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Comment by thinkloop | Hacker News Reader

> One chooses to be obese more than one chooses to be tall

I wonder - have you ever tried weed? With a few foreign molecules in your system you can go from barely liking cookies to consuming 5 boxes without being able to stop. The satiation part of the brain is very sensitive. Imagine having to constantly fight similar urges because of slight mutations in that zone. I think physical make up could be indirectly the most important factor in determining weight, especially when it comes to extremes like obesity.

edit: reworked phrasing

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Yes, they choose because of poor diet choices, nobody is hooking up a tube of big macs to their faces. A quarter of the entire US population didn't suddenly catch a disease and become obese.

Being sedentary and taking in 2500 calories a day is definitely a choice. A very small percentage of obese people have hunger as extreme as your 5 cookie box example. All it takes is not paying attention to caloric intake over a long period like 5 years.

I'm not expressing an opinion about the causes of the current obesity problem, but your comment had the opposite effect on me than the effect you wanted.

"A quarter of the entire US population didn't suddenly catch a disease and become obese."

Why not? When you put it that way, it strikes me as pretty implausible that 'a quarter of the entire US population suddenly became lazy and started stuffing their faces for no good reason'. Epidemics have happened frequently before; bouts of mass overeating are historically rare.

It happens a fraction of a percent at a time. Let a population increase their caloric intake by 0.2% a year, while their lives get more and more sedentary, and you will get an obesity epidemic in less than 30 years.

"Unrestricted junk food marketing + 100% sedentary lifestyle between sitting in the office, driving, and watching TV" explains mass obesity trends better than anything else, no pandemic needed.

>Why not?

Because it's obviously not contagious (diseases don't honor human defined borders). It's the culture of junk food and giant meals.

> A quarter of the entire US population didn't suddenly catch a disease and become obese.

Please explain how your statement of fact is true considering that this cited paper is stating that there is such a disease and possibly some portion of that population obesity is a product of this disease.

"Adv36 causes obesity in animals. In humans, Adv36 associates with obesity both in adults and children and the prevalence of Adv36 increases in relation to the body mass index."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4517116/

> possibly some portion of that population obesity is a product of this disease

Please state how "possibly some portion" is supposed to have any meaning whatsoever.

> Imagine what it would be like fighting similar feelings every second of every day because your satiation part of the brain is a bit off.

Yeah, that's how I stay not-obese.

> Imagine having to constantly fight similar urges all the time

I don't have to imagine, I have a child who survived a TBI that included damage to the hypothalamus. He's never satiated, always wants food. Even with strict diet controls and a locked pantry and a refrigerator with a lock and chain around it... he still manages to get food.

It's a living nightmare.

The degree of difficulty in controlling obesity has little to do with whether it's more controllable than height. Height is basically fixed, and trying to control it would involve starving yourself even harder, for longer, and doing so while you're a child.

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