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I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history. Everyone needs to check their body temperature regularly, it's a great m

I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history. Everyone needs to check their body temperature regularly, it's a great metric.

mhb 8y ago
Why do you think that?
- old-gregg 8y ago
  there was a guy here on HN just a few days ago who said something I'd never heard before: "after losing 50+ pounds my metabolism is ruined forever, I cannot eat more than 1600 calories without gaining weight". I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal.
  - SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
    I wonder what happened that caused those changes. Like, lots of people lose that much weight (myself included) and experience no changes. I see lots of pseudoscience on this I'd be interested in seeing what changes, what the contributing factors were, and how long it changes (is it permanent? Just a slow bounce back from the weight loss?). That's a drastic shift, and I imagine being cold is probably the tip of the iceberg in how a person changes if their metabolism drops that much.
  - paulcole 8y ago
    > I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal. Pretty simple explanation. It's not possible. If a person's body burns 1,600 calories a day, yes they will gain weight if they consistently eat more than that. If this person exercises more they will absolutely burn more calories.
  - the_gastropod 8y ago
    Well, it's totally normal for your metabolic rate to drop as you lose weight. Think about climbing a set of stairs: when you're 50lbs heavier, you're doing a lot more work than you are after you've lost the 50.
  - brandonmenc 8y ago
    He is obviously not properly counting calories.
  - mark-r 8y ago
    It's hormones. https://www.nutritionaction.com/daily/diet-and-weight-loss/a-leading-researcher-explains-the-obesity-epidemic/ https://www.nutritionaction.com/daily/diet-and-weight-loss/a... Look for the "Losing Weight" section.
  - mikekchar 8y ago
    The easiest way to look at this is to look at the cooling rate of a corpse. The slope of the cooling is pretty much linear as long as the ambient temperature is much lower than body temperature (for example 20 C vs 37 C). This allows you to calculate the amount of energy necessary to maintain body temperature. Convert that to kcal and this gives you the minimum number of kcal you must eat. I've actually done it before (and even wrote a comment in HN with the results -- though it was a long time ago and I don't know if there is a way to search comments), but it takes more time than I have now. Unless my memory is incorrect or my calculations faulty, the answer is that it's very, very unlikely that a person who is over about 50 kg would be maintaining their weight with 1600, even if they were doing no exercise at all. Unless they are living in a very hot climate, it appears to be thermodynamically impossible. Fun fact: I just searched my gmail for the word "corpse" to see if I emailed that calculation to anyone. I got 19 unrelated results. What the heck do I talk about in email??? There is actually one other variable (that I'm aware of) that's unaccounted for: the amount of nutrient absorption from the food. "Calories" in food are measured by burning the food and measuring the amount of heat given off. This value is multiplied by a kind of fudge factor to approximate how much of the nutrients are absorbed. According to a quick Google search, 98% of carbs, 95% of fat and 92% of protein is absorbed by the gut. So if we imagined that someone became super absorbent, they might require up to 8% less calories. But not enough to significantly alter calorie counting. I considered replying to the original poster of that comment, but decided that they probably weren't in the mood to receive the news. Almost certainly they are missing things in their calorie counting. On the plus side, if they are getting 1600 calories consistently and maintaining their weight, then their error is systemic and might not matter (i.e. the actual value is meaningless as long as it is consistent -- they can still go down to 1400 calories and lose weight). I've helped quite a few people lose weight before and it's pretty easy to overlook calories -- especially from fat. I had one friend who ate a really modest amount of food every day: typically a bran muffin (with butter) and coffee (with cream) in the morning. Half a subway sandwich (the kind with lots of different kinds of salami and mayonaise), a small bag of potato chips, and a bottle of sweetened ice tea for lunch. Pasta (with a cream sauce) and a salad (with dressing) in the evening. No desert, but the grand total number of calories was astounding -- pushing 3000 kcal per day. It's really, really easy to do.
    - 8y ago
  - JadeNB 8y ago
    > there was a guy here on HN just a few days ago who said something I'd never heard before: "after losing 50+ pounds my metabolism is ruined forever, I cannot eat more than 1600 calories without gaining weight". I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal. Whether or not your diagnosis is correct, how does that justify YinglingLight's claim (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17910631 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17910631) "I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history."?
SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
> "hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history" Possibly because it was only discovered a century and a half ago and it's easily measured in the modern era? Plus, two hundred years ago it would have been "cold and tired all the time", which I kind of think was the default state for humanity.
- seandougall 8y ago
  Sounds like what would have been called a “weak constitution”.
  - SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
    Which was everything from hypothyroidism to depression to coughing up blood.
paulcole 8y ago
> I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history. What makes you feel this way?

I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history. Everyone needs to check their body temperature regularly, it's a great metric.

mhb 8y ago

Why do you think that?

old-gregg 8y ago
there was a guy here on HN just a few days ago who said something I'd never heard before: "after losing 50+ pounds my metabolism is ruined forever, I cannot eat more than 1600 calories without gaining weight". I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal.
- SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
  I wonder what happened that caused those changes. Like, lots of people lose that much weight (myself included) and experience no changes. I see lots of pseudoscience on this I'd be interested in seeing what changes, what the contributing factors were, and how long it changes (is it permanent? Just a slow bounce back from the weight loss?). That's a drastic shift, and I imagine being cold is probably the tip of the iceberg in how a person changes if their metabolism drops that much.
- paulcole 8y ago
  > I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal. Pretty simple explanation. It's not possible. If a person's body burns 1,600 calories a day, yes they will gain weight if they consistently eat more than that. If this person exercises more they will absolutely burn more calories.
- the_gastropod 8y ago
  Well, it's totally normal for your metabolic rate to drop as you lose weight. Think about climbing a set of stairs: when you're 50lbs heavier, you're doing a lot more work than you are after you've lost the 50.
- brandonmenc 8y ago
  He is obviously not properly counting calories.
- mark-r 8y ago
  It's hormones. https://www.nutritionaction.com/daily/diet-and-weight-loss/a-leading-researcher-explains-the-obesity-epidemic/ https://www.nutritionaction.com/daily/diet-and-weight-loss/a... Look for the "Losing Weight" section.
- mikekchar 8y ago
  The easiest way to look at this is to look at the cooling rate of a corpse. The slope of the cooling is pretty much linear as long as the ambient temperature is much lower than body temperature (for example 20 C vs 37 C). This allows you to calculate the amount of energy necessary to maintain body temperature. Convert that to kcal and this gives you the minimum number of kcal you must eat. I've actually done it before (and even wrote a comment in HN with the results -- though it was a long time ago and I don't know if there is a way to search comments), but it takes more time than I have now. Unless my memory is incorrect or my calculations faulty, the answer is that it's very, very unlikely that a person who is over about 50 kg would be maintaining their weight with 1600, even if they were doing no exercise at all. Unless they are living in a very hot climate, it appears to be thermodynamically impossible. Fun fact: I just searched my gmail for the word "corpse" to see if I emailed that calculation to anyone. I got 19 unrelated results. What the heck do I talk about in email??? There is actually one other variable (that I'm aware of) that's unaccounted for: the amount of nutrient absorption from the food. "Calories" in food are measured by burning the food and measuring the amount of heat given off. This value is multiplied by a kind of fudge factor to approximate how much of the nutrients are absorbed. According to a quick Google search, 98% of carbs, 95% of fat and 92% of protein is absorbed by the gut. So if we imagined that someone became super absorbent, they might require up to 8% less calories. But not enough to significantly alter calorie counting. I considered replying to the original poster of that comment, but decided that they probably weren't in the mood to receive the news. Almost certainly they are missing things in their calorie counting. On the plus side, if they are getting 1600 calories consistently and maintaining their weight, then their error is systemic and might not matter (i.e. the actual value is meaningless as long as it is consistent -- they can still go down to 1400 calories and lose weight). I've helped quite a few people lose weight before and it's pretty easy to overlook calories -- especially from fat. I had one friend who ate a really modest amount of food every day: typically a bran muffin (with butter) and coffee (with cream) in the morning. Half a subway sandwich (the kind with lots of different kinds of salami and mayonaise), a small bag of potato chips, and a bottle of sweetened ice tea for lunch. Pasta (with a cream sauce) and a salad (with dressing) in the evening. No desert, but the grand total number of calories was astounding -- pushing 3000 kcal per day. It's really, really easy to do.
  - 8y ago
- JadeNB 8y ago
  > there was a guy here on HN just a few days ago who said something I'd never heard before: "after losing 50+ pounds my metabolism is ruined forever, I cannot eat more than 1600 calories without gaining weight". I didn't know how it's possible without his body temp being permanently lower than normal. Whether or not your diagnosis is correct, how does that justify YinglingLight's claim (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17910631 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17910631) "I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history."?

SketchySeaBeast 8y ago

> "hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history" Possibly because it was only discovered a century and a half ago and it's easily measured in the modern era? Plus, two hundred years ago it would have been "cold and tired all the time", which I kind of think was the default state for humanity.

seandougall 8y ago
Sounds like what would have been called a “weak constitution”.
- SketchySeaBeast 8y ago
  Which was everything from hypothyroidism to depression to coughing up blood.

paulcole 8y ago

> I feel hypothyroidism is more prevalent today than at any other point in human history. What makes you feel this way?