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The endorphin rush is completely independent of a calorie. If you eat less you will lose weight. It is physically impossible not to. You could be fed a drip of

The endorphin rush is completely independent of a calorie. If you eat less you will lose weight. It is physically impossible not to. You could be fed a drip of pure sugar and you will lose weight as long as you receive fewer calories that you burn.

ceejayoz 10y ago
"Put me in solitary confinement with an IV drip" isn't a very feasible diet plan, so managing non-calorie stuff like satiety, glycemic index, etc. can still have value. Side note: "as long as you receive fewer calories that you burn" ignores the fact that how much you burn can change.
- cheald 10y ago
  My own personal experience has been that managing nothing but calories is the most successful approach by a mile, but that sticking to decent macros is the best way to manage my satiation and stick to my calorie budget. If you're managing satiety and glycemic index and ignoring calorie intake, you're not going to manage weight well. These are all tools in managing calorie inputs, not replacements for it.
joecool1029 10y ago
While there is some truth to that... (Google 'potato hack') there's a ton of biochemical signaling that goes on to affect satiety and whether the cells burn or store that calorie input. Here's a blog post breaking down a recent paper on the topic: http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/boiled-mashed-potatoes-for-miracle.html http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/boiled-mash...
- antisthenes 10y ago
  Satiety is orthogonal to losing weight. So saying there is some truth to that is extremely snarky and dismissive.
opportune 10y ago
Because humans are not robots, typically instead of laboriously calculating how many calories we eat each day, we eat to a point of satiety. Some foods are better and some are worse at causing satiety. So in that sense, a kcal of sugar isn't the "same" as a kcal of protein because one makes you feel more "full" than the other and thus naturally encourages you to eat less.
- NikolaeVarius 10y ago
  Irrelevant. Humans are also not known for keeping track of how fast they run to millisecond precision but people do it to achieve a goal. If your goal is to lose weight, track calories to do it. I can lose weight on demand eating nothing but junk but keeping track of how much of it I'm eating.
abecedarius 10y ago
Do you burn a constant number of calories as you vary the calories consumed? No, not even if you keep your exercise regimen constant. The body is a complicated self-regulating feedback control system. It's not even surprising for it to reduce the burn rate when the input gets leaner.
- xherberta 10y ago
  In an older discussion on this issue, travisp shared this article: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1199154 http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1199154 >Effects of Dietary Composition on Energy Expenditure During Weight-Loss Maintenance > "The results of our study challenge the notion that a calorie is a calorie from a metabolic perspective. During isocaloric feeding ... total energy expenditure differed by approximately 300 kcal/d between very-low-carb and low-fat diets, an effect corresponding with the amount of energy typically expended in 1 hour of moderate-intensity physical activity." "In conclusion, our study demonstrates that commonly consumed diets can affect metabolism and components of the metabolic syndrome in markedly different ways during weight-loss maintenance, independent of energy content. The low-fat diet produced changes in energy expenditure and serum leptin42- 44 that would predict weight regain. In addition, this conventionally recommended diet had unfavorable effects on most of the metabolic syndrome components studied herein."
alasdair_ 10y ago
Weigh yourself, drink a gallon of zero-calorie water, weigh yourself again. Too simplistic? Okay, try drastically increasing or decreasing your salt intake and keep all other factors the same - you'll see a weight change from water retention. Again too simplistic? Okay, try substituting 500 calories a standard diet with 500 calories of celery. Note that even keeping all other factors constant, you lose more weight with the celery.
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  Don't forget too that there fun things on the market like "zero-calorie soda". If there is a simple proof that a calorie is not a calorie, it's that an oxymoron like "zero-calorie soda" is even possible, that the metric even allows for such an edge case/loophole [1]. [1] Because the sugar replacements are artificial 'plastics' that apparently don't burn when set on fire; how can that possibly be healthy?

ceejayoz 10y ago

"Put me in solitary confinement with an IV drip" isn't a very feasible diet plan, so managing non-calorie stuff like satiety, glycemic index, etc. can still have value. Side note: "as long as you receive fewer calories that you burn" ignores the fact that how much you burn can change.

cheald 10y ago
My own personal experience has been that managing nothing but calories is the most successful approach by a mile, but that sticking to decent macros is the best way to manage my satiation and stick to my calorie budget. If you're managing satiety and glycemic index and ignoring calorie intake, you're not going to manage weight well. These are all tools in managing calorie inputs, not replacements for it.

joecool1029 10y ago

While there is some truth to that... (Google 'potato hack') there's a ton of biochemical signaling that goes on to affect satiety and whether the cells burn or store that calorie input. Here's a blog post breaking down a recent paper on the topic: http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/boiled-mashed-potatoes-for-miracle.html http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/boiled-mash...

antisthenes 10y ago
Satiety is orthogonal to losing weight. So saying there is some truth to that is extremely snarky and dismissive.

opportune 10y ago

Because humans are not robots, typically instead of laboriously calculating how many calories we eat each day, we eat to a point of satiety. Some foods are better and some are worse at causing satiety. So in that sense, a kcal of sugar isn't the "same" as a kcal of protein because one makes you feel more "full" than the other and thus naturally encourages you to eat less.

NikolaeVarius 10y ago
Irrelevant. Humans are also not known for keeping track of how fast they run to millisecond precision but people do it to achieve a goal. If your goal is to lose weight, track calories to do it. I can lose weight on demand eating nothing but junk but keeping track of how much of it I'm eating.

abecedarius 10y ago

Do you burn a constant number of calories as you vary the calories consumed? No, not even if you keep your exercise regimen constant. The body is a complicated self-regulating feedback control system. It's not even surprising for it to reduce the burn rate when the input gets leaner.

xherberta 10y ago
In an older discussion on this issue, travisp shared this article: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1199154 http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1199154 >Effects of Dietary Composition on Energy Expenditure During Weight-Loss Maintenance > "The results of our study challenge the notion that a calorie is a calorie from a metabolic perspective. During isocaloric feeding ... total energy expenditure differed by approximately 300 kcal/d between very-low-carb and low-fat diets, an effect corresponding with the amount of energy typically expended in 1 hour of moderate-intensity physical activity." "In conclusion, our study demonstrates that commonly consumed diets can affect metabolism and components of the metabolic syndrome in markedly different ways during weight-loss maintenance, independent of energy content. The low-fat diet produced changes in energy expenditure and serum leptin42- 44 that would predict weight regain. In addition, this conventionally recommended diet had unfavorable effects on most of the metabolic syndrome components studied herein."

alasdair_ 10y ago

Weigh yourself, drink a gallon of zero-calorie water, weigh yourself again. Too simplistic? Okay, try drastically increasing or decreasing your salt intake and keep all other factors the same - you'll see a weight change from water retention. Again too simplistic? Okay, try substituting 500 calories a standard diet with 500 calories of celery. Note that even keeping all other factors constant, you lose more weight with the celery.

WorldMaker 10y ago
Don't forget too that there fun things on the market like "zero-calorie soda". If there is a simple proof that a calorie is not a calorie, it's that an oxymoron like "zero-calorie soda" is even possible, that the metric even allows for such an edge case/loophole [1]. [1] Because the sugar replacements are artificial 'plastics' that apparently don't burn when set on fire; how can that possibly be healthy?