Thermodynamics

[DaveMc]

Hi all, another "hello" from a new No S fan.

In the past I've always followed what I call the "Thermodynamics Diet", which is, in its entirety: "Eat less, exercise more". Basically, it's all about energy balance, so if you consume fewer calories and expend more, you should lose weight. I can't prove this, but my strong intuition is that everything else, including details about what kind of calories you eat and when you eat them, is what we in the science biz would call a second-order effect -- much less significant than the big, main effect of how many calories (of whatever form) you eat vs. how many you expend.

The No S diet is very profligate with words by comparison, coming in at over three times as many words as the Thermodynamics Diet! However, I think those extra words are well spent: I've been on TD several times in the past several years, and it always works, until I get distracted and start absent-mindedly eating more. It's insufficiently specific, is the problem. No S is specific enough that it gives me something to aim for, without requiring a lot of attention to maintain.

No S really does seem to be working for me, though I haven't in fact been keeping track of my weight. My clothes feel a bit looser in places, and in general I feel better about how I'm eating, and that's all I'm really after. Snacking in particular was a huge problem for me, and that's now under control. (I'm even seeing the promised S-day spillover: the other day, on an S-day, I went to eat something between meals, and it struck me as an odd thing to be doing. Don't get me wrong, I still ate it, but it gave me pause, and I didn't eat much.)

Oh, and one more thermodynamics comment. Someone once told me that eating an extra hundred calories a day would cause you to gain 10 pounds over the course of a year. This does seem to check out: 3500 calories is the widely accepted figure for the energy content of a pound of fat, so 365x100/3500 = 10.4. I used to find this incredibly depressing, since you can get an extra hundred calories by eating a couple pieces of fruit! But more recently, I've realized that it really should be considered as a good thing, if you just flip it around: if you eliminate 100 calories a day from your diet, you should *lose* ten pounds in a year. Homeostasis is a razor's edge, but one that cuts both ways.

Anyway, I just wanted to say hello. Thanks for being such an active community, these boards make for some interesting reading.

Cheers,
Dave

[jessdr]

The thermodynamics argument is a bit oversimplified. The body isn't a linear system. Your metabolism can and will adjust to its circumstances: slowing down in times of famine, putting on fat stores during pregnancy, etc. It's a complex system that can change its mechanical efficiency on the fly. And some fuels are more efficient than others. Mike Eades has a short explanation at:
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/meta ... ight-loss/
and Gary Taubes deals with it in more detail in "Good Calories Bad Calories".


But I think that's one of the strongest points about NoS: none of that matters. The program is about controlling excess, not trying to optimize the machine's performance.

You don't have to know how the machine works, it isn't relevant. Which is a good thing, since we don't understand how it works as well as we'd like to think.

You just have to fill the (limited-capacity) tank three times a day. And not with sugar.

[DaveMc]

The thermodynamics argument is a bit oversimplified. The body isn't a linear system. Your metabolism can and will adjust to its circumstances: slowing down in times of famine, putting on fat stores during pregnancy, etc. It's a complex system that can change its mechanical efficiency on the fly. And some fuels are more efficient than others. Mike Eades has a short explanation at:
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/meta ... ight-loss/
and Gary Taubes deals with it in more detail in "Good Calories Bad Calories".

Thanks for the link, that's interesting stuff. The detailed thermodynamics of metabolism must get incredibly complicated, and of course you're right that there's more to it than total energy content -- sorry for being too simplistic. I still can't shake the feeling, though, that for most people this isn't really the heart of the problem, and that paying attention to things like the nature of the foods they're consuming is less important than just reducing the total amount consumed. And as you say, No S is good for exactly that.

(If you do need to watch the exact nature of the calories consumed, then substance accounting is *really* never going to be sustainable! Counting calories is bad enough, but if you have to separately track protein, carbs, fat ... good luck with that!)

[Blithe Morning]

Dave,

... that paying attention to things like the nature of the foods they're consuming is less important than just reducing the total amount consumed.

100% agreed. Some of us here have started threads talking about the nature of food mainly because once we started paying attention, really started paying attention, to how much we ate, we couldn't help but notice that what we ate needed some attention too.

Or at least that was where I was. I shouldn't speak for the others.

[jessdr]

for most people this isn't really the heart of the problem, and that paying attention to things like the nature of the foods they're consuming is less important than just reducing the total amount consumed.

I totally agree. I forget where Reinhard said it (one of the podcasts maybe?) but I think that boils down to "premature optimization is the root of all evil".

Nit-picking about what you're eating isn't going to do much good if you're eating twice as much of it as you need. And why bother to nit-pick if a relatively painless habit does the job?


I do pay attention to the nature of what I eat because:

- I have a hard time making it to the next meal if I make the wrong choices

- My body seems to be picky about it, and I feel "off" when I make the wrong choices (and get blood sugar crashes after really egregiously bad-for-me choices)

- My weight loss stalls or reverses when I make consistently bad choices for a long period of time (like my 6-week take-out marathon last fall, while I was editing my instructional video)

- The bad choices aren't usually as satisfying as I think they're going to be. When I'm hungry, I may think that a big pile of mac & cheese would be the most awesome dinner ever (ahem, last Wednesday), but I always find the mac & cheese tastes better when it comes with a slice of pork roast, some broccoli, and some fruit salad. At least after the first four bites.


But these are just defaults, not rules. None of the "nature of the food" issues make my days green or red.

[DaveMc]

100% agreed. Some of us here have started threads talking about the nature of food mainly because once we started paying attention, really started paying attention, to how much we ate, we couldn't help but notice that what we ate needed some attention too.

Hmm, that makes sense ... Early on, you focus on getting the habit down, but then you start to have enough bandwidth to spare to think about finer details. I'm not there yet, I think, but I can see how one could be.

[clarinetgal]

What an intersting thread! I used to obsessively track my calories, protein/carb/fat intake, calories burned from exercise, etc... but it was making me too crazy, so I've recently stopped doing it.
However, I've been trying to pay attention to the foods that my body seems to want/need lately, and that's been going fairly well for me. I notice that when I eat more protein/fiber with my meals, I feel fuller and more satisfied for longer. I also know that eating low fat doesn't work for me, so I've been eating more of a moderate fat diet. Eating a high amount of carbs and low amounts of protein or fat doesn't work for me, either.
I'm not sure if I'll ever totally figure it out, but I've enjoyed trying to get to know my body better and bless it with foods that will make me feel my best.