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Ok, then I'll rephrase my question: If I consume 3-4k calories of fat per day and exclude all carbs, will I lose weight? The answer is still "No, not if I'm usi

• beagle3 13y ago
  Good for you. For some people, level of activity matters little, and intake composition (with amounts less relevant) making all the difference. I've been a very active fat-but-not-obese 220, and a lean-but-not-active 170, and my "calorie intake" was larger on the latter. I can easily go lean by going down to a 500-calorie-a-day diet for 2 months; And then, for 6-8 months, my intake doesn't seem to matter - I stay lean - until all of a sudden, with no change of intake, and within a couple of weeks, I balloon 20-30 lbs, that stay there until the next "low-calorie" period. Yes, this is baffling. No, I haven't figured it out yet, though gut bacteria and similar explanations seem much more relevant than anything else at this point. Read this guy about consuming 6k/day: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/sam-feltham/why-i-didnt-get-fat-from-eating-too-much_b_3428524.html http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/sam-feltham/why-i-didnt-get-... - I've known other examples. calorie counting is NOT science, physics or thermodynamics, and produces miserable results for some people.
  • DanBC 13y ago
    > going down to a 500-calorie-a-day diet for 2 months Re-feeding programmes for people with anorexia are carefully worked out to avoid problems. How were you re-feeding after this extreme modification to your diet? > http://www.huffingtonpost http://www.huffingtonpost This ruins your credibility. > calorie counting is NOT science, physics or thermodynamics, It is. Really, truly, it is. > and produces miserable results for some people. This may well be true. Reading this thread is clear evidence that people have horrible understanding of diet and nutrition, and that people get information from weird sources. I can easily imagine someone reducing calories to 1,800 per day but having a miserable time because they're also following some stupid advice they got from a quack.
    • beagle3 13y ago
      > Re-feeding programmes for people with anorexia are carefully worked out to avoid problems. How were you re-feeding after this extreme modification to your diet? Just gradually ramping back over a week. And you may want to read the definition of Anorexia, because from this post, it's probably NOT what you think it is. > It is. Really, truly, it is. [citation needed] "calorie counting" for the purpose of weight loss, as commonly practiced, is not. I've posted a few links https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6779151 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6779151, some from pubmed, in case you are interested. Calorie counting is only useful for weight management in the tautological sense (that eventually invokes E=MC^2) meaning not at all. If it's science, you would be able to provide reference to an experiment that demonstrates it, I guess? Not bomb calorimeter measurements, mind you (these imply you can eat paper - it's carbohydrate!, or drink gasoline). Real results that indicate, in no uncertain terms, that all energy is done through aerobic or anaerobic glycolysis (for which bomb calorimeter measurements have some relation), and never through fermentation (which is about 1/8th as energy efficient http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_hypothesis ), and that all edible carbohydrates (what's the scientific definition), all fat, all protein, and all alcohol (but not fiber, hydrocarbons, etc) are used for energy. It's not science. It really, really isn't. Not anymore than e.g. the lipid hypothesis, which was never proved though is accepted as gospel by "scientists".
• jerf 13y ago
  "Ok, then I'll rephrase my question: If I consume 3-4k calories of fat per day and exclude all carbs, will I lose weight? The answer is still "No, not if I'm using fewer than 3-4k calories in my daily activity."" Question is still based on a fundamentally flawed premise, which is that we can just talk about the human body as if it's a bag in which you stuff a certain amount of calories, and the bag passively accepts the stuffing with no reaction. Stuff it with 2000 calories or 10,000, it doesn't care. This is so obviously wrong that as soon as you examine the assumption consciously it's obviously flawed, but people don't, usually. The point is, if you eat nothing but protein and fat, you will find yourself unable to overconsume. (Barring a real medical disorder, like thyroid problems.) Whether you would hypothetically gain weight if you forced the food in isn't very relevant, except in a very abstract scientific sense. The truth is that humans aren't special, and just like the entire rest of the animal kingdom, our bodies have no particular inclination to become morbidly fat. Even in abundance, your body will self-regulate. It is not as if abundance is that unusual thing in the real world, not even sustained abundance, but you do not see morbidly obese deer waddling around or fat squirrels getting splattered in the road. What's wrong is what we eat, not our bodies. The idea that our bodies could be this... stupid is frankly just absurd. If you eat protein, fat, and natural high-complexity carb in moderation (not Russet potatoes or the modern biological candies that some fruits have been turned into), you body will regulate itself. Any discussion of weight gain or loss without discussion of regulation mechanisms is so flawed it can just be ignored; the body is full of them. I don't count calories; I watch what I eat. The calorie counting is done by ancient and well-honed parts of my brain I have no conscious access to, but I don't need that and don't want it. All "me" could do is mess it up. (I find my body is tending to self regulate to the "just barely overweight" part of the BMI spectrum. There is significant recent evidence that this is actually quite normal and healthier than fighting your way down to the "officially" correct BMI.)