Customer Reviews

The 10% Solution for a Healthy Life: How to Reduce Fat in Your Diet and Eliminate Virtually All Risk of Heart Disease and Cancer

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I own and have read this book as well as the newer follow up (published in 2004).

This book is now nearing 15 years old. I read it very recently and began to employ the methods taught in the book. It was not until reading Kurzweil's newest book that I saw he has changed many of his ideas since the writing of this book in 1992-93.

For example; in 10%, you should not eat more than 10% of your calories from fat. Carbohydrates are encouraged, sugar is not *that* big of a deal, and caffeine is the enemy. In the new book, fat can be 25% of your calories each day, carbohydrates must now stay very low, sugar is to be avoided at all costs, but caffeine is ok! In fact, the author now drinks 8 cups of green tea per day. Green tea is lower than coffee in caffeine, but 8 cups a day is still a lot of it.

I enjoyed reading this book, but I wish I had realized that the information contained within was out of date and no longer to be followed. It would have saved me $20.

When I started reading this book, I had already read enough to be convinced about the effectiveness of a low fat diet in both weight loss and disease prevention. I had read Joel Fuhrman's "Eat to Live" (read my review) and bought into the idea quite fully. Nevertheless the 10% solution added much to my knowledge on the subject. In particular, I found Kurzweil's clarifications about healthy and unhealthy fats particularly insightful and some of my faulty beliefs about polyunsaturated fats were rectified. Canola oil may be free of cholestrol but that doesnt mean its harmless ! Olive oil is a little better but go easy on that too.

Kurzweil has organized this book as a question and answer conversation between himself and a skeptic. This interesting format makes for easier reading. There are also some useful charts about ideal weight based on a system that are a little more advanced than the simplistic Body Mass Index. You are probably going to find out like me that you have a few more pounds to shed than you initially thought !

My only complaint about this book is that it hasnt been revised in almost a decade and so doesnt contain a lot of lessons learned from recent research. While the book does talk about caloric restriction as a life extension method, it does not stress adequately, the recent findings of the CRON (Calorie restriction with optimal nutrition) diet. While the importance of cutting down fat is explained very well, the disease fighting capabilities of fruits and vegetables and their extraordinary importance in a healthy diet are not adequately emphasised in this book.

Recent research shows us that many of the cancer fighting properties of fruits and vegetables may come from compounds whose importance we dont fully understand yet. Perhaps we may never fully isolate all compounds and we almost certainly wont be able to put them all into pills. Many of the recipes in the book are focussed on cutting down fat but dont try hard enough to make the non fat calories nutritionally dense. In that respect the book doesnt go far enough. Joel Fuhrman succintly summarizes it all in his book "Eat to Live" when he asks the reader to go right now and paste a note on the fridge that says "The salad is the main dish!"

In conclusion, this is a great book but if you are going to read only one book, that better be "Eat to Live".

The author is a scientist, not a nutritionist, who literally saved his life from terminal illness by researching how diet correlates with disease. The "hook" is that virtually EVERY reader in the USA has atherosclerosis --but does not know it! One detail overlooked (but noted by Andrew Weil, MD, elsewhere) is the essential ratio of omega-3 to omega-6. Very practical suggestions. You will die unnecessarily early if you fail to follow this advice. Makes tough technical stuff easy to read, understand & live by.

This is a terrific book. Why?
1) Because it is scientifically based unlike many fad diet books
2) Because it does not appear that Mr Kurzweil is simply going for a fast buck with a nonsense diet like so many book in the market those days
3) The writing style makes for easy, pleasant and persuasive reading
4) This book will in all likelihood DRAMATICALLY improve the health of many of its readers

There is at least one point that I think should be improved for the next edition. It is the country by country fat consumption vs heart disease risk, "linear" chart. The problem here is that as presented the data do not entirely justify the conclusion. Indeed one can easily see that virtually all high-fat countries are also the most industrialised countries (USA, Germany, etc) and all the ultra-low fat countries (Thailand, Chiana, etc) are developping. Why is this important? This is because has a group the less developped have typically a life-expectancy lower by about 10 years (typically due to increased infections and accidents) than the higher developped countries. Therefore it is EXPECTED that these countries should have a lower rate of heart disease than higher developped countries with higher life-expectancies, regardless of eating habits. This is because heart disease hits hardest the higher age group (60+), a group that is numerously less important in developping countries. Furthermore, in developping countries, it is not clear that medical care is sufficiently developped so that proper death cause are recorded. Perhaps they use categories such as "old age" for cause of death while we use more precise cause due to better availability of diagnostic tests. I think Mr Kurzweill should try to remove that bias from those charts (it should be relatively easy to adjust for the first problem: the different baseline life expectancy between countries, by using heart disease at different age and life tables).
I don't think that the corrected results would lead to entirely different results (although there is a very slight possibility it could) mainly because there are different other corroborative studies (autopsy study on young men, reversal of atherosclerosis following a ultra-low fat intake) in favor of ultra-low fat regimes. Still, this would strenghtened Mr Kurzweill valiant review, at least in rigorous scientific circles.
Congratulation Mr Kurzweill. You should be given an honorific medical degree. You earned it more than many of us for the improvement of individual and population health.

This book is a wonderfully easy-to-read "How to" guide to living in a healthy way. Ray Kurzweil does an excellent job in pooling together so much well-substantiated research data regarding what truly makes a healthy diet. His focus is on HEALTH and LONGEVITY rather than weight loss. He is concise, motivating and right on target. I encourage my patients to read his book if they are truly serious about getting/staying healthy!

Normally I like Ray Kurzweil's books, but this one is not among those. There is nothing original in this book! Don't waste your money! Its better to read Dr. Joel Fuhrman MD (Eat to Live), and Dr. Dean Ornish MD (Hart Disease Reversal Prog.). These two are actually practicing physicians and can offer insights into the experience gained through work with many patients. Anyone could have written a 10% solution by reading these two sources alone. Ray Kurzweil can do better than this, for example his "Fantastic Voyage" is quite good.

Did you know that reducing the fat intake of your diet to 10% or less will reduce your cancer and diabetes (type II) risk close to zero?

As other reviewers have accurately stated, following the recommendations of this book will change your health and your life. Healthy eating (eating foods with less than 10% overall fat) is essential for a healthy body and mind.

Written 15 years ago, this book's science remains highly relevant today. The recommendations of this book are particularly relevant for those with diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholestrol, obesity, and hypertension.

The book starts with a startling fact: 90% of Americans have atherosclerosis (thickening of the blood vessels by fatty materials and cholestrol). This is bad news since atherosclerosis is very very bad for you. Atherosclerosis and high body fat will probably substantially shorten your life and bring about host of health problems (cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure etc). It is important to note that the author disagrees with American Medical Association (AMA) on the pervasiveness of atherosclerosis. The author argues convincingly, however, that AMA sets their bar on healthy dieting to a VERY low level. If you are overweight at all (book provides weight charts), you will almost certainly have atherosclerosis.

So how do you rid of yourself from atherosclerosis and high body fat? Eat foods with less than 10% fat, eat foods in small portions (approximatley 2000 calories a day), and exercise regularly. This is FAR harder than it appears since most foods you see on the menu of most restaurants have higher than 10% fat.

It is important to note that the author does NOT try to convince people to have less than 10% body fat. For males, 15% body fat is OK and for females 24% is OK.

The author provides plenty of dietary suggestions and nutritional data. It even has a short cookbook.

What do you get if you follow the book's recommendation? You will be slim, fit, and free of most troubling diseases such as cancer and diabetes associated with atherosclerosis and high body fat.

Ray Kurzweil brings his legendary scientific mind to the world of nutrition and produces a work of science that becomes a work of art. Founded on facts and research this is a entertaining and well written work guaranteed to inspire and motivate depending only on experience and well subsitiated facts. This books covers many areas but is never overly obscure or unweildy.

Ray has included an robust index and a clever socratic dialogue that helps the reluctant reader digest his

Ray Kurzweil brings his legendary scientific mind to the world of nutrition and produces a work of science that becomes a work of art. Founded on facts and research this is a entertaining and well written work guaranteed to inspire and motivate depending only on experience and well subsitiated facts. This books covers many areas but is never overly obscure or unweildy.

Ray has included an robust index and a clever socratic dialogue that helps the reluctant reader digest his

You may not like the ideas in here, but if you have diabetes or high cholesterol, this diet could add years to your life. Very readable. I started eating this way, and my blood sugars dropped.