Obviously, the reason I tried and am trying multiple diets is that the experimental result is always that nothing actually works. Except that the Shangri-La diet worked for twenty pounds and then mysteriously stopped doing anything (i.e., abrupt cessation of the diet did not result in any significant change in weight trends) and Seth Roberts couldn’t get it working again. Paleo was among the diets tried, and it didn’t result in any weight loss or other detectable differences. Non-US-approved, powerful, dangerous drugs like clenbuterol, which are supposed to cause weight loss on the order of a pound a day, produced standard side effects but no weight loss in me.
I figure that metabolisms vary at least 10% as much as minds, which is a HUGE amount of variance. It actually points up something I may post about at some point, which is that statistical science itself is often a dead end—you can publish paper after paper after paper about effects that show up in 60% of the population—but you don’t know what separates the 60% from the 40% - and still have no real grasp on the phenomenon and no real ability to manipulate it.
It actually points up something I may post about at some point, which is that statistical science itself is often a dead end—you can publish paper after paper after paper about effects that show up in 60% of the population—but you don’t know what separates the 60% from the 40% - and still have no real grasp on the phenomenon and no real ability to manipulate it.
It actually points up something I may post about at some point, which is that statistical science itself is often a dead end—you can publish paper after paper after paper about effects that show up in 60% of the population—but you don’t know what separates the 60% from the 40% - and still have no real grasp on the phenomenon and no real ability to manipulate it.
Have you posted something about this? I think it’s an important point, too little appreciated on LessWrong.
ETA: I see that I asked the same at the time. I guess that means the answer is “no”.
I figure that metabolisms vary at least 10% as much as minds
That may be understating it. Have you come across the book “Biochemical Individuality”? First published in 1956, it catalogues the at times surprisingly large amount of variation among healthy individuals of even such gross physiology as the relative sizes and positioning of the organs. It appears to have been rediscovered in the 90s, but primarily by the less scientific end of the nutrition advice industry. I do not know if there has yet been any reliable work done on the implications of individual uniqueness for, well, just about the whole of medicine, nutrition, and the life and social sciences in general.
Just curious—have you tried drinking cold (around 2 degrees centigrade) water frequently throughout the day (about 500ml per hour)? And drinking about a liter of cold water after waking? Eating you first meal soon after waking may also be advisable.
Your sleep will most likely be disturbed with visits to the toilet, but doing so may increase your resting metabolism. The logic goes that with all that cold water intake, you’ll always be hydrated, and your body must maintain a faster metabolism in order to keep your temperature at equilibrium. The water also makes you feel full more easily, helping to better control desired calorie intake.
statistical science itself is often a dead end—you can publish paper after paper after paper about effects that show up in 60% of the population—but you don’t know what separates the 60% from the 40% - and still have no real grasp on the phenomenon and no real ability to manipulate it.
E.g., the vast majority of heuristics and biases research. Including many of the researchers you cite, Eliezer.
Obviously, the reason I tried and am trying multiple diets is that the experimental result is always that nothing actually works. Except that the Shangri-La diet worked for twenty pounds and then mysteriously stopped doing anything (i.e., abrupt cessation of the diet did not result in any significant change in weight trends) and Seth Roberts couldn’t get it working again. Paleo was among the diets tried, and it didn’t result in any weight loss or other detectable differences. Non-US-approved, powerful, dangerous drugs like clenbuterol, which are supposed to cause weight loss on the order of a pound a day, produced standard side effects but no weight loss in me.
I figure that metabolisms vary at least 10% as much as minds, which is a HUGE amount of variance. It actually points up something I may post about at some point, which is that statistical science itself is often a dead end—you can publish paper after paper after paper about effects that show up in 60% of the population—but you don’t know what separates the 60% from the 40% - and still have no real grasp on the phenomenon and no real ability to manipulate it.
I’d be very interested in such a post.
Have any of the diets you’ve tried produced changes (energy level, for example) for the better or the worse even if they haven’t affected your weight?
Not yet.
Have you posted something about this? I think it’s an important point, too little appreciated on LessWrong.
ETA: I see that I asked the same at the time. I guess that means the answer is “no”.
That may be understating it. Have you come across the book “Biochemical Individuality”? First published in 1956, it catalogues the at times surprisingly large amount of variation among healthy individuals of even such gross physiology as the relative sizes and positioning of the organs. It appears to have been rediscovered in the 90s, but primarily by the less scientific end of the nutrition advice industry. I do not know if there has yet been any reliable work done on the implications of individual uniqueness for, well, just about the whole of medicine, nutrition, and the life and social sciences in general.
Just curious—have you tried drinking cold (around 2 degrees centigrade) water frequently throughout the day (about 500ml per hour)? And drinking about a liter of cold water after waking? Eating you first meal soon after waking may also be advisable.
Your sleep will most likely be disturbed with visits to the toilet, but doing so may increase your resting metabolism. The logic goes that with all that cold water intake, you’ll always be hydrated, and your body must maintain a faster metabolism in order to keep your temperature at equilibrium. The water also makes you feel full more easily, helping to better control desired calorie intake.
It only takes 35 kilocalories to warm one litre of water from 2 °C to 37 °C.
Thanks—that’s quite useful.
I don’t think this is necessarily a good thing.
Updated. Thank you!
E.g., the vast majority of heuristics and biases research. Including many of the researchers you cite, Eliezer.