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I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

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Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#171

Post by james_marks »

jonplackett wrote: post #55

I always just assumed these were terrible. There just isn’t enough info in a photo, even for the world’s leading calorie counting expert, to give a sensible estimate of the calories content. Ans even more so for macros. Add to that the fact vision is still pretty crap and you have a complete joke that I can’t believe anyone is paying for.

What’s interesting to me is a tool can be terrible at its stated problem and still add value.

I suspect many of the results dieters get is “mere measurement”, e.g. it helps them be more thoughtful, seek education, etc.

So the value of the tool is in its ability to keep them engaged and hopeful (the unstated need), and the actual mechanic doesn’t have to be that good at the stated need.

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#172

Post by XorNot »

schmichael wrote: post #46
tayo42 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> seems to be against the concept of calorie counting as a whole too What are peoples criticisms of calorie counting? Its the only thing that keeps my weight from creeping up. There are way to many calorie dense foods that can easily sneak in if im thoughtless. (I want my 20 year old life style back :( )

My unprofessional nutritional advice is: do what works for you! So if that’s calorie counting: great! No need to give it a second thought. But if you are interested in critiques, a fair summary might be: calorie counting is at best extremely imprecise, both on how we measure the calories in food and how we estimate energy expenditure by activities. A little googling should lead to numerous discussions. I really enjoy…

People screw it up by trying to measure energy expenditure is the problem I consistently see.

There is never a reason to do this: people do it because they want to eat more, so they want to factor exercise in.

They're basically already sabotaging the process from the outset: the goal is generally weightloss, they have an easy and precise way to track that, and one week of "under eating" isn't going to kill anyone.

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#173

Post by jonplackett »

devmor wrote: post #164
jonplackett wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's cool that it worked with your maintenance calories. was that calculated a maintenance for sedentary lifestyle and the exercise was on top, or did you also eat the exercise calories and still lost weight?

The former - the ultimate goal was to get myself comfortable with eating in a way that would keep me at a stable weight and stick with it. I knew this was going to be the hardest part of the lifestyle change, so I opted for a more difficult up front program to ensure I could focus on that while I lost weight. I think that's something that a lot of people fail to account for when trying to lose weight that ultimately…

Totally agree - and if you track it and do the macros right it doesn't have to be this horrendous experience. Often you feel better!

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#174

Post by jonplackett »

dack wrote: post #91

Calorie tracking is also about educating yourself about how many calories certain things are, so you can make better decisions. Like, oil is insanely caloric and can accidentally add hundreds of calories, but it's nearly impossible to eat too many greens. Once you learn this, then the tracking is just to keep you honest - your brain knows what to do but it lies to you when it wants to bend the rules and those little…

Yeah there's like 2 or 3 foods you realise you're eating that totally mess you up. For me it was peanut butter and sausages (not together...).

Just so many calories and it's not like I even cared about either that much.

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#175

Post by BryantD »

XorNot wrote: post #163
MangoToupe wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the em-dash ever "necessary"? It was beloved by nerds on the internet long before there was any whisper of LLMs on the internet. What do you think chatbots are imitating if not humans who also use it?

It was only ever inserted by word processors for me. No one typing with a regular keyboard would ever bother, certainly not with the HN input box.

I think there are cases of people using keystroke expanders to automate the -- to em-dash conversation outside word processors. Not so common among technical folks, though, for postfix operator reasons.

The comment we're talking about doesn't read like AI to me because of the use of parenthetical asides, although that just means I haven't seen a LLM that tends to use parentheses heavily.

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#177

Post by skohan »

jonplackett wrote: post #174
dack wrote: post #91

Calorie tracking is also about educating yourself about how many calories certain things are, so you can make better decisions. Like, oil is insanely caloric and can accidentally add hundreds of calories, but it's nearly impossible to eat too many greens. Once you learn this, then the tracking is just to keep you honest - your brain knows what to do but it lies to you when it wants to bend the rules and those little…

Yeah there's like 2 or 3 foods you realise you're eating that totally mess you up. For me it was peanut butter and sausages (not together...). Just so many calories and it's not like I even cared about either that much.

I had the same experience. For me peanut butter and apples were my "healthy snack" and were accounting for a huge amount of calories per week.

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#179

Post by sumeno »

james_marks wrote: post #171
jonplackett wrote: post #55

I always just assumed these were terrible. There just isn’t enough info in a photo, even for the world’s leading calorie counting expert, to give a sensible estimate of the calories content. Ans even more so for macros. Add to that the fact vision is still pretty crap and you have a complete joke that I can’t believe anyone is paying for.

What’s interesting to me is a tool can be terrible at its stated problem and still add value. I suspect many of the results dieters get is “mere measurement”, e.g. it helps them be more thoughtful, seek education, etc. So the value of the tool is in its ability to keep them engaged and hopeful (the unstated need), and the actual mechanic doesn’t have to be that good at the stated need.

It can also be a negative value.

If I diligently track calories using one of these things and don't lose weight I'll say "screw it" and stop bothering because obviously counting calories doesn't work. I think this is much more likely to be the case because even proper calorie counting is difficult and frustrating

Re: I used AI-powered calorie counting apps, and they were even worse than expected

#180

Post by sumeno »

gavinray wrote: post #103
jonplackett wrote: post #55

I always just assumed these were terrible. There just isn’t enough info in a photo, even for the world’s leading calorie counting expert, to give a sensible estimate of the calories content. Ans even more so for macros. Add to that the fact vision is still pretty crap and you have a complete joke that I can’t believe anyone is paying for.

I have faith that ML can approximate calories from images under the following conditions: - The food is inside containers of a standard size, which the model can use as a volumetric reference - Optimally, the containers are clear plastic, for depth approximation - The food is homogenous, or mostly-homogenous. Dishes containing a lot of mixed ingredients seem like an intractable problem to me Now, whether or not abili…

And how is it going to tell how much oil or butter was used in a dish?
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