4 ms·
> We understand that the key to weight loss is calories in, calories out. That's not at all true. CICO is a straightforward restatement of a law of thermodyna
by jmull 9y ago
> We understand that the key to weight loss is calories in, calories out.
That's not at all true.
CICO is a straightforward restatement of a law of thermodynamics, and I'm not disputing that at all.
But from a weight-loss perspective, understanding CICO isn't necessarily that helpful, and certainly not "the key". The difficult question is how any particular individual can make CO > CI. (Well, actually, the goal is to balance CO with CI at a healthy weight, but of course that's step 2 for a lot of people.)
There are many millions of people for whom the answer to that question is not known.
I suspect it's because Human metabolism is complicated, with numerous overlapping and interacting mechanisms and system, where the parameters for how they interact vary by individual... hormones, habits, social network, culture, taste, access to food options, physical health, your job, etc., can all be significant factors, depending on the individual. Meanwhile, food producers of various sorts are often acting at cross-purposes, since their goal is to make as much money as possible, not necessarily help people lose weight.
- WorldMaker 9y ago> CICO is a straightforward restatement of a law of thermodynamics The Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to closed systems only. Show me the ecosystem where food consumed and a human body is a perfectly closed system with no other inputs/outputs and I'll show you how that does not resemble the real world and you are making underlying assumptions you cannot prove.
- bitwize 9y agoIn a closed system, CI=CO=0, by definition, so I think you've got the wrong thermodynamic law.
- WorldMaker 9y agoApologies, I did mean the First Law, but the criticism still applies. The First Law of Thermodynamics also includes a closed system assumption.
- WorldMaker 9y agoUnless by "restatement of a Law of Thermodynamics" it is meant "restate of the Law of Conservation of Mass-Energy", at which point the criticism becomes that you now have a tougher isolated system assumption in the general case to prove. The real criticism, however is that you cannot just assume that CICO is a restatement of the Law of Conservation of Mass-Energy, because it relies on the spurious assumption that "nutritional calories" are sufficient approximations for the entirety of energy in the system. There's been a ton of work in chemistry and physics to untangle the mistakes of phlogiston theory, and caloric theory [1]. The SI unit of energy is now the Joule to absolutely distance from the problematic "calorie", and the confusion between what nutrition studies call a calorie and what Physics calls a calorie and what Joules are is an amazing mess. Nutrition "science" seems to me like the last bastion of some middle ground between phlogiston and caloric theory, and CICO the battle cry of its devout believers. [1] https://www.britannica.com/science/caloric-theory https://www.britannica.com/science/caloric-theory