I think a lot of the magical thinking surrounding weight loss is because there's no one-size-fits-all solution, so people make up patterns in their heads and believe them to be true.
Does he keep a detailed food log? I have power lifted and worked out for over a decade now. Every single skinny person who has asked for my help to gain weight has told me exactly what you said above, "I eat 3-4k day and just can't seem to get any bigger." As soon as I put them on a food log we find out that nope, they are barely crossing 2k calories and are like most people who severely under/over estimate how much they eat.
In my experience it's very hard to compare the amount of food I eat with how much someone else at the table eats.
If inputs > outputs, there is net energy storage (as fat or protein)
If inputs < outputs, there is net energy deficit (lost from fat and protein)
Inputs = food and drink consumed
Outputs = Basal metabolic rate (BMR) + energy used for activity + energy lost in urine and faeces
Faeces caloric content varies between 50-350 kcal / day, urine 91–117 kcal / day [1]
Basal metabolic rate is primarily decided by fat-free mass, mass, and age, 26% of BMR is not defined by these parameters. Mean BMR is 1500 kcal/day, and 26% of this represents a variability of 1305-1695 kcal per day.[2]
(350-50) + (117-91) + (1695-1305) = 716 kcal
Therefore two people of identical age, fat-free mass and mass who consume identical caloric intake and perform identical exercise will have, at most, a variance of 716 kcal / day in their energy expenditure from the variance in urinary and faecal caloric loss and BMR
[1]: Rose C, Parker A, Jefferson B, Cartmell E. The Characterization of Feces and Urine: A Review of the Literature to Inform Advanced Treatment Technology. Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology. 2015;45(17):1827-1879. doi:10.1080/10643389.2014.1000761. Section 3.2.5 and Section 3.6.4
[2] Factors influencing variation in basal metabolic rate include fat-free mass, fat mass, age, and circulating thyroxine but not sex, circulating leptin, or triiodothyronine. Johnstone AM, Murison SD, Duncan JS, Rance KA, Speakman JR. Am J Clin Nutr. 2005 Nov;82(5):941-8.
Thermodynamics provides a lower bound on the amount of energy taken from food, but but couldn't it cost me 2 kcal to put 1 kcal into a stationary bike, while it costs someone else only 1.5?
All conservation of energy says here is that it has to cost at least 1.
His friends may be the same age, but have wildly different amounts of fat and muscle despite similar exercise regimens. I think that's what his point was, not that thermodynamics don't apply.
That kind of variance is enough to mean that if we trust the study, you could raise two different twenty-year-olds and one will die of starvation and the other will be clinically obese despite the same routine and diet.
Obese people usually display the opposite: they sit very still.
I often wonder how much obesity is a result of telling young children to keep still and stop fidgeting.
its likely the couch potatoe is unhealthy inside even though he looks fit on the outside.
on the other side, if someone is overweight (albeit not very obese) but overall eats a healthy diet, it shouldnt be that worrisome.
People just need help to find what works for them and for a majority of people who don't have hormone imbalances starting with energy in = energy used personally is going to get them very far in their weight control and just generally understanding what happens to their bodies in relation to food intake. We focus too much on anything but energy intake (this food is a super food, and this is healthy and that isn't). I'm not saying they are not important but if you want to make quick health improvements to a large group of people, starting from energy input to output is more effective.
I used to not be able to put on mass (hard gainer). What I found was that I wasn't eating as much as I thought and really to gain muscle mass and not just mass you then need to not only be in a caloric surplus you need to look a level deeper at your macros and increase your protein in take. If it fits your macros diet would get you close to a body that you are happy with as long as you tweak your macros to what you want to accomplish.
Also, healthy foods do have merit with their micros but again if you don't have hormone issues you can eat what is untraditional considered unhealthy foods, such as McDonalds, and not put on weight or even lose weight as long as you control for caloric intake. The hard part with unhealthy foods is controlling your calories. It is really easy to eat your daily total calories in one or two meals eating unhealthy foods (McDonalds in this example) than eating vegetables and healthier proteins and carbs (lean meats and whole grains). The Supersize me guy didn't get fat because he ate McDonalds he got fat because he ate sooo many calories. Fat Head was a bit of a rebuttal showing what happens when you try to control for calories more. Athletes are known to eat a lot of calories and don't become obese but again it's about getting your energy equation to balance or off balanced in the way you'd like. (caloric surplus to gain weight and a caloric deficit to loss weight)
There will be a lot of nuance in how everyone's bodies will respond and yes watching some metrics other than weight, like blood pressure and cholesterol , will be important in our health. Starting from a high level of just understand OUR personal energy needs and then working from there will give people a lot of benefit and make discussions easier. Because I hear so often from people that what I'm eating is unhealthy when in reality I'm within my caloric intake and within my macro makeup. Just because you eat a homemade cookie or a homemade cake doesn't make it healthier than my Snickers Bar (ooh I love Snickers). And it is so much easier to keep track of my calories when eating a Snickers bar than something homemade. It really is so easy to overeat on those treats especially during the holidays because you have no idea what the person used to bake those.
Once we figure out how to accurately measure basic metabolic process, we'll have gone a long way toward figuring out this woeful conundrum.
They are almost certainly not packing thousands of calories a day, everyday. Most of these people who you see eating a lot occasionally probably have very controlled and disciplined diets most of the time (whether that control comes easily to them or with great struggle is a different matter).
But it is simply not true that you can eat at significant net caloric surplus _regularly_ without gaining weight.
Also even basic metabolic science disproves your claim. If your immune system attacks your pancreas and damages your ability to produce insulin you will lose weight even if you stuff your face constantly, and if you inject insulin you will have trouble burning fat even when you have low glucose levels.
What I don't understand is why people cling to this weirdly puritanical belief obesity is purely the sin of gluttony when its clear scientifically that weight gain and loss are controlled by hormones
Is this clear, though? Many people can manage their weight by increasing or decreasing food intake.
It seems more likely that under normal circumstances weight can be easily managed, but other factors can force someone in either direction. Thus Alice doesn't understand why Bob is overweight and Charlie is underweight, because whenever Alice gets chubby or skinny she can easily get back in the normal range. For Alice, staying in shape is so easy that obesity really would be a sign of gluttony and being underweight would be a sign of mental illness, while for Bob and Charlie getting in shape would first require removing environmental factors.
It feels like there are a lot of Alices and a lot of Bobs that both argue with each other as though their own experience applies equally to everyone, which probably isn't true.
I've yet to see any study convincingly refute insulin's effect on fat uptake (also: we've known this for like a hundred years).
I don't really disagree with anything else you've said, but here's why this topic tends to get to me: with most other illnesses, we don't automatically assume the worst about the other person and assume it was their behavior that caused it. (while, incidentally, knowing nothing about their behavior). If someone got brain cancer, we wouldn't be like "looks like you used your phone too much!", and if someone is going bald you wouldn't be like "looks like you accidentally replaced your shampoo with Nair!"
Obesity is a symptom of quite a few underlying diseases. You can become obese from overeating, sure, but you can also become obese by getting a brain tumor in the wrong spot, or because you handle specific foods poorly, or you have endocrine issues, or your gut bacteria have become unhealthy, or... (lots of reasons). We act like obesity is the cause to everything, when it's often just a symptom.
When people frame this in moral terms ("you're fat because you're a glutton"), it just strikes me as clueless, because we have this rising obesity epidemic on our hands, and it seems really unlikely that somehow our generation is special in terms of just not being able to resist an extra slice of pizza.
You would think that with all the reproducibility issues around various topics we'd know better than to assume we completely understand human metabolism. If we're wrong, how much damage is being done?
Btw, do you have citations for these?
We already know that weight gain is caused by eating too much. This was shown in countless studies (where the amount eaten was actually monitored and not self-reported). The studies also show quite small variations in metabolism among individuals (https://examine.com/nutrition/does-metabolism-vary-between-t...)
If we accepted this information and stop pussyfooting about the issue we could take real steps to solve the problem. There are two major areas which could be improved: access to information and education.
In my view the most important things to have are:
-mandatory calorie information on any food sold, in case of fresh produce they should at least be available online, everything else should be labelled, especially in restaurants/food stands
-educating children about counting calories, estimating calorie needs, direct cause/effect relation between amounts eaten and weight loss/gain, strategies to track food intake, health and mental health risk of gaining weight etc.
Obesity is a big problem, especially for young people. Your health suffers, your self-esteem and mental health suffer, you become a burden to other people in your life who need to take care of you or interact with you in many situations. If you become obese and you never tracked your food intake it's a huge failure of education system, it's like getting scurvy because you didn't know you need Vitamin C to prevent it.
There's also already a massive amount of "education" of children. We all had to learn the (extremely flawed) food pyramid and now they're pushing "MyPlate" with the same zeal. This was all rammed down our throats when I was in high school 15 years ago, so I can only imagine that the focus has increased in recent years given current trends.
Your link isn't exactly concrete proof since it's evidently promotional text from a vitamin store? I've never seen someone try to use promotional copy as scientific evidence before.
We should all figure out what works best for our lifestyles and bodies.
That's a tautology, the question is why. What causes overeating and why do some people have great difficulty with it?
It's clearly not as simple as thinking to yourself, "I'd like to eat just enough today such that I don't overeat." Why are some bodies able to regulate caloric intake and others aren't?
If you can't start tracking calories and reducing intake yourself, then you should probably seek professional help. One issue is that many people don't see it as a health or lifestyle problem, and make endless excuses for why they can't possibly lose weight, ignoring advice from medical professionals.
Normal bodies don't require calorie tracking, the brain automatically signals the body to stop eating; no effort required. This system is broken in some people, their brain tells them they are hungry even after consuming too many calories. What causes this malfunction?
Why not? It's a skill necessary to adapt to circumstances our bodies didn't evolve in (that is constant and unlimited access to food). It's only natural that we need new skills to function in new environment. For example it's safe to assume that for most of human history people didn't have an option to eat whenever they are hungry while today you can always dial-in a pizza. It's expected that those mechanisms, which were shaped in times where food was scarce or at least not being as easily and quickly available, don't work that well today.
>>What causes this malfunction?
Unlimited exposure and access to rich and calorie dense food? I mean, it's not rocket science.
> Why not? It's a skill necessary to adapt to circumstances our bodies didn't evolve in (that is constant and unlimited access to food)
Perhaps not normal bodies, but certainly some bodies. I don't count calories. Sometimes I eat ridiculously large meals. Sometimes I snack on calorie-dense foods all day. But my weight has been basically constant since I stopped getting taller. Although I haven't measured it, it must be that I'm compensating by eating less (or at least less energy-dense) on other days. I do this without trying, or even thinking about it: I simply eat as much as I want to, whenever. When other people do the same, they gain weight. Obviously, they're eating more calories than they're burning, and I'm not, but why?
This completely ignores the interesting question, though.
But I do agree with you that exercise has little to do with losing weight and can be counter productive when trying to lose weight.
And exercise does help you lose body fat, unless you start eating extra to compensate for the exercise as most people vastly overestimate how much calories you actually burn working out. And of course power-training that helps you build muscle mass can increase your weight but that does not mean that it is bad for you. If you're going to the gym regularlly anyway during your diet just measure your body-composition to track your effective weight. (not sure how accurate that is though).
I only eat one time a day (dinner) and I'm fatter than ever. It's pretty natural for me to do that and I certainly eat less than than when I worried about trying to eat lunch. But I'm still fat and gaining despite the fact I watch my diet now, unlike when I was thin.
As someone who's on the verge of being overweight, what is the key to losing weight? This seems like a very curious proposition.
Easy win: No sugary drinks. Juice is as unhealthy as coke. If you want something with flavor, drink tea (without sugar).
For most people, it's to understand this: Carbohydrates make you gain weight. Not the fat in food.
Somewhat hard to implement, but with significant results: Cut sugar entirely from your diet. This automatically results in much healthier eating, because you have to check ingredients on everything this way.
Just like intelligence differs, your ability to gain or lose weight is not the same as other peoples'. In my experience it is not fair, but on the other hand, what is?
I would recommend something like the slow carb diet (Tim Ferriss), but anything that restrict your intake of calories and that you feel you can sustain over a long period of time is good.
It works every time, it is just hard to keep up with if you aren't motivated. I know it works though, it help me shred 25kg.
> Please avoid introducing classic flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say about them.
It doesn't make sense that our bodies would be capable of doing this. Evolutionary, if our bodies could do the same tasks for a lower energy expenditure, we'd all do that. But you simply can't keep a body at 37.5°C for half the calories
After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/02/health/biggest-loser-weig...
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It has to do with resting metabolism, which determines how many calories a person burns when at rest. When the show began, the contestants, though hugely overweight, had normal metabolisms for their size, meaning they were burning a normal number of calories for people of their weight. When it ended, their metabolisms had slowed radically and their bodies were not burning enough calories to maintain their thinner sizes.
If you asked 190 pounds me how many calories a meal was I'd usually give a higher number than 165 pounds me. Variation in comfortable resting weights likely has more to do with different satiation points than the number of calories burnt by an individual.