ok, and I’m assuming you feel that your weight would end up the same regardless of which group you were in.
Well, I disagree, but unless somebody does the study, we’ll never know.
lucwarm–
all calories are exactly the same.
a calorie (more properly, a kcal) is a unit of measurement like a BTU or an inch.
would you say that one inch is different from another inch? i hope not.
Hmmm, I killed this last thread back on bbboy, at least while I was still checking. Maybe I can do it again?
First, alcohol has about 7 kcal (Calories) per gram, and one mL of alcohol weighs 0.8 grams. Thus, an alcoholic who drinks a quart of 80 proof (40% EtOH by volume) vodka would get:
7 Cal * 40% * 932 ml * 0.8 g/mL
1700 calories from alcohol alone.
Of course, beer contains hops and other things besides alcohol and water; a can of non-alcoholic beer has roughly 100-150 calories. Vodka also contains grain carbohydrates, etc.
So why aren’t alcoholics fat? Some are. Some vomit up many of the calories when on a major binge. Enough have sufficiently poor nutrition that it is standard procedure to give them thiamine (vitamin B1) in the ER since a deficency of this can cause permanent psychosis/memory loss. Many chronic alcoholics have pancreatitis which can cause functional diabetes and liver damage which can make people nauseous and decrease appetites. So there. Ptui. ;j
As for plateaux, I do think they exist but I also think many people who do not keep specific track of their acivities overestimate their exercise and underestimate their caloric intake.
Addiction is a tougher issue. Nicotine is probably the most known addictive substance, to the extent many nerve receptors are “nicotinic” since this was the easiest way to stimulate them in early neurology experiments. So nicotine usually meets the DSM criteria for drug addiction, which can be summarized as “use despite known harm” and in practice means people suffer withdrawal symptoms after going the whole night without a drag and need one within minutes of waking up. Nicotine is physiologically addictive. Tasty food may be psychologically addictive, but I’m not convinced the body differentiates between one fat molecule and another or one carbohydrate molecule and another. People do have different levels of enzymes that breakdown fats, starch, etc. but these are usually present in great excess with the exception of lactose enzymes.
People who eat large quantities of fatty foods are often very successful at cutting down given a good reason such as a heart attack or new diagnosis of diabetes, which to me implies any addiction is psychological, even given the stress of being diagnosed with a severe illness.
My ha’penny. DrP MD.
I think another reason why fried, fatty, sweet (yummy, delicious) food seems as if their calories are “worse” is because they are, but not in the way you are saying lucwarm. These foods pack a whole lot more cals per square inch than veggies and such.
Think of the calorie difference between a pound of fried chicken as compared to a pound of carrots. When you are eating the bad foods you are eating many times more calories per bite.
Well, in terms of effect on the human body, I maintain that not all calories are the same.
Maybe a better way to put it would be to say that “calories” is an unsatisfactory measure of the propensity of different foods to make one gain or lose weight.
So, by claiming that all calories are the same, you are, in effect, comparing apples and oranges. (har har)
Look at it this way: Nobody in their right mind would claim that the proper way to evaluate a diet is to look at the total number of ounces of food consumed. Yet, an ounce is an ounce is an ounce.
So, to answer your question, I would say “not necessarily.” For example, an inch of gold chain is not the same as an inch of silver chain.
Let me give you another example: Just before posting this message, I ate two plain bagels purchased at a kosher bakery in Manhattan. (Gotta fill up before Passover starts!) Perhaps the total number of calories I ate was 500. Now, in theory somebody could measure my heart rate, body tempurature, blood insulin levels, etc, right now.
Let’s suppose that instead of eating those two bagels, I had eaten 500 calories worth of granulated sugar. It seems very likely that all of those measurements – body tempurature, heart rate, blood insulin levels, etc. – would be slightly but significantly different right now.
So there’s little doubt that different foods can have different effects on basic body processes, even if the number of calories consumed is the same. If that’s the case, then it’s not so ridiculous to propose that different foods can have different effects on weight gain or loss.
So what do you make of the study I cited above where people consumed extra calories in the form of alcohol but did not gain weight? (Of course, it is certainly possible that the study was flawed in some way.)
Well, as someone who has quit smoking and who has tried to diet a few times I can attest that the feelings involved are (for me, anyway) very very similar. The irritability, the desperate cravings when under stress, the waves of anxiety, etc. etc. etc. Thus, my inclination is to believe that similar (addictive) processes are at work.
If there’s anyone else out there who has dieted and tried to quit smoking at different times, I’d love to hear your thoughts.
That’s certainly possible – that “bad” foods leave one feeling less full than “good” foods, and as a result, one is inclined to eat more.
Without doing a study such as the one I proposed earlier, it’s impossible to know for sure.
But consider this: Even if the explanation you suggest is correct, it still supports my ultimate theory - that dieters should totally eliminate “bad” foods from their diets.
Not to mention the calories expended during the digestion of the bagels. That’s a very good point.
I wouldn’t conclude the study was flawed, just that we’re talking different things. The study says people who drink alcohol aren’t more likely to be overweight than non-drinkers, but perhaps half of Americans are overweight. The study was not looking at alcoholics. They often drink lots and eat little, due to stupor and nausea from pancreatic and liver disease. This does not apply to the occasional drinker, so details about the study population become important.
I don’t doubt that refusing food and tobacco feel similar to you. And maybe it is splitting hairs to differentiate between physiological and psychological addiction here.
I agree eating the same number of calories of fat and sugar influence your body in different ways independent of caloric content. Insulin levels would differ, heart rate might (via cortisol). The question is how much things change over the longer term. “You can get fat from sweets, but you can’t get sweet (sugar) from fat.” Granting that they could be different over the longer term, I’m less sure why one form of glucose (Pixie sticks vs. sweet coffee) should be different from another. Or two saturated fats of similar length should be different beause they come from a Danish or ice cream.
Thanks 
Ok, but the point I was trying to make was that, from the point of view of gaining/losing weight, not all calories are equal. The study I cite seems to support this position, no?
I think so, because addiction is significant here for one main reason: For most people, it is impossible to consume something they are addicted to in moderation for more than a short period of time.
I think this applies to cigarettes and to “bad” foods.
I’m not sure either what the specifics are of how different stuff affects the body. Complicating things further is the possibility of interaction among different foods. Certainly it is very difficult to study these things. Moreover, the reality is that many people are ashamed of their poor eating habits and cannot be trusted to report their diets accurately.
Nevertheless, this may not matter so much from a practical point of view. I suspect that most people can figure out what the “bad” foods are. It seems to me that if you totally eliminate the “bad” foods, the main potential problem you face will be that your fat intake will drop quite a lot. I am not a nutritionist, but I imagine that most adults get much more fat than they need. (Children, of course, are a different story.)
I think the answer lies more in the differences in individual BMR’s than in the foods eaten. I base this on the many, many overweight vegitarians I know. And if this dieter’s plateau is a real phenomenon, then ultrafilter’s calories in, calories out would seem a bit too simplistic.
I’m curious about the diets of your vegetarian friends. Do they ever eat “junk” food? ice cream? fried foods? cookies? cake?
For what it’s worth, when I went to college, I knew a lot of vegetarians (both thin & fat) who ate a lot of “bad” foods.
The study probably is not designed well enough to suggest calories from alcohol are different from other foods. I don’t know how diets were controlled, nor how long the study went on. I don’t know if the people in the study were similar to you and me, and I don’t know how it took into account the possibility that drinking more may make you eat less.
There are many vegetarians who use a lot of oil when cooking and others who eat lots of bread and sweets and pastry. The ones who stick primarily to rice and vegetables are rarely overweight.
The real problem with testing that old adage is that it’s very difficult to measure the calories a person expends during a given activity, and that amount varies highly among people. So it’s entirely possible that it is true, and does account for dieter’s plateau, if that’s a real phenomenon.
I’m no great big fan of the theory, but it’s the simplest one I’ve seen, and no one’s managed to shoot any holes in it yet (or at least they haven’t convinced me so far).
On the other hand, there are very good reasons to cut “bad” foods out of your diet if you’re trying to get in shape, and most of them have been cited in this thread.
The real problem with testing the adage is that the calories a person expends during a given activity most likely varies highly just among a sample of one person performing the activity at different times.
The human body is an amazingly adaptable machine, and if it is allowed to perfrom the same activity enough (say, running on a treadmill), it will become more efficient at it and require fewer calories to perform it.
Because of this, even if you continue the exact same workout program, eventually it will become a less effective workout. You’ll think you’re doing the same amount of work, and the distance on the treadmill will read the same, but your body will be better at it, so it won’t have burned as many calories as it once did. This is in addition to the fact that it just requires less energy for a lighter person to run that it does for an overweight person to run.
The only real way to combat this is to change up your workout every so often. If you’re dead-set against that, at least make sure you’re increasing the intensity every so often to make sure you’re actually doing as much work as you think you are.
Having said that, I’m off to the gym. I’ve got this gut I have to work off, you see…