-The coconut oil and olive oil articles use logic, not scientific evidence, and the logic has some flaws. First, they assume that all calories are treated the same by the body when in fact, the body responds very differently to different kinds of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats, far too much for me to go into on here. Suffice it to say, coconut oil contains fatty acids that are good for raising metabolism (which would make it so that you could eat more calories and have more energy without getting fatter) and promoting gut health. (Read the Mary Enig book recommended above for more information.) The argument against these fats is that the authors can't find any nutritive value in them, not because there is none. The "essential" vitamins and minerals list is by no means exhaustive. We don't really know all the compounds found in foods and why they're important.
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-Also, they may not contain terribly high levels of vitamins and minerals, but put them on vegetables, and not only will they taste better and make you want to eat more of them, but they will assist in the absorption of the vitamins and minerals contained in the vegetables. The belief that every person's body will be able to do the same thing with the same amount of micronutrients is a fallacy as well. There are many, many things that affect a body's ability to absorb nutrients (way beyond crohns disease), and food combining is one. I'm all for eating nutrient-dense foods, and combining them with healthy fats is a great way to nourish yourself. The article does make a good point, though, that you wouldn't want to just be eating coconut oil and not getting your other micronutrients. Coconut oil in junk food doesn't make it healthy (though it may be a better alternative to some other oils).
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-To its credit, the olive oil article wasn't arguing against eating any fats. It was arguing in favor of getting fats from whole foods such as avocados, nuts, etc. I'm all for that, especially when most of the olive oil on the shelves in our grocery stores are not even pure.
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-Dr. Esselstyn's study: First, there were only 17 people who made it all the way through the 20 year study, and he makes it clear even on his website that he only included data from those 17 people. 17 people is not enough for a rigorous scientific study. That sample size is so small, that we're really talking about 17 case studies, a few rungs down the scientific ladder from a scientific experiment. His website implies that there were other participants who were not "compliant" whose data was not included. This leads to asking what were those people's stories? Why did they drop out? Was a fat-free diet too difficult for them to follow? Did they experience too many undesirable side effects from the diet? How many non-compliant people were in the study? This makes a big difference for people who are attempting to follow this guy's recommendations. If 99% of the participants do it and get good results, that's one thing. If 99% of the participants feel terrible on that diet and drop out, it really doesn't mean much that 1% of the participants liked it well enough to keep going and got good results.
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-Secondly, he is basing his claims only on the lowering of cholesterol and a reduction in cardiac events. There's a lot more to health than those two factors, and I'm not convinced that the lowering of cholesterol is even a good thing. Read "Good Calories, Bad Calories" to get an idea of exactly what went into the theory that high cholesterol is itself the problem. Even mainstream medicine these days admits that HDL/LDL ratio (and there's evidence that even that is far too simplistic - again, read Good Calories, Bad Calories) matters a lot more. Yes, a fat-free diet would lower total cholesterol, but it's not going to improve your HDL/LDL ratio. It's going to reduce HDL as well as LDL.
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-A case study in my family: My dad has had cholesterol "problems" for years. Eating a very low-fat diet (high carb, high sugar/artificial sweeteners) and taking cholesterol-lowering drugs, he lowered his cholesterol drastically, but his triglycerides were through the roof. A year ago, he had a 5 bypass heart surgery and started listening to me a little on diet. Afraid of fat, he cut sugar and ate soaked whole whole grains (as opposed to flour), fruits, vegetables, and grass-fed meats, etc. Within a month or two, he had another lipids test and had normal triglycerides for the first time ever. Still, he had a terribly low HDL cholesterol. That slow-carb diet did great things for his triglycerides, but it still leaves something to be desired. My mom calls me and asks me what he would need to do to raise his HDL, and the only answer I could give her is that he needs to eat more healthy fats!
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