70% fat,25% protein ,5% cabs macro rations. is that in grams or calories?

(Gabe “No Dogma, Only Science Please!” ) #105

100 posts – well done guys!

Seriously, it bothers me that it’s controversial here to state a basic scientific fact: if you put energy into a system, that energy MUST go somewhere. Don’t like the word calories? (I’m looking at you @Brenda!) That’s fine – let’s call it energy.

Ketosis does not magically take your energy intake and magically make it disappear.

Pick your output – body heat, body activity, reduced efficiency in bodily processes/other ways of raising your basal metabolic rate. One or more of these must be going up if you’re increasing your energy intake. Period! (Or, I’ll grant you, perhaps it’s not being metabolized, and therefore effectively bypasses the system.)

I’m sure we will eventually understand the complex biochemical processes going on inside a human body being fed a LCHF diet. In the meantime, I am 100% certain that the first law of thermodynamics will apply while we still don’t understand those processes and will continue to apply once we do learn them.

I find it bemusing that a community so insistent on the maxim “show me the science” can insist that the first law of thermodynamics doesn’t apply to metabolism or the human body. The mind boggles.

Bless you all, we reached over 100 posts. Mic drop!

(8 year Ketogenic Veteran) #106

LOL. Up your fat, which will increase your metabolism… then fast. Watch What Happens.

You’re welcome

#107

Wow Gabe, I actually agreed with your entire post just now. :laughing:

(David) #108

Yes of course… why are we debating the obvious? Maybe we can debate gravity now?

It is still just not very relevant when we talk weight loss. I lost 30kg by lowering my insulin and raising my metabolism by eating more fat and IF, not eating less, IMO thats more important, I might be wrong.

(Consensus is Politics) #109

First, I’m almost as sedentary as possible without being bedridden. I have a back injury from the Air Force that prevents me from doing almost the simplest of chores. Loading the dishwasher, going shopping (ie walking) and playing way too much World of Warcraft.

So my amount of exercise didn’t change. My diet did change. I went from eating mostly carbs to (almost) no carbs. From 1500 calories a day to about 2500 and as high as 3000 some days.

Now this nonsense about thermodynamics. Your talking physics there, not physiology. Sure, physics apply, but then physiology isn’t static. When I was eating fewer calories, my BMR was reduced. When I ate more, it could increase, and do more maintenance thereby burning more energy, giving me a net loss. The problem with CICO is it assumes The only EXPENDITURE is in EXERCISE. I hear this all the time from body building friends. Calories in calories out. Move more eat less. I was one of them. My wife a registered nurse with degrees in nutrition, and some other related field (that was 20 years ago, I’m surprised I remembered that much).

If CICO mattered the way it’s portrayed as “It’s Physics!” Then my car should ALWAYS get the same gas mileage no matter who is driving. Energy in energy out. It doesn’t work exactly that simple. There are variables that go overlooked. Unforeseen even. When I beleived in “move more eat less” as a weight loss plan, I knew nothing of insulin’s role other than to shuttle sugar into the cells. As for my friends into body building, they know only what they want to know about insulin. That it will enhance metabolism after a workout, making insulin the new drug for builders. One of my friends that will not do it, says he see’s guys using it all day long. They are in for one hell of a surprise when they become T2DM, or develop clogged arteries.

(bulkbiker) #110

So the upshot of all this is
“its complicated”
Reducing what we put into our bodies won’t necessarily lead to weight loss as our metabolism can slow as well
Increasing what we put into our bodies won’t necessarily make us gain weight as our metabolism can speed up
Changing what we put into our bodies can have an effect but its probably individual…
Eating bacon is great so we should all do more of it?
None of us really know the secret but everyone has an opinion… at the end of the day
KCKO?

(David) #111

What we didn’t mention a lot in this thread is that even how you eat has a greater impact than what. If we eat 6 times a day, and constantly keep the insulin levels up, and we can’t access the body fat, then you will most likely gain weight. And if we eat the exact same once a day. Because the insulin goes down, and we use body fat while we fast, then we could lose weight.

So CICO is SO useless for talking weight loss :slight_smile:

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #112

Important point, and a major part of Dr. Fung’s message.

#113

This has been a great discussion to follow. The major thing that I feel is missing from the discussion is the implementation of IF and/or EF. This is where the “magic” happens, I don’t know the scientific jargons, but I agree that it can seem like magical thinking when you are doing the exact opposite of what you have been taught and getting better results than you ever did on the conventional wisdom of CICO–weight loss aside the health benefits are fantastical if you compare them to what the doctors would recommend especially with those suffering with type 2 diabetes, a disease that is considered progressive, hence irreversible. I wonder if you would argue that this is magical thinking too.

Personally, I am open to the fact that we don’t understand a lot of what it is going on during the fasting period and it could be the missing link in understand why one can continue to lose weight and gain health benefits even though our fat intake is astronomical and CI are high. There is more magical thinking in the idea that CICO is sustainable when only measuring your food intake and exercise and leaving out what the body does in the interim, we know that the body compensates with CICO hence you will have to continue to reduce CI and increase CO until it’s no longer sustainable, resulting in weight gain and the vicious cycle continues ad nauseam.

I am more worried about our health organisations that all think that a ketogenic diet coupled with fasting is “magical thinking” even with the evidence of thousands of type 2 diabetics reversing their “progressive” diabetes doing the exact opposite of their recommendations, than a forum with people that are self experimenting and reporting on their results. In short you don’t need to use ad hominem insults to make your point, we are all confused and just trying to figure it out along the way because as it stands at the moment the authorities on these matters refuse to get their heads out of the sand.

ETA you speak about CICO with authority as if no one else here has tried it. I don’t have a weight loss issue and came to this WOE for heath reason. I followed the same paradigm as you are, hence had to maintain a VLC diet to sustain my weight–under 700 calories a day with copious amounts of exercise. Now I eat of 2000 calories a day, exercise half the amount I used to but maintained my weight for the first 5 weeks then lost a kilogram in my 6th week. My skin has cleared up, the floaters in my eyes have disappears and my toenails have healed from all the stress I have put them under running every day. It’s possible I just wished these results into manifesting, I don’t have any other evidence other than the change in my diet, fasting, increasing calories and reduced exercise also coinciding with these events. The paradigm shift is the hardest part of the entire journey for me.

(Terence Dean) #114

Don’t hold your breath when it comes to health organisations, or government health policy. There are far too many companies with a lot of money invested in feeding a carbohydrate addicted population.

Imagine the uproar from farmers, breakfast cereal manufacturers, fast-food retailers, bread, pastries, cakes, pasta, rice growers if the government suddenly announced that wheat was bad for us. Not surprising that the AMA was calling for “The Magic Pill” documentary to be pulled from Netflix!

I saw an advertisement where they were talking about lowering sugar to combat diabetes but as we all know its not just sugar that is the issue.

#115

Agreed.

Although, I am not holding my breath, I refuse to hold my tongue. If we all make enough noise things can change. Even if it means that just me and those around me benefit, I will in my way try to make a change.

#116

Yes, some fibre rich vegetables have vitamin C. We need that.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #117

Interestingly, there are indications that we need very little vitamin C in ketosis. Beta-hydroxybutyrate, one of the principal ketones made by the liver, is not only great fuel for the brain, but also acts as a hormone that turns off certain genes that inhibit the body’s natural defenses against oxidative stress. We need vitamin C as an anti-oxidant when eating carbohydrate, because insulin turns on these genes and inhibits the body’s anti-oxidants; on keto, the body handles oxidative stress just fine without vitamin C. How cool is that?

#118

Yes, very cool!

(Gabe “No Dogma, Only Science Please!” ) #119

I think there has been a lot of misunderstanding here about what we are saying. Using the word “calories” does not mean any of us is in favour of CICO, which seems to be the premise of your post.

The magical thinking emerges when people start to imagine that keto somehow enables the body to defy the laws of physics. Keto does not enable your body to take in more energy than it burns while still losing weight. That is why you’ll hear Gary Taubes talking about people being on LCHF diets who find that they have a lot more energy and spontaneously decide to do more exercise.

Once again: nobody on this forum is arguing that “eat less, exercise more” is a good model for weight loss. But just because you’re on keto doesn’t mean calories don’t matter. You may not feel like they do, because keto seems to work “magically” for you, and that’s great. But you’re still putting energy into your body, and that energy has to go somewhere. That’s all we are saying.

I don’t think anybody in this thread insulted anybody else. I’m not sure what you’re referring to; it’s been a very civil discussion from my POV.

If you’ve increased calories and you’re losing weight, some process in your body is using that energy at a higher rate than you’re consuming it. Perhaps your BMR has gone up. Perhaps most of the fat loss is from your fasting days during which you’re at a caloric deficit.

I agree with you, broadly speaking: there’s a lot we don’t know. Clearly there is more going on than mere “energy balance.” Clearly the role of hormones in weight regulation would seem to explain fat loss/gain far better than what we are calling “CICO.” But our enthusiasm for LCHF doesn’t mean the laws of physics no longer apply. Energy in must be lower than energy out for weight loss to occur, AFAIK.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #120

Not only that, but if weight loss is occurring, then we are using more energy than we are taking in.

As I think about it, @gabe, it may be that people are so enthralled by losing weight at caloric levels that would have horrified them in the past, that it truly seems as though thermodynamics is irrelevant. I can certainly sympathize. After working so hard to get over the deeply ingrained idea that it is all about calories, I sometimes find my heart resisting the knowledge that calories are nevertheless part of the picture, even though my head knows that to be true.

What was it Feynman said? Something along the lines of “The first rule of science is that you must not fool yourself. And you’re the easiest person to fool”?

(Todd Allen) #121

No, but I can practically guarantee that if you chug a quart of MCT oil your calories out will go up in excess of metabolic increase. I wouldn’t call it magic but calories will disappear.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #122

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

(L. Amber O'Hearn) #123

Even Eric Westman acknowledges that fibre stalls weight loss in some, and advocates using total carbs, not net. Fibre is absolutely unnecessary and can cause problems.

(Diane) #124

Thanks for sharing this information! I hadn’t seen it stated so clearly/explicitly before. This makes me seriously consider a more carnivore approach as an experiment.

Thanks again!