My point is people who have successfully adopted a particular technique for reducing their caloric intake (fasting, kale, smoothies, veganism, omega 3 acids, etc) are disguising the underlying process that's conferring most of the health benefits they're seeing: which is weight loss.
How many stories have you read out there about Secret Diet X that does all sorts of allegedly amazing things for you? Paleo diet. Veganism. Atkins diet. The Zone diet. The Dukan diet. And on and on.
There are many strategies for reducing caloric intake and if 16:8 fasting works for you: fantastic. But at the end of the day most people will improve their health through weight loss, not some special ritual or ingredient, and I think we should be cautious before crowning specific calorie reduction techniques as having special or more beneficial properties unless there is clear scientific evidence for them.
Well, jonwinstanley above, for one. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
> No, calories vary massively. If someone ate 2000 calories of vegetables each day and someone else ate 2000 calories of sugar there would be a huge amount of difference between their nutrition.
Fasting when you are obese is different too. On average, you will burn more fat than muscle. Mainly because your body composition is primarily fat (i.e. 38% body fat).
I do 16:8 Intermittent Fasting. Are there health benefits to it? Maybe. But I know for sure that if I want to drop a bit of weight, this style of eating makes it a lot easier for me for reasons of hunger more than anything: I'm not that hungry until I eat. I also know for sure that I like eating big. If I have a couple small meals early on, I can have a great big meal near the end of my window as if I were a lion taking down a zebra.