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There are not obese people who do not eat too much. They simply do not exist. Then the question becomes: why do they eat too much? Yes, you are right, it's a

by wdewind 10y ago

There are not obese people who do not eat too much. They simply do not exist. Then the question becomes: why do they eat too much? Yes, you are right, it's a complex answer involving a ton of things. But my point in framing it as a food addiction is that the issue here is not that there is some kind of underlying metabolic damage or difference that accounts for obesity, unless that damage/difference somehow contributes to increasing the desire to eat more. If we could somehow get them to simply eat less, the condition would go away. There are arguments to be made about the mind body connection, and I think they are real, but the issues here are not that obese people are eating the same amount of food as non-obese people and that inflammation is causing some of that energy to be stored as fat. It's ridiculous and misleading for people who are genuinely trying to change their lives to suggest that small effects like this are the cause. Also: > No, if you are eating within caloric balance, the fat will not be burned for energy. Fat is constantly being stored and burned as energy even within a caloric balance. You cannot store fat longterm without at some point eating at a caloric surplus.

dragonwriter 10y ago
> Fat is constantly being stored and burned as energy even within a caloric balance. Sure, but (barring lean/fat changes due to exercise level), thats no net change in stored fat. > You cannot store fat longterm without at some point eating at a caloric surplus. Right, that's how it got stored in the first place. Once it's stored, though, you can keep the same quantity indefinitely without a surplus.
- wdewind 10y ago
  Agreed but no response to the rest of that though? Haha :)
aantix 10y ago
>get them to simply eat less It's not so "simple"; the body fights back. Hunger kicks in overdrive, the body becomes sleepy, lethargic, you get "fog brain" (for programmers this is death). Exercise leads to an amplification of these symptoms. It's not so easy as to "just put down the fork" or journal your feelings. The body doesn't want to change. And it's not like the body stops these signals after a while. I have dropped 30+ pounds, always to gain it back. Your framing of an addiction fails, especially when the participant still has to interact with food. It fails when the self-preservation acts in spite of the intent. It's a plan of perpetual feelings of starvation and less than ideal living quality. Gastric Bypass/Roux-en-Y appears to be the only long-term successful intervention. Weight loss is maintained https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22865194 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22865194
- wdewind 10y ago
  > It's not so "simple"; the body fights back. Hunger kicks in overdrive, the body becomes sleepy, lethargic, you get "fog brain" (for programmers this is death). For about two weeks, maybe. This is all the result of low blood sugar. Your body gets better at using fat to keep blood sugar high, and these symptoms subside. > Exercise leads to an amplification of these symptoms. I have literally never heard anyone else claim this, and what little science there is suggests the opposite. > It's not so easy as to "just put down the fork" or journal your feelings. The body doesn't want to change. Right, I'm not suggesting it is easy, I'm suggesting it is simple. > And it's not like the body stops these signals after a while. I have dropped 30+ pounds, always to gain it back. If you are still having the symptoms of low blood sugar that lasts for a significant period of time (> 2 weeks), this is absolutely something your doctor should look into. Regardless: the meta point here is that the body is not literally starving, it just feels like it is. Which sounds a lot like addiction: the body doesn't literally need those drugs, but brain chemistry makes it feel like it does. The study you linked to does not seem like a glowing endorsement for gastric bypass to me. Also, not that it matters, but you're talking to someone who has lost 35lbs more than a year ago, so I do have direct experience.
  - aantix 10y ago
    >I have literally never heard anyone else claim this, and what little science there is suggests the opposite. You haven't experienced increased hunger or increase fatigue/sleepiness after exercise? The Vox writeup has a link to some of the research regarding exercise for weight-loss. http://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518804/weight-loss-exercise-myth-burn-calories http://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518804/weight-loss-exercise-m... >The study you linked to does not seem like a glowing endorsement for gastric bypass to me. Why is that? 71 Morbidly obese patients that maintain 50%+ loss of their excess weight for over 9 years? No other diet and/or treatment rivals that. >Also, not that it matters, but you're talking to someone who has lost 35lbs more than a year ago, so I do have direct experience. Talk to us in 10 years (seriously). Something always happens; the diet becomes mundane, physical and/or mental issues, stress, you have a family that wants to eat something other than eggs and salad, simply not giving a shit anymore or just general aging & slowly of metabolism. 10 years is a long time to stick to the straight and narrow and keep the diet in check. Best of luck, maybe you have the mentality of a Navy Seal and will make it but most others do not.
creepydata 10y ago
So I was always very thin. Never cared about what I ate. Kept a very, very steady weight for a decade naturally without conscious effort on my part. I then went on a medication that has weight gain as a known side effect. When my doctor gave it to me she said "just don't eat extra." My diet did not change a bit. I didn't feel extra hungry. I gained a massive amount of fat and I gained it extremely fast. Three months later I was clinically obese. I then paid extra attention to my diet. Started micromanaging my calories, weighing food, gave up 99% of junk food and all alcohol. I gained more weight. I dropped my calories down to 1000 calories a day and started losing weight. But it was basically an uphill battle to keep that up. That's not living, you try it. I thought about food all day. If I started eating even a little more I'd gain again. I gave up and went off the drug. My weight is going down now but it's extremely slow going. I don't know if I am capable of being my former weight. I certainly am not not ever was addicted to food. The doctor assumed weight gain had to be caused by extra food intake. It was not. Sure you can say "rah, rah, 99% of obesity cases aren't drug induced." That is true, but my experience shows that people can be physiologically different. Or there may be something in the environment that is triggering abnormal fat storage. Who knows? But it can't be as simple as "food addiction." Food addiction can be a cause or maybe even a symptom but it's not the be all end all. Humans are much more complicated than that.
- wdewind 10y ago
  I can't really respond to an anecdote in any kind of useful way. There are simply too many factors that could effect this. What I can say is that the data does not support what you are claiming. This doesn't mean what you are claiming is incorrect, it means nutritional science is very very difficult and we don't have good evidence that supports your claim. Right now there is not reason to think obesity happens outside of a caloric surplus, and there is a fair amount of basic science that supports that view. If that view were not true, it would invalidate many things that we think are true about the physical world. That being said, while calories-in/calories-out is basically inarguable, there are many things going on that can effect calories-out even if calories-in remain the same. Body composition is one thing. I could definitely imagine medications that are catabolic leading to decreased muscle mass and increased fat storage. But I still don't think this would account for a massive change in bodyweight, not one that would make the difference between obese and not obese.

by wdewind 10y ago

dragonwriter 10y ago

> Fat is constantly being stored and burned as energy even within a caloric balance. Sure, but (barring lean/fat changes due to exercise level), thats no net change in stored fat. > You cannot store fat longterm without at some point eating at a caloric surplus. Right, that's how it got stored in the first place. Once it's stored, though, you can keep the same quantity indefinitely without a surplus.

wdewind 10y ago
Agreed but no response to the rest of that though? Haha :)

aantix 10y ago

>get them to simply eat less It's not so "simple"; the body fights back. Hunger kicks in overdrive, the body becomes sleepy, lethargic, you get "fog brain" (for programmers this is death). Exercise leads to an amplification of these symptoms. It's not so easy as to "just put down the fork" or journal your feelings. The body doesn't want to change. And it's not like the body stops these signals after a while. I have dropped 30+ pounds, always to gain it back. Your framing of an addiction fails, especially when the participant still has to interact with food. It fails when the self-preservation acts in spite of the intent. It's a plan of perpetual feelings of starvation and less than ideal living quality. Gastric Bypass/Roux-en-Y appears to be the only long-term successful intervention. Weight loss is maintained https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22865194 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22865194

wdewind 10y ago
> It's not so "simple"; the body fights back. Hunger kicks in overdrive, the body becomes sleepy, lethargic, you get "fog brain" (for programmers this is death). For about two weeks, maybe. This is all the result of low blood sugar. Your body gets better at using fat to keep blood sugar high, and these symptoms subside. > Exercise leads to an amplification of these symptoms. I have literally never heard anyone else claim this, and what little science there is suggests the opposite. > It's not so easy as to "just put down the fork" or journal your feelings. The body doesn't want to change. Right, I'm not suggesting it is easy, I'm suggesting it is simple. > And it's not like the body stops these signals after a while. I have dropped 30+ pounds, always to gain it back. If you are still having the symptoms of low blood sugar that lasts for a significant period of time (> 2 weeks), this is absolutely something your doctor should look into. Regardless: the meta point here is that the body is not literally starving, it just feels like it is. Which sounds a lot like addiction: the body doesn't literally need those drugs, but brain chemistry makes it feel like it does. The study you linked to does not seem like a glowing endorsement for gastric bypass to me. Also, not that it matters, but you're talking to someone who has lost 35lbs more than a year ago, so I do have direct experience.
- aantix 10y ago
  >I have literally never heard anyone else claim this, and what little science there is suggests the opposite. You haven't experienced increased hunger or increase fatigue/sleepiness after exercise? The Vox writeup has a link to some of the research regarding exercise for weight-loss. http://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518804/weight-loss-exercise-myth-burn-calories http://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518804/weight-loss-exercise-m... >The study you linked to does not seem like a glowing endorsement for gastric bypass to me. Why is that? 71 Morbidly obese patients that maintain 50%+ loss of their excess weight for over 9 years? No other diet and/or treatment rivals that. >Also, not that it matters, but you're talking to someone who has lost 35lbs more than a year ago, so I do have direct experience. Talk to us in 10 years (seriously). Something always happens; the diet becomes mundane, physical and/or mental issues, stress, you have a family that wants to eat something other than eggs and salad, simply not giving a shit anymore or just general aging & slowly of metabolism. 10 years is a long time to stick to the straight and narrow and keep the diet in check. Best of luck, maybe you have the mentality of a Navy Seal and will make it but most others do not.

creepydata 10y ago

So I was always very thin. Never cared about what I ate. Kept a very, very steady weight for a decade naturally without conscious effort on my part. I then went on a medication that has weight gain as a known side effect. When my doctor gave it to me she said "just don't eat extra." My diet did not change a bit. I didn't feel extra hungry. I gained a massive amount of fat and I gained it extremely fast. Three months later I was clinically obese. I then paid extra attention to my diet. Started micromanaging my calories, weighing food, gave up 99% of junk food and all alcohol. I gained more weight. I dropped my calories down to 1000 calories a day and started losing weight. But it was basically an uphill battle to keep that up. That's not living, you try it. I thought about food all day. If I started eating even a little more I'd gain again. I gave up and went off the drug. My weight is going down now but it's extremely slow going. I don't know if I am capable of being my former weight. I certainly am not not ever was addicted to food. The doctor assumed weight gain had to be caused by extra food intake. It was not. Sure you can say "rah, rah, 99% of obesity cases aren't drug induced." That is true, but my experience shows that people can be physiologically different. Or there may be something in the environment that is triggering abnormal fat storage. Who knows? But it can't be as simple as "food addiction." Food addiction can be a cause or maybe even a symptom but it's not the be all end all. Humans are much more complicated than that.

wdewind 10y ago
I can't really respond to an anecdote in any kind of useful way. There are simply too many factors that could effect this. What I can say is that the data does not support what you are claiming. This doesn't mean what you are claiming is incorrect, it means nutritional science is very very difficult and we don't have good evidence that supports your claim. Right now there is not reason to think obesity happens outside of a caloric surplus, and there is a fair amount of basic science that supports that view. If that view were not true, it would invalidate many things that we think are true about the physical world. That being said, while calories-in/calories-out is basically inarguable, there are many things going on that can effect calories-out even if calories-in remain the same. Body composition is one thing. I could definitely imagine medications that are catabolic leading to decreased muscle mass and increased fat storage. But I still don't think this would account for a massive change in bodyweight, not one that would make the difference between obese and not obese.