Site is a link aggregation of a series of blog posts that cite various studies about the mystery of why the obesity rate is increasing, and why the rate of increase is itself accelerating. Authors make a compelling argument that normal homeostatic processes (the theorized lipostat specifically) tend to keep people within a certain BMI range. Authors argue that environmental contamination is breaking the lipostat, driving obesity rates upwards, and faster where there's more contamination.
Interesting read and a great reason to switch to :vegan-v: with a focus on not buying anything wrapped in plastic.
Is it even true on a technical level? I feel like it depends on what you count as "in" and "out", and those are more complicated than simply how many calories enter your mouth, and how many you burn exercising.
I'm a reasonably active person but I can put down a huge number of carbs (mostly in legumes and grains, not sugar or white bread) as well as other calorie dense foods like nuts, and I'm the same slightly under average weight I've always been. I'm a massive eater and I just can't buy the CICO theory, because if it were so simple, I really should be gaining more weight.
CICO is weird because there are some weird things regarding metabolism but overall it is reliable.
IMO the best benefit of CICO is to expose the lies you tell yourself about what you put in your mouth. By forcing the count for everything, you can no longer try to logic away little snacks here and there and one is forced to confront how much they're actually eating.
I've had tons of friends and family struggle with various EDs. The biggest thing I've seen is people will have extremely caloric snacks and then logic that it doesn't count. CICO is extremely useful in breaking that mentality, but once you're deep into it, it gets more complicated.
I've helped several friends try to straighten out their diets and it's usually the case that they are habitually snacking on something and not doing the math on how many calories it is. I would never blame anybody for overeating in this godforsaken timeline, lord knows I stress eat all the fucking time, but if you genuinely want to lose weight you have to do some sincere dietary self-crit.
One of my friends went "keto" for a bit and didn't budge the scale at all after a couple of months, turned out she would be good all week and then drink like 4000 calories worth of sugary alcoholic beverages every weekend and not count them (no nutritional info on the cans).
Another would make a meal that would normally be healthy but she would add, no joke like 3-4 tablespoons of butter to every dinner and that's all it takes to go from losing 1 lb per week to 0 lbs per week.
things like keto bug me for a lot of reasons. I'm a firm believer in that a "diet" is a long term pattern, not just something you do for a bit. you don't describe an animals diet as something that it does for a couple months on and off.
The examples you gave are why I'm big into CICO, less for the restriction, more for the knowledge of what you're eating.
Yep, I was able to make sustainable, permanent changes to my diet because of what I learned about the caloric density of the foods I was eating. The best example is that I don't drink regular full-sugar soda anymore, and I hardly ever drink juice. It's just not worth it. I am a total sucker for baked goods, but I found that oatmeal will scratch that itch and is much more filling than the same amount of calories in cookies.
Another way I started thinking with high calorie stuff was converting those calories to miles run. Is eating four Oreos worth running two miles? Fuck no.
You also naturally trend towards eating healthier stuff, because healthier stuff is more filling per calorie.
Well if your excess calories are mostly slow digesting carbs, you're not going to gain lean mass. Especially if you're active. You'd have to eat more protein, while still in a calorie surplus. Because while CICO is true, not all calories are the same. Excess protein is more likely to be turned into lean mass, excess carbs and fat into fat. That why athletes and bodybuilders have macronutrient splits in their diets and don't just eat whatever they want all day to hit a calorie target.
Extreme example but read this
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4022420/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4022420/table/T2/?report=objectonly
The HP group in the extreme calorie surplus mostly consisting of protein( 4.4g of protein per kilogram of body weight!!!) actually lost fat and gained muscle (gained 1.9kg of lean mass and lost 0.2kg of fat), while eating 800 more calories than the control group. While the control group put on a little fat and muscle (gained 1.3 kg of lean mass and gained 0.3 kg of fat), despite eating 800 calories less.
Obviously please don't eat like this, it's an extreme example that shows that protein is more likely to be turned into lean mass than fat, and despite eating over 800 calories more, their body composition stayed similar and they didn't put on a ton of fat compared to the control group. In fact, the control group put on more fat
I mean, I think that's exactly my point. Everything you just posted goes to show it's a lot more complicated than CICO. If a calorie of beans isn't equal to a calorie of table sugar, and the protein group could eat 800 more calories than the control and still lose weight, then counting calories is not the be all and end all of weight loss or gain.
Especially if you're struggling to eat fewer calories and feeling tired/grumpy/not satiated, it might be more worthwhile to change the kinds of foods you're eating instead of trying to stay under 2000 or whatever with pancakes and pop.
Yeah, that's what I mean by "technically true". It's true as a technical law, you cannot get energy from thin air. But it's usefulness as a standalone thing is limited.