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Comment by bykovich2 | Hacker News Reader

"Calorie restriction is proven to help you live a longer life."

Flatly untrue. The article linked to "in proof" is about primate studies that suggest -- perhaps even strongly suggest -- that caloric restriction can slow the process of aging. This does not, however, rise to the level of proof, and certainly does not provide conclusive indication of what caloric restricters can expect more generally. The author is apparently willing to make this grandiose claim to a susceptible audience with nary a word about its limitations, which should set our alarm bells ringing.

If you want to calorically restrict, do it because you've thought long and hard about the consequences of a truly significant choice -- not because it's a tech industry fad.

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I agree, and this can be applied to every single diet fab that's been talked/tweeted/click-baited about in the past 10 years.

I do IF, but that's because if I try to eat anything within 3 or 4 hours of waking up I feel nauseous and sleepy. I also find it easier to manage caloric intake by limiting my "feeding window" to 8 or 10 hours. There are also some fringe benefits such as refining my ability to self-deny indulgences and be more thoughtful around food choices. Simply put, if I tell my self "no food after 8pm" I won't binge eat two pints of icecream before bed.

The only diet that matters is that one you can stick to.

I think the phenomenon is poorly understood and studied, but it's likely not the calorie restriction itself, like you claim.

Apparently it has to do with autophagy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autophagy), which your body seems to enter when you restrict calories. IF apparently stimulates your body to perform autophagy due to the fact that you're timing your meals.

TBH, I still need to do my own research to see how much of this is real vs. pseudoscience, but I've noticed an improvement to my health. Whether that's placebo effect or not, remains to be seen.

Well GPP is just saying that 'calorie restriction' is not proven to 'help you live a longer life', irrespective of the IF context.

As for IF, as you say, it is basically not proven to do anything (no 'phenomenon' at all). Simplest and most logical reason for success is because it helps people stick to their diet, by arbitrarily restricting the window of eating.

Opinion I read on r/leangains is that some people find it easier to e.g. just eat two 600-800 calorie meals within their IF window, rather than sticking to a diet that involves 3-4 smaller ~300-400 calorie meals, spread out through the day, none of which feel 'satisfying'.

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