But don't let you already knowing that get in the way of a pointless quip implying that they need educated in thermodynamics.
1. dehydration (feels like you are hungry/dying)
2. insufficient electrolytes (feels like you are hungry/dying)
3. high ghrelin (feels like you are hungry/dying)
The trick is to stay on top of #1 and #2 and power through #3. Eventually #3 will go way down.
Honestly, I just don't understand how people lose weight by simply not eating, as it feels like you have remarkably little control over what your body spends its remaining energy on or even how much energy it chooses to spend.
To flip this: up until a few years ago for me--when a switch flipped and I started rapidly gaining weight for some reason--it was also hard for me to gain too much weight, despite how I cared absolutely not for how much I ate. Like, people act like eating is some choice and that's what causes you to gain or lose weight, but if you try to eat too much it isn't trivial that you just gain weight. My experience is that I'd get full and just not want to eat as much for days after I ate too much, I'd get feelings of more energy leading me to burn more without realizing I was doing so, and I swear your digestion changes somewhat and you absorb less.
Like, what actually causes this mysterious engine to stop regulating itself is crazy. You know what has correlated with my gaining weight? I started feeling cold a lot. I used to never feel cold, but I started getting cold all the time and now I sleep under a giant stack of blankets and it is difficult for me to sleep without them... it is actually ridiculous how cold I get now. My body has clearly decided to stop spending much energy on raising its body temperature.
So like, I can eat less, but there are a ton of ramifications to that and my body starts automatically trying to correct and fight against it and inherently is making energy tradeoffs that I disagree with ("just burn the fat already!" ;P). People do these weird diet regimes--like keto--because it makes them think (maybe correctly!) that it gives them some control over how their body spends that energy budget. I honestly frankly think maybe I just need "more sun" or something stupid like that and I'll lose weight without even trying so hard.
I'm basically looking for that "switch" you describe. Whatever it is that makes the body turn up or down the furnace while leaving you satiated.
https://www.peptidesciences.com/blog/mots-c-metabolic-cardio...
It probably isn't the single solution to the problem, but it might be helpful to investigate.
Just go back in time 30 years, and people were much thinner. Were they driving around with an empty tank? I don't think so, and neither did they.
Now, weight loss is complex at the societal level, but very easy at the individual level. I am currently on a diet because I want to lose 10 or 15 pounds. Do I find it enjoyable? Not really. But I don't find it torture like I did when I had to have an urological exam. Good planning helps, choosing protein over carbs and fats helps, and after 3 weeks, more or less, the feeling of hunger decreases significantly.
And if you go back in time -- not that they were necessarily better times, I'm just talking about the contexts I write about -- many more men wore a suit and many more women wore a dress. Today, asking someone to wear a dress or a suit seems like asking a stallion to wear a saddle for the first time.
Were those who chose the attractiveness of certain more formal dresses over the comfort of sagging shorts and flip-flops foolish? It seems to me that when people are free from certain social expectations they tend, entropically, to choose maximum comfort, such as unlimited calorie consumption and sloppiness in self-presentation. And one could argue why this modern trend does not also see an explosion in the number of sexual relationships -- after all, sex should be one of our strongest urges. But it has just been replaced by pornography, just as physical performance -- showing one's muscles or strength, or sensitivity of soul and body -- has been replaced with watching professional sports played by others while gorging ourselves on chips and beer from the comfort of the couch.
Is the violent person unable or unwilling to be nonviolent toward others? It is hard to say, but for violent people, we (Western democracies) have decided that they are unwilling to be nonviolent, not incapable. In fact, apart from a few "insane" cases, they are housed in normal prisons (separations from gen pop can take place for security reasons) and not in special institutions.
As for addicts, the modern view in Western societies is that they are largely incapable of controlling themselves (when I was a teenager years ago, they were considered unwilling). Addiction is considered a disease, not a lifestyle choice. But cigarette smokers, for some reason, are considered unwilling to quit, not incapable (not: "they need help," but: "it's disgusting"). The jealous lunatic is considered unwilling, not unable to stop acting like a jealous lunatic: could they be addicted to love? (No, some say, that they are addicted to control, not love. But would the diagnosis of "addiction" change?).
For fat people we are observing the same transition observed for addicts. When I was a teenager, being fat was a moral weakness. Today it is the fault of genes, broken families, seed oils, soils lacking magnesium: "they cannot lose weight, either because of genetics or soil and water", etc. Since more and more people are getting fat, which is bad, I don't think, from a consequentialist point of view, that the "addiction" approach for fat people is working.
You seem to think that the obese are "unwilling" (whatever that means) to eat less and exercise more and thus lose weight. You basically recommend that they try harder, if I understand you correctly.
I think that there is another reason why they can't eat less and work out more and why the internal feedback systems of their bodies are "misleading" them in a way, making them overeat and have increased appetite and lethargy despite all the energy they're carrying in their body fat.
My course of action would be to identify what causes this "breakage" in the metabolism that'll fix the feedback loop and therefore allow them to naturally and spontaneously eat less and move more.
What means is that the person who is paralyzed from the waist down cannot run (unable), the person with a minor knee pain who is not running can be either unable and unwilling, and the person with no pain, functioning legs etc. who is not running is able to do so, but unwilling (maybe they like different sports or they want to watch a movie).
The other day, pizza was offered at work. I wanted to eat a couple of slices, but I thought about the summer, and the beach, and swimsuits. And I decided not to eat pizza. But I really wanted to eat a couple of slices with cheese and salami. Did I restrain my urge, or I did not have an urge, just a desire? Is the nature determined by the results?
From a consequentialist point of view, and outside pathologies of various nature (such as yours), I find it better to assume that overweight people are unwilling to close the fridge, put the fork down, and push themselves away from the table.
I am perfectly willing to make a lot of sacrifices to lose weight. It's just that none of the sacrifices you list have an effect. Why would I continue to sacrifice it it doesn't work?
So I prefer "unable" in the sense that "we haven't figured out the way and thus they can't just do it harder."
Instead of the wheelchair, think of paralyzed people before wheelchairs. They "couldn't" walk because they were paralyzed and wanting it harder didn't work. What worked was inventing the wheelchair.
My argument is we haven't invented an effective fat loss diet or intervention that works even in a minority of obese people by any reasonable definition of "works." (I.e. long-term, sustainable w/o leading to ramped down metabolism, doesn't lead to massive lean tissue loss, doable "at large" in their normal lives not while literally being locked in a camp.)
Calories In Calories out (CICO) is the ABCs of weight loss, but it vastly oversimplifies a complex problem.
Obese people tend to stay obese despite dieting. Their bodies and brains aren't wired the same way as non-obese peoples.
Obese people experience things like:
metabolic slowdown (so a BMR calculator is no longer sufficiently accurate for them to accurately gauge their daily calorie requirements)
thyroid disorders (causing inaccurate BMR calculations)
high body weight with low muscle percentage (increases the difficulty of exercise or daily movement, causing inaccurate BMR calculations)
pre-diabetes
diabetes
high blood pressure
difficulty feeling full or satisfied with ANY amount of food
depression
lack of motivation
anhedonia
the side effects of drugs designed to treat the diabetes, high blood pressure, depression, lack of motivation, and anhedonia
hormonal imbalances caused by having additional fat cells in your body
the inexpressible and wearying feeling of hopelessness caused by a years long battle with obesity that has yet to find true and lasting success.
All of that is compounded by the fact that even if you lose a significant amount of weight, you will likely then struggle with keeping it off because you body has created an enormous reservoir of fat cells to store the fat you previously acquired.
For obese people, those fat cells have been noted as being able to preferentially absorb the nutrition you intake, leaving your other organs deprived and your body hungry despite your stomach being full to bursting.
Sure, if despite those obstacles you consume fewer calories than you burn, you will still lose weight. Broken clocks are right twice a day and a car can roll downhill even if it's out of gas.
However, these argumentative people fail to understand that you are not talking about "Calories In, Calories Out". That is NOT the conversation. They can argue CICO all they want, but they're arguing with a brick wall.
The thing you are trying to find is the permanent perfect solution to a problem you are dealing with. That isn't something that even the smartest and most highly respected person on Hacker News can do for you with some words or argument.
I honestly feel like they get some sort of pleasure dismissing everything you're trying to do for yourself. They're getting a kick out of shitting on your efforts, feeling better about some tiny fragment of their jerkish lives because they pooh-poohed someone on the internet with their vain and short-sighted facts and logic.
Don't let them get you down. You don't have to defend yourself from those people. They won't be proven wrong because they're still saying their ABC's while you're working on your Shakespeare.
The issue with compliance is that you can't drive with an empty gas tank. I think most diets can't be complied with and then we blame the dieter when the body's feedback system activates.