I find the “Calories In, Calories Out” paradigm really exasperating. It may be technically correct, but it’s a red herring, useless in practice, because it completely misses the real issue.
The body has a multitude of feedback mechanisms to maintain homeostasis. Weight is usually pretty stable. If you exert willpower to count calories and eat fewer of them, then the predictable response of the body is to reduce energy expenditure and to become hungrier. Neither is pleasant.
The mistaken mainstream scenario goes like this: You have sinned. You’ve been a glutton, but just a little bit. Occasionally, over the years, you’ve indulged yourself in the pleasures of eating and had just a bit too much. But a little here and a little there adds up over the decades and now you’re definitely overweight!
Calories In, CaIories Out. But exercise seems to barely burn more than breathing, unless you’re literally running marathons, so it’s really just about Calories In.
So, if you want to lose the excess weight, then you simply have to Eat Fewer Calories. Ultimately, that’s the only way any diet can work. So let’s try the direct approach: fasting two days in a row per week will do it. (You can still have water, which has no Calories.) Couldn’t be simpler. You exhaust your glycogen stores the first day, so your body has not choice but to switch to burning fat on the second. (Fasting for even longer periods works even better, but there are risks. 48 hours is perfectly safe unless you’ve got a weird medical issue. People do it religiously all the time.)
Continue until you’re back to normal weight. Problem solved, right? Just do it again in a few decades when your gluttony catches up with you again. Right?
Except it doesn’t work like that.
If you try this, and you’re not already so overweight that you fail to sustain the program to hit your target, then when you stop you’ll probably gain most of it back within a year. Not the decades it took you in the first place. If you’re sufficiently overweight, then you’ll lose some, but then gain enough of it back each week between fasts that you stop making progress.
Why?
Somehow the body’s homeostasis program for weight got out of whack. That’s the real issue. That’s the part I’m interested in. Not the guilt/repentance cycle, because that never works. If things are working properly in the first place, then when you indulge, you have more energy and are less hungry. Homeostasis! For normal, healthy people, gaining weight seems to be as hard as losing it!
Why did the “set point” go up, permanently? Why don’t you just get more fidgety and burn it off? Why don’t you just get less hungry for your next meal? I don’t fracking know.
There are a lot of interesting hypotheses. Maybe it’s the fats. Skim the milk! Go vegan! Except whole milk works better for weight loss. Maybe it’s the carbs. Atkins/Keto/Carnivore. /Paleo? No vegan! Maybe it’s only both at once? Maybe it’s the excess fructose building up fat in your liver. Maybe the antibiotics killed off an important strain in your gut flora, and no diet can work until you get it back. It’s a ratchet. Maybe it’s the emulsifiers emulsifying your gut lining, causing irritation. Maybe it’s the omega-6, causing inflammation. Maybe it’s just the ratio with the omega-3? Moar fish! Except mercury. Less fish! Maybe it’s the high–glycemic index foods causing insulin spikes causing insulin resistance. Maybe it’s the low–glycemic index foods not causing spikes not causing satiety. Maybe it’s just not enough fiber. Moar beans. Grains must be made Whole. Maybe it’s the lack of fiber that killed off the strain (and no diet can work until you get it back). Would fermented foods help? Some other probiotics? Which ones? Maybe it’s mysterious chemicals in our packaging. Could be the plasticizers? Preservatives? Pesticides? Maybe it’s the lectins. Beans are bawal. No moar beans. Grains are unWholy. Don’t get me started on all the deadly nightshades. In fact, all the New World Plants are a Paradox. Unless you’re Latino. GMOs are perfectly safe! Except they sometimes add pest-resistance, I mean “natural” pesticides, I mean lectins. Oops. Unless you cook them. Unless they’re soybeans. Or peanuts. Other nuts must be roasted. Other gurus will be roasted too. Because they’re nuts. It’s a racket. And that A1-casein looks suspiciously lectin-like. You need special organic cows instead. Or switch to goat milk. It’s the only way to be sure.
I am not making this up. I have evidence for all of this.
I notice I am Confused about this. No, I am very confused about this. So is everyone else. I think the global warming metaphor has thoroughly broken down. It’s like when no-one knew what was causing scurvy and thought vitriolic elixir, vinegar, or seawater might help. We are that confused about this. No-one knows what the hell is going on, and even if they do, I’ve got ten more hypotheses that sound just as plausible. And have studies. That maybe haven’t been replicated. Le sigh.
I don’t think I can respond to everything in your comment, but let me try to address the main point. As I understand, you say that something is left unexplained by the “Calories in, Calories out” paradigm. That something is explained by your question,
Why did the “set point” go up, permanently?
I think the most likely explanation is simply that modern food is tastier than the more bland food eaten in the past. “Taste” here should be interpreted as capturing all dimensions of the satisfaction of eating, including texture, mouthfeel, and aftertaste. There is also a simple explanation for why typical food has gotten tastier over time; namely, food science has gotten better, corporations have become more efficient at producing and marketing processed foods, and consumer incomes have gotten higher—thus enabling more access and greater choice.
This explanation also perfectly predicts your long paragraph addressing possible causes. Is it fat? Carbs? High-glycemic index foods? Not enough grains? I ask: why couldn’t it be all those things at once?
If the reason why we eat more is because food has gotten tastier, then we should also expect the “cause” to be multifaceted. After all, most people don’t think that there’s only “one thing” that makes food taste good. Taste is more complicated than that, and varies between people.
Reducing the question of “why are we getting obese?” to “why do foods taste good?” doesn’t solve the problem, of course—we still don’t have a full theory of why food tastes good. But, in my opinion, if it’s correct, then it totally deconfuses the proximate mechanism here.
In that sense, I think my CO2 analogy holds quite well. There are many reasons why people omit CO2: electricity, temperature control, transportation etc. And as we’ve gotten richer, those justfications have become more salient, as people can afford to purchase service that provide those benefits, omitting CO2 as a byproduct. Simply knowing this doesn’t mean you’ve solved climate change, of course, but it gets you a lot further than “Why are people burning more CO2 than before? I don’t know; could be anything.”
I find the “Calories In, Calories Out” paradigm really exasperating. It may be technically correct, but it’s a red herring, useless in practice, because it completely misses the real issue.
The body has a multitude of feedback mechanisms to maintain homeostasis. Weight is usually pretty stable. If you exert willpower to count calories and eat fewer of them, then the predictable response of the body is to reduce energy expenditure and to become hungrier. Neither is pleasant.
The mistaken mainstream scenario goes like this: You have sinned. You’ve been a glutton, but just a little bit. Occasionally, over the years, you’ve indulged yourself in the pleasures of eating and had just a bit too much. But a little here and a little there adds up over the decades and now you’re definitely overweight!
Calories In, CaIories Out. But exercise seems to barely burn more than breathing, unless you’re literally running marathons, so it’s really just about Calories In.
So, if you want to lose the excess weight, then you simply have to Eat Fewer Calories. Ultimately, that’s the only way any diet can work. So let’s try the direct approach: fasting two days in a row per week will do it. (You can still have water, which has no Calories.) Couldn’t be simpler. You exhaust your glycogen stores the first day, so your body has not choice but to switch to burning fat on the second. (Fasting for even longer periods works even better, but there are risks. 48 hours is perfectly safe unless you’ve got a weird medical issue. People do it religiously all the time.)
Continue until you’re back to normal weight. Problem solved, right? Just do it again in a few decades when your gluttony catches up with you again. Right?
Except it doesn’t work like that.
If you try this, and you’re not already so overweight that you fail to sustain the program to hit your target, then when you stop you’ll probably gain most of it back within a year. Not the decades it took you in the first place. If you’re sufficiently overweight, then you’ll lose some, but then gain enough of it back each week between fasts that you stop making progress.
Why?
Somehow the body’s homeostasis program for weight got out of whack. That’s the real issue. That’s the part I’m interested in. Not the guilt/repentance cycle, because that never works. If things are working properly in the first place, then when you indulge, you have more energy and are less hungry. Homeostasis! For normal, healthy people, gaining weight seems to be as hard as losing it!
Why did the “set point” go up, permanently? Why don’t you just get more fidgety and burn it off? Why don’t you just get less hungry for your next meal? I don’t fracking know.
There are a lot of interesting hypotheses. Maybe it’s the fats. Skim the milk! Go vegan! Except whole milk works better for weight loss. Maybe it’s the carbs. Atkins/Keto/Carnivore. /Paleo? No vegan! Maybe it’s only both at once? Maybe it’s the excess fructose building up fat in your liver. Maybe the antibiotics killed off an important strain in your gut flora, and no diet can work until you get it back. It’s a ratchet. Maybe it’s the emulsifiers emulsifying your gut lining, causing irritation. Maybe it’s the omega-6, causing inflammation. Maybe it’s just the ratio with the omega-3? Moar fish! Except mercury. Less fish! Maybe it’s the high–glycemic index foods causing insulin spikes causing insulin resistance. Maybe it’s the low–glycemic index foods not causing spikes not causing satiety. Maybe it’s just not enough fiber. Moar beans. Grains must be made Whole. Maybe it’s the lack of fiber that killed off the strain (and no diet can work until you get it back). Would fermented foods help? Some other probiotics? Which ones? Maybe it’s mysterious chemicals in our packaging. Could be the plasticizers? Preservatives? Pesticides? Maybe it’s the lectins. Beans are bawal. No moar beans. Grains are unWholy. Don’t get me started on all the deadly nightshades. In fact, all the New World Plants are a Paradox. Unless you’re Latino. GMOs are perfectly safe! Except they sometimes add pest-resistance, I mean “natural” pesticides, I mean lectins. Oops. Unless you cook them. Unless they’re soybeans. Or peanuts. Other nuts must be roasted. Other gurus will be roasted too. Because they’re nuts. It’s a racket. And that A1-casein looks suspiciously lectin-like. You need special organic cows instead. Or switch to goat milk. It’s the only way to be sure.
I am not making this up. I have evidence for all of this.
I notice I am Confused about this. No, I am very confused about this. So is everyone else. I think the global warming metaphor has thoroughly broken down. It’s like when no-one knew what was causing scurvy and thought vitriolic elixir, vinegar, or seawater might help. We are that confused about this. No-one knows what the hell is going on, and even if they do, I’ve got ten more hypotheses that sound just as plausible. And have studies. That maybe haven’t been replicated. Le sigh.
Never be too sure.
I don’t think I can respond to everything in your comment, but let me try to address the main point. As I understand, you say that something is left unexplained by the “Calories in, Calories out” paradigm. That something is explained by your question,
I think the most likely explanation is simply that modern food is tastier than the more bland food eaten in the past. “Taste” here should be interpreted as capturing all dimensions of the satisfaction of eating, including texture, mouthfeel, and aftertaste. There is also a simple explanation for why typical food has gotten tastier over time; namely, food science has gotten better, corporations have become more efficient at producing and marketing processed foods, and consumer incomes have gotten higher—thus enabling more access and greater choice.
This explanation also perfectly predicts your long paragraph addressing possible causes. Is it fat? Carbs? High-glycemic index foods? Not enough grains? I ask: why couldn’t it be all those things at once?
If the reason why we eat more is because food has gotten tastier, then we should also expect the “cause” to be multifaceted. After all, most people don’t think that there’s only “one thing” that makes food taste good. Taste is more complicated than that, and varies between people.
Reducing the question of “why are we getting obese?” to “why do foods taste good?” doesn’t solve the problem, of course—we still don’t have a full theory of why food tastes good. But, in my opinion, if it’s correct, then it totally deconfuses the proximate mechanism here.
In that sense, I think my CO2 analogy holds quite well. There are many reasons why people omit CO2: electricity, temperature control, transportation etc. And as we’ve gotten richer, those justfications have become more salient, as people can afford to purchase service that provide those benefits, omitting CO2 as a byproduct. Simply knowing this doesn’t mean you’ve solved climate change, of course, but it gets you a lot further than “Why are people burning more CO2 than before? I don’t know; could be anything.”