Are we just an echo chamber?


(Alec) #81

I am after this as well. But it clearly is not simple or easy or we would all know how to do it. And, importantly, if it were just a case of CICO, stalls would not exist. For me, the existence of stalls clearly demonstrates why CICO doesn’t work.


(bulkbiker) #82

In the short term though. These guys want to cut for a competition not for the rest of their lives surely.
We all know that cutting calories for a few days usually results in a few pounds off… more than a few days and they pile back on with a few friends who come along for the party. Context is everything and most importantly time.


(Ron) #83

@Alecmcq - very good point, sustainable long term weight management vs short term focus management. I am sure even in the competitive world there are individual challenges and a one plan protocol doesn’t always work for all.


(Ron D. Garrett) #84

It definitely is NOT the same when Keto. I’ve done both now and I can definitely say that you don’t need to “cycle” or CICO to “cut”. However one does have to play with macros (or “tune”) to find out exactly what works best for ones own body. For example. My friend Keto Savage maintains a higher fat ration during his cut that works for him while my body won’t work with his ratios. He comes in between 78-80% fat ration while my body does best on a cut around 69-73% fat ratio BUT the ONLY macro that we manipulate are fats and protein as our carbs are normally less than 10g it so anyway. So no need to CICO BUT I am mindful NOT to over eat so I guess we can call that intuitive CICO


(LeeAnn Brooks) #85

I find those that adhere to the CICO way of thinking when they come to Keto is exactly what causes the stalls in the first place. This may not be true for people who have been on Keto for a while, but definately with newbies who are trying to lose weight the same way that failed them over and over again. And now that I’m reading the Obesity Code, I’m more convinced than ever that this is what is causing stalls for many newbies (and maybe for more advanced people as well).


(Mark Rhodes) #86

This alone is the SAME as many of the studies that relied on self-reporting of food journals and exercise. So the threshold of evidence is basically the same as other studies which determined saturated fat as the evil in society. it is a correlational study when looked at as a whole.

Because we have correlation, now we need an RCT.


(Mark Rhodes) #87

I look back over @carl and @richard started on the Podcast. Then it was just about accountability. It was far simpler then. Now, we all go deep and wonder aloud if “X” aids or hinders. If “B” creates a stall? If we were an echo chamber we would not have found fasting. Protein limits. Carnivore. If we were an echo chamber we would not apply lessons learned from a single n=1 and do our own experiment. We test. When our results do not coincide with the others results we do not immediately dismiss, we look for reasons to explain BOTH results!

I just cannot see how this is an echo chamber.


(TJ Borden) #88

Great point. In fact, to take it a step further. The idea of a weight set point shouldn’t exist either. Even if you controlled and metered everything you ate down the last calorie (and let’s pretend all the info from MFP was dead on correct) so you knew EXACTLY what your intake was. All it would take is a difference in the amount of steps taken in a day to change your output, and you’d gain or lose accordingly.


(LeeAnn Brooks) #89

The Obesity Code should be required reading!!


(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #90

It isn’t that the truth is “in between,” exactly, but rather that it’s more nuanced. “Calories don’t matter” is true enough, in the sense that the body’s hormonal response to what we eat is more relevant than how much we eat. It’s also true that I have lost a significant amount of weight without needing to take into account the number of calories in each meal.

The difficulty lies in explaining that no one is disregarding the laws of thermodynamics, but that the laws are not being applied correctly in the case of the energy-expenditure model of weight gain and loss. As Gary Taubes points out, this model assumes that the causality runs only in one direction (i.e., eat more, gain; eat less, lose), when perhaps the causality runs in the other direction (i.e., if our body is in permanent fat-storage mode, we will inevitably gain more and will have to eat more to support that gain; whereas if we can eat in a way that allows stored fat to be metabolized, we will inevitably need to eat less because our body will support its energy expenditure from its stores along with our dietary intake).

Now, compare the two expressions in parentheses in the previous sentence, and you will see why people say “calories don’t matter” in response to “all calories count.” The nuanced understanding of what the body does with the food we eat is harder to put into words, and is not as zippy as “eat less, move more.” Though personally, I would like to think that “eat keto, be healthy” might work.

ETA: Another point made by both Gary Taubes and Robert Lustig occurred to me; namely, that people enjoy putting the burden on others, and that it is to the advantage of the big food companies to do so. After all, “You’re doing it wrong!” is one of the most satisfying sentences one human being can ever say to another. So making weight gain the direct results of a person’s gluttony and sloth is an effective and deadly strategy.

But here’s the point: when teenagers have their growth spurt, not even the most ardent CICO theorist is willing to claim that the growth is the result of eating more. Also, our teenaged years are often the period in our life when we are moving the most, which should interfere with growth, according to the CICO model. Yet we all understand that the growth spurt is caused by hormones, and the eating is the consequence of the growth spurt, and not its cause. So why do we assume that in the case of weight gain later in life that the causes are not equally hormonal? When I watch that in Dr. Lustig’s lectures and read that in Taubes’s books, it makes an awful lot of sense.


(the cheater) #91

@PaulL - Dude… What a fantastic and well-written post! Very good points made. Thank you!

I’ve listened to the podcast but haven’t read the book. Need to put it on my list :slight_smile:


(Mark Rhodes) #92

and the ambient temperature. And the degree of difficulty in digesting one food versus another. Or reading a science paper vs watching a popcorn flick. Or adult entertainment… :roll_eyes::smile:


(Beth) #93

I think most of us would agree that we’d love to have the magic formula for breaking stalls! I stalled about 10 lbs. above my ideal weight. There was a time in my life where the only goal of weight loss was to have an ideal body. In the arrogance of youth, I wasn’t particularly concerned with health.

Now I’m so grateful to have a forum like this and podcasts like the Dudes. This is a place where people can be “real”! Some of us stall, some of us fall off the wagon. I have found this to be an accepting place to try and move the needle on our health and continuously adjust our understanding as we share new information and science .

Yep, if I could lose those last 10 lbs. and fit into a size 6, that would be great, but in the meanwhile I’ll settle for a 5.2 A1C and the freedom to eat until I’m satisfied.


(Doug) #94

Dave, I think this is normally true, if one is sensitive to insulin enough - and the bodybuilders are. That said, I don’t think it will work for everybody, even among the insulin-sensitive; I know one dear woman in Las Vegas whose case is truly confounding.

For most of us on this forum, it’s clearly not just a case of CICO. However, many times during studies the ‘control’ group on a high-carb or much-higher-carb-than-keto diet loses some weight. CICO can and usually does work - for the duration of the studies. The difference, IMO, is the relative unsustainability of caloric restriction for weight loss among the general public. If left to their own devices, increased hunger (likely drastically increased among the insulin resistant) and metabolic slowdown screw up their weight loss.

I think CICO does work, but not in a vacuum - hormonal issues can make all the difference in the world. It is hormonal regulation that makes for apparent weight set-points, and for weight-loss stalls as well, (when everything else is “equal” enough).

Ron, it’s fascinating that you’ve narrowed it down to the difference between 78-80% and 69-73%. :sunglasses:

Paul, that indeed was a great post by you, and I should have read ahead - you address the hormonal issues well.


(Alec) #95

I have been perhaps a little too strident in this string. I have always believed CICO to be true. The problem is it isn’t useful for weight loss. Because you can’t control calories out. Your body does that for you, and ultimately always has the last laugh. The low calorie diet success rate proves that. I know, I have a LOT of experience in doing exactly this.

Is it the first or second sign of madness: expecting a different result from the same actions? :rofl::crazy_face:


(Alec) #96

And yet the hormonal model of obesity is yet to be accepted generally by the scientific community? Why is that?


(Doug) #97

Alec - heck, man, it’s a great discussion. :slightly_smiling_face: Have to laugh - if we had conscious control over our hormones, it’d be different, eh? I think you have gone a long way towards what we can do - improve our insulin sensitivity. The “Calories Out” part - you are closing the gate that leads to fat storage and opening the gate that leads to fat usage for energy.


(LeeAnn Brooks) #98

The problem with the CICO is the sustainability of it, as you mention. However the true travesty of CICO is the fundamental belief that its subsequent failure is on the part of the individual. Even your own wording hints of this with “If left to their own devices” which indicates a failure of the individual, even though the things you mention are actually a failure of CICO itself.

Increased hunger- limiting calories released an increase in hunger hormones. Metabolic slowdown - biological response to decrease in calories in proportion to the decrease in calories consumed.

There is something like a 95% long term failure rate of CICO dieters. Short term loses can not be equated with success. With rates like that, it’s unreasonable to believe the individuals are all at fault. Highly motivated, dedicated people in all aspects of life still fail spectacularly with CICO. And all the science supports the idea that the body actively works to achieve a level of stasis. So why do we continuously place blame at the feet of the dieter and not the diet?
If anything else had a 5% success rate across the board, would we be blaming the individuals or would we be believing something g was wrong with the system? For example, if a university with a diverse population had a 5% graduation rate, would we be looking at the students or the university?


(Doug) #99

LeeAnn, I usually only made it 3 or 4 days into a calorie-restriction diet. :smile:

I agree with you - the overwhelming failure rate shows that humans, by nature, are rarely if ever set up for it. Blaming people, saying they’re weak, etc., solves nothing and if anything just makes things worse.


(Alec) #100

Doug
Perhaps, but I don’t think that is the solution: if it were we wouldn’t get stalls in keto. The body would say “lots to eat here (bodyfat), we can just up the calories out, no problem”. But if that were true, and that is what it did, we would not have stalls. There is something else causing the stall that at the moment we don’t understand.

Going back to the middle of this string @Daves_Not_Here said the below, and he is spot on. At the moment, we are convinced CICO doesn’t help (well, some of us are anyway :rofl::rofl:), but we don’t really have much of an alternative to offer. I certainly don’t. I am battling a stall much like a few others on here. I have a list of things i am going to try, and I am executing one strategy right now for 4 weeks. I will report on success or (more likely) failure! There, that’s pessimism for you!