looking task manager.

7. WIFI - Sync: Yes you read it right. You no longer need to connect the iPhone/iPad/iPod to sync it with your Mac/PC. Wireless sync brings effortless syncing. So whenever you are in the vicinity of the computer to which the iOS device syncs and provided you are connected to a power source, the iOS devices auto syncs to your computer. 8. iCloud: This is one of the best things to write about. iCloud is what MobileMe wanted to be but never could be and more. Check out some cool features below

Sync your Contacts, Calendars, Mail, bookmarks across all iOS devices and Macs/PC's

Automatic Downloads: When you buy an App/Song in iTunes on your computer it is automatically downloaded wirelessly on all your iOS devices. No need to manually sync them

Photo Stream: Shoot a picture on your iPhone and it will automatically appear in iPhoto on your computer and other iOS devices. Photo stream brings seamless syncing of new pictures through all computers and iOS devices. I tried it and the new photos on my iPhone instantly appeared in iPhoto on all my Macs. Apple provides free storage for this and it is completely free. The synced pictures will be kept for 30 days on Apple servers after which they will be deleted.

5 GB free storage: iCloud provides free 5GB storage which does not include photo stream. You can get more storage but you need to pay for that.

Backups: iCloud will take regular backup of your iOS devices to the cloud servers. Just in case your iPhone gets lost or you buy a new one, just enter your iCloud login on the new device and complete data will be synced back. This includes settings, SMS messages, applications, music, app data and virtually everything you had on your iPhone/iPad. A completely hassle free backup system finally.

Past purchases: Now you can see what you have bought in the past and download it again free of cost. So you can now re-download your apps, music, movies, tv shows and anything else you bought off iTunes without having to worry about losing them.

iTunes Match: Apple has a whopping 18 Million song database. So they thought that they would probably have every song you have in your library. Thus iTunes match was born. What it essentially does is that it will scan your current iTunes library and find those songs in iTunes database. Once it matches all/whatever songs it can, then you are able to download your complete library on the go. So now when you recall a lovely song which you have in iTunes but not your iPhone, you can just download it off iTunes Match. All this for a $24.99 annual fee. On another note, this will legalize your music which you have gotten from "well you know what" sources.

9. Selective Call log Delete: Yessssssssssss...... For those who want to delete "certain" calls from the call log can finally do so.

P.S Will save a lot of questioning from your wife.

10. PC Free: iOS 5 will allow setup of all iPhones/iPads/iPods without the need of a computer. When you first turn on your phone, it will allow to connect to a network and activate. You can then complete the entire setup on the phone itself. All music/apps/videos can be downloaded to the iOS device directly using "past purchases" feature. 11. New Mail: the mail client has been beefed up. Some very welcome features here.

Create new mailboxes: You can now create new mailboxes right on the phone. This was earlier possible only through the computer.

Flag Messages: Messages can be flagged right on the phone. The flags are synced to your account so they can been seen on the computer also.

Formatting: When writing a mail you can now format text in RTF format. Underline, Bold, italics and yahooooooo. :-)