CICO, It's a math formula

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  • A_Rene86
    A_Rene86 Posts: 141 Member
    edited April 2017
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    nutmegoreo wrote: »
    A_Rene86 wrote: »
    3bambi3 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Repeating: CICO is not calorie counting. You need not count, calculate, or (in the normal sense of the word) estimate calories in order to use CICO to lose weight. You need not know how many calories you eat. You need not know how many calories you burn. You cannot lose weight without 'using CICO'. Or gain weight, or maintain weight, for that matter. It's trivially true.

    However . . . employing it conciously and intentionally helps some people. A lot. Whether they count calories, or not.

    The arguments here about whether CO (or CI) are knowable, precise, accurate, etc., have more to do with whether calorie counting works. The many people who are successful here on MFP by using calorie counting would lead us to conclude that it does work . . . even if it's no more scientific than standing in a pentagram painted in blood on your basement floor, and sacrificing a virgin goat.

    Maybe calorie counting works by placebo effect, simply because We Believe.

    (I'm pretty sure it fails for some because they don't.)

    So basically if one does not use CICO they get put in a coffin to be buried or cremated?

    One does not "use" CICO. CICO is simply the equation that describes energy balance. Methods of achieving energy balance, i.e. calorie counting and/or keto, etc. are not CICO.

    I think this about EIEO is basically the same as CICO perhaps? They talk about energy imbalance in humans and get into some actual causes of energy imbalances.

    https://nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/obe/causes

    Your source states that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. I'm glad you seem to agree. As for the genetic disorders listed that cause overweight or obesity, they impact a tiny percentage of the world's population:

    Cohen syndrome: diagnosed in less than 1,000 people worldwide
    Bardet-Biedl syndrome: 1 in 140,000-160,000 worldwide
    Prader-Willi syndrome: 1 in 10,000-30,000 worldwide
    Alstrom syndrome: Less than 1,000 people worldwide

    ETA: endocrine disorders:

    Hypothyroid: 1 in 3,000-4,000 people
    Cushing disease: 10-15 people per million

    @3bambi3 everyone that logs on to MFP knows that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. :)

    Look at that! And only 19 short pages for you to agree with the original post.

    @A_Rene86 based on professionals sources in links posted in this thread I personally see the original post to be mainly fake news that can be harmful new MFP members and the cause of MFP owners in general.

    And you would be wrong.

    So very very wrong.

    But I must say, you take majoring in the minors/not seeing the forest for the trees to a whole new level.

    Then post links based on science that prove me wrong!

    Please say what your thoughts are? That CICO doesn't apply to some people? Or just that CICO doesn't explain why people over or under eat?

    How about your post professional sources that prove your thoughts? Why do we have to prove you are wrong? I believe I lost weight because of the purple unicorn that follows me around. Prove me wrong and cite at least 3 professionals.
    A_Rene86 wrote: »
    3bambi3 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Repeating: CICO is not calorie counting. You need not count, calculate, or (in the normal sense of the word) estimate calories in order to use CICO to lose weight. You need not know how many calories you eat. You need not know how many calories you burn. You cannot lose weight without 'using CICO'. Or gain weight, or maintain weight, for that matter. It's trivially true.

    However . . . employing it conciously and intentionally helps some people. A lot. Whether they count calories, or not.

    The arguments here about whether CO (or CI) are knowable, precise, accurate, etc., have more to do with whether calorie counting works. The many people who are successful here on MFP by using calorie counting would lead us to conclude that it does work . . . even if it's no more scientific than standing in a pentagram painted in blood on your basement floor, and sacrificing a virgin goat.

    Maybe calorie counting works by placebo effect, simply because We Believe.

    (I'm pretty sure it fails for some because they don't.)

    So basically if one does not use CICO they get put in a coffin to be buried or cremated?

    One does not "use" CICO. CICO is simply the equation that describes energy balance. Methods of achieving energy balance, i.e. calorie counting and/or keto, etc. are not CICO.

    I think this about EIEO is basically the same as CICO perhaps? They talk about energy imbalance in humans and get into some actual causes of energy imbalances.

    https://nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/obe/causes

    Your source states that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. I'm glad you seem to agree. As for the genetic disorders listed that cause overweight or obesity, they impact a tiny percentage of the world's population:

    Cohen syndrome: diagnosed in less than 1,000 people worldwide
    Bardet-Biedl syndrome: 1 in 140,000-160,000 worldwide
    Prader-Willi syndrome: 1 in 10,000-30,000 worldwide
    Alstrom syndrome: Less than 1,000 people worldwide

    ETA: endocrine disorders:

    Hypothyroid: 1 in 3,000-4,000 people
    Cushing disease: 10-15 people per million

    @3bambi3 everyone that logs on to MFP knows that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. :)

    Look at that! And only 19 short pages for you to agree with the original post.

    @A_Rene86 based on professionals sources in links posted in this thread I personally see the original post to be mainly fake news that can be harmful new MFP members and the cause of MFP owners in general.

    And you would be wrong.

    So very very wrong.

    But I must say, you take majoring in the minors/not seeing the forest for the trees to a whole new level.

    Then post links based on science that prove me wrong!

    Please say what your thoughts are? That CICO doesn't apply to some people? Or just that CICO doesn't explain why people over or under eat?

    How about your post professional sources that prove your thoughts? Why do we have to prove you are wrong? I believe I lost weight because of the purple unicorn that follows me around. Prove me wrong and cite at least 3 professionals.

    This is ridiculous pseudo-science. I've seen the weight loss unicorn and he's clearly green.

    A clear green unicorn? That's just silly now. Everyone knows the only translucent unicorns are the blue ones.

    makingmark wrote: »
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    makingmark wrote: »
    OP is great, CICO is just math. Yes there are complexities that can go in to determining CI and CO for each individual, but it is always the basis for determining where the energy balance lies and if a person is gaining or losing.


    It is amazing we have a thread this long that has really been derailed for the most part by one person trying to turn math into psychology and some really badly formed psychology at that.

    Welcome to MFP. You must be new here.

    No, just heavily medicated today and was actually thinking a bit too hopefully

    That would help :laugh:



    @GaleHawkins I don't think your point is as obvious as you seem to think it is. The "research" you are using to make your murky point is suspect at best. Although there are many complicating factors to weight loss, gain, and maintenance, we can only control and influence so much of it. For example, I can't control how many calories are actually absorbed once I consume them (unless by adding additional substances which may improve digestion such as digestive enzymes for medical conditions where this would be appropriate). Just because I can't control those factors, doesn't mean that I should give up on trying to control the ones that are within my power. Focusing on so many of these minor details makes the whole process overwhelming for newcomers and they want to give up before they even get started. All you're doing is smoke and mirrors and making it seem unnecessarily daunting for people who may not know better. You are conflating so many different aspects and then claiming that it's useless.


    Amen. I spent much of my teens and early twenties about 20 pounds overweight, all the while blaming my slow metabolism. Finding out that I was not special, and that it was not complicated was a huge relief, because it meant I could do something about it! Trying to factor in all of these insignificant details seriously overcomplicates the issue and leads many people to just say forget it. Personally, I'd rather focus on the aspects I can control and adjust according to my results, over time.

    You are desperately attempting to complicate the issue, when the reality is that it's very simple. Why you're so aggressively opposed to logic is beyond me, and frankly of little concern to me, but for the fact that you are confusing new people who need a simple, logical set of steps to get started with.


    ETA: That last part is not for you, nutmegoreo, in case that wasn't clear lol.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
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    A_Rene86 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    A_Rene86 wrote: »
    A_Rene86 wrote: »
    3bambi3 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Repeating: CICO is not calorie counting. You need not count, calculate, or (in the normal sense of the word) estimate calories in order to use CICO to lose weight. You need not know how many calories you eat. You need not know how many calories you burn. You cannot lose weight without 'using CICO'. Or gain weight, or maintain weight, for that matter. It's trivially true.

    However . . . employing it conciously and intentionally helps some people. A lot. Whether they count calories, or not.

    The arguments here about whether CO (or CI) are knowable, precise, accurate, etc., have more to do with whether calorie counting works. The many people who are successful here on MFP by using calorie counting would lead us to conclude that it does work . . . even if it's no more scientific than standing in a pentagram painted in blood on your basement floor, and sacrificing a virgin goat.

    Maybe calorie counting works by placebo effect, simply because We Believe.

    (I'm pretty sure it fails for some because they don't.)

    So basically if one does not use CICO they get put in a coffin to be buried or cremated?

    One does not "use" CICO. CICO is simply the equation that describes energy balance. Methods of achieving energy balance, i.e. calorie counting and/or keto, etc. are not CICO.

    I think this about EIEO is basically the same as CICO perhaps? They talk about energy imbalance in humans and get into some actual causes of energy imbalances.

    https://nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/obe/causes

    Your source states that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. I'm glad you seem to agree. As for the genetic disorders listed that cause overweight or obesity, they impact a tiny percentage of the world's population:

    Cohen syndrome: diagnosed in less than 1,000 people worldwide
    Bardet-Biedl syndrome: 1 in 140,000-160,000 worldwide
    Prader-Willi syndrome: 1 in 10,000-30,000 worldwide
    Alstrom syndrome: Less than 1,000 people worldwide

    ETA: endocrine disorders:

    Hypothyroid: 1 in 3,000-4,000 people
    Cushing disease: 10-15 people per million

    @3bambi3 everyone that logs on to MFP knows that if you eat more calories than you burn you will gain weight. :)

    Look at that! And only 19 short pages for you to agree with the original post.

    You spoke too soon! Lol

    I take it back. I take it all back. I've been lying...I lost weight using the magic macro. ;)

    @GaleHawkins You are what is harmful to new MFP members. New and veteran MFP members alike are best served by taking personal responsibility for their behaviors and their weight and using the CICO equation to figure out a more appropriate balance. If people believe that it's their metabolism, their genes, the fact that they didn't "eat this, not that" then they will continue to gain weight under the misguided belief that it's not their fault and they can't do anything to change it. That is what's "harmful".

    A deep irony, in my opinion, is that people like Gale do have useful information that could help newbies. Gale, for example, seems to have found a personal route to satiation and reduction of cravings that is unusual, even idiosyncratic, and that took research and experimentation to identify.

    If the message were more like "when it comes to satiation and cravings, everyone is different, and here's what I had to go through to find the unusual set of things that work for me", I think that could be quite helpful. Some of the keto fans do this, and I believe they are helpful to newbies as those folks seek a sustainable way of eating (WOE) for themselves.

    It's the argument that "what works for me works for everyone, 'science' proves it, so you need to agree" that becomes an issue.

    I'm a long-time (4+ decade) vegetarian who buys mostly one-ingredient foods, cooks them at home, and eats 10+ servings of veggies and fruit every day. I could find whacky web sites that stump for that WOE (it would be easy), plus even a few peer-reviewed studies that support bits of it; argue that everyone must eat My Way; and suggest that there's a huge meat-y, multi-ingredient food, restaurant-based, anti-vegetable conspiracy that prevents people from eating "right"; and that they could succeed if they would only ignore the crazy "eat all junk food within your calories and you can lose weight" CICO people.

    But I don't do that. Because it would be stoopid. Also unhelpful.

    You make a really good point, @AnnPT77 . I agree -I don't doubt that Gale possesses some knowledge that could be useful to newcomers in an anecdotal sense, but this insistence on disproving a scientific equation in order to support his own claims is ridiculous and frankly, downright arrogant.

    I am not trying to disprove any scientific equation in this thread.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
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    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Okay, maybe this will go over better:

    Tom has 5 apples. He gave Jessica 2 apples. How many apples does Tom have now? What equation represents that exchange?

    Maybe Tom ran back to the apple tree and picked 3 more apples after he gave Jessica two, because he's a carb addict.

    Or maybe he stole the two apples back from Jessica after he gave them to her because he's a kleptomaniac.

    Or maybe a bird swooped down and took one of his remaining apples when he set them down for a minute to re-tie his shoe.

    Or maybe he's absent-minded and dropped both of the apples and didn't notice.

    Or maybe the exchange of apples took place in a high-crime environment and Tom was robbed of the remaining apples (and his wallet and watch as well) immediately after Jessica walked away with her two apples.


    So you see, it's abundantly clear that no equation can adequately explain such a concept because there are a multitude of factors beyond poor Tom's control which completely negate simple mathematics.

    Or at least that's the way some of this discussion has gone.

    Awesome @AnvilHead you finally factually explained the CICO we are talking about in this thread in a way that I think the rest can grasp finally when it comes to weigh loss.

    Thanks so much for pointing out how CICO has so many unknowns. It may be 10% of the weigh loss factors per one speaker I heard lately.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    edited April 2017
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    kclaar11 wrote: »

    I am not trying to disprove any scientific equation in this thread.

    No, you just repeatedly (in every thread) try to argue that CICO is not a scientific equation at all, but just a "concept" of dieting. And then try to complicate it further by saying that because there are variables that go in to it that it is "debunked" and essentially worthless.

    If CICO is a valid scientific equation please then just write it out fully and post it here in this tread.

    https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/534182/how-to-build-a-mathematical-formula
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
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    psuLemon wrote: »
    kclaar11 wrote: »

    I am not trying to disprove any scientific equation in this thread.

    No, you just repeatedly (in every thread) try to argue that CICO is not a scientific equation at all, but just a "concept" of dieting. And then try to complicate it further by saying that because there are variables that go in to it that it is "debunked" and essentially worthless.

    If CICO is a valid scientific equation please then just write it out fully and post it here in this tread.

    https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/534182/how-to-build-a-mathematical-formula

    The paper with the mathematical formula has been posted twice already in this thread.

    And considering Dr. Hall is one of the leading researches in metabolism, my bets are on him over pretty much anyone.

    Agreed.

    Gale, here's the link for the CICO equation:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2266991/
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    edited April 2017
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    psuLemon wrote: »
    kclaar11 wrote: »

    I am not trying to disprove any scientific equation in this thread.

    No, you just repeatedly (in every thread) try to argue that CICO is not a scientific equation at all, but just a "concept" of dieting. And then try to complicate it further by saying that because there are variables that go in to it that it is "debunked" and essentially worthless.

    If CICO is a valid scientific equation please then just write it out fully and post it here in this tread.

    https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/534182/how-to-build-a-mathematical-formula

    The paper with the mathematical formula has been posted twice already in this thread.

    And considering Dr. Hall is one of the leading researches in metabolism, my bets are on him over pretty much anyone.

    Oh one more thing about Dr. Hall -- wasn't his PhD in physics? IIRC, he got into metabolism and nutrition from being asked to design a predictive model for a company that had something to do with diabetes.

    If anyone in all of these discussions is going to understand closed systems and how energy balance works in them, it would be him.
This discussion has been closed.