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What If Obesity Is Nobody’s Fault?

27 points by mellavora 4y ago

davidn20 4y ago
"United States federal law does not protect people against obesity discrimination" If we are going to talk about laws for obesity discrimination. Isn't it better to discuss height or attractiveness discrimination first? We know those things can't be change by lifestyle at all. Weight and obesity is a hard topic to discuss concretely because people are individuals. It's like sleep, some people can operate on 3 hours of sleep, while others need 9. However, by in large, it's calories in vs calories out.
- caturopath 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lookism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lookism
- spaetzleesser 4y ago
  "However, by in large, it's calories in vs calories out." It's way more complex. The quality of the calories count and if you move/exercise a lot you can eat almost any amount without gaining weight. Obesity is a consequence of a sedentary lifestyle and super processed food that's designed to be addictive and not nutritious.
  - davidguetta 4y ago
    Weight loss IS calories in out and that includes ecercice.. What you are talking about is hunger management, which is different, but yes also important on long term than just counting
- lsaferite 4y ago
  Did we read the same article? They expressly called out that the mice ate the same amount of calories, pooped the same amount of calories, and had the same levels of activity.
  - brohee 4y ago
    Yes, and with 10-15% reduction in food intake the fat mouse lost weight. The fact that we do not all handle food intake in the same way doesn't mean it's not a lifestyle issue, not everyone has to eat the same. Some people are more efficient, good for them, now they can eat less. And I say that as a fatty myself (from overeating, no magic here).
    - leereeves 4y ago
      > Some people are more efficient, good for them, now they can eat less. Let's not try to frame that is if it were a good thing. In parts of the world that are overflowing with so much delicious food, almost everyone would like to be able to eat more of it without getting fat. The inefficient people are the fortunate ones.
      - feet 4y ago
        Just because we like something doesn't mean we should do it I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to use cocaine every day
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
        leereeves 4y ago
        > I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to use cocaine every day There are plenty of people who do use cocaine regularly, and a lot of them are celebrities.
        feet 4y ago
        And how many people have died due to the cardiotoxicity? I think you may have missed the point I was making. Just because people like something doesn't mean it is beneficial or it should be done regularly
      - 4y ago
- bombcar 4y ago
  If we can find those who do not operate under calories in vs calories out we should either arrest them for breaking the laws of thermodynamics or enlist them as a power source somehow. As a culture we share blame in making it way to damn easy to eat billions of calories. Coca Cola has probably done more health damage that Big Tobacco. As he drinks his Diet Coke he posts this, c’est la vie.
  - fnordpiglet 4y ago
    Did you read the article?
    - ioslipstream 4y ago
      Obesity is someone's fault. If it weren't, then we would always have had the same obesity rate. The fact that the obesity rate is rising, or has risen in the last 40 years is evidence that something somewhere happened and someone is at fault. We can likely blame lobbyists for the tragedy that we'll never figure it out because of special interest money in keeping the "someone/something" in the dark.
      - roenxi 4y ago
        Obesity has a cause, and people have a responsibility to manage their own health. But does it really make sense to say obesity is someone's 'fault'? Choices have consequences, but fault requires unambiguous harm.
        orwin 4y ago
        I disagree, or rather i think you're too absolute. My cousin was obese at 8 (after a car accident this parents started to eat a lot, and as the youngest he followed). He had prediabetes at 12 and that killed his hormonal balance. He now cannot be anything else than obese, even with calorie restrictions.
        fnordpiglet 4y ago
- cratermoon 4y ago
  "Here it is demonstrated, however, that weight stability coexists with a persistent energy imbalance" ^1 1 Serious analytical inconsistencies challenge the validity of the energy balance theory https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844020310483 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S240584402...
- dbspin 4y ago
  >by in large, it's calories in vs calories out. It's absolutely not... I have zero sympathy for the 'fat pride', political fatness etc side of body positivity. But I can confirm both through personal experience and research that your perspective is uselessly reductive. Endocrine disruption, sleep schedule, glycemic index and pharmaceutical drugs can all enormously impact on weight gain and retention. Moreover the 'calories in, calories out hypothesis' (first outlined in this paper from the 1950's - https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article-abstract/6/5/542/4729975 https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article-abstract/6/5/542/47299...), has been debunked (see this recent met-analysis - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4516704/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4516704/). Weight gain / loss in humans is a dynamic system, where the body will preconsciously adjust activity preferences and metabolic activity to maintain weight homeostasis. There are also enormous interindividual differencies in how the body responds to calorie load - related to genetic and gut microflora differences - https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/gut-bacteria-and-weight#TOC_TITLE_HDR_3 https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/gut-bacteria-and-weight... (not a link to a study directly, but links to dozens of stories confirming impact of gut bacteria on weight and overall health). Additionally, we've seen cross species weight gain, including in species that exist outside of human society, indicating that there are environmental factors for cross cultural weight gain beyond worse diets and more sedentary life styles - https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/everything-getting-fatter https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/everything-getting....
  - nailer 4y ago
    Yes people have different bodies - some slimmer, some less so. No, that doesn't explain why people are suddenly morbidly obese.
    - DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
  - dafneee 4y ago
    >It's absolutely not So why do we never find obese people among starving conditions (famines, concentrations camps, etc)
- ChadNauseam 4y ago
  You say calories in calories out, but it’s not true. A rock has zero calories, but eat a rock that’s too big to pass through your digestive tract and you’ll gain one rock-worth of weight (followed by death). That’s why I prefer a much more simple and natural model: mass-in vs mass-out.
  - dafneee 4y ago
    E=mc^2 Calorie-in vs calorie-out, or mass-in vs mass-out is really the same thing in the end.
    - fknorangesite 4y ago
      TIL I am a nuclear reactor.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
  - pjc50 4y ago
    Kind of difficult to measure exhalation mass without special equipment. And that's how weight must be lost: you have to oxidise the carbon in it and breathe it out.
rocket_surgeron 4y ago
Genetics is irrelevant. The impact of genetics in mice, as shown in the article, is practically the same in humans: ±10% in all but the most extreme, rare, and irrelevant edge cases. If you have bad genetics, eat 10% less and you won't be obese. Eat 15% less and you'll lose weight and then you can resume eating 10% less once at a healthy weight. In a typical person's diet, eating 10% less is equivalent to not eating 51g of cheese. That is a cube of cheese approximately 2cm per side. In the typical American's diet, not consuming the average 145 daily calories of sugar-sweetened beverages already gets you more than halfway there so all you have to do to get to 15% less is not eat the equivalent of two slices of sliced cheese. (113 calories, 145+113+113=371 = 18% of a 2000 calorie diet) https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/data-statistics/sugar-sweetened-beverages-intake.html https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/data-statistics/sugar-sweetene... If you are one of the EXTREMELY RARE, SPECIAL, AND STATISTICALLY IRRELEVANT edge cases, yeah, it's gonna be tough for you.
- leereeves 4y ago
  About 75% of US adults are overweight or obese[1]. I don't think telling people "eat 10% less and you won't be obese" is a sufficient response. I blame the companies that are designing foods to be fattening and addictive and advertising them everywhere. Even Subway (marketed as healthy) tries to upsell cookies and chips and soda. Supermarkets sell "salads" with a bit of lettuce and 500 calories of meat, cheese, and dressing. Even gas stations try to upsell junk food. Why aren't food companies being held responsible for the harm caused by their products in the same way that, say, big tobacco was? 1: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm
  - davidn20 4y ago
    I don’t think people are blaming the individual, but it is up to the individual to take responsibility of their own lives. Obviously, a person environment has a great deal of impact, but the issue with saying “It’s all the corporation's fault!” Is you just surrendered any control over your life. You’re basically saying I’m a bag in the wind, and I am the way I am because of outside influences. Also, most companies exist to serve people. The reason most food are super processed and fattening is because that’s what people want. It’s not what they need, but that’s what people want. Most people prioritize cheap, delicious food over health, even if they don't say it.
firecall 4y ago
An interesting article with no conclusions. The obesity epidemic is a crisis that has only existed for 30 or so years. But yet we see yet another study looking for biological reasons to blame for us being obese! Our food chain has been corrupted and our shelves are full of processed foods. We spend all day sitting at desks and driving cars. Until we change our society we aren't going to fix the obesity crisis.
- jaywalk 4y ago
  As a "person of obesity" who sits at a desk all day and doesn't eat the healthiest diet, I 100% agree with this. When I decide to focus on being more active and eating healthier, my weight goes down. Do I have to work a little harder than others? Possibly, but crying about that isn't going to make me less obese.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Do companies and society promote harmful things that are OK in moderation to me? Debt, soda, sure. Should we reduce that? Sure! But in the end I’m still the one who chooses to fall to temptation.
- ioslipstream 4y ago
  This. Interesting that we talk about fat shaming and body pride. Why? It's not healthy, and it never will be.
syrrim 4y ago
>If, even some of the time, obesity is not due to a person overeating or under-exercising, should discrimination against the obese carry the same legal consequences as discrimination based on age, race, or gender? And by the same measure, should purveyors of fattening foods be made unaccountable for the perceived consequences of their products? Both questions are strange, for different reasons. The first, because it doesn't follow from the above. They later clarify "Only when they were fed 10 to 15 percent less did they slim down to the size of their unaltered siblings." So its not that such a specimen can't lower thir obesity by eating less, but simply that they have a lower threshold for becoming obese. As for the second question, if some portion of people would be obese regardless of the era, "purveyors of fattening foods" can still be accountable for all the other obese people. Though we don't especially have a tradition of holding such companies accountable in any meaningful sense.
krageon 4y ago
This article consistently spreads the fantasy energy can come from nowhere. Your weight is (almost) always within your control, even the study under discussion doesn't claim otherwise. It even points out if the fat mice eat less, they will not be fat. It gleefully ignores this by going ever deeper into fanciful argumentation, not at all based on any kind of evidence.
georgyo 4y ago
As a person with a gastro disease, these findings seem extremely obvious to me. At least about the exploding poop findings. I have a great deal of trouble gaining weight, and the way I have always worded it is that "Some people's digestive systems are better at holding on to calories" A close friend who counts as morbidly obese at 380lb, eats 1800 calories a day, and does not loose weight. They have to go significantly lower to make looses. Their body is very good at holding on to calories.
- brohee 4y ago
  Invariably, those low calorie intake morbidly obese people are miscounting calories (calorie counting is extremely hard). Controlled settings where they are only eating what they claim to eat see them shedding weight real fast.
  - the_only_law 4y ago
    Yeah, I’ve given up every time I’ve tried to count calories, because inevitably, I end up having to “guess” because I’m eating stuff without explicit calorie info. I can’t eyeball volume/mass of food, so converting based on a known value for a portion of food wasn’t really an option.
- pverghese 4y ago
  No way in hell that friend is eating only 1800 calories. If that was true she/he would be in a medical journal as a study
  - nradov 4y ago
    Right, most people significantly underestimate their calorie consumption.
- ticviking 4y ago
  Having lost 125lbs by following a very strict food plan. I doubt your friend is being honest with themselves about their portion size. I have to weigh everything to stay on track to lose weight at the rate I want to. (Despite losing 125lbs I'm still morbidly obese). My ability to estimate portion size is so hilariously bad I have started to assume 500 calories for each Carb or 'rich food'(meat, cheese etc) I have to guess on and 300 calories for each veg or fruit serving I guess. Experience has shown that I am actually roughly that bad and calculating serving sizes for things. Also depending on their height they may need to eat a 1500, or 1200 calorie diet to trigger weight loss(consult a pro to help guide this process).
knorker 4y ago
We already know it's not exactly calories in, calories out. But it's close. This article too says that when the fat mice ate 10% less they went back to a normal weight. 10% less is not "starving yourself". If you have a gene like this then it's not fair. But life's not fair. At least this you CAN fix. You can't fix ugly genes, short genes, or hair loss genes. Or low IQ genes. So the title is wrong. Ultimately it is, actually, someone's fault. The fat person led their own life there. It's not a short person's fault that they're short, and they can't fix it. But a fat person ate themselves fat, and can eat less and will lose weight.
- pnutjam 4y ago
  Would you take a 10% pay cut? 10% is a significant amount.
  - knorker 4y ago
    I would take a 10% pay cut for vastly better health, yes. And for food i disagree. 10% less is actually not that much less. It's more like remembering to eat less than it is to stop eating while still hungry.
- colinmhayes 4y ago
  > We already know it's not exactly calories in, calories out. It literally is though. If you burn more calories than you eat you will lose weight. It's tautological. Now some people are genetically disposed to having different calorie spends all else equal, but that doesn't change the calories in, calories out equation.
  - knorker 4y ago
    You are technically correct. The best kind of correct.
jmyeet 4y ago
I'm wary of this early result. If the mice were defecating equal calories yet some were putting on weight and others weren't then the energy had to go somewhere. Until there's a clear idea of where that energy went, this result is little more than speculation. In contrast there was another study earlier this year that showed "naturally thin" people simply eat less. There are genetic predispositions in play here. The gut biome too may play a role. The biggest factor however is our relationship with food. People eat for a variety of reasons eg for the experience, to self-medicate (eg anxiety, depression), as a reward, as an activity that itself acts as a reward, etc. The healthiest attitude to have is to treat food as fuel. I tend to eat the same thing a lot. Part of this is decision fatigue. Part of it is probably ADHD or something adjacent. But a lot of it is simply thinking of food as fuel and not tying it to emotional states, social obligations or hobbies.
- crazygringo 4y ago
  > Until there's a clear idea of where that energy went The idea is 100% clear, it's differing metabolic rates. There is zero mystery here. (To be clear, the physical mass that the obese mouse puts on, is breathed out in the lean mouse. And the lean mouse runs hotter too, of course.) Both rat's (and people's) metabolisms vary widely -- for a host of different reasons (genetics/activity/diet/etc). Which is what tends to get ignored in the whole calories-in-calories-out viewpoint.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
danielrpa 4y ago
Yes, some people gain weight easily, others don't while eating the same things. But for the vast majority of people, it's possible to find a calorie intake that will keep you healthy AND make you lose weight.
- guerrilla 4y ago
  Nope, you're just another person confounding necessary and sufficient conditions [1] 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32750512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32750512
pydry 4y ago
>Yet Majzoub’s study on mice suggests that obesity may in fact be controlled by the unalterable way an individual’s body functions. If that were the case obesity probably wouldnt vary so widely across decades and countries.
globular-toast 4y ago
Isn't this obvious? Of course there is a genetic component to obesity. If my girlfriend ate the same as me, she would be obese. She's female and much smaller. If I don't watch the salt knowing I have a genetic predisposition to high blood pressure, is that not my fault? It depends on your perspective. Ultimately I think we each have to play our hands the best we can. There's no point arguing with the hand you've been dealt. It's certainly harder for people with the lower calorific requirement. Food often comes in "one size fits all" and that's more often than not a male-sized portion. Why are women forced to exercise restraint at restaurants when they are served too much food? But, oddly, when I have suggested different portion sizes people have baulked and said it would be sexist. The big issue I rarely hear people talk about yet is addiction. Obesity is, in the majority of cases, food addiction. Does anyone think obese people want to be obese? They are all conscious of being uncomfortable, incapable and unattractive. But they can't stop eating. That's addiction. But we still allow fast food and junk food that specifically preys on this addiction. We accept their advertising everywhere. We accept their specifically engineered formulations of sugar, salt and fat designed to be as addictive as possible. If you want someone or something to blame, the food industry would be it.
throwayyy479087 4y ago
This is obvious to me - we also used to blame conditions like psychosis and cancer on sin|heresey|laziness|impurity. I'm very certain we'll find something like BPA, environmental estrogen, or HFCS causes significant weight gain. When I was in France I ate bread, cheese, pate, and meat like a pig and lost weight. I walked less than I do at home and drank more. You can't tell me there's nothing to that. I also don't believe it's simple carbs because China, Japan, and India's food cultures eat a ton of rice and obesity isn't nearly the same problem there.
jononomo 4y ago
- jononomo 4y ago
  And here's another tip: exercise is for after you get in shape, it is not in order to get in shape. You get in shape by eating only beef. Then after you're in shape you will want to exercise.
  - DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
- tonmoy 4y ago
  This is a really aggressive comment about something that is not a common knowledge without any sources. I do have high cholesterol and I’m cutting down on red meat, should I not?
  - DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
  - jononomo 4y ago
    Ok, I'll be dropping a substack article about this. Stay tuned. Give me until Friday.
  - jononomo 4y ago
    I posted a long comment above in response to another guy who questioned the benefits of high cholesterol -- and I linked to sources. Yes, if you have high cholesterol then you should not worry about it and you should eat more red meat.
- yladiz 4y ago
  Scurvy and the dangers of high cholesterol. Slaps welcome. But really, and giving you the benefit of the doubt that you’re not a troll, sure beef is more healthy than many things and most processed foods but it is definitely not the healthiest single thing you can eat. Stating that it is does not make it so, and also stating that it has all the nutrition you need is pretty disingenuous. If you have proof beyond anecdotes then show it. Edit: I fell for the troll :(
Namari 4y ago
I remember reading a while ago that one reason about high/low metabolism was based on their microbiome. They fed rats a rich diet for 2 generations and they noticed that the new generation got fat even though they were not eating much, they noticed the new genetation was missing a strain of bacteria that their grandfathers had.
pjc50 4y ago
Another (long) hypothesis, based on the observation that even lab animals have gained weight over the years: https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2021/07/07/a-chemical-hunger-part-i-mysteries/ https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2021/07/07/a-chemical-hunger-p... I'm not sure I agree all the way to the conclusion, but it's definitely worth considering that inter-country obesity may be linked to an environmental factor.
vsareto 4y ago
People don't seem to realize how much the deck is stacked against them in the US. Portion sizes at restaurants are massive and most of the food is shit. You grow up with this stuff, so you get used to it, which conditions you heavily later on. This gets worse if you have parents and friends who aren't conscientious about these issues too. CICO is not wrong but it's like 5% of the issue. People only lazily argue CICO as some kind of case-closed internet flourish. It's like going up to an NBA pro and going "bro, why do you ever miss, it's just physics"
- jsmith45 4y ago
  Right, and furthermore Calories In Calories Out is a problematic system anyway. You stop by a restaurant and order a burger. Maybe the restaurant has calories posted. Those calories are probably based on the "corporate standard" for that item, or might be based on buying samples of the product from several locations and averaging. But your burger won't have exactly that number of calories. Perhaps this person puts more or less of certain toppings on than is average. Perhaps your patty was slightly larger or smaller than average. All of that means it is hard to know the real calorie count. The same sort of thing will apply but is possibly even worse for food you prepare yourself from scratch. It is not trivial to even calculate the calories in meals you prepare, especially if fresh produce is involved. (For packaged ingredients you can try to go by the info on the nutrition label, but be warned that the rounding rules can make those misleading at times. But for fruits and vegetables, the best you can do is look up the average Caloric density for this variery, and hope that the items you have are not from some local strain with meaningful differences from the normal for that variety). In the end, it is actually easiest to accurately count calories when only eating prepackaged foods, which are generally viewed poorly. And this is not counting the fact that the systems we use to determine the calories in food are not completely accurate. Using a calorimeter to measure the heat energy output by completely combusting the food is objective, but flawed because the body does not perfectly combust everything we ingest! The Atwater system we currently use can at least in theory account for this, but the numbers used are not especially accurate and have known weaknesses. Plus they depend on accurately determining the number of grams of protein, fat, carbohydrates, non-digestible carbohydrates (like dietary fiber), etc. I suspect that even on extremely tightly controlled packaged food we could be out by over 10%. The limited precision of the Atwater numbers could easily bring the food to a 5% margin of error on its own, before considering accuracy issues with those numbers, or accuracy/precision limitations on determining the protien, fat, carb contents. And so far I've only tackled the calories in side, and not issues with calories out, like accounting for the basal metabolic rate varying in response to changes to the diet, or that not 100% of all nutritional value will get extracted from the food, and many others. There is a LOT that can be said about that side. But bigger picture, compliance with any given diet is an issue, and any diet that approach that requires counting calories means more effort must be expended to comply, making it much more likely that the person will either "cheat" on the diet, or just stop even trying after getting worn down enough. That is why even if CICO is thermodynamically sound and sufficent, it is not in and of itself a viable dieting strategy.
sw104 4y ago
While there may be an underlying cause exacerbating the issue, I still think most people's obesity (and being overweight) is almost entirely on poor lifestyle choices, and refuting this is mostly a coping mechanism. I'd be willing to bet most people (even those in shape) underestimate their calorie intake and overestimate their energy expenditure, unless actively logging it, and these small differences gradually add up. I've lost 10kg since June (starting from a healthy weight of 75kg), and my special method that doctors don't want you to know, is calories in, calories out. I track food in, and I track exercise. Even if my weight is being influenced by microplastics or something else, I believe everything is still within my own control. I do think that in an ideal world, junk food (including alcohol) would be treated akin to cigarettes, with bland packaging . featuring health warnings, and a carpet ban on being advertised.
28304283409234 4y ago
This article is dated 2013.
type0 4y ago
If you are fat and keep telling yourself that obesity is Nobody’s Fault at least you should blame the gravity that it's difficult to walk uphill.
nunez 4y ago
"Maintenance Phase" is an excellent podcast that discusses this issue in depth. My take away from listening to it is that obesity is something misunderstood but very socially stigmatized because it just is. The scientists' findings with the mice definitely tracks.

27 points by mellavora 4y ago

"United States federal law does not protect people against obesity discrimination" If we are going to talk about laws for obesity discrimination. Isn't it better to discuss height or attractiveness discrimination first? We know those things can't be change by lifestyle at all. Weight and obesity is a hard topic to discuss concretely because people are individuals. It's like sleep, some people can operate on 3 hours of sleep, while others need 9. However, by in large, it's calories in vs calories out.

caturopath 4y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lookism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lookism
spaetzleesser 4y ago
"However, by in large, it's calories in vs calories out." It's way more complex. The quality of the calories count and if you move/exercise a lot you can eat almost any amount without gaining weight. Obesity is a consequence of a sedentary lifestyle and super processed food that's designed to be addictive and not nutritious.
- davidguetta 4y ago
  Weight loss IS calories in out and that includes ecercice.. What you are talking about is hunger management, which is different, but yes also important on long term than just counting
lsaferite 4y ago
Did we read the same article? They expressly called out that the mice ate the same amount of calories, pooped the same amount of calories, and had the same levels of activity.
- brohee 4y ago
  Yes, and with 10-15% reduction in food intake the fat mouse lost weight. The fact that we do not all handle food intake in the same way doesn't mean it's not a lifestyle issue, not everyone has to eat the same. Some people are more efficient, good for them, now they can eat less. And I say that as a fatty myself (from overeating, no magic here).
  - leereeves 4y ago
    > Some people are more efficient, good for them, now they can eat less. Let's not try to frame that is if it were a good thing. In parts of the world that are overflowing with so much delicious food, almost everyone would like to be able to eat more of it without getting fat. The inefficient people are the fortunate ones.
    - feet 4y ago
      Just because we like something doesn't mean we should do it I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to use cocaine every day
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - leereeves 4y ago
        > I'm sure there are plenty of people who would like to use cocaine every day There are plenty of people who do use cocaine regularly, and a lot of them are celebrities.
        feet 4y ago
        And how many people have died due to the cardiotoxicity? I think you may have missed the point I was making. Just because people like something doesn't mean it is beneficial or it should be done regularly
    - 4y ago
bombcar 4y ago
If we can find those who do not operate under calories in vs calories out we should either arrest them for breaking the laws of thermodynamics or enlist them as a power source somehow. As a culture we share blame in making it way to damn easy to eat billions of calories. Coca Cola has probably done more health damage that Big Tobacco. As he drinks his Diet Coke he posts this, c’est la vie.
- fnordpiglet 4y ago
  Did you read the article?
  - ioslipstream 4y ago
    Obesity is someone's fault. If it weren't, then we would always have had the same obesity rate. The fact that the obesity rate is rising, or has risen in the last 40 years is evidence that something somewhere happened and someone is at fault. We can likely blame lobbyists for the tragedy that we'll never figure it out because of special interest money in keeping the "someone/something" in the dark.
    - roenxi 4y ago
      Obesity has a cause, and people have a responsibility to manage their own health. But does it really make sense to say obesity is someone's 'fault'? Choices have consequences, but fault requires unambiguous harm.
      - orwin 4y ago
        I disagree, or rather i think you're too absolute. My cousin was obese at 8 (after a car accident this parents started to eat a lot, and as the youngest he followed). He had prediabetes at 12 and that killed his hormonal balance. He now cannot be anything else than obese, even with calorie restrictions.
        fnordpiglet 4y ago
cratermoon 4y ago
"Here it is demonstrated, however, that weight stability coexists with a persistent energy imbalance" ^1 1 Serious analytical inconsistencies challenge the validity of the energy balance theory https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844020310483 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S240584402...
dbspin 4y ago
>by in large, it's calories in vs calories out. It's absolutely not... I have zero sympathy for the 'fat pride', political fatness etc side of body positivity. But I can confirm both through personal experience and research that your perspective is uselessly reductive. Endocrine disruption, sleep schedule, glycemic index and pharmaceutical drugs can all enormously impact on weight gain and retention. Moreover the 'calories in, calories out hypothesis' (first outlined in this paper from the 1950's - https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article-abstract/6/5/542/4729975 https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article-abstract/6/5/542/47299...), has been debunked (see this recent met-analysis - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4516704/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4516704/). Weight gain / loss in humans is a dynamic system, where the body will preconsciously adjust activity preferences and metabolic activity to maintain weight homeostasis. There are also enormous interindividual differencies in how the body responds to calorie load - related to genetic and gut microflora differences - https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/gut-bacteria-and-weight#TOC_TITLE_HDR_3 https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/gut-bacteria-and-weight... (not a link to a study directly, but links to dozens of stories confirming impact of gut bacteria on weight and overall health). Additionally, we've seen cross species weight gain, including in species that exist outside of human society, indicating that there are environmental factors for cross cultural weight gain beyond worse diets and more sedentary life styles - https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/everything-getting-fatter https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/everything-getting....
- nailer 4y ago
  Yes people have different bodies - some slimmer, some less so. No, that doesn't explain why people are suddenly morbidly obese.
  - DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
- dafneee 4y ago
  >It's absolutely not So why do we never find obese people among starving conditions (famines, concentrations camps, etc)
ChadNauseam 4y ago
You say calories in calories out, but it’s not true. A rock has zero calories, but eat a rock that’s too big to pass through your digestive tract and you’ll gain one rock-worth of weight (followed by death). That’s why I prefer a much more simple and natural model: mass-in vs mass-out.
- dafneee 4y ago
  E=mc^2 Calorie-in vs calorie-out, or mass-in vs mass-out is really the same thing in the end.
  - fknorangesite 4y ago
    TIL I am a nuclear reactor.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
- pjc50 4y ago
  Kind of difficult to measure exhalation mass without special equipment. And that's how weight must be lost: you have to oxidise the carbon in it and breathe it out.

rocket_surgeron 4y ago

Genetics is irrelevant. The impact of genetics in mice, as shown in the article, is practically the same in humans: ±10% in all but the most extreme, rare, and irrelevant edge cases. If you have bad genetics, eat 10% less and you won't be obese. Eat 15% less and you'll lose weight and then you can resume eating 10% less once at a healthy weight. In a typical person's diet, eating 10% less is equivalent to not eating 51g of cheese. That is a cube of cheese approximately 2cm per side. In the typical American's diet, not consuming the average 145 daily calories of sugar-sweetened beverages already gets you more than halfway there so all you have to do to get to 15% less is not eat the equivalent of two slices of sliced cheese. (113 calories, 145+113+113=371 = 18% of a 2000 calorie diet) https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/data-statistics/sugar-sweetened-beverages-intake.html https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/data-statistics/sugar-sweetene... If you are one of the EXTREMELY RARE, SPECIAL, AND STATISTICALLY IRRELEVANT edge cases, yeah, it's gonna be tough for you.

leereeves 4y ago
About 75% of US adults are overweight or obese[1]. I don't think telling people "eat 10% less and you won't be obese" is a sufficient response. I blame the companies that are designing foods to be fattening and addictive and advertising them everywhere. Even Subway (marketed as healthy) tries to upsell cookies and chips and soda. Supermarkets sell "salads" with a bit of lettuce and 500 calories of meat, cheese, and dressing. Even gas stations try to upsell junk food. Why aren't food companies being held responsible for the harm caused by their products in the same way that, say, big tobacco was? 1: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm
- davidn20 4y ago
  I don’t think people are blaming the individual, but it is up to the individual to take responsibility of their own lives. Obviously, a person environment has a great deal of impact, but the issue with saying “It’s all the corporation's fault!” Is you just surrendered any control over your life. You’re basically saying I’m a bag in the wind, and I am the way I am because of outside influences. Also, most companies exist to serve people. The reason most food are super processed and fattening is because that’s what people want. It’s not what they need, but that’s what people want. Most people prioritize cheap, delicious food over health, even if they don't say it.

firecall 4y ago

An interesting article with no conclusions. The obesity epidemic is a crisis that has only existed for 30 or so years. But yet we see yet another study looking for biological reasons to blame for us being obese! Our food chain has been corrupted and our shelves are full of processed foods. We spend all day sitting at desks and driving cars. Until we change our society we aren't going to fix the obesity crisis.

jaywalk 4y ago
As a "person of obesity" who sits at a desk all day and doesn't eat the healthiest diet, I 100% agree with this. When I decide to focus on being more active and eating healthier, my weight goes down. Do I have to work a little harder than others? Possibly, but crying about that isn't going to make me less obese.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Do companies and society promote harmful things that are OK in moderation to me? Debt, soda, sure. Should we reduce that? Sure! But in the end I’m still the one who chooses to fall to temptation.
ioslipstream 4y ago
This. Interesting that we talk about fat shaming and body pride. Why? It's not healthy, and it never will be.

syrrim 4y ago

>If, even some of the time, obesity is not due to a person overeating or under-exercising, should discrimination against the obese carry the same legal consequences as discrimination based on age, race, or gender? And by the same measure, should purveyors of fattening foods be made unaccountable for the perceived consequences of their products? Both questions are strange, for different reasons. The first, because it doesn't follow from the above. They later clarify "Only when they were fed 10 to 15 percent less did they slim down to the size of their unaltered siblings." So its not that such a specimen can't lower thir obesity by eating less, but simply that they have a lower threshold for becoming obese. As for the second question, if some portion of people would be obese regardless of the era, "purveyors of fattening foods" can still be accountable for all the other obese people. Though we don't especially have a tradition of holding such companies accountable in any meaningful sense.

krageon 4y ago

This article consistently spreads the fantasy energy can come from nowhere. Your weight is (almost) always within your control, even the study under discussion doesn't claim otherwise. It even points out if the fat mice eat less, they will not be fat. It gleefully ignores this by going ever deeper into fanciful argumentation, not at all based on any kind of evidence.

georgyo 4y ago

As a person with a gastro disease, these findings seem extremely obvious to me. At least about the exploding poop findings. I have a great deal of trouble gaining weight, and the way I have always worded it is that "Some people's digestive systems are better at holding on to calories" A close friend who counts as morbidly obese at 380lb, eats 1800 calories a day, and does not loose weight. They have to go significantly lower to make looses. Their body is very good at holding on to calories.

brohee 4y ago
Invariably, those low calorie intake morbidly obese people are miscounting calories (calorie counting is extremely hard). Controlled settings where they are only eating what they claim to eat see them shedding weight real fast.
- the_only_law 4y ago
  Yeah, I’ve given up every time I’ve tried to count calories, because inevitably, I end up having to “guess” because I’m eating stuff without explicit calorie info. I can’t eyeball volume/mass of food, so converting based on a known value for a portion of food wasn’t really an option.
pverghese 4y ago
No way in hell that friend is eating only 1800 calories. If that was true she/he would be in a medical journal as a study
- nradov 4y ago
  Right, most people significantly underestimate their calorie consumption.
ticviking 4y ago
Having lost 125lbs by following a very strict food plan. I doubt your friend is being honest with themselves about their portion size. I have to weigh everything to stay on track to lose weight at the rate I want to. (Despite losing 125lbs I'm still morbidly obese). My ability to estimate portion size is so hilariously bad I have started to assume 500 calories for each Carb or 'rich food'(meat, cheese etc) I have to guess on and 300 calories for each veg or fruit serving I guess. Experience has shown that I am actually roughly that bad and calculating serving sizes for things. Also depending on their height they may need to eat a 1500, or 1200 calorie diet to trigger weight loss(consult a pro to help guide this process).

knorker 4y ago

We already know it's not exactly calories in, calories out. But it's close. This article too says that when the fat mice ate 10% less they went back to a normal weight. 10% less is not "starving yourself". If you have a gene like this then it's not fair. But life's not fair. At least this you CAN fix. You can't fix ugly genes, short genes, or hair loss genes. Or low IQ genes. So the title is wrong. Ultimately it is, actually, someone's fault. The fat person led their own life there. It's not a short person's fault that they're short, and they can't fix it. But a fat person ate themselves fat, and can eat less and will lose weight.

pnutjam 4y ago
Would you take a 10% pay cut? 10% is a significant amount.
- knorker 4y ago
  I would take a 10% pay cut for vastly better health, yes. And for food i disagree. 10% less is actually not that much less. It's more like remembering to eat less than it is to stop eating while still hungry.
colinmhayes 4y ago
> We already know it's not exactly calories in, calories out. It literally is though. If you burn more calories than you eat you will lose weight. It's tautological. Now some people are genetically disposed to having different calorie spends all else equal, but that doesn't change the calories in, calories out equation.
- knorker 4y ago
  You are technically correct. The best kind of correct.

jmyeet 4y ago

I'm wary of this early result. If the mice were defecating equal calories yet some were putting on weight and others weren't then the energy had to go somewhere. Until there's a clear idea of where that energy went, this result is little more than speculation. In contrast there was another study earlier this year that showed "naturally thin" people simply eat less. There are genetic predispositions in play here. The gut biome too may play a role. The biggest factor however is our relationship with food. People eat for a variety of reasons eg for the experience, to self-medicate (eg anxiety, depression), as a reward, as an activity that itself acts as a reward, etc. The healthiest attitude to have is to treat food as fuel. I tend to eat the same thing a lot. Part of this is decision fatigue. Part of it is probably ADHD or something adjacent. But a lot of it is simply thinking of food as fuel and not tying it to emotional states, social obligations or hobbies.

crazygringo 4y ago
> Until there's a clear idea of where that energy went The idea is 100% clear, it's differing metabolic rates. There is zero mystery here. (To be clear, the physical mass that the obese mouse puts on, is breathed out in the lean mouse. And the lean mouse runs hotter too, of course.) Both rat's (and people's) metabolisms vary widely -- for a host of different reasons (genetics/activity/diet/etc). Which is what tends to get ignored in the whole calories-in-calories-out viewpoint.

deleted 4y ago

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danielrpa 4y ago

Yes, some people gain weight easily, others don't while eating the same things. But for the vast majority of people, it's possible to find a calorie intake that will keep you healthy AND make you lose weight.

guerrilla 4y ago
Nope, you're just another person confounding necessary and sufficient conditions [1] 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32750512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32750512

pydry 4y ago

>Yet Majzoub’s study on mice suggests that obesity may in fact be controlled by the unalterable way an individual’s body functions. If that were the case obesity probably wouldnt vary so widely across decades and countries.

globular-toast 4y ago

Isn't this obvious? Of course there is a genetic component to obesity. If my girlfriend ate the same as me, she would be obese. She's female and much smaller. If I don't watch the salt knowing I have a genetic predisposition to high blood pressure, is that not my fault? It depends on your perspective. Ultimately I think we each have to play our hands the best we can. There's no point arguing with the hand you've been dealt. It's certainly harder for people with the lower calorific requirement. Food often comes in "one size fits all" and that's more often than not a male-sized portion. Why are women forced to exercise restraint at restaurants when they are served too much food? But, oddly, when I have suggested different portion sizes people have baulked and said it would be sexist. The big issue I rarely hear people talk about yet is addiction. Obesity is, in the majority of cases, food addiction. Does anyone think obese people want to be obese? They are all conscious of being uncomfortable, incapable and unattractive. But they can't stop eating. That's addiction. But we still allow fast food and junk food that specifically preys on this addiction. We accept their advertising everywhere. We accept their specifically engineered formulations of sugar, salt and fat designed to be as addictive as possible. If you want someone or something to blame, the food industry would be it.

throwayyy479087 4y ago

This is obvious to me - we also used to blame conditions like psychosis and cancer on sin|heresey|laziness|impurity. I'm very certain we'll find something like BPA, environmental estrogen, or HFCS causes significant weight gain. When I was in France I ate bread, cheese, pate, and meat like a pig and lost weight. I walked less than I do at home and drank more. You can't tell me there's nothing to that. I also don't believe it's simple carbs because China, Japan, and India's food cultures eat a ton of rice and obesity isn't nearly the same problem there.

jononomo 4y ago

jononomo 4y ago
And here's another tip: exercise is for after you get in shape, it is not in order to get in shape. You get in shape by eating only beef. Then after you're in shape you will want to exercise.
- DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
tonmoy 4y ago
This is a really aggressive comment about something that is not a common knowledge without any sources. I do have high cholesterol and I’m cutting down on red meat, should I not?
- DangMeatSlurper 4y ago
- jononomo 4y ago
  Ok, I'll be dropping a substack article about this. Stay tuned. Give me until Friday.
- jononomo 4y ago
  I posted a long comment above in response to another guy who questioned the benefits of high cholesterol -- and I linked to sources. Yes, if you have high cholesterol then you should not worry about it and you should eat more red meat.
yladiz 4y ago
Scurvy and the dangers of high cholesterol. Slaps welcome. But really, and giving you the benefit of the doubt that you’re not a troll, sure beef is more healthy than many things and most processed foods but it is definitely not the healthiest single thing you can eat. Stating that it is does not make it so, and also stating that it has all the nutrition you need is pretty disingenuous. If you have proof beyond anecdotes then show it. Edit: I fell for the troll :(

Namari 4y ago

I remember reading a while ago that one reason about high/low metabolism was based on their microbiome. They fed rats a rich diet for 2 generations and they noticed that the new generation got fat even though they were not eating much, they noticed the new genetation was missing a strain of bacteria that their grandfathers had.

pjc50 4y ago

Another (long) hypothesis, based on the observation that even lab animals have gained weight over the years: https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2021/07/07/a-chemical-hunger-part-i-mysteries/ https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2021/07/07/a-chemical-hunger-p... I'm not sure I agree all the way to the conclusion, but it's definitely worth considering that inter-country obesity may be linked to an environmental factor.

vsareto 4y ago

People don't seem to realize how much the deck is stacked against them in the US. Portion sizes at restaurants are massive and most of the food is shit. You grow up with this stuff, so you get used to it, which conditions you heavily later on. This gets worse if you have parents and friends who aren't conscientious about these issues too. CICO is not wrong but it's like 5% of the issue. People only lazily argue CICO as some kind of case-closed internet flourish. It's like going up to an NBA pro and going "bro, why do you ever miss, it's just physics"

jsmith45 4y ago
Right, and furthermore Calories In Calories Out is a problematic system anyway. You stop by a restaurant and order a burger. Maybe the restaurant has calories posted. Those calories are probably based on the "corporate standard" for that item, or might be based on buying samples of the product from several locations and averaging. But your burger won't have exactly that number of calories. Perhaps this person puts more or less of certain toppings on than is average. Perhaps your patty was slightly larger or smaller than average. All of that means it is hard to know the real calorie count. The same sort of thing will apply but is possibly even worse for food you prepare yourself from scratch. It is not trivial to even calculate the calories in meals you prepare, especially if fresh produce is involved. (For packaged ingredients you can try to go by the info on the nutrition label, but be warned that the rounding rules can make those misleading at times. But for fruits and vegetables, the best you can do is look up the average Caloric density for this variery, and hope that the items you have are not from some local strain with meaningful differences from the normal for that variety). In the end, it is actually easiest to accurately count calories when only eating prepackaged foods, which are generally viewed poorly. And this is not counting the fact that the systems we use to determine the calories in food are not completely accurate. Using a calorimeter to measure the heat energy output by completely combusting the food is objective, but flawed because the body does not perfectly combust everything we ingest! The Atwater system we currently use can at least in theory account for this, but the numbers used are not especially accurate and have known weaknesses. Plus they depend on accurately determining the number of grams of protein, fat, carbohydrates, non-digestible carbohydrates (like dietary fiber), etc. I suspect that even on extremely tightly controlled packaged food we could be out by over 10%. The limited precision of the Atwater numbers could easily bring the food to a 5% margin of error on its own, before considering accuracy issues with those numbers, or accuracy/precision limitations on determining the protien, fat, carb contents. And so far I've only tackled the calories in side, and not issues with calories out, like accounting for the basal metabolic rate varying in response to changes to the diet, or that not 100% of all nutritional value will get extracted from the food, and many others. There is a LOT that can be said about that side. But bigger picture, compliance with any given diet is an issue, and any diet that approach that requires counting calories means more effort must be expended to comply, making it much more likely that the person will either "cheat" on the diet, or just stop even trying after getting worn down enough. That is why even if CICO is thermodynamically sound and sufficent, it is not in and of itself a viable dieting strategy.

sw104 4y ago

While there may be an underlying cause exacerbating the issue, I still think most people's obesity (and being overweight) is almost entirely on poor lifestyle choices, and refuting this is mostly a coping mechanism. I'd be willing to bet most people (even those in shape) underestimate their calorie intake and overestimate their energy expenditure, unless actively logging it, and these small differences gradually add up. I've lost 10kg since June (starting from a healthy weight of 75kg), and my special method that doctors don't want you to know, is calories in, calories out. I track food in, and I track exercise. Even if my weight is being influenced by microplastics or something else, I believe everything is still within my own control. I do think that in an ideal world, junk food (including alcohol) would be treated akin to cigarettes, with bland packaging . featuring health warnings, and a carpet ban on being advertised.

28304283409234 4y ago

This article is dated 2013.

type0 4y ago

If you are fat and keep telling yourself that obesity is Nobody’s Fault at least you should blame the gravity that it's difficult to walk uphill.

nunez 4y ago

"Maintenance Phase" is an excellent podcast that discusses this issue in depth. My take away from listening to it is that obesity is something misunderstood but very socially stigmatized because it just is. The scientists' findings with the mice definitely tracks.