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If a calorie is a calorie, why do we see this?

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Replies

  • estherpotter1
    estherpotter1 Posts: 137 Member
    lettuce calories would be better than weightloss than fat or sugar calories.
  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,899 Member
    just_Tomek wrote: »
    lettuce calories would be better than weightloss than fat or sugar calories.

    For weight loss???? Absolutely not. For nutritional value, yeap.

    Eh, I think an avocado or some nuts (high fat) compare perfectly well to, say, iceberg lettuce for nutritional value.

    Even a banana (high sugar) does.

    Of course, I'm all for a diet that includes nuts, avocado, bananas, and lettuce (I like boston lettuce, it's yum, with some spinach and watercress, perhaps). Also, many other greens, fruits and veg, and sources of protein and fat.
  • Jruzer
    Jruzer Posts: 3,501 Member
    lettuce calories would be better than weightloss than fat or sugar calories.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma
  • happysquidmuffin
    happysquidmuffin Posts: 651 Member
    SezxyStef wrote: »
    Only 30 people? Then it sounds like statistical anomalies and math threw off the data. Not a big enough study to be accurate. The data is just fluff. Especially if their calorie intake wasn’t controlled every day!
    erickirb wrote: »
    Did both groups have the same maintenance cals. if one was higher (BF group) and ate the same cals as the other group they would be expected to lose more. the other possible reason, as noted before, is that bigger breakfast could lead to a higher NEAT.

    ^^This.

    Plus time of day of weigh-ins...plus the set number of calories allegedly eaten, plus - if it were this simple I'm pretty sure we all would have done this.

    It's still about calories, not bogus 30 sample "studies."

    Just for clarity it was over 90 and they were split into groups...not just 30 people in total.

    Thank you, didn’t know it was 90 total. But that’s still only 45 or 30 people per group, so the data is hardly relevant. Needs to be 200+ people each for control group and differing groups, so that each person only contributes half a percent to each category of data. Just my opinion. That way the math doesn’t skew the data out of whack, and less of a chance that a few crazy outliers skew the data too.
  • GaleHawkins
    GaleHawkins Posts: 8,160 Member
    edited January 2020
    lettuce calories would be better than weight loss than fat or sugar calories.

    @estherpotter1 while this can vary from person to person the question I now ask what will this or that type calorie do to help or harm the make up of my gut microbiome?

    Unless it is planned obesity there has to be some type of health issue for obesity to occur. The gut microbiome is one of many factors in mammal health.

    In my case for 40 years after each weigh loss I would sooner or later have a 100%+ regain so at 63 I said to heck with weight loss and started working to get more healthy and have better lab results. That was in 2014 when I changed my Way Of Eating without any weight loss objective and eating to never go hungry I accidentally lost 50 pounds without considering how many calories I ate but focused on eating calories that gave me better health and better health markers on my lab tests. That is how I proved in my case the WOE make up of the right kind of calories (that varies from person to person) was more important to me than the number of calories. I did not know about the gut microbiome at that time.

    The freedom to eat all I want has changed me both physically and mentally for the better. In 2020 the 50 pound weight loss has not return since it went away in 2015. My new WOE quickly reduced my pain from Ankylosing Spondylitis (arthritis) starting in 2014 so I was able to avoid starting on Enbrel injections for pain management.

    If interested read up on the ways one's gut microbiome can change what our bodies do with a calorie after we eat it.

    Calories are always a factor but seldom ever the primary cause of long term weight gains or losses.

    https://sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190927135200.htm


  • SnifterPug
    SnifterPug Posts: 746 Member
    https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/0256/bf06835c5fc0d3b8eaa9f1e32f46934f3b69.pdf

    I am in no way advocating the red wine diet, and the study itself points out that for social drinkers alcohol calories should be treated as normal calories. Nevertheless, it would appear that a calorie is not always a calorie.

    I also recommend a new book just out by a bariatric surgeon who has been exploring why people become overweight and obese and has some very interesting things to say:

    Why We Eat (Too Much) by Dr Andrew Jenkinson
  • VictoriaTuel
    VictoriaTuel Posts: 1,604 Member
    My main issue with these results is that they don't account for food weight at all. When I eat dinner late I weigh more in the morning regardless of whether I ate more or less calories that day. Sometimes the difference can be as much as 4-5lb depending on the type of food I ate.

    The people who ate a larger breakfast had an inherent advantage in supposed weight loss because when they woke up, they (allegedly) hadn't eaten more than 700 calories in the past 16 or so hours. Their bodies had plenty of time to use or get rid of the food they ate, but the large dinner group had eaten 1200 calories in that time frame. There was no point in the day where they hadn't just eaten or eaten less than 700 calories in the past 16 hours. There was simply no comparable time for them to weigh in.