carbs are my enemy

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  • PeachyCarol
    PeachyCarol Posts: 8,029 Member
    edited December 2014
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    LeenaGee wrote: »

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.

    Now who do I believe? - MrM or countless articles that state "As is often the case when science is dummied down, it becomes wrong. Such is the case in the distortion of the Law of Thermodynamics which has been simplified into the popular wisdom: “Calories in = calories out.” This simplistic adage has become something “everyone knows” to be true. It’s behind widely held beliefs that managing our weight is simply a matter of balancing calories eaten and exercise. While that’s been used to sell a lot of calorie-reduced diets and calorie-burning exercise programs for weight loss; sadly, it’s also been used to support beliefs that fat people “most certainly must be lying” about their diets and activity levels, because otherwise their failure to lose weight would seem to “defy the Law of Thermodynamics.”

    While it might seem inconceivable, this simplified maxim is little more than superstition and urban legend. To realize this fact requires us to first go back to physics class and fill in the missing parts of the first Law of Thermodynamics.

    The first Law of Thermodynamics, or energy balance, basically states that in a closed system, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred.

    The human body is not a machine. There are countless, wildly varying, variables (external and internal) involved and that affect the efficiencies of a system and for which we have no control over. Understanding this helps to explain why calories cannot be balanced like a cheque book, and why people never seem to gain or lose precisely as calculated.

    Balance in an open system, like the human body, is when all energy going into the system equals all energy leaving the system plus the storage of energy within the system. But energy in any thermodynamic system includes kinetic energy, potential energy, internal energy, and flow energy, as well as heat and work processes.

    In other words, in real life, balancing energy includes a lot more than just the calories we eat and the calories we burn according to those exercise charts. The energy parts of the equation include: calories consumed; calories converted to energy and used in involuntary movement; calories used for heat generation and in response to external environmental exposures and temperatures; calories used with inflammatory and infectious processes; calories used in growth, tissue restoration and numerous metabolic processes; calories used in voluntary movement; calories not absorbed in the digestive tract and matter expelled; calories stored as fat, and fat converted in the liver to glucose; and more. Add to that, to put it simply, each variable affects the others, varies with mass and age, involves complex hormonal and enzyme regulatory influences, and differs in efficiency.

    Calories eaten and calories used in voluntary movement are only two small parts of energy balance and are meaningless by themselves, unless all of the other variables are controlled for, as our metabolism… which they can never be as they aren’t under our control.


    Now obviously I don't have a great knowledge of physics but I am tying to learn as I go along and MrM does not have the answers that make a lot of sense to me. Basically, the body is a very complex machine and there are other factors involved in gaining and losing weight.

    All that verbiage does is prove that the author doesn't know what he or she is saying nor do they understand CICO. Yes, your body uses calories being alive. This isn't news to anyone here. All CICO calculations account for this with TDEE/BMR. There are variables involved in those things based on age, weight, and gender. That's why you're asked those things on just about every calculator available.

    Try again.

  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
    Options
    tigersword wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    I have a friend from London and didn't know about the shift weight slang. Honest mistake.

    I have several friends in the UK, watch plenty of British tv, and I've never heard that term before. *shrug*

    Maybe you're just not paying enough attention ?
  • ndj1979
    ndj1979 Posts: 29,139 Member
    edited December 2014
    Options
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you shift weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you *kitten* weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….

    You and your crazy slang!
  • FatFreeFrolicking
    FatFreeFrolicking Posts: 4,252 Member
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you *kitten* weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….

    I think you forgot the "f" in shift :p
  • ndj1979
    ndj1979 Posts: 29,139 Member
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you *kitten* weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….

    I think you forgot the "f" in shift :p

    yea looks that way ..
  • ndj1979
    ndj1979 Posts: 29,139 Member
    Options
    fixed it …

    and out
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
    edited December 2014
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    fixed it …

    and out

    Adios

    'That means goodbye - in non American'
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    fixed it …

    and out

    Adios

    'That means goodbye - in non American'

    I'm not sure you know the difference between "vocabulary" and "slang." Also, don't you find it rather insulting to refer to Spanish as "non-American?"
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
    edited December 2014
    Options
    tigersword wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    fixed it …

    and out

    Adios

    'That means goodbye - in non American'

    I'm not sure you know the difference between "vocabulary" and "slang." Also, don't you find it rather insulting to refer to Spanish as "non-American?"

    Non - American is just my slang for language which is not English!

    I'm sure anyone Spanish would not be offended by being non American!

    You seem very sensitive today - maybe best not to obsess over the correct term for things - on an Internet forum it will drive you insane!
  • Kalikel
    Kalikel Posts: 9,626 Member
    Options
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you shift weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….
    I think she was referring to your habit of asking innocent-sounding questions in order to bait people into fights or ambush them with nastiness.
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    Options
    Kalikel wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you shift weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….
    I think she was referring to your habit of asking innocent-sounding questions in order to bait people into fights or ambush them with nastiness.
    I think you meant to say, "correcting misinformation."
  • tennisdude2004
    tennisdude2004 Posts: 5,609 Member
    Options
    tigersword wrote: »
    Kalikel wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    ndj1979 wrote: »
    down 1.4lbs this week by cutting carbs in half... it had stalled for 4 weeks .... i think i will keep going

    You know that's water weight, right? Keep counting calories.

    of course its water weight but it will only continue to drop from here. i no longer feel bloated sick or tired and it will only get better. by eating 180g of carbs per day i could not shift any more weight and i was keeping within 1200 calories per day and doing 50 minutes of cardio per day.

    how do you shift weight???

    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    not a brit so I don't know the "lingo"…

    why would you assume an american would know british slang? That is like assuming an Italian would know american slang...

    Because it is so common that the vast majority of people would know it, assuming they have ever watched television or movies with British characters or interviews with live British people. (Not to mention that you have a reputation around MFP for playing dumb just so you can mock people.)

    hmmm well according to others in this thread they have never heard of it as well. So I guess it is not as common as you state.

    So asking how you shift weight is mocking? Ok…if you say so ..

    I see another white knight as entered the fray …

    I am off to watch football…just in case you are wondering that is the one where the guys throw the football around, not soccer ….
    I think she was referring to your habit of asking innocent-sounding questions in order to bait people into fights or ambush them with nastiness.
    I think you meant to say, "correcting misinformation."

    I'm sure he will be touched by your white knighting him, but I think the poster about is closer to the mark!
  • ForecasterJason
    ForecasterJason Posts: 2,577 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    Trust me to join the conversation at this point. :p But I will say I agree with earlnabby. lol

    I noticed a lot of the conversation stated as a fact that "overeating leads to weight gain."

    What I don't understand is how do people, like myself, my husband and my sons overeat all our lives and not gain weight.

    My husband and sons eat constantly and never gain weight. I was the same up until I was 50 (I am too scared to say "until I reached menopause age.") Now I have to be a lot more careful as I have found the weight creeping on slowly over the years. Funny that, weight seems to shift, stall, creep, increase but is mighty hard to lose.

    Anyway, what I want to know is, "after eating like a pig for over 50 years why aren't I the size of a house instead of just 5 kilos overweight if the statement about overeating is fact?

    Because you don't.

    There are people who eat all day long and are still within their maintenance number. My boyfriend is one, for example. He eats a lot. He eats a lot of high calorie foods. He doesn't, however, eat over maintainece when the calories are averaged out over a week.

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.
    I agree with what you're saying, but it's all about perception. I mean, just a week ago I was talking to a friend in person, and she couldn't believe when I said I eat cake and cookies often and yet she can see how skinny I am. I understand that some of us who can just eat and eat without gaining are still eating around maintenance, but it means our maintenance is much higher than normal, and/or our bodies are more efficient at burning calories. So therefore, it appears as though we are in a calorie surplus.

  • PeachyCarol
    PeachyCarol Posts: 8,029 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    Trust me to join the conversation at this point. :p But I will say I agree with earlnabby. lol

    I noticed a lot of the conversation stated as a fact that "overeating leads to weight gain."

    What I don't understand is how do people, like myself, my husband and my sons overeat all our lives and not gain weight.

    My husband and sons eat constantly and never gain weight. I was the same up until I was 50 (I am too scared to say "until I reached menopause age.") Now I have to be a lot more careful as I have found the weight creeping on slowly over the years. Funny that, weight seems to shift, stall, creep, increase but is mighty hard to lose.

    Anyway, what I want to know is, "after eating like a pig for over 50 years why aren't I the size of a house instead of just 5 kilos overweight if the statement about overeating is fact?

    Because you don't.

    There are people who eat all day long and are still within their maintenance number. My boyfriend is one, for example. He eats a lot. He eats a lot of high calorie foods. He doesn't, however, eat over maintainece when the calories are averaged out over a week.

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.
    I agree with what you're saying, but it's all about perception. I mean, just a week ago I was talking to a friend in person, and she couldn't believe when I said I eat cake and cookies often and yet she can see how skinny I am. I understand that some of us who can just eat and eat without gaining are still eating around maintenance, but it means our maintenance is much higher than normal, and/or our bodies are more efficient at burning calories. So therefore, it appears as though we are in a calorie surplus.

    But the fact still remains that you aren't. Perception doesn't change the physics. The facts are all that matter in this case.

  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.

    Now who do I believe? - MrM or countless articles that state "As is often the case when science is dummied down, it becomes wrong. Such is the case in the distortion of the Law of Thermodynamics which has been simplified into the popular wisdom: “Calories in = calories out.” This simplistic adage has become something “everyone knows” to be true. It’s behind widely held beliefs that managing our weight is simply a matter of balancing calories eaten and exercise. While that’s been used to sell a lot of calorie-reduced diets and calorie-burning exercise programs for weight loss; sadly, it’s also been used to support beliefs that fat people “most certainly must be lying” about their diets and activity levels, because otherwise their failure to lose weight would seem to “defy the Law of Thermodynamics.”

    While it might seem inconceivable, this simplified maxim is little more than superstition and urban legend. To realize this fact requires us to first go back to physics class and fill in the missing parts of the first Law of Thermodynamics.

    The first Law of Thermodynamics, or energy balance, basically states that in a closed system, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred.

    The human body is not a machine. There are countless, wildly varying, variables (external and internal) involved and that affect the efficiencies of a system and for which we have no control over. Understanding this helps to explain why calories cannot be balanced like a cheque book, and why people never seem to gain or lose precisely as calculated.

    Balance in an open system, like the human body, is when all energy going into the system equals all energy leaving the system plus the storage of energy within the system. But energy in any thermodynamic system includes kinetic energy, potential energy, internal energy, and flow energy, as well as heat and work processes.

    In other words, in real life, balancing energy includes a lot more than just the calories we eat and the calories we burn according to those exercise charts. The energy parts of the equation include: calories consumed; calories converted to energy and used in involuntary movement; calories used for heat generation and in response to external environmental exposures and temperatures; calories used with inflammatory and infectious processes; calories used in growth, tissue restoration and numerous metabolic processes; calories used in voluntary movement; calories not absorbed in the digestive tract and matter expelled; calories stored as fat, and fat converted in the liver to glucose; and more. Add to that, to put it simply, each variable affects the others, varies with mass and age, involves complex hormonal and enzyme regulatory influences, and differs in efficiency.

    Calories eaten and calories used in voluntary movement are only two small parts of energy balance and are meaningless by themselves, unless all of the other variables are controlled for, as our metabolism… which they can never be as they aren’t under our control.


    Now obviously I don't have a great knowledge of physics but I am tying to learn as I go along and MrM does not have the answers that make a lot of sense to me. Basically, the body is a very complex machine and there are other factors involved in gaining and losing weight.

    Can you please provide the link to that article? If it isn't from a peer-reviewed scientific database (which I'm sure it isn't), it holds no value or accuracy.

    junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2008/10/first-law-of-thermodynamics-in-real.html

  • blktngldhrt
    blktngldhrt Posts: 1,053 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.

    Now who do I believe? - MrM or countless articles that state "As is often the case when science is dummied down, it becomes wrong. Such is the case in the distortion of the Law of Thermodynamics which has been simplified into the popular wisdom: “Calories in = calories out.” This simplistic adage has become something “everyone knows” to be true. It’s behind widely held beliefs that managing our weight is simply a matter of balancing calories eaten and exercise. While that’s been used to sell a lot of calorie-reduced diets and calorie-burning exercise programs for weight loss; sadly, it’s also been used to support beliefs that fat people “most certainly must be lying” about their diets and activity levels, because otherwise their failure to lose weight would seem to “defy the Law of Thermodynamics.”

    While it might seem inconceivable, this simplified maxim is little more than superstition and urban legend. To realize this fact requires us to first go back to physics class and fill in the missing parts of the first Law of Thermodynamics.

    The first Law of Thermodynamics, or energy balance, basically states that in a closed system, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred.

    The human body is not a machine. There are countless, wildly varying, variables (external and internal) involved and that affect the efficiencies of a system and for which we have no control over. Understanding this helps to explain why calories cannot be balanced like a cheque book, and why people never seem to gain or lose precisely as calculated.

    Balance in an open system, like the human body, is when all energy going into the system equals all energy leaving the system plus the storage of energy within the system. But energy in any thermodynamic system includes kinetic energy, potential energy, internal energy, and flow energy, as well as heat and work processes.

    In other words, in real life, balancing energy includes a lot more than just the calories we eat and the calories we burn according to those exercise charts. The energy parts of the equation include: calories consumed; calories converted to energy and used in involuntary movement; calories used for heat generation and in response to external environmental exposures and temperatures; calories used with inflammatory and infectious processes; calories used in growth, tissue restoration and numerous metabolic processes; calories used in voluntary movement; calories not absorbed in the digestive tract and matter expelled; calories stored as fat, and fat converted in the liver to glucose; and more. Add to that, to put it simply, each variable affects the others, varies with mass and age, involves complex hormonal and enzyme regulatory influences, and differs in efficiency.

    Calories eaten and calories used in voluntary movement are only two small parts of energy balance and are meaningless by themselves, unless all of the other variables are controlled for, as our metabolism… which they can never be as they aren’t under our control.


    Now obviously I don't have a great knowledge of physics but I am tying to learn as I go along and MrM does not have the answers that make a lot of sense to me. Basically, the body is a very complex machine and there are other factors involved in gaining and losing weight.

    Can you please provide the link to that article? If it isn't from a peer-reviewed scientific database (which I'm sure it isn't), it holds no value or accuracy.

    junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2008/10/first-law-of-thermodynamics-in-real.html

    Junkfood science written on someone's blogger account in 2008 isn't exactly the place one should be reading about science.
  • LolBroScience
    LolBroScience Posts: 4,537 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.

    Now who do I believe? - MrM or countless articles that state "As is often the case when science is dummied down, it becomes wrong. Such is the case in the distortion of the Law of Thermodynamics which has been simplified into the popular wisdom: “Calories in = calories out.” This simplistic adage has become something “everyone knows” to be true. It’s behind widely held beliefs that managing our weight is simply a matter of balancing calories eaten and exercise. While that’s been used to sell a lot of calorie-reduced diets and calorie-burning exercise programs for weight loss; sadly, it’s also been used to support beliefs that fat people “most certainly must be lying” about their diets and activity levels, because otherwise their failure to lose weight would seem to “defy the Law of Thermodynamics.”

    While it might seem inconceivable, this simplified maxim is little more than superstition and urban legend. To realize this fact requires us to first go back to physics class and fill in the missing parts of the first Law of Thermodynamics.

    The first Law of Thermodynamics, or energy balance, basically states that in a closed system, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred.

    The human body is not a machine. There are countless, wildly varying, variables (external and internal) involved and that affect the efficiencies of a system and for which we have no control over. Understanding this helps to explain why calories cannot be balanced like a cheque book, and why people never seem to gain or lose precisely as calculated.

    Balance in an open system, like the human body, is when all energy going into the system equals all energy leaving the system plus the storage of energy within the system. But energy in any thermodynamic system includes kinetic energy, potential energy, internal energy, and flow energy, as well as heat and work processes.

    In other words, in real life, balancing energy includes a lot more than just the calories we eat and the calories we burn according to those exercise charts. The energy parts of the equation include: calories consumed; calories converted to energy and used in involuntary movement; calories used for heat generation and in response to external environmental exposures and temperatures; calories used with inflammatory and infectious processes; calories used in growth, tissue restoration and numerous metabolic processes; calories used in voluntary movement; calories not absorbed in the digestive tract and matter expelled; calories stored as fat, and fat converted in the liver to glucose; and more. Add to that, to put it simply, each variable affects the others, varies with mass and age, involves complex hormonal and enzyme regulatory influences, and differs in efficiency.

    Calories eaten and calories used in voluntary movement are only two small parts of energy balance and are meaningless by themselves, unless all of the other variables are controlled for, as our metabolism… which they can never be as they aren’t under our control.


    Now obviously I don't have a great knowledge of physics but I am tying to learn as I go along and MrM does not have the answers that make a lot of sense to me. Basically, the body is a very complex machine and there are other factors involved in gaining and losing weight.

    Can you please provide the link to that article? If it isn't from a peer-reviewed scientific database (which I'm sure it isn't), it holds no value or accuracy.

    junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2008/10/first-law-of-thermodynamics-in-real.html

    Best troll ever
  • blktngldhrt
    blktngldhrt Posts: 1,053 Member
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    LeenaGee wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    Don't be an a@@. You know very well it is a Brit term for making it go away.

    Trust me to join the conversation at this point. :p But I will say I agree with earlnabby. lol

    I noticed a lot of the conversation stated as a fact that "overeating leads to weight gain."

    What I don't understand is how do people, like myself, my husband and my sons overeat all our lives and not gain weight.

    My husband and sons eat constantly and never gain weight. I was the same up until I was 50 (I am too scared to say "until I reached menopause age.") Now I have to be a lot more careful as I have found the weight creeping on slowly over the years. Funny that, weight seems to shift, stall, creep, increase but is mighty hard to lose.

    Anyway, what I want to know is, "after eating like a pig for over 50 years why aren't I the size of a house instead of just 5 kilos overweight if the statement about overeating is fact?

    Because you don't.

    There are people who eat all day long and are still within their maintenance number. My boyfriend is one, for example. He eats a lot. He eats a lot of high calorie foods. He doesn't, however, eat over maintainece when the calories are averaged out over a week.

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.
    I agree with what you're saying, but it's all about perception. I mean, just a week ago I was talking to a friend in person, and she couldn't believe when I said I eat cake and cookies often and yet she can see how skinny I am. I understand that some of us who can just eat and eat without gaining are still eating around maintenance, but it means our maintenance is much higher than normal, and/or our bodies are more efficient at burning calories. So therefore, it appears as though we are in a calorie surplus.

    No sir. Fact and perception are not one in the same. The appearance of a calorie surplus does not make it a surplus. It doesn't matter what appears to be. The only thing that matters is what is

    Your maintenence is probably not higher than normal..it is simply higher than her maintenance. Also, being able to eat cake and cookies is not really a good yard stick with which to measure your calorie in being higher than hers.
  • FatFreeFrolicking
    FatFreeFrolicking Posts: 4,252 Member
    Options
    LeenaGee wrote: »

    Like MrM said..physics. You MUST overeat to gain weight. This is fact.

    Now who do I believe? - MrM or countless articles that state "As is often the case when science is dummied down, it becomes wrong. Such is the case in the distortion of the Law of Thermodynamics which has been simplified into the popular wisdom: “Calories in = calories out.” This simplistic adage has become something “everyone knows” to be true. It’s behind widely held beliefs that managing our weight is simply a matter of balancing calories eaten and exercise. While that’s been used to sell a lot of calorie-reduced diets and calorie-burning exercise programs for weight loss; sadly, it’s also been used to support beliefs that fat people “most certainly must be lying” about their diets and activity levels, because otherwise their failure to lose weight would seem to “defy the Law of Thermodynamics.”

    While it might seem inconceivable, this simplified maxim is little more than superstition and urban legend. To realize this fact requires us to first go back to physics class and fill in the missing parts of the first Law of Thermodynamics.

    The first Law of Thermodynamics, or energy balance, basically states that in a closed system, energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred.

    The human body is not a machine. There are countless, wildly varying, variables (external and internal) involved and that affect the efficiencies of a system and for which we have no control over. Understanding this helps to explain why calories cannot be balanced like a cheque book, and why people never seem to gain or lose precisely as calculated.

    Balance in an open system, like the human body, is when all energy going into the system equals all energy leaving the system plus the storage of energy within the system. But energy in any thermodynamic system includes kinetic energy, potential energy, internal energy, and flow energy, as well as heat and work processes.

    In other words, in real life, balancing energy includes a lot more than just the calories we eat and the calories we burn according to those exercise charts. The energy parts of the equation include: calories consumed; calories converted to energy and used in involuntary movement; calories used for heat generation and in response to external environmental exposures and temperatures; calories used with inflammatory and infectious processes; calories used in growth, tissue restoration and numerous metabolic processes; calories used in voluntary movement; calories not absorbed in the digestive tract and matter expelled; calories stored as fat, and fat converted in the liver to glucose; and more. Add to that, to put it simply, each variable affects the others, varies with mass and age, involves complex hormonal and enzyme regulatory influences, and differs in efficiency.

    Calories eaten and calories used in voluntary movement are only two small parts of energy balance and are meaningless by themselves, unless all of the other variables are controlled for, as our metabolism… which they can never be as they aren’t under our control.


    Now obviously I don't have a great knowledge of physics but I am tying to learn as I go along and MrM does not have the answers that make a lot of sense to me. Basically, the body is a very complex machine and there are other factors involved in gaining and losing weight.

    Can you please provide the link to that article? If it isn't from a peer-reviewed scientific database (which I'm sure it isn't), it holds no value or accuracy.

    junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2008/10/first-law-of-thermodynamics-in-real.html

    Lol. Gale, "junkfoodscience.blogspot.com" is NOT a peer-reviewed scientific database.
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