听力文本

For decades people who want to control their weight have been told to count calories. Given that the great majority of diets fail, is this good advice? Could the calorie be one of the biggest delusions in dietary history? The idea of counting calories was introduced by Wilbur Atwater. He believed that a calorie is a calorie. His theory was that a calorie provided the body with an equal amount of energy no matter what kind of food or micronutrient it came from. He concluded that one gram of either protein or carbohydrate provided four calories of energy, compared with nine from one gram of fat. And more than a century later, that series of numbers four, four, nine, remains in standard use around the world today to calculate the energy that we get from foods.

But what Atwater didn't factor in at the time was that different people burn different foods at different rates depending on their genetic makeup, or variables such as the type of bacteria in an individual's gut. And cooking food will increase the amount of calories a person can absorb from it. Atwater's findings led to the misconception that fat always leads to more weight gain than other foods, including sugar. This theory has shaped dietary policy in the West for decades. In fact, if excess sugar is in the bloodstream, then insulin stacks it straight into fatty tissue, making eating sugar the fastest way to create body fat. The fault is not entirely Atwater's. In 1967 the sugar industry secretly funded Harvard University research designed to point the blame for rising obesity levels at fat rather than sugar. This led the U.S. Senate and many other governments to recommend a low-fat, low-cholesterol diet. That advice coincided with the most dramatic rise in obesity in human history, contributing to a rapid rise in cardiovascular diseases, which have become the leading cause of death worldwide. Atwater's assumptions have become so deeply entrenched in society that many deem an overhaul of the system too disruptive and expensive. But more than a century on, it's time to bury the world's most useless measure.

关注公众号知问导图，回复TEX，免费获取本期内容详解等更多精彩内容。

重点词汇解析

Given v.给予，赠送(give的过去分词)；adj.指定的，确定的；假设的；prep.（表示原因）考虑到；（表示假设）倘若，假定；

Over a given period, the value of shares will rise and fall.

股票的价值在某一特定的时期内会有涨跌。

delusion n.欺骗；谬见；错觉；妄想

The problem is, as author and environmentalist Bill McKibben wrote 30 years ago, this is a grand delusion.

问题在于，正如作家和环境保护主义者比尔麦克基本30年前写的那样，这是一个巨大的妄想。

dietary adj.饮食的，规定食物的；n.规定的食物；食谱；

His theory was that a calorie provided the body with an equal amount of energy no matter what kind of food or micronutrient it came from.

他的理论是，无论是哪种食物或微量营养素，卡路里都能给身体提供同等数量的能量。

entrenched v.用壕沟围绕或保护…；使处于牢固地位；n.壕沟；防御设施；



For sure, one week of brighter data isn’t enough to shift entrenched pessimism.

可以肯定的是，一周更透明的数据不足以改变根深蒂固的悲观情绪。

deem v.认为；视为；相信；

That film is banned in Thailand because its depiction of King Mongkut - the current king’s great-great grandfather - is deemed disrespectful and false.

这部电影在泰国被禁止，因为它描述的蒙古国王-现任国王的曾祖父-被认为是不尊重和虚假的。

overhaul vt.彻底检查；翻修，检修；n.检查；彻底检修；

The report recommends an overhaul of public finances.

该报告建议对公共财政进行彻底改革。

参考翻译

几十年来，想控制体重的人一直被告知要计算卡路里。考虑到绝大多数节食计划都失败了，这还是个好建议吗？卡路里是否是饮食史上最大的空想之一？计算卡路里的想法是由威尔伯·阿特沃特提出的。他认为“卡路里就是卡路里”。他的理论是，无论是哪种食物或微量营养素，卡路里都能给身体提供同等数量的能量。他总结说，1克蛋白质或碳水化合物提供了4卡路里的能量，而每克脂肪中有9卡路里。一个多世纪后，这一系列的数字，4-4-9，仍然被世界各地的标准所使用，以此来计算我们从食物中获得的能量。但是，阿特沃特当时没有考虑到的是，不同的人以不同的速度燃烧不同的食物，这取决于他们的基因构成，或者一个人肠道中细菌的种类等变量。烹饪食物会增加一个人从食物中吸收的卡路里。阿特沃特的研究结果导致了一种误解，即脂肪总是比其他食物（包括糖）导致更多的体重增加。几十年来，这一理论影响了西方的饮食政策。事实上，如果血液中含有过量的糖，胰岛素就会直接堆积在脂肪组织中，从而使吃糖成为产生脂肪的最快方法。这并不完全是阿特沃特的错。1967年，制糖业秘密资助哈佛大学的研究，旨在指出肥胖水平上升的罪魁祸首是脂肪而不是糖。这导致美国参议院和许多其他政府推荐低脂、低胆固醇的饮食。这一建议恰逢人类历史上肥胖率的急剧上升，导致心血管疾病迅速上升，目前，心血管疾病已成为世界范围内主要的死亡原因。阿特沃特的假设已经在社会中根深蒂固，以至于许多人认为对这套饮食系统的彻底改革太具有破坏性，而且成本太高。但一个多世纪过去了，是时候埋葬这些世界上最无用的措施了。