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The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

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Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#211

Post by glogla »

partialrecall wrote: post #119
berdon wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want to expand a little bit more: The body can be simplified down into an input/output black-box - almost like a thevenin equivalent. But most people unaccount for lost energy in the output. No two bodies are alike and no two bodies share the same efficiency in breaking down food, absorption, conversion, and excretion. Yes, you can collect the excrement and analyze the output. But that analysis doesn't tell you muc…

You're describing difficulties with precise measurement of inputs and outputs, but I don't think the difficulty of making those measurements refutes the core idea of CICO at all. The difficulty of actually implementing CICO suggests we should have sympathy for those who fail. This doesn't refute CICO.

CICO is mostly nonsense, because you can't control neither CI no CO.

CI is based what people eat, but how much and how often people eat (if you don't expect perfect and infinite willpower) is based on how hungry they are, and that is hormonally controlled, based on complex feedback loop that includes insulin levels (so what you eat and how often) and activity levels.

CO includes many things you have no conscious control over, like heating (ever stopped being cold after a meal?), muscle repair and buildup, brain, etc. Only small fraction of that is exercise.

People saying "it's just CICO" are as disgusting as millionaires saying "just stop being poor, it's easy, you have to make more than you use" while knowing nothing (and not caring) about student loans, healthcare costs for non-insured people, housing crisis or anti-labor practices that suppress wages.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#212

Post by UnFleshedOne »

teflodollar wrote: post #189
hoschicz wrote: post #153

I first wrote this as a reply in this thread and now I'm looking at it, I think it's relevant to the article as a whole -- sugar, insulin, calorie reduction, stress, fitness in general. I believe that the "diet" mentioned in the article is in effect a calorie-restriction one. > Losing weight and gaining weight is simple physics. > you are losing weight because you are consuming less calories. This is only true in the…

Excuse me, but this does not make any sense. If somebody stopped losing weight after making progress for six months on the exact same diet, it would only mean that their body is now burning as much as it is consuming, so their intake would need to be reduced again. This is basic thermodynamic stuff. I promise I could lose weight eating nothing but ice cream sprinkled with powdered starch, as long as I could control m…

That works the other way too -- if you can increase your metabolism you can lose weight without eating less.

Strength training is one way to do that for example -- more muscles, more food burned just by sitting there.

Getting back to the perfect analogy with debt -- you can spend more or less money and control your debt that way, or you could make more, or a combination of the two. Which way is likely more effective in your case is what varies.

Saying that controlling debt is as simple as spending less than you make is both true and too general to be useful.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#213

Post by magna7 »

dpark wrote: post #167
hoschicz wrote: post #153

I first wrote this as a reply in this thread and now I'm looking at it, I think it's relevant to the article as a whole -- sugar, insulin, calorie reduction, stress, fitness in general. I believe that the "diet" mentioned in the article is in effect a calorie-restriction one. > Losing weight and gaining weight is simple physics. > you are losing weight because you are consuming less calories. This is only true in the…

> This is only true in the first up to 6 months of a calorie-restriction diet. Then, body adjusts its metabolism (lower body temperature, making you feel more lethargic to keep you from exercising, etc) and your weight begins to slowly climb back up, sans any further calorie restriction. At this point, it's easy for a dieter to blame himself of lacking willpower: "it worked, and it stopped working now, I must've been…

While I agree with you that this is not a major effect, it is an effect nonetheless and it's due to changes in hormones. Dr Fung has a blog where he discusses it using an analogy https://idmprogram.com/how-to-control-the-body-weight-thermo....

I'm not the OP, but I'm also not convinced that the set point exists. Regardless, fasting is a better way of losing weight than caloric restriction IMO since it lowers insulin, but to each their own. Either way, the laws of thermodynamics haven't changed, it's just how your body responds, and we're all unique in that sense. Whatever works for people, so long as they're losing weight if they're obese or overweight.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#214

Post by on_and_off »

castlecrasher2 wrote: post #37

Eat less, lose weight. I read long ago that if you want to maintain weight, eat until you're a little bit hungry. If you want to lose weight, eat until you're still pretty hungry. I've been following the latter on and off over the years, and have been doing it again for the past 8 weeks and have lost a pound a week. I've found it to be much easier than calculating BMR/caloric rate then calculating calories and settin…

This. I have started exercising a lot (6 times a week, with a trainer) and I have only gained weight (both muscles and fat).

Turns out there is a consensus that exercise is the best thing you can do for yourself. It will do wonder on many aspects, but it won't make you thinner.

Eating less will.

A couple of years earlier, I did some small changes to my alimentation :

- always have an healthy breakfast (instead of just drinking a coffee). I generally cook some muesli. It is delicious and I can use one batch for almost a week.

- control the quantities I eat. I was brought up to always finish my plate. It is polite and in theory it avoids waste. But in practice I have been eating too much just in order to finish some arbitrary plates (I was buying lunch around work these days, no control over the portions). I decided to just stop eating once I had enough.

With these 2 small changes, I lost 15 kgs (from 84 to 69 kgs for 1.90m).

Now that I work out, I am back at 77 kgs, but a way healthier one (and there is still some progress to be made, both in building muscle and losing fat).

The whole "exercise so you can continue to drink coke, have burgers, etc" sounds a lot like companies wanting you to do everything but what would hurt their bottom margins.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#215

Post by bscphil »

scarface74 wrote: post #159
berdon wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might try clicking the link I provided. The Wikipedia page details the virus and provides links to other sources one of which was conducted on chickens where they measure input/output and still saw positive weight gain.

So exactly how do you explain mass just coming out of nowhere?

I think all berdon is trying to say by "not simple physics" is that even though CICO is true, it's not helpful to people trying to lose weight because there are many other conditions (e.g. a virus) that can affect the body's metabolism - to a limited extent. This particular virus seems to make you fatter even on a precise calorie controlled diet, which implies it must reduce your metabolism.

For the record I disagree with this - I think CICO is a helpful way to think about weight loss, because it implies that if you aren't losing weight on a calorie controlled diet, you simply haven't cut enough. (Though serious problems might be indicative of some medical condition, in which case you should consult a doctor to see if it can be alleviated to make CICO easier.)

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#216

Post by vinceguidry »

dpark wrote: post #167
hoschicz wrote: post #153

I first wrote this as a reply in this thread and now I'm looking at it, I think it's relevant to the article as a whole -- sugar, insulin, calorie reduction, stress, fitness in general. I believe that the "diet" mentioned in the article is in effect a calorie-restriction one. > Losing weight and gaining weight is simple physics. > you are losing weight because you are consuming less calories. This is only true in the…

> This is only true in the first up to 6 months of a calorie-restriction diet. Then, body adjusts its metabolism (lower body temperature, making you feel more lethargic to keep you from exercising, etc) and your weight begins to slowly climb back up, sans any further calorie restriction. At this point, it's easy for a dieter to blame himself of lacking willpower: "it worked, and it stopped working now, I must've been…

> This is pseudoscientific garbage.

This seems unnecessary. The rest of your comment does not support this assertion. And it's inflammatory, which is contrary to the HN guidelines.

To this point:

> There is also definitely nothing magic that happens at the 6 month mark and the absurdity of this should be enough to make it clear that this is garbage.

There doesn't have to be anything magical. I would have to read the book to be sure, but pretty sure 6 months describes the general point at which the continuous process fades into noise. Nothing about the body has an on/off switch, but that doesn't mean we can't describe biological processes in general terms.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#217

Post by berdon »

Reedx wrote: post #207
berdon wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone really is different. Vastly different gut flora, vastly different neural connections in the brain, vastly different neural connections in the gut. In fact, the only things that are similar across bodies are their macroscopic qualities and those are arguably the least important.

Regardless of those differences, people don't become (or remain) obese with a consistent healthy diet.

Have you ever taken immunosuppressants?

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#218

Post by magna7 »

skygazer wrote: post #210
teflodollar wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excuse me, but this does not make any sense. If somebody stopped losing weight after making progress for six months on the exact same diet, it would only mean that their body is now burning as much as it is consuming, so their intake would need to be reduced again. This is basic thermodynamic stuff. I promise I could lose weight eating nothing but ice cream sprinkled with powdered starch, as long as I could control m…

Yes, what you said is correct. If you could control your appetite, or response to it, you could lose weight on a calorie restricted diet of "fattening" foods. While I'm not a proponent of Jason Fung or his book, I have read it. From what I recall, where your as-long-as-I-could-control-my-portions diverges from Fung's book is that he believes its nearly impossible for people generally to ignore their appetite in the l…

Why aren't you a proponent of Fung? I'm just curious.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#219

Post by dpark »

glogla wrote: post #204
dpark wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of that changes physics. It might change dietary compliance but that’s all.

This might be true in thermodynamic sense but it is a useless and trite statement. It's like saying "people are in debt because they borrowed money" - true, but banal and trivial, and pretending it's the whole story and saying nothing of medical debt, student loans or living from paycheck to paycheck and payday loans dayloans is only good for feeling better than someone, most likely while pretending that all people i…

If you want to discuss the socioeconomic reasons for the rise in obesity, I think there’s plenty of meat there to discuss meaningfully. That’s very different from discussing gut flora or gut neural connections or metabolism. Indeed, all the ways that “people are different” are irrelevant because the rise in obesity is a societal problem. It’s not about the individuals and their differences.

If you’re an individual who wants to lose weight, focus on calories in and calories out because those are the biggest factors by far and they are also largely within your control. If you want to talk about social problems then ignore individuals and discuss the broader problems that are leading to such a large and consistent calories in discrepancy. In either case gut flora is probably not the major factor and probably not where the solution will be found.

I also didn’t dismiss anyone as stupid and your accusation is out of place.

Re: The grandmaster diet: How to lose weight while barely moving

#220

Post by opportune »

RobertRoberts wrote: post #9

I did tests for weight loss. I found that you don't lose weight until you sleep. (stay up all night and weigh your self repeatedly, in the morning, no loss, but after you sleep and wake, your weight goes back to "morning weight") I found that if you don't sleep well, you don't lose as much. If you eat too late before going to bed, you don't lose as much. If you adjust your diet (however you want is my experience) to…

This is just not true. As a counterpoint, I have done 48 hour wakeful crunch time sessions before with very little eating (about 400-800 kcal/day). I typically lost 5 lbs over that time (which I mostly gained back as much of it was water, but also lost some fat and muscle). Don’t extrapolate your anecdotal personal data like that.

Your weight is mostly a function of how much stuff is in your bowels, glycogen, how hydrated you are (indirectly how much salt you have), your muscle mass, fat mass, and then a relatively static amount for the rest (organs, skeleton). Sleeping does not magically make you lose weight. You just lose a lot of water while you sleep due to breathing, and might lose a small amount of fat and/or glycogen

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