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matt comments on Open Thread: October 2009 - Less Wrong
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The real costs of caloric restriction are very high. We experience all sorts of negative symptoms, like lack of attention/lack of sexual function and physical pain when we are hungry. I am quite certain that I couldn't achieve a true CR diet if I tried. Even if I made a strong effort, there is still a fair chance I will wind up in an unhappy medium, in which I don't achieve the benefits because I couldn't pass some threshold at which CR becomes effective.
In fact, for most people, CR is probably impossible. Most of us do not even have the willpower to keep our weights in the "acceptable" range in spite of the fact that we idealize lean, low-fat bodies. We're battling millions of years of evolutionary programming.
However, we might see some of the same benefits from taking resveratrol or the forthcoming sirtuin drugs. Resveratrol is pretty cheap, much cheaper than CR (in terms of suffering), so I bet that would be a better candidate for most people than attempting (and likely failing) CR.
knb: I found it a little hard to separate your experience from your speculations there - could you clarify the meaning of "we experience" vs "I couldn't achieve a true CR diet if I tried". I suspect that you're speculating.
CR isn't a line you need to get over - more CRON (CR with Optimal Nutrition) is better: http://www.crsociety.org/files/images/cr-youth.gif
I don't CR as much as I'd like to, but I lost about 18% of my body weight from my set point (at which point my family instructed me not to look any freakishly thinner)… and it was only hard at first. Some of what makes it easier is habit, some is clearing the high GI cycle from your system (once I stopped eating high GI foods I fairly quickly stopped craving high GI foods), but I think most of it is simple life hacking: