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Comment by abcd_f | Hacker News Reader

> Shed 20lbs without even exercising.

Simply not drinking carbonated soda will do that.

Ditto counting calories with no changes to the diet composition. Pasta is fine, potatoes are OK, even deep fried ones. Just eat less, basically, and you will shed weight.

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It's true, of course, that "just eating less" will cause you to lose weight. That part is not controversial, if you discount the fringe. However, there is evidence that this is a lot harder than it sounds, which is why we all have these weird diets in an effort to get ourselves to eat less.

Being fat is pretty terrible; Not only does it feel physically bad, but everyone seems to feel it's okay to pick on you about it, because, as we all know, how much you eat has a lot to do with it. Stop putting food in your mouth, am I right?

However, statistically speaking, once you are obese, there's an extremely, uh, slim chance of you attaining and keeping a healthy weight for any period of time.

http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2015.30277...

This indicates that to go from having a long term obese BMI to long term 'normal' bmi, you have to have willpower in the top 1% (If we're assuming it's mostly willpower, and I don't have a better model)

Actually, it is a little controversial. Apparently our bodies adapt to lower calories intake.

So if your basal metabolism rate is 2500 initially, and you drop it to 1500, after a few weeks/months and after you've lost some weight, if you eat anything above the 1500, you start putting weight again. I believe there are some studies that show this out there.

Intermittent fasting (skipping breakfast for instance and keeping a 16+ hours period between your last meal and first meal the next day) seems to avoid that, but I'm not sure if you can eat your original number of calories in the eating period and still lose weight, or if you can reduce the calories then. Also, low carbs anyway.

That's why a proper dietician-supplied diet will go for a calorie deficiency of a few hundred, max 500 below your maintenance; any lower and your body will go into hunger mode, and simply use less calories. Eat less, but not too much less. Losing a pound per week is about the maximum you should aim for. It'd probably be more if you're obese, but along with the fat you're losing a lot of water. (also, carbs cause more water retention)

Pasta is not "fine"--source? Pasta is all carbs, which just gets turned into sugar in your body.

Source- human history, people have been eating pasta as a staple food for centuries.

The Japanese are some of the healthiest and thinnest people in the world and have a carb heavy diet.

Perhaps. But the most interesting aspect of this is that I never feel hungry, ever. I eat as many bananas and apples as I can stuff my face with, and keep losing weight.

Best diet ever. Luckily I don't need much variety. I throw in some hotdogs (Nathan's brand, no added sugar/corn starch/dextrose) when I want some variety. Also you can put coconut milk in chicken with garlic and spices and it's the best thing.

>Best diet ever.

No bread, no pasta, no potatoes? I beg to differ.

You add the coconut milk in because it has sugar which compliments the other ingredients in a curry.

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