ciphergoth comments on Akrasia and Shangri-La - Less Wrong

38 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 10 April 2009 08:53PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (94)
Tags: incomplete_art seth_roberts willpower akrasia other_optimizing

Comments (94)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: SoullessAutomaton 10 April 2009 09:25:57PM 3 points [-]

The idea that the calories you take in through your mouth are the "input" and that the exercise you do to burn them is "output" and that the balance between the two is all that matters is bullshit.

Well, if you manage to consistently gain weight while consuming fewer calories than you expend, this has interesting consequences for thermodynamics.

It's not bullshit, but it's also a red herring for the actual question, which is how to actually reduce body weight in a sustainable, healthy manner.

Comment author: ciphergoth 10 April 2009 09:39:32PM 6 points [-]

There's a difference between "false" and "bullshit". You could argue that the equation is bullshit without saying that it was strictly false.

Comment author: saturn 10 April 2009 10:09:42PM *  3 points [-]

The thing is, it's both bullshit and strictly false. There's always some amount of food energy that goes in your mouth and comes straight out the other end, and this varies based on a host of poorly-understood factors.

Edit: I'm arguing against the extremely common assertion that energy eaten = energy expended + weight gain, which is what your original comment looked like. If you're talking strictly about fat cell behavior, you're right, but this is rather useless information for the purpose of weight loss. What SoullessAutomaton said was energy eaten >= energy expended + weight gain, which is indeed true.

Comment author: jonas 11 April 2009 04:37:19AM 1 point [-]

If you have diabetes mellitus you lose a lot of glucose in your urine. Certainly that simple case complicates the energy in energy out dogma.

Comment author: ciphergoth 11 April 2009 08:42:36AM 0 points [-]

"out" would have been a better word than "expended" - to cover all the ways that energy can leave your body, including glucose in the urine.

Comment author: SoullessAutomaton 10 April 2009 09:45:14PM 2 points [-]

Fair enough, but I think making the distinction explicit is important, and that Eliezer's edited post is better for it.

Call me superstitious, but I prefer to avoid anything that might get the Laws of Thermodynamics angry. You don't wanna mess with those guys.

Comment author: Jonnan 11 April 2009 02:42:07AM 0 points [-]

Nah - they're cool

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit