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Why does calorie counting work for weight loss and why are calories interchangeable? (lemmy.zip)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by wolf@lemmy.zip to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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According to a book I am reading, diet science currently agrees that there is one way to loose weight: A calorie deficit.

For example, if I need 2000 kcal a day and eat only 1500 kcal a day, I will loose some weight over the next weeks/months.

To my understanding, calories here are totally interchangeable, if we are only concerned with loosing weight (and ignore nutrients etc).

Calories are basically measured by burning food and measuring how much energy was set free.

My question is: Why and how does it work so good and why are calories interchangeable?

In more detail: Why can we translate the burning of calories with fire to processing the calories in food with our digestion system so perfect? Why is there no difference (concerning weight loss), if I eat 1500 calories as pure sugar or eat them as pure protein (where I would assume the body needs more energy to break down the protein)?

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[–] Ek-Hou-Van-Braai@piefed.social 10 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

When you inhale you breath in oxygen, your body then adds carbon to that and you exhale CO2

With every exhale you're literally losing carbon, when you eat you add carbon back into your body.

Burning wood on the fire works the same way, wood is carbon and when burnt in a fire it gets added to Oxygen and you get CO2

A fire and your metabolism both just take carbon and "burn" it with oxygen releasing CO2

You're basically a big bucket of carbon and water with a slow leak.

So if you eat less "carbon" in a day than you breath out, you'll lose weight

[–] wolf@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 week ago

Thanks a lot! To the point and on an abstraction level that is very clear!