Intermittent fasting

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Eating within a compressed daily window (or occasionally skipping longer) is a low-cost way to pull the hormesis lever: it lowers mTOR, raises AMPK, and triggers autophagy — the body’s cleanup of damaged tissue.

Why it may work

When the stomach is empty, the body is freer to digest waste tissue (autophagy) instead of processing incoming food (Longevity).
Calorie restriction is a stressor that appears to slow aging — the same AMPK/adversity mechanism as cold and exercise (Sinclair).
Ketosis: the two easy routes into it are restricting carbs or fasting; mitochondria run more efficiently on ketones than glucose (Head Strong).

Common protocols on file

16:8 — Sinclair fasts ~16 hours, drinks hot water/coffee/tea through it, eats nuts if he must (Sinclair).
The 12–8pm window — Karpathy’s time-restricted eating; the practical default (Food).
One meal a day (OMAD) — Jack Dorsey frames it as a “boring superpower” for mental clarity; three meals is a social structure, not a biological requirement (Jack Dorsey).
Longer fasts (a day+, not beyond a week to avoid muscle loss) — deep autophagy after ~3 days; the liver learns to regulate glucose after ~3 weeks of practice (Sinclair).

Caveats

Muscle is the priority — don’t fast your way into losing it (see strength training); longer fasts risk muscle loss.
Most of the aggressive claims come from Sinclair’s contested framework (supplements). Time-restricted eating is the low-risk core; extended fasting is more experimental.

Hormesis · Nutrition for longevity · Strength training for longevity

Citations

Nutrition for longevity

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Different sources, roughly one diet. The convergent pattern: plant-forward, low-sugar, minimally-processed, eaten in a compressed window. Not a rigid regimen — a direction.

The pattern

Less red meat, more plants. Plants activate mTOR less than red meat, so they leave more room for repair/autophagy; the Mediterranean diet cut mortality ~31% across six studies (David Sinclair, source). Lots of olive oil (oleic acid activates sirtuins), moderate poultry, moderate red wine. A family history of colon cancer is a common concrete reason to cut red meat.
Avoid sugar above almost all else — sugar switches off the mTOR/sirtuin protective machinery; fructose is the worst for the brain (Head Strong, Sinclair).
Karpathy’s longevity diet (Food): eat 12–8pm, pescetarian-leaning, no liquid calories (soda, juice, alcohol, milk), avoid fast carbs (bread/rice/pasta/potatoes), avoid processed food. Follow Michael Pollan — shop the outer walls of the store, prefer farmers’ markets, skip long ingredient labels.
Feed the brain (Head Strong): sugar and oxidized fats slow neurogenesis; omega-3s, polyphenols (coffee, chocolate, berries), and foods like wild salmon, eggs, and greens support it. Mitochondria run cleaner on ketones than glucose.

Contested / personal-preference edges

Dairy flagged in the notes as carcinogenic/hormonal (Food) — this is a stronger claim than the mainstream consensus; treat as the author’s read, not settled.
Alcohol is treated as effectively a toxin — empty calories, kills gut bacteria, worse mood next day, direct cellular damage, and it depletes NAD (the longevity molecule). Reduction, not a hard rule (Alcohol).

It connects to everything

Eating in a window is intermittent fasting.
Low-sugar + plant polyphenols is the hormesis lever in food form.
Weight is just energy balance — eat less than you burn; more muscle raises the baseline burn, another vote for strength training (lose weight).

Hormesis · Intermittent fasting · Strength training for longevity · Supplements for longevity · Caffeine & sleep

Nutrition on Today Purpose

Intermittent fasting

Why it may work

Common protocols on file

Caveats

Related

Citations

Nutrition for longevity

The pattern

Contested / personal-preference edges

It connects to everything

Related

Citations