Some fat people dont cycle because they are intelligent, and there's no way even the moderately stupid ones are going to cycle to help out those selfish greedy fit people.

Also I do enjoy a nice drop of lunch.

I can't keep almonds in the house or I'll eat 2 pounds per day. They are said to be good for you, but not in those quantities as they are very high in calories, fat, and even carbs. So nuts are really not an option for me, and I have to abstain completely. But if I don't buy them, I don't crave them.

Yes, and certain calories are more likely to be spent than others. If you eat some apples vs. the equivalent calories of pure sugar, I'd say you're much more likely to actually burn the calories from the apples. Also, with the right diet and a non-ruined metabolism, if you eat extra calories your body will just burn more calories or burn them the next day, or even be less hungry the next day. It's not like your expenditure is predetermined. Calorie-counting is useless unless you're eating processed foods which load you up on calories (bad ones at that) without filling you up. Real foods fill you up so it's hard to get a surplus of calories from things like fruit and veggies.

Exercise barely burns calories (considering how much exercise it takes to burn off like 1 donut) and it makes you have to eat more anyway to compensate. The benefit of exercise wrt weight is that it boosts your metabolism in the long term so that you're burning more even while not exerting yourself (which you did mention). Muscle gain is at least part of why that happens but I don't think it's the only reason. Cardio is what really boosts the metabolism and you don't gain huge muscles from that.

Glucose either gets burned now or stored as glycogen. Glycogen gets burned later. Fructose (refined sugar is 50% fructose) either gets burned or stored as fat (not glycogen), and also screws with your liver much the same way alcohol does (alcohol and fructose have a lot in common). So that's one case where there can be a big difference. However, you didn't mention soda or candy in that quote, you mentioned Cheerios which doesn't have fructose but instead a fast-digesting form of glucose (very fast -- Cheerios has a glycemic index higher than pure table sugar). I'm not entirely sure why high-GI starches make people fat since theoretically they'd just be stored as glycogen. It probably has to do with what Gary Taubes says and maybe also the constant spike/crush of the metabolism. Taubes talks about how on a high-simple-carb diet, the fat that people eat doesn't get burned since the body has so many carbs available to burn at all times. So the fat, which would normally be burned no problem, just gets stored. He also writes a lot about insulin response (in fact that seems to be the main culprit according to him).

If I were to start eating 500 calories more per day than I do now, I would probably start burning 500 more a day than I do now (without extra exercise), and thus I wouldn't gain weight. I don't know this for certain because I've never purposely ate more than I wanted to, but I'd do it for a bet. And so far you're like 2-0 against me in bets. This one would have to be for money though, and enough to make it worth it for me to screw with my diet for a few months.

Some leftover sherry from last Xmas. Literally. I don't drink much. Thank God.

You probably covered it but why is your drinking a problem? Apart from the detrimental effects on health, etc. You seem like a decent enough sort so it can't be that you become obnoxious with others.

They gave you an opening:
https://www.youtube.com/v/gyGOJ1_kcI...130&***********.

I had to take preemptive measures, because I saw where it was going. Had already restricted the consumption by different methods, according to the official standards of what represents "heavy drinking", staying beneath that by decisions and by restricting supply. My decision to really do something about it didn't come out of the blue, I don't think the human psyche is capable of such things suddenly.

When I was up for the real deal: as a method I gave promises to myself, here, at the ATF forum and in real life, that helped me to turn the wagon. I was at a point where it still was possible to stop the process before it was starting to seriously affect my mind, capacity, health and potential. Had started to look forward to the drinking I could do when coming home, if it was the day I had allowed myself to drink. Scary. When that popped up I knew it was time to act, and do it hard, was without alcohol entirely for three weeks.

It was a lesson I will remember forever. I really understand now how people can become slaves of alcohol. My addicting potential is only a little bit smaller, and my knowledge of my own psychology is a bit bigger, that will probably be enough for me to manage.
I have this tendency with candies and chocolate. Not buying them fixes the problem. I'm about to do the same thing with alcohol.

The carbohydrate in apples is just sugar: fructose, glucose, and sucrose which is fructose bonded to glucose. Whether you eat the sugar in an apple or a sugar pill, if you are not storing fat, it will either be burned immediately for energy or stored as glycogen and burned later. The sugar from the apple will be absorbed into your system more gradually over a longer period of time because it has to be freed from the structure and fiber of the apple by your digestive processes, and because the fructose has a lower glycemic index than glucose or sucrose. Pure sugar will cause a larger spike in your blood sugar and insulin, and insulin can trigger fat storage. The idea that insulin plays a critical role in weight control has long been claimed by proponents of low carb diets, but this has not been broadly accepted by medical science. There are those in the medical community who will say that this emphasis on insulin is little more than pseudoscience, except for those with diabetes or other metabolic disorders. They will most likely agree that getting carbs from fruits is better than getting it from table sugar. Much of this is because of vitamins, fiber, and other helpful chemicals in fruit that are not directly related to weight maintenance, and part of it is that blood sugar spikes and insulin spikes can lead to hunger and overeating. That's a separate issue which doesn't apply if we are just discussing the effects of different foods while holding calories constant. If you got your 2500 calories a day from ho-hos and ate nothing else, you shouldn't gain weight.


Not so. Fructolysis metabolizes fructose to trioses which can be converted to glucose and then glycogen. Glucose can be converted to fat when glycogen stores are full. Glucose is converted to Acetal CoA which is the entry point to the Krebbs cycle when you metabolize carbs, and it is the entry point to liposynthesis when you are storing fat. I was a biochem major for a couple years a lifetime ago.


"The notion that high GI foods lead to obesity ultimately rests on the assumption that GI equals Satiety Index (SI). It turns out that the highest SI food tested was the potato which is also one of the highest GI foods.[8] Clearly then the presumption that all high GI foods lead to overeating and obesity is not correct. Therefore, the theory that high GI foods invariably lead to excessive insulin output which in turn prevents fat burning and promotes fat storage and obesity is of little scientific merit. In fact, insulin output in response to a meal correlates far better with total calories consumed than it does with the relative GI of the various foods in that meal."

- Do High Glycemic Index Foods Cause Obesity and Diabetes?
A look at the false claims made in Sugar Busters and the Zone Diet books.




A donut can be a whopping 300 calories. You can burn over 600 by running 5 miles, and you can burn close to 1000 calories by running 7:30 miles for 1 hour. That's a major fraction of total calories that you take in if you're eating right. Here's a calculator.

When people don't exercise and they eat carbs when their glycogen stores are full, they develop insulin resistance and obesity. Periodic exercise reverses the effect of insulin resistance.


Cardio boosts your metabolism while you're exercising, and perhaps for a little while after you stop. Adding muscle causes you to burn more calories all the time. I haven't seen anything that said cardio boosts your metabolism when you aren't working out, though intuitively it seems like it could. Lifting weights burns almost no calories while you're doing it. Say you bench press 250 pounds by lifting it 2 feet 20 times. Do the math on that and you burned 3 calories. Cardio activity also develops your heart muscle and other slow twitch muscle for endurance and fast twitch for sprinting. There is controversy in the exercise community about which is better for burning fat, with many touting weight training over cardio. For some reason, fat burning from certain types of cardio like treadmills seem to plateau, and it is believed that's because the body adapts to this type of exercise. That's why it's important to change things up. It's called muscle confusion. Research has shown that those who combine both cardio and strength training burn more fat than those who do either alone. Modern trainers have found creative ways to have you using different muscle groups in plyometric interval and circuit training along with cardio, like the Insanity program that I did awhile back.


All diets that work do so because they limit calories. Not eating a surplus of calories IS calorie counting. There is no diet that allows you to consume more calories than you expend and still lose weight or maintain weight. The primary reason that low carb diets like Atkins work for metabolically normal people is not because of some hocus pocus to do with insulin which may only be a second order effect at best. It's because when you eat nothing but meat, fat, eggs, and green leafy vegetables, you can feel full on 1000 calories per day. With that kind of calorie restriction long term, you will lose weight. I've limited my calorie intake to 500 per day of only homemade fruit and vegetable juices, with supplemental protein that would get it to about 1000 3 days per week while working out intensely and gaining strength and muscle mass. I burned more calories in exercise than I took in. That worked great. Now people tell you that you shouldn't juice because it spikes your blood sugar. That didn't seem to be a problem. So yes calorie counting works as long as you don't count to a high number.


There is research that says that isn't true. See above article.

I'd love to take this bet for a large sum and would happily give you odds but there's no practical way to do it sadly.

The idea that you wont gain weight is frankly biazarre. A healthy metabolism isn't tuned to some ideal weight resulting in it burning off those extra calories. A healthy body converts spare calories into a store of energy in the form of fat and that's exactly what would happen to you.

Yeah I'm not sold on the low-carb preachings, just thought some of the theory sounded interesting. I haven't gotten around to reading much of the literature yet (especially not the counter-literature you mention) and it doesn't concern me much since the carbs I'm eating now don't seem to be hurting me. My carb:fat ratio is somewhat even but higher in carbs. I do agree with the low-carb advocates about the demonization of fats / satfat being a gov't myth.

I'll admit I'm far from an expert on weight, I've never had to worry about my weight. My main interest is nutrition. Still learning on that front, didn't become obsessed until this time last year.

That's my point. If you chug some soda then watch tv, are you as likely to burn that sugar as if you had scarfed down some apples? The apples you could just gradually burn as the sugar gradually released into your system. You can burn off apples watching tv. Interesting, I'll look more into that. Also I didn't think of it before but, even the fructose that gets stored as fat isn't necessarily a bad thing, the stored fat can be burned later too.
I heard/read somewhere that it would take a ridiculous amount to fill the glycogen stores to capacity, no?
On days that I run, I feel like I eat more calories. I don't track my calories though.
I meant it's not necessary to actively/consciously count. Your body can do the counting for you (but only if the calories are coming from real foods). I agree that some way or another, you have to balance the equation of input/output (can't argue with physics).
All 3 of my "or" statements are false? I'll read the article. Just doesn't make sense because 1 day of surplus doesn't make you gain weight.

Do you think there's any truth to the theory that such calories restriction can prolong one's life? (Compared to a healthy normal-calorie diet.)

Just by putting it like that, you've partly convinced me. I just wonder if weight gain only happens after a certain amount of surplus, as opposed to following a linear relationship. Like, maybe +100 would result in me burning an extra 100 but +1000 wouldn't make me burn an extra 1000.
500, maybe I'd gain some weight but I don't think anything close to 1 pound a week. I'm mostly basing this on gut feeling, I've always been one of those people who "couldn't gain bodyfat if he tried". But I never purposely ate extra calories so this is most likely me committing the fallacy of, "That can't happen to me."
No practical way unless you already trusted me or lived nearby to monitor the progress. But maybe I'll do this as an experiment for curiosity. Here is what I'm thinking:

2 weeks of:
- Eating how I do now but logging my caloric intake
- Tracking my weight on the most reliable scale I can think of, my high school wrestling room scale.
- Reducing my running to an amount that will just maintain what little muscle I have.
- Tracking my speed during those runs.

Then 3 weeks of:
- 500 extra calories
- The same amount of running as the previous 2 weeks, with the same speed.
- My usual amount of walking (which is just to and from my car, not much).
- Same amount of sleep, no caffeine, no extra excitement.

Can you think of any more ways to ensure the variables are isolated?

Theoretically I should gain 3 pounds in those 3 weeks. I'd be surprised if I even gained half that.

Will be a pain in the ass to do all the tracking though, so without the motivation of winning a bet, I don't know if I'll actually follow through with it. Maybe between semesters. I am getting pretty curious now...55% chance I do it. I'll post the experiment in the Fitness forum if/when I do.

Btw Bruce, love the dancing banana! Should be your avatar imo

Trust is not the only issue. Its a very difficult experiment outside of a laboratory, measuring calorie intake and exercise that precisely is dubious done in the way you suggest. External factors like the temperature will make a difference as well - no idea how much but if you maintained the same diet and exercise going from summer to winter you might expect a change in weight.


Its not 100% efficient and you will burn a small extra bit because you are carrying more weight so we would expect less than 3lb. 1.5lb sounds very low but its not bizarre like putting on no weight.

Not giving up the straight line after all. Obtained 50ml of Rhum Negrita Bardinet. First I'll eat some daim candy, then some cheese, and then I'll have the rum!

Will have to choose Spring courses soon. I'll talk to a professor or two but will get opinions here:

1) What kind of knowledge should one have before taking undergraduate Stochastic Processes? How much Stats is critical to already know? I'm taking Stats 1 now (it's one above intro, it covers continuous random variables, EV's, moment GF's, pdf's, etc). I've taken Dynamical Systems, not sure if that will help.

2) What things are covered in Monte Carlo Methods? It sounds interesting but there's no course description and the Wiki article doesn't delve into many specifics.

3) There is a seminar elective Financial Derivatives. I have to decide between this and Monte Carlo (unfortunately I won't get to take both). The topic list is as follows: It's stuff I want to learn at some point, but how much new math would I learn from that course? Isn't all that stuff just applications of diff eq's, calculus etc. and so if I knew the math itself, couldn't I figure out the financial concepts on my own (granted the course would no doubt speed up the process)?

Lol. Ice cream truck just drove by. SoCal is highly recommended.

Those things piss me off. Driving around with their annoying song. I want to take out a bazooka and blow it up.

I guess you are the brother of the guy that shot that video according to him;





(Published on Jun 23, 2012; Legend has it that my brother shot one of these with a home made bazooka that shot Estes rockets. Yeah, he's a bad ass.)


Somehow striking that truck seems emotionally painful though, like killing a cartoon or teddy-bear or something! However if it kept driving around for many times i can see how getting out a tennis ball machine or a bat practice system or kids running with paint guns would make a nice mild jacka$$ episode.

You'd like this one. No song. "BBBRRRRRINNNNNNGGG" "BRRRRRRINNNNG" "BRINNNNNNNGGGG "you are late for class" school bell thing to it.

It is pretty aggressive. Almost a "you want ****ing ice cream?!? I've got your ****ing ice cream right here you freaking whore. Where's my money, bitch?"

(SoCal is soooooo ****ing awesome it shouldn't exist in reality. Audio glaciem cremor dolor, ergo sum.)

That's just as bad. We've got an old Mexican guy who pushes a cart around doing that. I stick my head out the window and yell, "I'm going to shove that bell up your ass!". Actually I don't, but I think it and imagine doing it.

I don't know which is worse.

oncearoundthemullberrybushthemonkeychasedtheweasle themonkeystoppedtoscratchhisnosePOPgoestheweasleon cearoundthemullberrybushthemonkeychasedtheweasleth emonkeystoppedtoscratchhisnosePOPgoestheweasleonce aroundthemullberrybushthemonkeychasedtheweaslethem onkeystoppedtoscratchhisnoseBOOM!

Lol. That song used to tilt me too. Doot de doot de doodly doot, de doot de doot de doooo doot.

The key part of that is "used to." Ability to quietly forgive the minor inconveniences that others foist upon your magnificence is a sign of strength.

Damn people making noise in the middle of the afternoon when decent people are trying to sleep.

But those are very minor compared to idiot dog owners with their goddam dogs. As soon as they start up, I start scheming of what I can do with chocolate. Then I start thinking about how I can send this woman an anonymous letter making her believe there's a lunatic in the neighborhood that's a threat to her kids if she didn't shut up her yapping mutt. She'd have to shut it up then. So I'm thinking about how I can word it to make my point but not be guilty of any crime if I'm caught. Sometimes I just think about coaxing it into my garage and slitting it's throat with my Ka-Bar, then disposing of it. I could do that with no more remorse than stepping on a cockroach. They're just big barking rats as far as I'm concerned. And we kill cows for no better reason than to have a tasty cheeseburger. The one bad thing is that they had a little girl, and she'd be heartbroken if her dog was killed. It's not her fault her parents are idiots. So I think how I can intervene to comfort the little girl, and then get her a kitten.

Personally I think dogs are absurd pets, but if you're going to own one, then it's your responsibility to make sure it doesn't cause any annoyance to anyone else. As soon as it does, it is no longer a pet, and I have the right to hunt it down like game. Even if I have to come over to your house, and as I'm trying to talk to you, and your dog is jumping all over me and slobbering like a giant asshat, and you feebly say "no", to no avail, and tug on his leash and start waterskiing behind the dog as he drags you around, then I get to just take out a gun and shoot your dog right there in your house just because you're an idiot.

But instead of doing all that, I instead decide to write down the time when I hear the dog start barking, and when it stops. I do this for a couple days, and amazingly, it doesn't happen that often. Pretty soon it stops almost completely. Amazing. Problem solved.

But now I've got this other problem. Neighbor keeps running his garage door. I mean how many times do you have to run a garage door in a day? He's not even going in or out, he just keeps opening and closing it for no apparent reason. So I'm thinking about how I'm going to tell this guy to leave his door open. But I decide to use the same trick and start writing down the times. For a few days, it's really not that bad. 10 times a day maybe. Then one day around midnight it happens like 20 times in an hour, so now I'm like, GOD DAMMIT, THIS IS AN ACTUAL PROBLEM.

Garage man at it again. BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BRRRRRRRRRRRR. Must be smoking pot or something. Now I'm thinking about building an infrasound generator. Perfect for Halloween. Every time he touches that door, he gets a sick creepy feeling until he's conditioned not to do that. They're very easy to build.

Kind of like in college when we built a little tunable oscillator that would silence any FM radio using the capture effect. FM has the property that you only need to be very slightly stronger than the strongest signal to completely capture the receiver, and that's easy when you're close to it. You're basically adding a large rotating vector to a smaller one, so the rate of zero crossings is determined by yours alone. You can capture it with an unmodulated carrier, or you can send a voice modulated message telling them to stfu. Doesn't work against CD players though. You'd need something like electromagnetic pulse for that.

This is actually an interesting science question. How can you send someone a letter without leaving anything that can be traced back to you. It's not as simple as it sounds because of Locard's exchange principle. That says the perpetrator of a crime always leaves something behind and takes something away. You have to make sure you leave no fingerprints, DNA, or even a fiber that can be linked to your clothing, carpet, or anything that belongs to you. You can't just print it on your own printer or use your own paper because those have distinct signatures. You could purchase those just for the purpose and then destroy them, but you need to travel far from home to do it because you will be on video making the purchase of equipment that you no longer own. Ordering them on the internet leaves an electronic trail. Then you need to dispose of equipment somewhere they can't be found, otherwise you're introducing a lot more things to which Locard's principle applies. You're all over that equipment, and it can leave something on you. If you write it, you're handwriting can be identified. You could cut and paste letters from magazines, but you'd have to basically do it in a clean room with a space suit on. So that's more equipment...

nah, wearing some basic protective gear (hair, hands, mouth) on a sanitized desk is pretty much all you need...

But that would mean Locard was wrong.

no it wouldn't, bcs. Heisenberg was right - some things are far to small to measure precisely

and since it's innocent until guilty - BruceZ is a free man

You could satisfy Locard as long as what you leave behind is never found.

You'd probably want to avoid talking about how to commit the perfect crime on the internet.