Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

colorado.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 151 posts

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#121

Post by hirvi74 »

exfatloss wrote: post #27
vanilla_nut wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe this myself, but I do know a lot of people who believe being overweight is unfairly demonized and not as harmful as TPTB would have us believe. Many point to BMI as an inaccurate gauge of healthiness (there's a fair point there about eating disorders and ethnic predispositions towards higher BMIs) and unhealthy obsessions with thinness (as opposed to fitness). Look up "Fat Acceptance" if you'd like to…

> some people need a bit of a push to kick bad habits like overeating I think this is the real culprit - the idea that overeating is the root cause and not a symptom, and that a little bit of a push makes a difference.

Overeating is the "cause" of obesity because that is the mechanism of action that facilitates obesity. How else could one reasonably become obese?

Overeating is the "how" not the "why" -- at least, that's how I see it.

It would be like saying alcohol is the root cause of alcoholism, when in reality, the root cause of alcoholism is often much more nuanced. Hence why many people with addictions tend to be polysubstance users or "hot swap" to a new vice after abstaining from another. It's not about the mechanism of escape, but rather the need to escape.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#122

Post by uptownfunk »

hirvi74 wrote: post #112

The topic of obesity somewhat reminds me of a joke I once heard from a stand-up comedian whom I cannot remember the name of, but it went something along the lines of, "People always ask you why you quit drinking, but you know... People never ask you why you drank in the first place." I do not believe that there is a significant portion of the human population that wakes up each day and decides to actively diminish th…

This seems to try and give people a way out which is the exact opposite of what is needed to deal with this. There has to be a commitment and a no-way-out approach. It quite literally can be life or death. If individuals are not responsible for their own health then who is? How hard is it to eat chicken/tofu + veggies for one meal a day and cut out pizza/pasta/rice/wheat?

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#123

Post by kaba0 »

hirvi74 wrote: post #112

The topic of obesity somewhat reminds me of a joke I once heard from a stand-up comedian whom I cannot remember the name of, but it went something along the lines of, "People always ask you why you quit drinking, but you know... People never ask you why you drank in the first place." I do not believe that there is a significant portion of the human population that wakes up each day and decides to actively diminish th…

Or Big Sugar not actively lobbying and promoting their propaganda would help greatly — it really is unbelievable that due to having loads of corn, the US decided to slowly kill their populace by forcing them onto an over-sweetened diet, purely for profit. For foreigners, plenty of food is simply not edible they are so sweet, like who puts sugar into bread?! And it being the way people grew up with, it is exceedingly hard to change. And it does show up very well on statistics between different first world countries.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#124

Post by kaba0 »

sundvor wrote: post #69
toomuchtodo wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ozempic and Wegovy. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/31/opinion/ozempic-weight-lo... https://archive.is/rnTGB https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/01/30/1152039...

Those are outliers. For the rest of us there's discipline and sheer willpower, as well as smart energy management. Train too hard? My appetite goes nuts. Train not enough? The weight loss is muscle. It kind of never stops. (Speaking as someone fast approaching the big five oh, on the very upper end of the normal BMI and not enough muscle to sugar coat all the excess gut fat which somehow disappears when clothed thank…

BMI can be misleading sometimes, more than normal muscle mass for example is not really accounted for — if you have the chance have a look at your body fat percentage.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#125

Post by kaba0 »

exfatloss wrote: post #74
vkazanov wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This approach his its limits. I used to run, climb, do boxing... eat whatever i felt like eating. But traumas do accumulate. 10 km a day becomes impossible. Joints, spine, heart - everything has limits. Counting calories isn't that hard and it works by the very definition of energy.

> Counting calories isn't that hard and it works by the very definition of energy. It doesn't "work" unless your definition of "work" is "lost a few pounds of water weight over a few weeks." Certainly does not work when going from obese to normal weight.

As per your blog, your test is n=1. Besides, if people can really accurately count their calorie intakes and won’t overeat what they use up, then it is thermodynamically impossible not to lose weight. It is really hard to do in practice, especially for longer periods of time, but the theory behind is sound and straightforward.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#126

Post by thorio »

uptownfunk wrote: post #32

For those struggling, controlling your diet is the single most effective thing you can do to make progress on obesity. Much easier to say no to a 300 cal donut than to run 30 minutes. Cutting out the daily donut for two weeks is about a pound of fat. Maybe we need a “just say no” to junk food campaign like we had in the 90s. Lean meat, tofu, tempeh, seitan, veggies, low calorie sauces, limited fruits, protein smoothi…

"Cutting out the daily donut for two weeks is about a pound of fat."

While I'm completely behind your post in general, unfortunately it's much more complicated. It comes down to calories in vs energy consumption. If you oversupply your buddy with calories however most science I read states 7.000 calories of surplus to be one kilo in fat in the average human. Highly recommend the Huberman episode about nutrition.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#127

Post by vkazanov »

exfatloss wrote: post #74
vkazanov wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This approach his its limits. I used to run, climb, do boxing... eat whatever i felt like eating. But traumas do accumulate. 10 km a day becomes impossible. Joints, spine, heart - everything has limits. Counting calories isn't that hard and it works by the very definition of energy.

> Counting calories isn't that hard and it works by the very definition of energy. It doesn't "work" unless your definition of "work" is "lost a few pounds of water weight over a few weeks." Certainly does not work when going from obese to normal weight.

I don't understand how counting calories can not work. It's the law of evergy conservation: energy in, energy out. This is not about water at all. Fat is just your main energy storage mechanism. And what's good about fat is that you can burn through it relatively quickly unlike building muscle which takes years. You can even count how many steps you need to do to burn through a kg of fat.

I've lost "post-covid" 15 kg (93kg to 78kg, 180cm height) in about 3 months with counting calories and ensuring a reasonable deficit. MyFitnessPal did help here.

I was just getting about 1800-2000 calories daily (which is not too bad), walking about 10k-15k steps a day (a morning walk, lunch-time walk and an evening one) and doing some very lightweight kettlebell exercises. There are details on how you might want to track weekly averages instead of daily weight values.

Certainly, i was never obese just slightly overweight. Obesity can mean certain serious food-related disorders but most of the time it's just a bad diet together with not moving a lot.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#128

Post by vkazanov »

tjohns wrote: post #95
crazygringo wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cutting out the daily donut for two weeks is about a pound of fat. For many people, no it's not. Becuse their metabolism just decreases by the exact same amount they cut calories. They cut out the daily donut, and they find themselves fidgeting less and wearing a sweater because they're suddenly a little chilly a lot of the day. And the scale doesn't budge. For many people, losing weight is a whole lot more complex…

Metabolism does slow down, but there is a lower limit. The exact numbers and rate will change, but the fact is that sufficient caloric restriction will cause weight loss. That said, as someone who struggles with weight loss, it's still hard. There are both physioloical and psychological issues that make it challenging. As an aside, keto is the only thing thats worked reliably for me so far - largely because of the ca…

Metabolism changes is something like going down from 2100 maintenance calories to 1900 calories. A donut is /at least/ 300+ calories. Age-related metabolism changes are also not that serious.

I've seen people losing 40kg (120kg to 80kg) by just walking and counting calories. It's the last 5-6 kg that are harder than the first 20kg is almost trivial to lose - one all the right habits are in place.

And habits are the hardest part. It's not the body, not laws of thermodynamics, it's just your habits (most of the time).

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#129

Post by vkazanov »

michaelborromeo wrote: post #118
crazygringo wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cutting out the daily donut for two weeks is about a pound of fat. For many people, no it's not. Becuse their metabolism just decreases by the exact same amount they cut calories. They cut out the daily donut, and they find themselves fidgeting less and wearing a sweater because they're suddenly a little chilly a lot of the day. And the scale doesn't budge. For many people, losing weight is a whole lot more complex…

I think “for many people” is more like “for a minority of people.” For a few people losing weight is complex. For most people, it’s simple. Eat less. Move more. Saying otherwise is a cop out.

Yes! Cannot stress it enough. Move. It doesn't even have to be intense! Running can be traumatic. But calories don't care if it's a walk you're doing or a run.

Unless you have some fundamental food-related disorders it's not that hard. Our bodies were meant to gain weight weight quickly - and lose it if necessary. For most people losing 10-20 kg is a question of 3-4 months, or even less.

Re: Excess weight, obesity more deadly than previously believed

#130

Post by vkazanov »

exfatloss wrote: post #93
taeric wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an area where calories is scary misleading. The 30 minutes walking is indeed low in the direct impact. For some reason, it punches well above expectations, though. Probably something about base metabolism and such, but whatever it is, you will lose more weight from walking than you'd expect. Similarly, people probably walk way way less than you would expect. It is kind of scary to see how few steps I can get…

Yea, I suspect it has a pretty low effect in terms of calories, but it helps immediately bring your blood sugar back under control within That's maybe the magic of "walkable neighborhoods." You just walk over to the store/the cafe/the restaurant real quick, and then you walk back. It was only maybe a few hundreds steps, but that's enough to put away a ton of the glucose you just dumped into your bloodstream. It is sh…

I started walking on my way to work and back (London, UK). It's about 5k + 5k steps. Plus a 4k step walk after lunch. Together with a limited calorie intake (2k cal a day) it made wonders. It was crazy to watch the first 5kg just vaporize in 2 weeks.

I went down to 1800 calories and the remaining 10kg were gone in 6 weeks.

Post reply on HN