Tom Treutlein said:
Sugar, I apologize. I was joking around with a friend of mine as I wrote that post and kind've just let that slip in there - I don't support the idea that women are more illogical or irrational than men - just a greater percentage I've known have been more so, so I tease people about that. Do I actually believe it to hold true all the time? Not at all.
Anyway - wnt2b, I never said I was great or anything, so stop making me out to seem arrogant, 'cause I think I'm far enough from it.
I want to stick to science because I feel secure in it. I like empirical data that comes to solid conclusions as to why something works. Maybe HST will have some of its principles disproven in the future, which will show the science wasn't perfect. Taking the gamble that it is in fact perfect, I stick with it, because once science has been proven...you can't disprove it. Maybe it's not 100%, but after the results I and others have seen on it, it's hard for me to say that it isn't the best method around for size alone.
Tom,
the difficulty is not with science. Neither I nor any other sound-minded individual would encourage you to forget about the evidence that science offers, but I would ask you to put it in perspective. You need to realize, in the first place, the essentially provisional status that all research from modern science provides, and you need to realize more specifically, that when it comes to exercise science, and especially when it comes to the science of hypertrophy, the results that science has produced have been paltry. To offer, as HST does, an interpretation of the source of muscle growth, and then to claim, as you seem to imply, that this is a.) an interpretation whose analysis can not be extended, or, in other words, an interpretation which does not leave much, for example the indirect effects of squats, open to further analysis within their own model of hypertrophy, and b.) that there could not be entirely different sources of hypertrophy which that model does not take into account, is extremely arrogant. This arrogance, or stupidly high opinion of the results of some limited research, prevents you from seeing the many other accounts of muscle growth which have been made (each of which has its own short-comings) and from experimenting with yourself, trying different programs. One of the things that has become clear about hypertrophy is that it is incredibly complicated: there is a complicated set of interrelated factors (nutrition, power output, force production, workload, time-under-tension, hormonal response, etc.), and b/c they are interrelated, no account of hypertrophy has a chance of being authoritative until it adequately explains precisely how each of these factors relates to the others, and then there would still remain a task of implementing such an account in different individuals. That said, the best policy is one of making personal experiments, or attempts, at acheiving your goals, following the models of science that have been so far created is a good start, but you must keep your attempts open to new possibilites, following where your progress dictates. Finally, I have never met anyone who has made tremendous growth by following a program resembling HST (this could just be b/c I have not met enough people), and, soemone else once quite intelligently told me that the best workout for people like you was A.) to open up your ears to all the suggestions made by successfull people with experience, and B.) multiple heavy sets of SHUT THE FUCK UP!
Please Scroll Down to See Forums Below 
Maybe it isn't I who needs the "multiple heavy sets of SHUT THE FUCK UP!". Bitch.
