Gaining Weight

Factual Questions
1

OK - This sounds like a stupid question, but I don’t think it is:

If, at 9:00 on a Monday morning, I eat a 5-pound bag of M&M’s, will I gain more than 5 pounds?

I asked my family members… they laughed at me and said, “Of course!”

Then I challenged them to explain why.

“Well…” they began, “your body will combine the sugars and fats in the candy with other compounds in your body to make fat.”

“Yes,” I answered. “But the laws of conservation of matter insists that those new combinations can not be any more massive than their component parts.”

Who is right?

2

You are, but don’t waste your breath. Ya ain’t gonna win this one. Trust me. . . .

3

There was another thread like this a while ago, and I think the consensus was that you need to look at it in terms of calories.

You need about 3500 extra calories to gain a pound. A pound of milk chocolate has about 2,350 calories, so five pounds of M&M’s would have approximately 11,750 calories. Assuming none of these calories are expended you would gain about 3.36 pounds.