“Unless you’ve repealed the first law of thermodynamics”
Nope. Doesn’t even come CLOSE to working that way! That law applies to a CLOSED SYSTEM. Period. No human is a closed system. No human absorbs all the calories that enter their mouth. Much goes out the other end. And no human burns calories by actual burning. We convert them into energy, and that is done at varying rates of efficiency. Pima Indians have incredible rates of obesity and diabetes, and it AIN’T based on eating!
Many of us have known people who could eat anything and struggle to maintain weight. I can gain weight breathing deep while near a donut. My sister is in between, although her closest friend in high school had to eat like a horse just to stay above 90 lbs.
All of us are affected by hormones. Those hormones affect how we process food, how efficiently we use energy, etc. You might as well pretend all cars get the same gas mileage.
How we store weight differs too. People who are insulin resistant tend to convert more energy to fat and tend to “lock it up” in a way others do not.
“Adult weight gain and obesity are well-established causal risk factors for the development of type 2 diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease and obesity-related cancers [1,2,3]. In line with these findings, adult weight gain was strongly associated with increased insulin resistance in multiple studies [4,5,6,7,8,9].
It is well-established that abdominal adiposity, and in particular visceral adipose tissue, is strongly related to insulin resistance and risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus, also after adjustment for total body fat...
As shown in Figure 1, each higher category of change in body weight during adulthood was associated with higher fasting and postprandial glucose and insulin concentrations at middle age, after adjustment for sex, age, BMI at age 20, ethnicity, education, smoking, alcohol consumption, physical activity, and family history of diabetes.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6832997/
NOTE: The problem is they have it backwards. They think weight gain CAUSES the problem when it is the PROBLEM THAT CAUSES THE WEIGHT GAIN! And yes - hallelujah! - there is an approach that gradually deals with the root problem!
I’ve spent most of my life fighting fat, to include running 5 miles a day for most of my adult life. I believed the calories in/out theory and believed all the dieticians who told me a low-fat diet was the way to lose weight. I’ve never been VERY obese with a BMI running from 22-29.(Normal weight = 18.5–24.9 / Overweight = 25–29.9)
Three years ago, I read The Obesity Code. Then read Gary Taubes’ “Good Calories, Bad Calories” and “Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It”. Then “THE BIG FAT SURPRISE
Why Butter, Meat & Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet” by Nina Teicholz.
When I applied it, it began to work. Not instant weight loss, but three years later my waistline is the best it has ever been. UNLIKE EVERY OTHER DIET I TRIED SINCE 1972, IT WORKED!
If I sound like a zealot, I am! I spent my life fighting, telling myself I just needed to eat less and run more (than 5 miles a day) - and it didn’t work. Now I’ve seen gradual success, after all those years, by changing WHAT I eat, not by counting calories!
Lots of videos here:
https://www.youtube.com/user/lowcarbdownunder/videos
I’m glad you found something that worked for you. I agree exercise is a red herring. “Low fat” diet wasn’t one of dietary experts better moments. It coincided with double digit monetary inflation rates and subsequent interest rates, right when Milk, and dairy products like butter and cheese got really expensive for families. They also pushed hydrogenated industrial fats as “healthier” than butter, and “eggs have high cholesterol”.
Whatever your basal metabolic rate is, that’s how many calories it takes to “keep the lights on”. If you eat less than that, over time you will burn fat. If you eat more than that, you will tend to gain weight. It really is that simple. It is true that certain ethnic backgrounds are prone to Metabolic syndrome, and eventually Type 2 Diabetes.
“It is well-established that abdominal adiposity, and in particular visceral adipose tissue, is strongly related to insulin resistance and risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus, also after adjustment for total body fat...”
This is true. They don’t have it “backwards” though. I’m not sure where you’re getting that. The problem is with excess glucose in particular, the pancreas starts releasing more and more insulin and it has less and less of an effect. Excess carbohydrate is the classic way to do this. Metabolic syndrome. It will progress to Type 2 Diabetes. Insulin resistance is caused by excess carbs, is my understanding.
Type 2 is reversible, by losing the fat. Imtermittent fasting has many of the same benefits as exercise does, it gives the body a metabolic workout.
So long as there is glucose in the muscles, liver, or bloodstream, no fat burning can occur. If insulin is present, no fat burning can occur. That’s why intermittent fasting is so effective, it mimics the way humans used to operate. People who eat 3 meals a day, with snacks in between, and a late night snack, they never get a chance to enter the “fed state”, where insulin levels are low.
This is why low carb diets are more effective, but it is still a fact that one way or another, some sort of net calorie deficit has to occur in order to lose weight. We don’t llive on air. For me, one meal a day is ideal. It might take the form of an entire pizza, or maybe a large sausage and cheese omelet, hamburger casserole, chili mac, beans and rice, meatloaf and mashed potatos. Large, satisfying meals. Life is too short to eat food we don’t like.
I eat anything I want, just not as much of it as I’d like. Carbs are risky in large amounts because they tend to stimulate the appetite - for more carbs - and lead to overeating or binging. I’m down 60 pounds. I could use to lose a few more “vanity” pounds but already meet the long published height/weight chart standard. N.b. I didn’t exercise to get there, other than ordinary day to day chores and activities. This is not optimal but it’s clear to me exercise isn’t really a big factor.
Or put another way, I need to gain more muscle when I lose the little remaining fat. The BMI is defective in that muscle weighs more than fat, and skews the results. It’s important to get plenty of high quality protein, eggs are particularly great for this. USDA used to classify eggs in the meat category.
What I’m getfing at, is people who were judged medically overweight or obese before puberty, they have a real problem fhroughout life. Stats are not good for them. Those of us who put on the poundage as adults can control it. But, the individual has to want to lose the weight. It does take a stubborn determination, and a lifelong committment to staying healthy.