The 3,500 calories-per-pound myth...

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  • lgfrie
    lgfrie Posts: 1,449 Member
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    Don't fall for the "myth" thing, OP. There's an entire diet industry that feeds and sustains itself by taking uncontroversial, established facts or axioms, like "eat less and move more to lose weight", and declaring them myths. Shockingly, the way you get past the myth is by adopting some kind of New Thinking, which means buying some dumb product or joining some program/plan at a cost.

    Myth: "calories matter". New Thinking: Anything but calories matter. Reality: only calories matter.

    Myth: "a pound of fat = 3500 calories". New Thinking: That's a myth. Reality: A pound of fat = 3500 calories.

    And so on.

    Been weighing myself daily and tracking calories and exercise very precisely for a year and a half, and a pound of fat = 3500 calories. Could it be 3498 or 3505? Sure, I guess. It isn't more than 5 or 10 calories off.
  • Nony_Mouse
    Nony_Mouse Posts: 5,646 Member
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    Avidkeo wrote: »
    NorthCascades wrote: »
    gisem17 wrote: »
    ... Of course the Earth is flat. Just look at a map...

    16-9.jpg

    I know you're actually trying to be helpful here, I'm posting this in response because it's funny. I'm having a stressful day and a laugh helped.

    I hope we've helped the OP, before this thread went off the rails. The key takeaway is the first few results from a Google probably aren't reliable, you have to be discerning about how and where you get information. Also, 3,500 has worked well for many in here. Finally, the actual number isn't worth getting hung up on because of CICO, you'll lose weight, mostly fat, by eating a calorie deficit, and hopefully doing strength training.

    That map is really wrong. Nz is in the absolute wrong place. At least its on there I guess

    Came to say the same thing! We are, sadly, most definitely not tropical. But yeah, at least we're on that one.
  • zebasschick
    zebasschick Posts: 909 Member
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    but... but... but it must be true... the OP read it on the internet!
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,395 Member
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    gisem17 wrote: »
    NorthCascades wrote: »
    I know you're actually trying to be helpful here, I'm posting this in response because it's funny. I'm having a stressful day and a laugh helped.
    Actually I'm not. I'm taking a silly idea to ridiculous levels. That's just my sense of humor. I'm glad you found it amusing. I think I owe the OP an apology. So sorry.

    You certainly made me laugh and provided some desperately needed distraction from a statistical and fluid in porous media movement problem. <3:D (I just hope nobody though you were serious, as you got a big fat Disagree)
  • SeanD2407
    SeanD2407 Posts: 139 Member
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    It's around that number.
    Just like 2000 calories a day for women and 2500 calories a day for men to "maintain and be healthy" are general guidelines on nutrition labels.
    3500 is a general guideline. It's very safe logic though that eating 500 calories less or 500 calories will generally make you lose or gain around a lb. Of course it always fluctuates.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,970 Member
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    Avidkeo wrote: »
    NorthCascades wrote: »
    gisem17 wrote: »
    ... Of course the Earth is flat. Just look at a map...

    16-9.jpg

    I know you're actually trying to be helpful here, I'm posting this in response because it's funny. I'm having a stressful day and a laugh helped.

    I hope we've helped the OP, before this thread went off the rails. The key takeaway is the first few results from a Google probably aren't reliable, you have to be discerning about how and where you get information. Also, 3,500 has worked well for many in here. Finally, the actual number isn't worth getting hung up on because of CICO, you'll lose weight, mostly fat, by eating a calorie deficit, and hopefully doing strength training.

    That map is really wrong. Nz is in the absolute wrong place. At least its on there I guess

    And there's no Mongolia! It's just not even there at all.
  • domeofstars
    domeofstars Posts: 480 Member
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    I didn't know it had been established as a ''myth''???
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,900 Member
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    Redordeadhead wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    A ramdom Google search is pretty much guaranteed to return nonsense answers near the top, when it's in the realm of health, diet or fitness. There's money to be made by convincing people that the simple truth is not really true, and that the site (with something to sell) knows the secret tricks/hacks/strategies.

    Yes, and even more so when your search is so leading. If you search for the words "3500 calories 1lb myth", of course you're going to pull up sites featuring the same words. I just searched "earth is flat" and some of the first results are "5 facts that prove the earth is flat" and "why the earth is actually 100% flat".

    Yes, for this reason I strive to not be leading with my google searches.

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