6 ms·

I’m quite surprised you haven’t been accosted with the “calories in, calories out isn’t real” yet. Fwiw it is how I and others I know have lost significant amo

by dgfitz 4y ago

I’m quite surprised you haven’t been accosted with the “calories in, calories out isn’t real” yet. Fwiw it is how I and others I know have lost significant amounts of weight. There was a “keto” thread on hn the other day and holy moly was keto/calories in, calories out attacked and rebuked.

paulpauper 4y ago
Then why not just eat nothing? That way you only have to focus on the calories out portion? Obviously, some people find it much harder at this than others. Some average-sized adult males get overweight with just 1300-1700/calories a day due to slow metabolisms or other genetic factors.
- scottlamb 4y ago
  > Some average-sized adult males get overweight with just 1300-1700/calories a day due to slow metabolisms or other genetic factors. I think this is largely a myth. (The 1700 calorie end is vaguely plausible but not the 1300 calorie end). There was a good article posted here a while ago [1] which talked about this. Now, it isn't necessarily easy to maintain a certain calorie count, in terms of either knowing how much you're eating or actually sticking to it despite hunger pangs. And some foods can help you feel fuller with less, you can have different balance of muscle vs fat at the same weight, etc. In those senses I agree with people who say calories in calories out isn't the whole story. But in the end, thermodynamics always wins. Quote from the article: > Starvation Mode is this wacky idea that if you eat too little an amount of calories for an extended period of time your body stops burning fat; in fact, it starts doing the opposite–you start gaining weight ‘even when consuming 800 calories’. Sound familiar? > So, how much truth is there to this? > Well, see, Starvation Mode is an odd one. Because, while it’s not entirely correct, it’s not entirely incorrect either. > The correct part: When you reduce calories, more specifically as you begin to get leaner, there is, in fact, some slowing of metabolic rate. > The incorrect part: Due to this low-calorie consumption your body decides fuck you and proceeds to enter this phantom zone of otherworldliness where the laws of thermodynamics cease to exist, resulting in no fat loss, or worse, gaining fat on some absurdly low number of calories. It goes on for quite some time, and it's worth reading, but I'll quote just one more part. > This British actress was adamant she had a slow metabolism, turned out she was simply misreporting calorie intake. > When she recorded her food intake via video journal, her intake, according to her, was 1100 calories. When they checked her actual intake (with doubly labelled water) it came to 3000 calories. > Even when she was keeping a food diary, she misreported by 43%. [1] https://physiqonomics.com/eating-too-much/ https://physiqonomics.com/eating-too-much/ discussed at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31381410 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31381410
  - alwayslikethis 4y ago
    Ketogenic or low carbohydrate diets greatly reduce the feeling of hunger and allows you to be burning fat directly most of the times. I assume this accounts for its effect on weight loss: even without counting calories directly, you are eating fewer calories.
    - scottlamb 4y ago
      I've been doing low carb myself and think this makes sense. Less insulin spiking => more manageable hunger. It's not magic, though. If you're trying to lose significant weight, you still have to make peace with hunger. And low carb—particularly strict keto—can lead to accidental micro nutrient deficiencies, so I track nutrition anyway, even after reaching my fitness goal.
- jupp0r 4y ago
  Some people have such slow metabolism that they still get overweight when eating nothing.
  - amluto 4y ago
    Which is how the matrix works: you can use these people as power plants!
- oaktrout 4y ago
  Some people are born with 12 fingers. 1700 per day is close the basal metabolic rate (laying in bed all day) for a thin adult male. It is less than 3 hot pockets per day, very few people gain weight eating that much.
  - Brian_K_White 4y ago
    You say "3 hot pockets" as though this were an example of some obviously small thing. I would probably feel overstuffed if I tried to eat 3 hot pockets a day and nothing else. I could do it for a few days but I probably couldn't keep it up for long. I'd throw up probably within a week from gradually basically not being able to keep up. I would still be full from the last one when it came time for the next one, and that would get a bit worse each day. People are in fact different, and most Americans are like fish that aren't aware of water when it comes to their concept of what is a reasonable amount of food. They are swimming in it all day since birth, and these gross amounts seem normal. I am thin and energetic. I burn my food. But fairly sedentary and lazy, IE, my job isn't chopping wood all day nor do I ever go to a gym. But I just have nervous energy and am very thin. I'm willing to do active things when there is something to do, I typically go up and down stairs with energy etc. I almost always feel grossly overstuffed after about the 2nd meal if I'm staying with other people and eating on their schedule for more than a day. Normally I just eat one not-large meal late at night and nurse one large (say 14oz) coffee most of the day. So it's not a slow metabolism, at least as far as most cliche signs appear. When I do eat too much, I don't gain weight much. And yet, I just can not gag down a fraction of what everyone around me eats. Oh and I'm American too. This isn't coming from an Asian or something when I said Americans. Mostly German & French ancestry. Raised in upper middle class, north east, moved around a out equal parts rural and urban. Basically I was raised in the same environment that I'm saying warped most Americans, and the same quality (good and bad ie processed) and quantity of food was available. People simply vary and you just can't make many assumptions based on one's own experience. Wait I just realized something ... unless capitalism has done it's usual thing and hotpockets are much smaller now than the last time I had one. In which case disregard. The more I think about it the more I fear this is entirely likely. :)
    - 4y ago
- Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
  Can you post a link to that study? My first thought is that 1300 cannot be a caloric surplus. 1700 maybe if we are generous with "average-sized" and assume a completely sedentary person. To me that just sounds like people who aren't counting properly.
- Grustaf 4y ago
  Because eating nothing is not sustainable for more than a few weeks. If you have that slow of a metabolism then you should either build more lean mass and get more active, which drives up the metabolism, or eat less. One way to eat less without feeling hungry is to eat bulkier food, more fibre, and lower GI foods. Since I started eating pure rye bread I'm much less hungry.
- djitz 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Barbieri%27s_fast https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Barbieri%27s_fast It worked for him
Waterluvian 4y ago
Thermodynamics is thermodynamics. However what I think people are meaning to argue is that “just don’t eat as much” can be akin to saying, “just stop being depressed.” It can basically be impossible if not dangerous for some. Also, our calorie furnaces all work a bit differently. Thermodynamics laws hold, but some of us have far wider margins for how generously our body will burn off or otherwise not hold on to those calories.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- paulpauper 4y ago
  exactly, I don't get why so many people who are presumed to be smart always default to this oversimplistic assumption, ignoring that food consumption and calorie burning are as biologically-driven as almost everything else in life.
  - actionablefiber 4y ago
    The reason is that it works well enough, most of the time, for most people. If you are trying to lose weight, you do not need an exact formula to compute the derivative of your weight with respect to time; you need a mental model of your diet and metabolism that moves you toward your goal. CICO basically tells you to look at your two most important levers for doing that (how much you eat and how much you move) and adjust them until your weight moves in the right direction.
    - JackFr 4y ago
      But people have an extremely poor mental model of calories out. In particular there is a great misunderstanding with respect to the role of exercise. It’s not the calories you burn during the period of exercise, rather it’s the changes to your body that exercise causes that encourage weight loss.
      - josephcsible 4y ago
roberttod 4y ago
IIRC the way calories are measured for food is pretty simplistic, and calories in, calories out isn't terribly accurate. I can imagine it still helps a lot with weight loss, I myself lost ~20lbs a while back counting calories. But like a lot of diets that take some effort to maintain, seems like they probably aren't easy to keep up long term vs. generally eating more healthy and building habits around exercise.
eitland 4y ago
I think I realized two things a while ago: 1. calories in / calories out is true when calories are around what you need or below. If you go above, a lot it the excess calories will, for many of us, just leave unused. 2. Many people consume a lot morr calories than they think, but because of 1. it can hide itself. When some of them cut a lot of calories (not count exactly how many they eat in total, but just cut the sugar Cola and the extra chocolate) they might still be above 0 because of the big breakfast, big lunch and too big dinner.
- Beaver117 4y ago
  Yeah this is why competitive eaters such as Matt Stonie stay lean while eating 20,000+ calories. His body will waste most of that, and he'll spend the rest of the week exercising and eating healthy.

by dgfitz 4y ago

paulpauper 4y ago

Then why not just eat nothing? That way you only have to focus on the calories out portion? Obviously, some people find it much harder at this than others. Some average-sized adult males get overweight with just 1300-1700/calories a day due to slow metabolisms or other genetic factors.

scottlamb 4y ago
> Some average-sized adult males get overweight with just 1300-1700/calories a day due to slow metabolisms or other genetic factors. I think this is largely a myth. (The 1700 calorie end is vaguely plausible but not the 1300 calorie end). There was a good article posted here a while ago [1] which talked about this. Now, it isn't necessarily easy to maintain a certain calorie count, in terms of either knowing how much you're eating or actually sticking to it despite hunger pangs. And some foods can help you feel fuller with less, you can have different balance of muscle vs fat at the same weight, etc. In those senses I agree with people who say calories in calories out isn't the whole story. But in the end, thermodynamics always wins. Quote from the article: > Starvation Mode is this wacky idea that if you eat too little an amount of calories for an extended period of time your body stops burning fat; in fact, it starts doing the opposite–you start gaining weight ‘even when consuming 800 calories’. Sound familiar? > So, how much truth is there to this? > Well, see, Starvation Mode is an odd one. Because, while it’s not entirely correct, it’s not entirely incorrect either. > The correct part: When you reduce calories, more specifically as you begin to get leaner, there is, in fact, some slowing of metabolic rate. > The incorrect part: Due to this low-calorie consumption your body decides fuck you and proceeds to enter this phantom zone of otherworldliness where the laws of thermodynamics cease to exist, resulting in no fat loss, or worse, gaining fat on some absurdly low number of calories. It goes on for quite some time, and it's worth reading, but I'll quote just one more part. > This British actress was adamant she had a slow metabolism, turned out she was simply misreporting calorie intake. > When she recorded her food intake via video journal, her intake, according to her, was 1100 calories. When they checked her actual intake (with doubly labelled water) it came to 3000 calories. > Even when she was keeping a food diary, she misreported by 43%. [1] https://physiqonomics.com/eating-too-much/ https://physiqonomics.com/eating-too-much/ discussed at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31381410 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31381410
- alwayslikethis 4y ago
  Ketogenic or low carbohydrate diets greatly reduce the feeling of hunger and allows you to be burning fat directly most of the times. I assume this accounts for its effect on weight loss: even without counting calories directly, you are eating fewer calories.
  - scottlamb 4y ago
    I've been doing low carb myself and think this makes sense. Less insulin spiking => more manageable hunger. It's not magic, though. If you're trying to lose significant weight, you still have to make peace with hunger. And low carb—particularly strict keto—can lead to accidental micro nutrient deficiencies, so I track nutrition anyway, even after reaching my fitness goal.
jupp0r 4y ago
Some people have such slow metabolism that they still get overweight when eating nothing.
- amluto 4y ago
  Which is how the matrix works: you can use these people as power plants!
oaktrout 4y ago
Some people are born with 12 fingers. 1700 per day is close the basal metabolic rate (laying in bed all day) for a thin adult male. It is less than 3 hot pockets per day, very few people gain weight eating that much.
- Brian_K_White 4y ago
  You say "3 hot pockets" as though this were an example of some obviously small thing. I would probably feel overstuffed if I tried to eat 3 hot pockets a day and nothing else. I could do it for a few days but I probably couldn't keep it up for long. I'd throw up probably within a week from gradually basically not being able to keep up. I would still be full from the last one when it came time for the next one, and that would get a bit worse each day. People are in fact different, and most Americans are like fish that aren't aware of water when it comes to their concept of what is a reasonable amount of food. They are swimming in it all day since birth, and these gross amounts seem normal. I am thin and energetic. I burn my food. But fairly sedentary and lazy, IE, my job isn't chopping wood all day nor do I ever go to a gym. But I just have nervous energy and am very thin. I'm willing to do active things when there is something to do, I typically go up and down stairs with energy etc. I almost always feel grossly overstuffed after about the 2nd meal if I'm staying with other people and eating on their schedule for more than a day. Normally I just eat one not-large meal late at night and nurse one large (say 14oz) coffee most of the day. So it's not a slow metabolism, at least as far as most cliche signs appear. When I do eat too much, I don't gain weight much. And yet, I just can not gag down a fraction of what everyone around me eats. Oh and I'm American too. This isn't coming from an Asian or something when I said Americans. Mostly German & French ancestry. Raised in upper middle class, north east, moved around a out equal parts rural and urban. Basically I was raised in the same environment that I'm saying warped most Americans, and the same quality (good and bad ie processed) and quantity of food was available. People simply vary and you just can't make many assumptions based on one's own experience. Wait I just realized something ... unless capitalism has done it's usual thing and hotpockets are much smaller now than the last time I had one. In which case disregard. The more I think about it the more I fear this is entirely likely. :)
  - 4y ago
Vt71fcAqt7 4y ago
Can you post a link to that study? My first thought is that 1300 cannot be a caloric surplus. 1700 maybe if we are generous with "average-sized" and assume a completely sedentary person. To me that just sounds like people who aren't counting properly.
Grustaf 4y ago
Because eating nothing is not sustainable for more than a few weeks. If you have that slow of a metabolism then you should either build more lean mass and get more active, which drives up the metabolism, or eat less. One way to eat less without feeling hungry is to eat bulkier food, more fibre, and lower GI foods. Since I started eating pure rye bread I'm much less hungry.
djitz 4y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Barbieri%27s_fast https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Barbieri%27s_fast It worked for him

Waterluvian 4y ago

Thermodynamics is thermodynamics. However what I think people are meaning to argue is that “just don’t eat as much” can be akin to saying, “just stop being depressed.” It can basically be impossible if not dangerous for some. Also, our calorie furnaces all work a bit differently. Thermodynamics laws hold, but some of us have far wider margins for how generously our body will burn off or otherwise not hold on to those calories.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
paulpauper 4y ago
exactly, I don't get why so many people who are presumed to be smart always default to this oversimplistic assumption, ignoring that food consumption and calorie burning are as biologically-driven as almost everything else in life.
- actionablefiber 4y ago
  The reason is that it works well enough, most of the time, for most people. If you are trying to lose weight, you do not need an exact formula to compute the derivative of your weight with respect to time; you need a mental model of your diet and metabolism that moves you toward your goal. CICO basically tells you to look at your two most important levers for doing that (how much you eat and how much you move) and adjust them until your weight moves in the right direction.
  - JackFr 4y ago
    But people have an extremely poor mental model of calories out. In particular there is a great misunderstanding with respect to the role of exercise. It’s not the calories you burn during the period of exercise, rather it’s the changes to your body that exercise causes that encourage weight loss.
    - josephcsible 4y ago

roberttod 4y ago

IIRC the way calories are measured for food is pretty simplistic, and calories in, calories out isn't terribly accurate. I can imagine it still helps a lot with weight loss, I myself lost ~20lbs a while back counting calories. But like a lot of diets that take some effort to maintain, seems like they probably aren't easy to keep up long term vs. generally eating more healthy and building habits around exercise.

eitland 4y ago

I think I realized two things a while ago: 1. calories in / calories out is true when calories are around what you need or below. If you go above, a lot it the excess calories will, for many of us, just leave unused. 2. Many people consume a lot morr calories than they think, but because of 1. it can hide itself. When some of them cut a lot of calories (not count exactly how many they eat in total, but just cut the sugar Cola and the extra chocolate) they might still be above 0 because of the big breakfast, big lunch and too big dinner.

Beaver117 4y ago
Yeah this is why competitive eaters such as Matt Stonie stay lean while eating 20,000+ calories. His body will waste most of that, and he'll spend the rest of the week exercising and eating healthy.