If the insulin affects your fat tissue to increase energy pick up by the tissue itself (which we know it does), the result will be hunger. That hunger will lead

If the insulin affects your fat tissue to increase energy pick up by the tissue itself (which we know it does), the result will be hunger. That hunger will lead to a) increased food intake, b) lower activity levels, or c) breakdown of other tissues to feed the fat. Thermodynamics holds, but the insulin is the driver in the process. Two things I suggest you look at: Zucker rats. An obese strain of rat. You can semi-starve it from infancy and it will get just as obese. It will be smaller, but the body fat percentage will be the same. The second thing to look at are overfeeding studies. It's very hard to overfeed people with protein. The only successful studies had to be done on prisoners, and they barely gained weight. With carbohydrates, it's the opposite. People would eat 10,000 calories a day and complain of being hungry. Weight gain is easy to introduce.