![]() Silicon Valley’s obsession with extreme fasting overlaps with a trend for what is often termed “ biohacking” the idea that your body is a system that can be quantified and optimized. It’s very dangerous stuff.” Hacking your body “We’re no longer cavemen we’re not equipped to be doing extreme water-only fasting diets,” Longo stresses. Longo unambiguously advises against the sort of extreme three-day water-only fasts that Dorsey said he was playing with, and that seem particularly popular in Silicon Valley. For example, he says: “There is very little doubt that fasting 12-13 hours a day is safe but things get a little more complicated when you fast 16-18 hours.” Clinical studies have shown this sort of extended fasting can have positive effects on metabolism but also a number of negative results, such as an increase in gallstones. Longo stresses that it’s always important to put safety first and warns against being too extreme. However, while there is exciting research about the efficacy of fasting, there are also some studies that show it can have negative effects. (While a few studies on mice suggest fasting may improve the efficacy of chemotherapy there remains a lot more research to be done and fasting should not be considered an alternative to chemotherapy.) Various studies, he notes, have shown that “fasting is as good as chemotherapy” in treating cancer and there is growing evidence that fasting can help with longevity by lowering markers of aging such as cholesterol and blood pressure. ![]() He likens it to a “reset” mode on your body that helps eliminate damaged cells and replace them with newly regenerated ones. Longo believes that fasting, in general, can be highly beneficial. The specially formulated diet costs $225 a pop and, according to the website, “provides scientifically researched micro- and macro-nutrients in precise quantities and combinations that nourish you, but are not recognized as food by your body and therefore mimics a fasting state!” Fasting 12-13 hours a day is safe but things get more complicated when you fast 16-18 hours Dr Valter Longo This involves eating a low-calorie diet that follows a very specific carbohydrate/protein/carbs ration for five days a month, a few times a year. Finally there is the Fasting Mimicking Diet™, which is Longo’s brainchild. Then there is time-restricted feeding, where you fast 12-18 hours a day and consume all your calories within a narrow eating window. The second method is often known as the 5:2 diet and involves eating normally five days a week followed by two days where you only eat around 500 calories. Longo notes that there are four distinct approaches to fasting, “which all have benefits and limitations”. It’s about as instructive as talking about “eating”, he says. As Dr Valter Longo, who is director of the Longevity Institute at the University of Southern California, and something of a rock star among the fasting community, explains to me over the phone, the word “fasting” doesn’t mean much. It’s worth slowing down and defining “fasting”. Indeed, in many ways it feels like Silicon Valley is inadvertently rebranding eating disorders. Starving yourself and constructing rigid rules and rituals around when and how you eat is generally seen as a problem when it’s teenage girls doing it when tech bros do it, it’s treated very differently. Meanwhile the compulsive measuring behaviors associated with eating disorders, including obsessively tracking your calorie intake and exercise, have been normalized by fitness tracking apps and the Silicon Valley ethos that constant self-examination leads to self-improvement. ![]() However, as Dr Allison Chase, an eating disorder specialist, tells me over email, “any eating behaviors that involve restriction or rigid rules is concerning” and can be a precursor to diagnosable eating disorders.Īlso concerning is the way these behaviors are glamorized, particularly in Silicon Valley, where a number of high-profile tech execs extol the transformative power of extreme fasting. Any eating behaviors that involve restriction or rigid rules is concerning Dr Allison Chaseįasting, of course, is not synonymous with anorexia. ![]()
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