6 ms·

metabolism is orthogonal . It's possible to have a fast metabolism and still be obese if you're eating at a surplus. But it's also possible people with faster m

metabolism is orthogonal . It's possible to have a fast metabolism and still be obese if you're eating at a surplus. But it's also possible people with faster metabolisms may be more successful at weight loss if already obese. So a 300-lbs person who eats 10,000 calories/day to be weight stable will find it easier to lose weight compared to to a 300 lbs person who is stable at 4,000 cal/day. This can also explain how some people lose tons of weight on GLP-1 drugs, whereas others lose less. The guy eating 10,000 calories/day will lose much more weight more rapidly owning to having a much bigger metabolic furnace, as soon as he restricts eating and his body is no longer getting 10,000 calories/day. Unfortunately, there are no studies that investigate the link, if any, with metabolism and dieting success.

sethammons 2y ago
10k calories a day is what a black bear eats preparing for hibernation. And it is what Michael Phelps would eat daily when training in the pool for hours on end. Obese people can remain obese eating 1000 calories a day. I recall one episode of My 600lb Life and the show's featured person that day was at 900 or 1200 calories a day and still didn't lose weight. Might have still been gaining. It is a dynamic system. People tend to only consider the CI in CI/CO.
- ykonstant 2y ago
  >Obese people can remain obese eating 1000 calories a day. I recall one episode of My 600lb Life and the show's featured person that day was at 900 or 1200 calories a day and still didn't lose weight. Might have still been gaining. How is that possible? There is a lower bound on calories needed (on average across say six months) to maintain life. Adding to that the calories needed to maintain the weight, I don't see how an obese person could stay alive with "CO" significantly lower than 1200 kcal.
  - eftpotrm 2y ago
    And yet it happens. A doctor in my family told the story of a patient they were treating in hospital who medically needed to lose weight, and who they found unable to get any reduction until they dropped below _200_ calories a day. Metabolism is _significantly_ more complex than CI/CO, from experience.
    - ykonstant 2y ago
      For how long? Irregularities can persist for a small amount of time, no doubt; but for how long does one maintain weight and life on 300 calories a day?
    - phyalow 2y ago
      Come on, this is ridiculous. CI/CO is a thing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamics https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamics
      - d4704 2y ago
        Agreeing and I found it interesting to learn more about caloric availability to the body. I.e. calories on the label vs what the body can actually access. Like drinking smoothies (high availability) vs raw fruit (lower availability) Dr. Greger (Nutrition focused) discusses some of this on calorie density and some referenced studies here if interested: https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/how-to-lose-weight-eating-more-food/ https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/how-to-lose-weight-eating-mo...
      - inglor_cz 2y ago
        I don't believe that people can gain weight while eating almost nothing, but I believe that their internal distribution of energy may be out of whack. Proponents of naive thermodynamics model tend to assume that only "excessive" energy is stored into bodily fat, once all the other tissues have had their fair share. That is not really true in insulin resistant people, whose storage may be excessive and leave the rest of the body unsatisfied and hungry, which drives them to eat more than a healthy person would. To us, this looks like deliberate overeating, to them, it is a result of constant hunger caused by the fact that some part of the energy consumed is being immediately locked away in fat tissues by dysregulated metabolic processes. Notably, it isn't easy to "correct" this situation by just eating less, because that will leave those people feeling really starved. Insulin sensitivity must be restored first, then the fat stores will give up their excess willingly and that person won't suffer.
    - _Algernon_ 2y ago
      You cant cheat thermodynamics, so something does not add up. Most likely the calorie estimates if they were self reported. To illustrate a single 37.5g snickers is slightly below 200kcal. I probably get that number of calories just from the milk in my coffee in an average day.
  - jodrellblank 2y ago
    > "How is that possible?" Eat 1200 Calories per day, drink 5Kg of water, water retention, body mass and scale weight goes up with increasing water weight?
  - ben7799 2y ago
    It happens because we act like calories are calories when it's clearly not true. Calorie counts in nutrition data are generated by something like burning the food in a bomb calorimeter. Which is most definitely not what our bodies do. We have all kinds of different biochemical ways of metabolizing different types of foods. So someone eating 1000 calories of day could be eating very healthy or they could be ingesting a whole bunch of garbage full of sweeteners. It doesn't seem like anyone really understands how it works but all those sweeteners are more likely to make you gain weight.
    - tekla 2y ago
      Why is it that people claim the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to humans?
      - bslanej 2y ago
        Because our metabolisation mechanisms are extremely complex and many things, like genetics, decide how we metabolise food; we are not petrol engines.
      - TheCoelacanth 2y ago
        Obviously the laws of thermodynamics apply, but the most naive application of the laws of thermodynamics doesn't. A human body isn't a bomb calorimeter and it doesn't perfectly combust everything you eat.
      - asoneth 2y ago
        No one is claiming that the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to humans.
- _Algernon_ 2y ago
  I'm sure an obese person claiming to eat 1000kcal per day can still gain weight but that is largely due to selfreported calorie estimates being a bad measure. Put that person in a chamber where calorie intake is controlled and I'd bet the effect disappears.
  - nikanj 2y ago
    Ate only 1000kcal in food. Added in 1400kcal in sugary drinks and 2000kcal in small bites of this and that (that don't need to be counted, because it's just one spoonful of peanut butter!)
    - op00to 2y ago
      The small bites have doomed me in the past until I charted and realized the impact.
  - Izkata 2y ago
    Yeah, I don't know if it was that episode or from somewhere else, but there was a similar thing where they followed the person around for a day and it turned out they didn't count anything ate as a snack between meals. They were accurately counting their meals, but including the snacks went somewhere above 3000 a day.
    - bluecheese452 2y ago
      Secret eaters, a British show.
- vkazanov 2y ago
  As somebody who went through successful weight cuts at least 3 times I must notice that not losing weight on 200 calories a day is... a very unrealistic situation. Even a 1000 calories is starving. (I do weightlifting, and controlling one's weight is basics of everything in the gym)
- bluecheese452 2y ago
  This is completely and obviously untrue.

sethammons 2y ago

10k calories a day is what a black bear eats preparing for hibernation. And it is what Michael Phelps would eat daily when training in the pool for hours on end. Obese people can remain obese eating 1000 calories a day. I recall one episode of My 600lb Life and the show's featured person that day was at 900 or 1200 calories a day and still didn't lose weight. Might have still been gaining. It is a dynamic system. People tend to only consider the CI in CI/CO.

ykonstant 2y ago
>Obese people can remain obese eating 1000 calories a day. I recall one episode of My 600lb Life and the show's featured person that day was at 900 or 1200 calories a day and still didn't lose weight. Might have still been gaining. How is that possible? There is a lower bound on calories needed (on average across say six months) to maintain life. Adding to that the calories needed to maintain the weight, I don't see how an obese person could stay alive with "CO" significantly lower than 1200 kcal.
- eftpotrm 2y ago
  And yet it happens. A doctor in my family told the story of a patient they were treating in hospital who medically needed to lose weight, and who they found unable to get any reduction until they dropped below _200_ calories a day. Metabolism is _significantly_ more complex than CI/CO, from experience.
  - ykonstant 2y ago
    For how long? Irregularities can persist for a small amount of time, no doubt; but for how long does one maintain weight and life on 300 calories a day?
  - phyalow 2y ago
    Come on, this is ridiculous. CI/CO is a thing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamics https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermodynamics
    - d4704 2y ago
      Agreeing and I found it interesting to learn more about caloric availability to the body. I.e. calories on the label vs what the body can actually access. Like drinking smoothies (high availability) vs raw fruit (lower availability) Dr. Greger (Nutrition focused) discusses some of this on calorie density and some referenced studies here if interested: https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/how-to-lose-weight-eating-more-food/ https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/how-to-lose-weight-eating-mo...
    - inglor_cz 2y ago
      I don't believe that people can gain weight while eating almost nothing, but I believe that their internal distribution of energy may be out of whack. Proponents of naive thermodynamics model tend to assume that only "excessive" energy is stored into bodily fat, once all the other tissues have had their fair share. That is not really true in insulin resistant people, whose storage may be excessive and leave the rest of the body unsatisfied and hungry, which drives them to eat more than a healthy person would. To us, this looks like deliberate overeating, to them, it is a result of constant hunger caused by the fact that some part of the energy consumed is being immediately locked away in fat tissues by dysregulated metabolic processes. Notably, it isn't easy to "correct" this situation by just eating less, because that will leave those people feeling really starved. Insulin sensitivity must be restored first, then the fat stores will give up their excess willingly and that person won't suffer.
  - _Algernon_ 2y ago
    You cant cheat thermodynamics, so something does not add up. Most likely the calorie estimates if they were self reported. To illustrate a single 37.5g snickers is slightly below 200kcal. I probably get that number of calories just from the milk in my coffee in an average day.
- jodrellblank 2y ago
  > "How is that possible?" Eat 1200 Calories per day, drink 5Kg of water, water retention, body mass and scale weight goes up with increasing water weight?
- ben7799 2y ago
  It happens because we act like calories are calories when it's clearly not true. Calorie counts in nutrition data are generated by something like burning the food in a bomb calorimeter. Which is most definitely not what our bodies do. We have all kinds of different biochemical ways of metabolizing different types of foods. So someone eating 1000 calories of day could be eating very healthy or they could be ingesting a whole bunch of garbage full of sweeteners. It doesn't seem like anyone really understands how it works but all those sweeteners are more likely to make you gain weight.
  - tekla 2y ago
    Why is it that people claim the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to humans?
    - bslanej 2y ago
      Because our metabolisation mechanisms are extremely complex and many things, like genetics, decide how we metabolise food; we are not petrol engines.
    - TheCoelacanth 2y ago
      Obviously the laws of thermodynamics apply, but the most naive application of the laws of thermodynamics doesn't. A human body isn't a bomb calorimeter and it doesn't perfectly combust everything you eat.
    - asoneth 2y ago
      No one is claiming that the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to humans.
_Algernon_ 2y ago
I'm sure an obese person claiming to eat 1000kcal per day can still gain weight but that is largely due to selfreported calorie estimates being a bad measure. Put that person in a chamber where calorie intake is controlled and I'd bet the effect disappears.
- nikanj 2y ago
  Ate only 1000kcal in food. Added in 1400kcal in sugary drinks and 2000kcal in small bites of this and that (that don't need to be counted, because it's just one spoonful of peanut butter!)
  - op00to 2y ago
    The small bites have doomed me in the past until I charted and realized the impact.
- Izkata 2y ago
  Yeah, I don't know if it was that episode or from somewhere else, but there was a similar thing where they followed the person around for a day and it turned out they didn't count anything ate as a snack between meals. They were accurately counting their meals, but including the snacks went somewhere above 3000 a day.
  - bluecheese452 2y ago
    Secret eaters, a British show.
vkazanov 2y ago
As somebody who went through successful weight cuts at least 3 times I must notice that not losing weight on 200 calories a day is... a very unrealistic situation. Even a 1000 calories is starving. (I do weightlifting, and controlling one's weight is basics of everything in the gym)
bluecheese452 2y ago
This is completely and obviously untrue.