this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2024
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calories are an arbitrary metric anyways, wood has a ton of calories but you can’t digest it, so they’re a very vague guideline at the very best, and misleading at worst
They're still helpful in sorting out a 600 calorie meal that's going to keep someone on track to lose weight versus a 1200 calorie meal that is going to make them gain weight. Even if it's not exact, it's a useful guideline.
There’s not really much actual solid research which demonstrates that calorie-counting is an effective method of weight loss.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/stop-counting-calories
Moreover, there’s not really much solid research which demonstrates that weight loss should even be the focus of improving our health. People who are considered “overweight” based on their BMI score (which is another completely arbitrary and unhelpful metric) should not be focusing on weight loss.
The thing that people should be focusing on is simply any type of regular physical activity. It doesn’t particularly matter much what that activity is, it’s far more effective to choose an activity you enjoy.
Agreed on BMI but you're missing the point on calories. If people want to lose weight the simplest way is to count calories. Run a caloric deficit, lose weight. Doesn't get any more simple than that. It doesn't matter if it's not 100% accurate if it works.
Yeah. No.
As much as science knows anything, it knows that having too much body fat is bad for your health. Even the article you just linked states weight loss as its goal.
BMI is a crappy measure of body fat, fair; bodybuilders and athletes often have very high BMIs while having very little fat, but it's not "arbitrary" either. Doesn't matter much, since we have tools to measure body fat percentage directly. No need to use BMI at all.
Also note that article says to eat less "processed" food, but doesn't explain what that actually means. Is bread processed? How about a salad? How much dressing do I have to add to lettuce before it counts as "processed"? No answers here.
There's something to be said for the caloric availability of any given food, but it's pretty silly to say that you shouldn't consider them at all. People who are trying to lose weight need some measure of how much they're eating so they can be sure they're eating less. Until we have a better one, calories aren't going anywhere.
As for exercise, it is definitely important, but it simply isn't realistic to out-train a bad diet. It's not at all reasonable to say that exercise is more important for weight loss, and anyone who's actually lost a ton of weight will tell you as much.