Calorie Restriction and Cause of Overeating and Obesity

2012

Calorie Restriction

With calorie restriction (CR) you restrict your calorie intake. The point is to live longer:

For humans, it's uncertain whether CR is better than say a diet that maintains a healthy weight. Since many have lived on little energy, while still eating at least half-decent nutritionally, if there would have been any great impact of CR it would have been better observed by now one would think. If there are benefits, the effect of CR on longevity compared to e.g. mice is probably much less, maybe a few years. Furthermore, there is an NIA CR study on monkeys, where the control group arguably ate relatively healthy, that suggests no increase in longevity with CR.

Cause of Overeating and Obesity

"These calculations have led to the push hypothesis for the obesity epidemic: dramatic increases in production, availability, and marketing of cheap, readily available food over the past few decades has led to increased food consumption and obesity", Carson Chow. [1, 2] The easier the access to food, the bigger the intake. Excess of food leads to excess in intake. This holds for animals in general, also wild ones. [???]

Restricted Access and Calorie Restriction

I find the above explanation very convincing. With typical Western world access to food, you can eat about twice as many calories as when you only have access to low-calorie, high-nutrient, satiating food, eating more or less ad libitum. With unlimited access to predominantly high-calorie, low-nutrient, non-satiating food, like candy, the intake can maybe differ a factor two again, to an energy intake of perhaps four times as much as in the severely restricted access case. Your culture and environment are all-important.

A relatively easy way to do calorie restriction is to see to it that you don't have easy access to high-calorie, low-nutrient, non-satiating food. Whenever you do your shopping, you show restraint in what you buy. This shopping restraint might then automatically and effortlessly lead to calorie restriction while still eating ad libitum.

Restricted Access Diet Examples

Below are diet examples that are nutrient rich and satiating while still low in calories. They are also low-cost and environmentally friendly.

Vegan Pasta and Porridge