5 ms·

His premise: That in weight loss, pure calorie counting is what matters most -- not the nutritional value of the food. This should not be a startling revelatio

by spudlyo 16y ago

His premise: That in weight loss, pure calorie counting is what matters most -- not the nutritional value of the food. This should not be a startling revelation. Mind you we're speaking simply of weight loss, not "healthy eating" or "good nutrition" or any of the other topics that people often mix up with weight loss. It seems that in Professor Haub's case that the benefit to losing the weight outweighed the negative consequences of eating junk food -- at least in the short term.

niels_olson 16y ago
True. But a healthy weight is by far the single most important nutritional goal in our society. Malnutrition due to any other cause is exceedingly rare in the developed world.
coffee 16y ago
I think this is a startling revelation to MOST people. Most people do, as you've noted, mix up healthy food with weight loss. Have you ever told someone who wants to lose weight they should not add ton's of fattening (yet healthy) olive oil to their salads? Typical response: "But, it's healthy fat!" - yea, but it's fattening at 110 calories per tablespoon... Weight loss and good nutrition are mixed together. It's the premise behind a lot of marketing on food labels. Look how healthy some food product labels appear. "I want to lose weight, and the label says 'healthy choice' so it must be okay for me to eat!" A close review of the nutrition facts tells a completely different story. But who really reviews nutrition facts? I never looked at the nutrition facts, and I was always overweight. This last year I started tracking my food and it's calories ( one example: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1828786 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1828786 ) - This is the first time in my life that I've been decreasing body fat percentage and increasing muscle percentage. No fad diet, hell, I drink beer and eat pizza. But the days that I do, I make sure to keep my calorie count in a deficit. It was startling to me, as obvious as it is now, that "healthy food" does not equal "low calorie food." And the way to lose body fat is eat less calories. Whodathunkit :)
- niels_olson 16y ago
  > "healthy food" does not equal "low calorie food." And the way to lose body fat is eat less calories. Can't be overstated. Please tell anyone who will listen.
  - eru 16y ago
    You can also try to grow more muscles by, say, weightlifting to get a more active metabolism.
- byrneseyeview 16y ago
  As someone who is eating a delicious, olive oil-doused salad right now, I have to interject: your calorie sources do affect your weight gain, albeit indirectly: if you're getting most of your energy from carbs, you'll consistently crave food a few hours after eating. If you get the majority of your calories from protein and fat, you'll get over this. I consume a lot of fat and protein: two or three dozen eggs per week, fatty red meat for most dinners, olive oil-soaked salads for lunch, etc. This has led to significant weight loss, as well as a substantial energy boost. As this is (fairly) close to the diet that humans evolved to consume, it's not especially surprising that it works.
  - coffee 16y ago
    You're missing the point. You are stating that if one eats the "correct types" of food, one will lose weight. Not true. You can eat to many calories of the "correct types" of food and still gain weight. The article discusses a man eating Twinkies, yet still lost weight. You're saying you eat fatty red meats, yet still lost weight. The Twinkies guy, as well as you, have lost weight because you're in a calorie deficit, regardless of the "types" of food you're eating.
    - mikeklaas 16y ago
      His point was that eating less carbs leads to eating less total calories (through suppression of appetite). He didn't claim that eating two different foods comprising the same # of calories lead to different amount of weight loss.
spinlock 16y ago
I think jumping to the conclusion that "calorie counting is what matters most" or that it's "not the nutritional value of the food" is bad science. This experiment proved that it was possible for one man to loose weight eating only junk food. I'm not a statistician, but I'm going to guess that a sample size of 1 is too small to generalize. There was also no competing hypothesis tested in this experiment. A trial was not done where the nutritional value of the food was tested. Anyway, in my anecdotal experience, I've been able to go from 205 back to my college pole-vaulting weight of 185 by following a 40-30-30 ratio of calories from fats, carbs, and protein without ever worrying about total calories. That's great for me but it says nothing about you because a simply can't generalize from my unique experience.
- niels_olson 16y ago
  Maintaining a healthy weight is by far the most important nutritional goal in the developed world, and, by a vast margin, the most important thing you have to do (not optional), is watch how much you eat.
richcollins 16y ago
Most of the research and theory that I've seen on the subject espouses the idea that the type of food that you eat has a significant effect on hunger level, not that the type of calorie matters wrt weight loss. So you'll lose the same amount of weight if you eat the same number of calories of HFCS and beef jerky, but you'll be horribly hungry all day eating the HFCS while you'll feel satiated on the jerky.
- zerohp 16y ago
  In my experience losing 85 pounds with calorie counting, hunger is mostly related to how much fiber I'm taking in. The more fiber I get, the more satisfied I am a few hours later. From what I've read, we evolved to eat a far greater amount of fiber than most American's eat today which is one of the significant problems with our diet.

by spudlyo 16y ago

niels_olson 16y ago

True. But a healthy weight is by far the single most important nutritional goal in our society. Malnutrition due to any other cause is exceedingly rare in the developed world.

coffee 16y ago

I think this is a startling revelation to MOST people. Most people do, as you've noted, mix up healthy food with weight loss. Have you ever told someone who wants to lose weight they should not add ton's of fattening (yet healthy) olive oil to their salads? Typical response: "But, it's healthy fat!" - yea, but it's fattening at 110 calories per tablespoon... Weight loss and good nutrition are mixed together. It's the premise behind a lot of marketing on food labels. Look how healthy some food product labels appear. "I want to lose weight, and the label says 'healthy choice' so it must be okay for me to eat!" A close review of the nutrition facts tells a completely different story. But who really reviews nutrition facts? I never looked at the nutrition facts, and I was always overweight. This last year I started tracking my food and it's calories ( one example: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1828786 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1828786 ) - This is the first time in my life that I've been decreasing body fat percentage and increasing muscle percentage. No fad diet, hell, I drink beer and eat pizza. But the days that I do, I make sure to keep my calorie count in a deficit. It was startling to me, as obvious as it is now, that "healthy food" does not equal "low calorie food." And the way to lose body fat is eat less calories. Whodathunkit :)

niels_olson 16y ago
> "healthy food" does not equal "low calorie food." And the way to lose body fat is eat less calories. Can't be overstated. Please tell anyone who will listen.
- eru 16y ago
  You can also try to grow more muscles by, say, weightlifting to get a more active metabolism.
byrneseyeview 16y ago
As someone who is eating a delicious, olive oil-doused salad right now, I have to interject: your calorie sources do affect your weight gain, albeit indirectly: if you're getting most of your energy from carbs, you'll consistently crave food a few hours after eating. If you get the majority of your calories from protein and fat, you'll get over this. I consume a lot of fat and protein: two or three dozen eggs per week, fatty red meat for most dinners, olive oil-soaked salads for lunch, etc. This has led to significant weight loss, as well as a substantial energy boost. As this is (fairly) close to the diet that humans evolved to consume, it's not especially surprising that it works.
- coffee 16y ago
  You're missing the point. You are stating that if one eats the "correct types" of food, one will lose weight. Not true. You can eat to many calories of the "correct types" of food and still gain weight. The article discusses a man eating Twinkies, yet still lost weight. You're saying you eat fatty red meats, yet still lost weight. The Twinkies guy, as well as you, have lost weight because you're in a calorie deficit, regardless of the "types" of food you're eating.
  - mikeklaas 16y ago
    His point was that eating less carbs leads to eating less total calories (through suppression of appetite). He didn't claim that eating two different foods comprising the same # of calories lead to different amount of weight loss.

spinlock 16y ago

I think jumping to the conclusion that "calorie counting is what matters most" or that it's "not the nutritional value of the food" is bad science. This experiment proved that it was possible for one man to loose weight eating only junk food. I'm not a statistician, but I'm going to guess that a sample size of 1 is too small to generalize. There was also no competing hypothesis tested in this experiment. A trial was not done where the nutritional value of the food was tested. Anyway, in my anecdotal experience, I've been able to go from 205 back to my college pole-vaulting weight of 185 by following a 40-30-30 ratio of calories from fats, carbs, and protein without ever worrying about total calories. That's great for me but it says nothing about you because a simply can't generalize from my unique experience.

niels_olson 16y ago
Maintaining a healthy weight is by far the most important nutritional goal in the developed world, and, by a vast margin, the most important thing you have to do (not optional), is watch how much you eat.

richcollins 16y ago

Most of the research and theory that I've seen on the subject espouses the idea that the type of food that you eat has a significant effect on hunger level, not that the type of calorie matters wrt weight loss. So you'll lose the same amount of weight if you eat the same number of calories of HFCS and beef jerky, but you'll be horribly hungry all day eating the HFCS while you'll feel satiated on the jerky.

zerohp 16y ago
In my experience losing 85 pounds with calorie counting, hunger is mostly related to how much fiber I'm taking in. The more fiber I get, the more satisfied I am a few hours later. From what I've read, we evolved to eat a far greater amount of fiber than most American's eat today which is one of the significant problems with our diet.