I think there is compelling evidence that calories in/out isn't the cause of obesity but just a description of the process. People overeat and move less because they are getting fat, they dont get fat because they overeat. Partitioning too much energy to storage instead of use drives the hunger and attempted energy saving elsewhere in order to serve the imperative to store fat. The key to obesity is what is it that changes the fat storage set point. This makes more sense of many lines of data. Think of say drugs that cause fat gain whether or not you eat more. Or getting taller during puberty. I grew a foot during puberty and I ate a ton, but it would be hard to argue I got tall *because * i ate more than I burned, though I definitely did that. When my wife put on 20 pounds of muscle as a bodybuilder it wasn't because she ate more than she burned, though she definitely had to do that. Hormones tell your body where to allocate what you eat.
Yeah, I've never thought the calories in-out theory really explained what's going on. Of course if you don't eat anything you will use up fat reserves and lose weight, but when you eat food, the body is making choices as to where it does with that energy. So what exercise does, in addition to burning calories, is send a signal to your body that it has to be ready for action, to hunt down a mastodon or whatever. When you're sedentary, you're sending the message that life is easy, so the body says OK, let's save those calories for later, store them in fat.
Also, just talking about calories grossly simplifies what food is and how it's processed. I remember all these Atkins people would say fruit is bad because it has sugar. Others say avocados are bad because they have fat. And I'd reply, "Please show me a person who got fat from eating too many avocados."
I think there is compelling evidence that calories in/out isn't the cause of obesity but just a description of the process. People overeat and move less because they are getting fat, they dont get fat because they overeat. Partitioning too much energy to storage instead of use drives the hunger and attempted energy saving elsewhere in order to serve the imperative to store fat. The key to obesity is what is it that changes the fat storage set point. This makes more sense of many lines of data. Think of say drugs that cause fat gain whether or not you eat more. Or getting taller during puberty. I grew a foot during puberty and I ate a ton, but it would be hard to argue I got tall *because * i ate more than I burned, though I definitely did that. When my wife put on 20 pounds of muscle as a bodybuilder it wasn't because she ate more than she burned, though she definitely had to do that. Hormones tell your body where to allocate what you eat.
Yeah, I've never thought the calories in-out theory really explained what's going on. Of course if you don't eat anything you will use up fat reserves and lose weight, but when you eat food, the body is making choices as to where it does with that energy. So what exercise does, in addition to burning calories, is send a signal to your body that it has to be ready for action, to hunt down a mastodon or whatever. When you're sedentary, you're sending the message that life is easy, so the body says OK, let's save those calories for later, store them in fat.
Also, just talking about calories grossly simplifies what food is and how it's processed. I remember all these Atkins people would say fruit is bad because it has sugar. Others say avocados are bad because they have fat. And I'd reply, "Please show me a person who got fat from eating too many avocados."