One Degree wrote:This makes a lot of sense even to someone like me who knows if they gain weight it is due to too much beer.
but, I think all of us have seen the bathroom scales refuse to cooperate with our eating and exercising sometimes. It is like our body metabolism adjusts to our efforts.
Edit: Actually I notice it more when I have been extremely lazy for a long period and been eating like a pig. I get on the scales to see the bad news and am pleasantly surprised.
In addition to this, it looks like the signalling process and reward system is broken in some people. Since getting enough nutrition and preparing for bad times via fat storage guarantees our survival, the human body is set up to take care of it all without us thinking about it. It's going to send you off to find food (or makes you reject food), no matter what you consciously think. You can fight this, but it's another way by which the body becomes your enemy if it's dysregulated.
This may also be related to the microbiota which produces neurotransmitters that are identical to those produced by the body. We are basically in a symbiotic relationship with trillions of microbes, many of which seem to be essential to our health and overall functioning. I don't want to sound like a hippie, but we have for decades fought a war against all bacteria, viruses and fungi under the assumption that they are either detrimental or irrelevant. Turns out this was almost certainly wrong. I'm reminded of scientists naming parts of our DNA "junk DNA" reflecting the thought at the time that these parts are useless. One of the most common and dangerous fallacies is equating absence of evidence with evidence of absence. We just can't help doing it again and again.
LV-GUCCI-PRADA-FLEX wrote::eh: look all I know is that unless you actually keep track of what you eat and stick to a calorie deficit diet, all this hogwash about genetic predispositions and exercise means diddly. Is it really so crazy an idea that if you keep track of what you eat and make sure that the calories are at a deficit of what you need, that you will see results not matter what your genetics are? Like how much mental gymnastics do you want to do when you can do what I am telling you and see the results for yourself.
Why ignore the vast differences in obesity rates between ethnic groups, e.g. two thirds in Pacific Islanders versus teens or even single digits in East Asians (numbers are for several generations of immigrants in Western countries)?
Do you accept that advice to eat more is useless in anorexic people? Before you answer note that we are (finally and slowly) moving away from the idea that illnesses like anorexia are purely "psychological". There is almost certainly a lot more going on on the physical/biological level.
The idea that we have full control over our behaviour has value in daily life, although in my opinion we will eventually also have to accept that this control is limited to some extent for every one of us. It has no place in science, however, where we must follow up clues the data give to us, even if we don't like them or are ideologically opposed.