Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#41

Post by Retric » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:41 PM UTC

codahale wrote: post #26

mr_luc wrote: post #16

The article itself it insightful. But, brother hackers, can we allow an article whose title is a blatant lie to be voted to the top of Hacker News? Running is exercise. Running 1600 meters, on average, burns 124 calories for a man. ("Energy Expenditure of Walking and Running", Syracuse Uni study). This only takes a few minutes. Even if a person is taking in massively more calories than their body needs -- let's say,…

1,000 calories, considering the modern possibilities, isn't that much. I mean, that's a bit less than two slices of toast with Nutella. Weight loss programs have to focus on preempting and managing appetite. There's a wealth of studies connecting exercise to increased appetite (c.f. OP), especially focused, running-at-the-gym, doing-penance-for-those-donuts exercise. (Low-level activity—walking around, say—doesn't se…

If you think of exercise as 30 minutes a day 3 times a week then diet is by far more important. But, at extreme levels of exercise it's hard to eat enough calories to keep from losing weight.

At the true elite level Michael Phelps is fueled by 12,000 calorie a day diet, eating that much food just hard. Think 60 Twinkies a day plus a 3000 calorie diet.

But even 1/2 that and most people would still have problems keeping up for months at a time. The average human body could do 8 hours of exercise a day 7 days a week for years after training. So we don't really need to look at the true extremes of human capability to find a level of exercise that will balance all, but the most ridicules diet.

PS: If you are going to work a desk job, then nights and weekend exercise is not going to cover a horrible diet.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#42

Post by ghshephard » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:41 PM UTC

dkarl wrote: post #21

ghshephard wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"if you don't show some self-restraint" - the articles premise was that the brief bursts of activity reduce your ability to show self-restraint. I find it interesting that people think "self-restraint" is some magical ability that isn't weakened/enhanced like any other capability of people. The reality is that managing the "Self-Restraint" muscle is probably much more important than trying to manage other muscles.

Self-restraint is a hackable psychological phenomenon in one's brain. I agree that it is not an innate moral power, but I disagree that it is a distinct human quality that can be strengthened. Self-restraint boils down to optimism. People can put themselves through anything if they have faith that it will pay off in the end. Rational knowledge doesn't help, and it isn't a matter of simply being harsh with oneself, ei…

I'm not really able to comprehend what you are trying to get at here, though I recognize you are putting a lot of effort into trying to explain your worldview.

By "improving Self-Restraint" I mean "Making changes so one is not motivated to eat".

o Stomach Stapling

o Avoiding High Glycemic/Carb Rich foods

o Not going out to the Gym for 60 minute work outs.

Trying to rely on some moral-superiority is pretty much going to lose out in the long run (though most people have pretty good 6-12 month runs, and a nice 30-50 pound drop in weight - then it all comes back and more.)

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#43

Post by JanezStupar » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:42 PM UTC

A lot of bad logic in this article. The main point being - that author feels like she's exercising a lot. 30 minutes cardio a day is not a lot (the biggest exercise being an 1 hour intensive interval training), otherwise the author runs 5.5 miles (1 hour?).

That is not a lot of training. Lets assume that this is mostly all exercise the author is doing (she's probably sitting through most of her day). That is barely making up for the lack of exercise.

If she (or anybody else for that matter) stopped loosing weight at her current intake/expenditure level it's merely an indication that she either eats too much or exercises too little.

But the basic problem being that people believe that 30 minutes or 1 hour is a lot exercise. At those levels you don't even get your body going yet. What a person thinks about their fitness level is irrelevant. A person doing only 1 hour of exercise a day is barely fit. Really fit people (athletic - thin) can go on for 3-5 hours without problem.

So if you want to lose weight drop any meals after 4 pm (4 pm being last snack - a fruit). Start eating in the morning, eat every 3 hours (breakfast - snack - lunch - snack - over) and exercise at least 1 hour a day (2 being super good). Don't work yourself too hard. Go for low intensity workout (walking, light running, cycling). You HAVE to stay under 70% HR (sub 140 BMP for 20-30 yr old).

You can eat anything in any combination. This kind of diet is kinda hard for first two weeks but then it becomes a habit.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#44

Post by jodrellblank » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:44 PM UTC

absconditus wrote: post #25

pohl wrote: post #12

The first thing that jumped out at me is that weight is the wrong metric in the first place. I'd rather be the same weight but have more, and better proportioned, muscle mass. (Muscle burns calories even when you're resting...it's a much better knob to tweak than the number of calories burnt during exercise.) The author might be better off by giving away his bathroom scale and thinking about his body as a system.

The article does address this to some extent. For example: "According to calculations published in the journal Obesity Research by a Columbia University team in 2001, a pound of muscle burns approximately six calories a day in a resting body, compared with the two calories that a pound of fat burns. Which means that after you work out hard enough to convert, say, 10 lb. of fat to muscle — a major achievement — you wo…

Assuming a direct conversion of calories in to fat, as you do when you talk about eating 40 calories, leads to this quote:

"If you eat 2,700 calories per day, that's roughly 1 million per year, 10 million in a decade. ~12 tons of food in a decade. To maintain your bodyweight to within 5lbs in a decade would require an accuracy of 0.1% in your calorie counting. Under this model, the question isn't why do people get fat, it's how does anyone avoid it?" - Gary Taube's Big Fat Lies lecture.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#45

Post by jodrellblank » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:46 PM UTC

mr_luc wrote: post #16

The article itself it insightful. But, brother hackers, can we allow an article whose title is a blatant lie to be voted to the top of Hacker News? Running is exercise. Running 1600 meters, on average, burns 124 calories for a man. ("Energy Expenditure of Walking and Running", Syracuse Uni study). This only takes a few minutes. Even if a person is taking in massively more calories than their body needs -- let's say,…

It is not incorrect because it does not claim that it can't make you thin.

All it claims is that inside the article is an explanation of why exercise will not make you thin. Which there is. Even if you disagree with it, there is still one. Even if it was "because exercise has 8 characters and words with 8 characters are bad" it would still be an accurate title.

It's not a lie or a blatant lie.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#46

Post by gaius » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:50 PM UTC

codahale wrote: post #26

mr_luc wrote: post #16

The article itself it insightful. But, brother hackers, can we allow an article whose title is a blatant lie to be voted to the top of Hacker News? Running is exercise. Running 1600 meters, on average, burns 124 calories for a man. ("Energy Expenditure of Walking and Running", Syracuse Uni study). This only takes a few minutes. Even if a person is taking in massively more calories than their body needs -- let's say,…

1,000 calories, considering the modern possibilities, isn't that much. I mean, that's a bit less than two slices of toast with Nutella. Weight loss programs have to focus on preempting and managing appetite. There's a wealth of studies connecting exercise to increased appetite (c.f. OP), especially focused, running-at-the-gym, doing-penance-for-those-donuts exercise. (Low-level activity—walking around, say—doesn't se…

1,000 calories, considering the modern possibilities, isn't that much. I mean, that's a bit less than two slices of toast with Nutella.

Yes, it is VERY difficult to out-train a bad diet. There is an example I use with friends, which is if you drink 5 pints of beer, you'll need to run 10 miles to burn that off (really). Have a pizza or a kebab on the way home, another 10 miles. Have a fry-up for breakfast, another 10 miles. So even if you ran a Marathon tomorrow, with your hangover, you've still gained fat from one Friday night. And you're doing again on Saturday night too.

On the subject, of athletes, everyone at the top of any sport is a genetic freak. That's not to disparage the effort they put in. But hey, Michael Phelps didn't get his extraordinarily long armspan from training. He didn't get his flipper-shaped feet from training. He was born with them. And he was born with an extraordinary metabolism too.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#47

Post by gaius » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:53 PM UTC

JanezStupar wrote: post #43

A lot of bad logic in this article. The main point being - that author feels like she's exercising a lot. 30 minutes cardio a day is not a lot (the biggest exercise being an 1 hour intensive interval training), otherwise the author runs 5.5 miles (1 hour?). That is not a lot of training. Lets assume that this is mostly all exercise the author is doing (she's probably sitting through most of her day). That is barely m…

I downvoted you as your last meal of the day should be high protein, low GI. Fruit is the opposite.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#48

Post by ghshephard » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:55 PM UTC

xiaoma wrote: post #10

Here's my experience: Running was extraordinarily effective in helping me lose weight. However, it took quite a bit to do it. I was on a cross-country team in high school. That took me from slightly chubby to rail-thin. Every single person on the team who started out over-weight made great progress. One fat kid lost at least 30 pounds in just three months. Nobody I knew who kept running stayed fat. Still, I have to s…

"cross-country team in high school" - I presume that means you were exercising more than 3 times a week at 30 minutes?

The premise of the article isn't about athletes (which you were) won't lose weight by engaging in their activity. Of course people who _regularly and continuously_ exercise are going to lose weight. Anybody who works with a bicycle rider who commutes more than 10-15 miles into work knows that there are no fat cyclists - And those who bicycle more are usually worrying about getting _enough calories_ to maintain their weight and keep up their conditioning/muscle mass.

The article was talking about whether it makes sense for your average cube-rat to go out to the gym three times a week for a 60 minute excercise regime - and the conclusion is no. It really doesn't help you lose weight because you end up eating more than you just spent in caloric expenditure from the exercise.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#49

Post by Retric » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:56 PM UTC

dkarl wrote: post #40

kscaldef wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

running an hour at a 10 minute mile (6 mph) is unlikely to lead to injury.

Over forty miles per week with no rest days == too much for most people, way too much if you're overweight. Sure, some people do a lot more, but there are always exceptions. Every running trail and running club is disproportionately populated by people who have better resistance to injury. Steady running is one of the most challenging things you can do to your joints. (I find doing fartlek over a given distance a lot…

"aren't many things you can do by yourself that burn calories as well as running."

All activity's at your aerobic limit burn the same number of calories. You can run, dance, row, weigh lift, or just bail hay, and you will encounter the same limit. It's basically a question of how much oxygen you can absorb though the lungs and dump into your blood stream.

Re: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin

#50

Post by jodrellblank » Sun, Aug 09, 2009, 7:57 PM UTC

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #23

kingkongrevenge wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Weight gain = Calories In - Calories out Not true. People and lab animals can be made to get fatter while in caloric deficit with elevated insulin levels.

This comes up in Hacker News every time a health story comes up, usually quoting a pop-sci writer. You've stated it by far the clearest with no vagueness or handwaving so hopefully you can answer this (or provide pointers to research): In this theory where does the stored energy (i.e. the fat) come from if not from the calorie intake? How can this be done for more than a short period of time (e.g. I know you can brea…

It's better to argue "weight gain = calories in - calories out" is not the whole story than to argue that it's completely wrong - you can't eat and drink nothing for a week and just get heavier, but what you can do is more like... eat 3500 calories extra in a week without putting on a pound of fat (1lb of fat ~=3500 calories) because your body is not trying to store as much as it can as fat, or eat -3500 calories in a week and end up slowing down your metabolism and moving less and destructing other bodily parts so you turn it into a calorie surfeit and do put on a pound of fat.

This comes up in Hacker News every time a health story comes up, usually quoting a pop-sci writer

Bit of an ad-hom on pop-sci writers there, eh?