I’ve seen a number of repeated comments I’d like to address so I don’t have to keep replying individually: *1. Digestion of food differs.* (17:20 - 17:51) Yes, foods are digested differently, some being absorbed less fully (fiber rich, as one example), some requiring more caloric input to break down the food (protein, for example). As I mentioned near the end of the video, there are many considerations to getting nutrients past the intestines into the blood stream, and while these considerations are important, they complicate the message of the video (calories are all equal) as they discuss nutrient differences, not calories. *2. The health of food differs.* (11:57 , 12:39, 15:52) Again, I mentioned this multiple times in the video (11:57 , 12:39, 15:52) - this is a discussion of the biochemistry and physiology of calories, not of nutrients, although they are closely related. We need to separate the nutrient from the calorie for us to have a discussion about each. I acknowledge that consuming certain foods (made of set nutrients) can worsen or better health in the context of the totality of a diet; however, this is again extending the video message beyond what it is - this is also why I added a mention that this isn’t an all-encompassing education on nutrients, I’m simply trying to extract the definition of “calorie” from the concept of “nutrients”. *3. If calories matter, why are there calories in wood, motor oil, etc.?* All things have calories, but only a certain subset of things in this world can we extract the calories through our bodily metabolic processes. If you consume motor oil, other than the fact that you will die, you will also not absorb said motor oil, so it will not end up at the site of cellular absorption (beyond the intestine) - additionally, even if it did, your cells have no metabolic systems to extract the calories (by turning motor oil into ATP) like they do for carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins. *4. Are you saying calorie counting is the superior way to diet?* (12:30 - 13:23) No. I'm saying a calorie deficit is foundational to fat loss, but there are many ways to achieve that calorie deficit that could have more or less merit for you (i.e. a diet that is more satiating at the same calorie deficit, etc.). *5. X diet is better for satiety and X diet sucks.* (12:30 - 13:23 , 15:52) All well and good, but these are matters of nutrients, not calories. They matter, but they aren't the point of this particular video. *6. Nutrition labels and Calories.* I've seen some people mention that nutrition label calories (calories in food) are determined by burning the food and therefor do not represent what happens in the body. Food calories are determined by a bomb calorimeter, where scientists input a known amount of heat and then measure the difference in heat output - it is a highly controlled circumstance. Obviously, this invites the idea that it doesn't apply to us, but in reality, scientists do the same thing with humans - we don't burn them alive, but we put a person in an insulated room that is sensitive to heat changes through the conductance in an intricate water system surrounding the room; the difference in heat between the person not being in the room (baseline) and the person being in the room (quietly, usually lying down) is a direct measure of resting metabolism and is known as 'direct calorimetry'. So, while not all of the food may be absorbed exactly as its packaged, we tend to absorb a vast majority of the nutrients (90% or more) we consume (except in special circumstances, like fiber), and therefor we utilize those nutrients to generate similar amounts of energy/calories.

Thank you for the education. From my personal experience I have lost weight from calorie counting and there is no doubt that if you burn more calories than you consume you will lose weight, wherever those calories come from. But for me it only really worked when I started to find out what effect different foods had on me and adjusted my diet accordingly. Rather than just thinking “if I cut my calories I’ll lose weight” and within 2 weeks I was so hungry I’d eat anything you put in front of me. I changed my diet to whole foods, less carbs and cut out nearly all sugar. I found it really curbed my hunger and I could sustainably lose weight and keep it off. So I agree all calories are equal but what you actually eat makes a massive difference to how you feel.

It is just a heuristic for the concept that two 500-calorie *meals* are not equal, in terms of their effect on the body: nutrition, satiety, blood glucose, sustained energy, etc. 1200 calories of chips and candy is miserable compared to 1200 calories of real food. We would all agree that a kilowatt generated by a tire fire is the same as a kilowatt generated by a windmill. We would also agree that this doesn't mean there is nothing to choose between them.

As a recovering physicist, the argument that "calories are a physics concept, not a physiology one" never fails to give me a good chuckle. If anyone thinks they have found a mechanism that breaks the laws of physics, please report to your nearest Nobel foundation for a chance at a million+ dollar prize.

If you're diabetic or prediabetic, I'd still want to get most of my calories from proteins and fats and I find hard to believe that if you're in a surplus of 1000 calories, that you'd put on same amount amount of fat if those surplus calories came from either sugar or protein.

When you explained that calories are the heat released from the phosphate molecule separating from the Adenosine molecule, it all made sense for me. Nice job ✓ This is what has been missing from this whole discussion in the nutrition space I also appreciate the highly relevant point you made about how nutrients vary widely on human biochemistry via different hormonal responses etc.. 👍

I remember seeing a Dr Fung video and he said that calories are important but they are of secondary importance and not of primary importance. The hormonal response that those different nutrients elicits is primary. As a type one diabetic that was just at Disney World this past weekend, I can keenly attest to the marked effect of carbohydrates on my physiology. 😅

2700 calories of high carb lowfat for 40 days and i didn't lose any weight. 2700 calories of high fat and leafy green carbs and i lost 18 lbs in a month. In 3 months I lost 40 lbs. Calories didn't matter while I was doing this.

Yes, a calorie is a calorie, but only AFTER it is absorbed from the digestive tract. I think this point is the key reason for the ongoing disagreement: we are comparing apples to oranges-pun intended 😂

Okay, I'm starting to see where you're coming from. Dr. Fung's point about a block of wood stuck with me. Yeah, it might have a hundred calories but you're not going to pull them out through digestion. Your points are foundational though like in philosophy. We can't have a discussion until we're both on the same page about what we're debating. "This therefore that" doesn't work unless we're talking about the same thing. Usually it's stuff like truth and meaning instead of cookies and hotdogs but I guess it applies to everything...lol

Calories are not equal only in respect of how mush are absorbed (piece of wood vs spoonful of sugar, for average human), and more importantly - how much energy (calories) is takes to break down the food molecules to access their calories.

I wanted to test this for myself. I ate only a junk food diet for over 6 months at the exact same calories. My weight and physiology stayed exactly the same. Did I feel like crap and was I hungry a lot of the time, yes, but it proved to me that a calorie is just a calorie. I am not saying just calories matter because if I ate to satiety in my experiment above I would have over consumed calories.

Dear Nicolas, with all due respect that is the wrong side of the calorie efficiency equation. Different fuels have different efficiencies and different chemical ratios of byproducts from their combustion. The metabolism of any organism is an "internal combustion engine" and the efficiency of that engine is different from its design and type of fuel. The calorific value of hydrogen is 150 kJ/g, where as diesel is 45 kJ/g of energy output over mass. Also, the "engine types" to burn these fuels have their own efficiencies. Hydrogen engines are at best around 45 percent thermal efficiency with current technology and diesel engines are about 35 percent thermal efficiency. It also takes energy from other machinery to put any fuel into a usable form. The human body produces heat so therefore some of the energy is lost to that inefficiency. Breaking down carbohydrates requires less energy than breaking down proteins or fats; and the enzymes that do so are different "machines" and have different efficiencies. Each type of metabolic fuel will have a different efficiency chemical chain of reactions to get it in the usable form of ATP. Ketogenesis, fructolysis, glycolysis, and gluconeogenesis require different enzymatic reactions (machinery) that each have different efficiencies. In other words, different sources of food conversion will take differing amounts of energy used by the body to convert them to ATP, thus differing amounts of calories for carbohydrate, protein, or fat to produce useable metabolic energy. I have never seen that side of the calorie efficiency equation (enzymatic engines) worked out. Maybe you can be the first !!

Yes, nuance is a tough cell, I mean sell! Great channel, replete and articulate explanations of complex topics that cannot be digested in soundbites and celebrity.

Dr Berry: Engery does not have any mass that we know of Einstein: m=E/c^2

1. We don't have receptors for calories. Do we have receptors for other units, like degrees Celsius, Newtons, then? No, so clearly when someone puts you in an oven or squashes you in a compacter you will not be affected. 2. Calories comes from physics so they do not apply. Sooo....we must live outside of physical space and time then. I never knew. Or maybe they mean that the second law of thermodynamics does not apply to human beings, because we are not closed systems. I guess we cannot apply the second law of thermodynamics to the sun and earth then either and must concluded that in these systems energy CAN be freely created and destroyed, because they are both not closed systems. 3. Different foods have different hormonal reactions. Clearly this proves calories do not influence hormones at all, not one bit. Replace your water with molten butter people. Calories do not matter, because hormones are influenced only by WHAT (and when) you eat and not at all by calories. Oh yeah, obviously this last statement proves that sugars, in any form, are evil and only low-carb diets work. Though, in every low-carb and TRE study were calories are not restricted there are always some subjects that did not loss weight or even gained weight, but never mind that. That proves nothing.

One correction: Breaking bonds does not release energy it requires energy. It is when chemical bonds are made that energy is released. Biologists often make this mistake.

Sure, calories ARE calories, and that’s why they literally don’t matter. I ate 3000 calories yesterday and lost 2lbs but only walked 6k steps (bad weather). I wonder why someone who supposedly needs to eat 1400 calories / day or less to lose weight can do that?

To be clear, although the chemical processes for absorbing 500kcal of broccoli and 500kcal of sugar are completely different, AND the resulting ATP is indistinguishable, are both processes equally _efficient_? In other words, is the same percentage of the measured calories of both examples ultimately turned into ATP?

Well, it really depends on what you mean. Physically a calorie is a calorie, so from that perspective they are indeed all the same. But the same amount of calories can have very different effects on things like blood sugar, cholesterol, satiety, etc. For example 100 calories of fat or protein would be much more filling than 100 calories of carbs (because they digest more slowly) so you'd be less likely to eat more. So from an energy standpoint all calories are equal, but not really from a health standpoint.

What is the caloric difference between 100 calories of olive oil and 100 calories of motor oil? Same amount of energy, but the second option possibly impairs the future energy production by human body. Similarly, drinking one shot of 3000 calories from concentrated glucose drink will have different effect than 3000 calories from the same glucose but slowly ingested through the whole day. In the first case, the system is overloaded, so the excess glucose must be immediately converted to a storage form. Damages to the system caused by high glucose concentration and effectiveness of storing and releasing the energy from the storage were not considered in the talk. Surprisingly, I do agree with J. Fung and with Physionic at the same time (apart from the tile). Simply, I applied different assumptions, which for better understanding should be expressed explicitly.

The problem with CICO approach and why it generally fails in the long term is it ignores the elephant in the room, which is satiety/hunger. The SAD that includes UPF concocted using highly processed starches, added oils, and sugar are engineered to override natural hormonal feedback loops that keep caloric intake in check. It also biases the system to store excess energy as fat rather than burn it.

Dr. Fung is looking at it through the lens of insulin resistance and diabetes. The cookies spike insulin and in diabetic's (type 2) the spike is bigger and lasts longer. The fat stores stay closed. So if I ate 100 calories of cookies only, it could be hours before my body would be able to pull from my fat stores to make up the difference. If I ate more cookies later before the spike ends then I'll be blocked for even more hours, never losing weight. If I ate 100 calories of chicken or broccoli I would have little or no insulin spike and I would start burning fat to make up for the restriction. I understand It is different for someone healthy trying to lose fat and not insulin resistant, but he is working with a group that has different problems. Still, I love your content, keep it up!

5:18 Dr Berry: "Does it measure energy or does it measure mass?". Neither, a scale measures weight, not mass.

Analogy: KiloWatts-hours can be generated by many different ways, Hydro, Solar, Fossil fuels, but KiloWatts-hours are KiloWatts-hours. They are a unit of measure we use to allow comparisons of electrical energy.

Some gut hormones are released in response to non-specific calories, or the absence of calories. Ghrelin for example is released by the absence of calories.

You still ignore that a kCal from Sugar is NOT EQUAL to a kCal of proteins or various other type of food. because we EXPEND energy to digest the food, DIFFERENT amount of energy to digest different food I can give you 5000 kCal of sugar and you will lose weight dramatically if I give you sugar inside a plastic shell !

I believe part of the concept that was being stressed was the difference in how the food is processed within our bodies. For example, it takes less energy to breakdown 100 Calories of sugar, as opposed to 100 Calories of celery. Your body has to work harder to break the celery down, thus the amount of net energy that your body has available to use after digestion varies. I believe this is where they were going with not all calories are equal. If we ate the same amount of calories of sugar and celery, the body would need to burn fat to make up the difference from the additional amount of energy expended just to break the celery down.....please correct me if this concept is incorrect.

Dr. Fung is right and you are right as well Nick. That is why they say that if you want to lose 1lb of fat you have to burn 3500 calories. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Good points. Time well spent. Thank you 👍🏾😎🙏🏾

There was no mention of Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), the amount of energy you expend when doing nothing. This is the majority of energy that you expend. We know that reducing calories in leads to a lowering of your BMR, which is why the weight loss in most calories reduction diets stalls after a few months. But, some foods have the same metabolic slowing effect. Fructose (50% of sucrose) gets converted to fat via de novo lipogenesis if your other calorie needs are met. This should get moved to the skin, but can remain in the liver and gum up the processing. Raised insulin from glucose consumption retains the weight of fat, in the skin fat cells, so their potential energy is never released. Calories are a good approximation as to whether you might be "over eating" but the effect on your weight cannot be calculated because of the variables concerning your metabolism. If we consider E=Mc² every gram of food contains approximately 900,000,000,000 calories, so its no wonder we're putting on weight.

The issue is that people are often literal about it. Yes, a calorie is a calorie is a calorie as a calorie is just a measure of energy. But, foods act differently in the body. Example - eat a little too much fat and your body might want to store it as the fats are easily converted into body fat. Eat a little too much carbs, carb to fat conversion is inefficient so your body might rev up your metabolism a little to try to get rid of the energy that way. Or, 100 calories of refined white bread is not the same in your body as 100 calories of high fiber beans. From the absolute definition of calorie, the energy units in the food is the same but how they act in your body is not the same, thus in your body a calorie is not always a calorie.

Nicely done. There is no weight loss without Calorie deficit but also there is a difference from a health standpoint between 2000 Calories of Fructose vs 2000 Calories of Broccoli. Something that should be made clear by nutrition pundits.

I think the reason people say they are not the same is because 100 calorie broccoli will make you feel full while 100 calorie pure white table sugar won't make you feel full. Same with eating protein and fat, if you eat the same amount of calorie in white bread, you will become hungry sooner after white bread consumption compared to protein and fat consumption. I notice from own experience, when I eat white bread with my dinner, I eat more and I become hungry again sooner.

Dr. John Berardi (Co-Founder of Precision Nutrition) once had a podcast and started to interview folks like Dr. Fung. That's, people he disagrees with, because he wanted to have these kinds of discussions, question them, find out why/what/how. He asked him several times whether he thinks CiCo works or not, and eventually Dr. Fung admitted that CiCo works. In other podcasts he'd say that it doesn't work, that people who count calories are stupid, that it's all about hormones and insulin and whatnot. So frustrating, especially when you meet people irl who want to lose weight, start to exercise and improve their health, and then they have to face all that misinformation and conflicting information.

Fung says in that interview (or another) that you can’t get away from the physics ie., it’s correct - you need to create a deficit. Whatyou have presented very well just supports what Fung says imho.

Interesting video, but I believe this message is of lesser importance for someone trying to improve their metabolic health. One question though, in 'direct calorimetry' testing do all of the following produce the same result over a 24-hour test? 1. 2000 calories of protein. 2. 2000 calories of fat 3. 2000 calories of carbohydrates 4. 2000 calories of glucose 5. 2000 calories of fructose 6. 2000 calories of ethanol Would there be any differences in the type of protein or fat consumed as I suspect they may be for fructose and ethanol?

Some foods are more addictive than others. Ultra-processed foods are highly palatable and so people tend to eat more. These may have the same calories per ounce as a broccoli salad, but they are easier to overconsume. The food industry loves the saying a calorie is a calorie, which is correct but how it affects hunger is huge, at least for me.

BUT, if you ingest 500 calories, yet your intestines for one reason or another cannot absorb those calories, doesn't that mean that you could eat more and not gain weight???

Also, the effect of the Gut Microbiome. These have been show to raise or lower BMR and promote or retard fat gain from the same ingested calories. So, foods that benefit or degrade the gut microbiome can have you gain weight or lose weight from identical number of calories. I'm in the "energy is not weight" camp. Every time you breathe in you "ingest" a load of Oxygen. When you breathe out you lose a load of CO2 and water and Ketones. You sweat, wee and poo. The amount of food you eat has to fit into this complex equation.

I guess Ken Berry has never heard of the most famous equation in history. Energy may not "have mass" largely because it's not really a material thing, more just natures accounting system, but mass is an excellent proxy for total rest energy, that is E=mc^2. C, of course is taken as a constant in vacuum, so mass is linearly proportional to energy.

If I eat 1000 caliries worth if wood chips it is in no way similar to eating 1000 calories worth of sugar! Calories are not the same as what comes to our ability to adsorb them!

Way better than all those "doctors" and carnivores who just look like narcissistic exhibitionists. My rebuttal to them would be the likes of Maggie Q (vegan), Maye Musk (Mediterranean), Mika Takishima (balanced soy and plant dominant with chicken and fish), et al. You provide very good explanations in this video.

100 cal of protein vs 100 cal of carb will produce different amounts of ATP no ? Therefore they are not equal and what use is this heat produced in the breaking of the bonds ? ( beyond the important task of keeping you warm)

This is such an important distinction. I was keto and carnivore for 6 years, but only recently gained a good understanding of the vital importance of micro nutrients. That has changed the game in my health journey. My main focus is on maximizing vital nutrients now.

Dr. Bikman has a talk entitled "The Metabolic Advantage" in which he refers to the fact that an individual in ketosis will be wasting ketones from the body during breathing. Of course those lost calories are in some sense -- very definitely your sense too -- if those calories were directly from dietary fat, then they were not fully consumed in the sense of cellular respiration, though they probably did incur a slight metabolic energy deficit. But there are so many individual factors involved that you can't say, for instance, that 50g of dietary fat will never produce its full caloric energy value. Neither can you say it will always produce that value.

I've just found your videos and am really enjoying your way of explaining how the digestive system works. It's truly amazing!

Most people tend to like a simple, easy explanation when it comes to eating, weight loss physiology, and nutrition. But it is complicated and there are many factors involved. Genetics, various medical conditions, body composition, etc. I have no problem with doctors encouraging people to avoid processed food. But some of the recommendations that are made are downright scary.

A doctor giving a regular interview and another doctor talking in regular youtube video. These are two situations where there is no reason to make things more complicated in such cases knowing that the audience that watches them consists mainly of average people with average knowledge on the subject. I think "They are wrong" is an overstatement.

So, in the end, the best unit that could exist to measure the amount ingested would be one that takes into account how much ATP can be generated with that food. Let me explain, ideally, it would be to say that 100 grams of carrots generate 1 "X" ATPs and that 100 grams of olive oil make, for example, 20 "X" ATPs (I obviously don't know the proportion, but to make it clear that oil has a greater potential to generate ATP per unit of weight). A unit about the energy that our body could potentially make with a certain food, removing all the parts that are unable to generate ATP from the equation.

The bottom line is that calories are calories, but when it comes to weight loss, some foods will make dieting downright torturous to consume at the lower amount of calories you would need to lose fat.

Every thing our body does is subject to the laws of physics. "That's physics, not physiology" is sophistry, at best.

Why not consume both types of information? . Dr. Fung seems to be highly regarded by the scientific & research community. However, a deeper and more complex explanation of the physiology involved is also very useful. I am subscribed to both of these scientists. 🎆

Ignorant question. Wasn't there a Randall cycle where mitochondria can't utilise simultaneously sugar and fat and there happens something as jamming of mitochondria and no gear engine state when energy is used up for heat? my question probably is if if there is that other way of spending energy instead of storing it

Prof Bart will love this

Calorie is the measurement of HEAT energy produce by food. We also can get heat energy by having hot bath or sauna but will it make you gain weight. Why don't you just measure mass in vs mass out because it way more accurate than calorie.

Hmm.. it is worth emphasising the wood concept by Dr Fung. Wood had lots of calories, but we cannot absorb them. So similarly, while the measurement of calories is correct, there must als be an efficiency term in how we absorb calories from different food sources.

I think by 'calories not equal' they usually mean that eating a 100 calories sugar is not equal to eating 100 calories of protein powder. Its not the calories in the food that the 'not equal' refers to but the 'eating', so what the body does with it. And all this in the context of overeating, so when it comes to storing fat. I wonder if there is a difference in this regard because I'm not sure if the body can convert and store protein with the same efficiency as sugar for example, and this is where this question is rooted I think.

Fiber will slow down the sugar that's why fiber is in fruits and vegetables they got a lot of sugar but they got a lot of fibers or slow it down.

When people say 100 calories isnt 100 calories. It isnt nessarily about the theoretical burn but rather the outcome. If i give someone 100 calories but one they are allergic and induces inflamation and is highly processes and has creatine or iodine in it and has thermochloric burn and compare it to something else. At the end of the day those are way different effects. Foods can cause you to store weight such as iodine or creatine. Some actually burn easier and give thermochloric burn. Some food give satiation differences or blood sugar. So yes 100 calories is 100 calories. But 100 calories vs another 100 calories can actually effect your overall weight.

I feel like one of the biggest considerations for people who want to follow a calories in calories out approach to dieting would be protein. Its metabolism into sugars is itself expensive and happens conditionally when total energy is quite low or when protein ratio is overwhelmingly high.

Its possible to lose bodyfat and just lose omega 3, and increase fat stored in the liver. Combine that with large loss of lean muscle mass, its a worry. Metabolism adapts, and the person is in a far worse off situation than prior to fat loss. Then they put the weight back on and die. Changing lifestyle to quality food, increasing muscle to fat ratio is much more important than worrying about calories in, calories out.

It takes energy to break a chemical bond, the energy is released when the new anorganic phosphate group (PO4) is formed. It is impossible to obtatin energy by braking a bond, you have to overcome the electrostatic interaction between the atmos. This is a myth that i hate, and needs to be fixed.

Sorry, you're missing this. The metabolic effects in the body from different foods (calories) are very different. This then affects body weight.

The calories in a high fibre diet contain calories that are not available by digestion therefore calories from different sources affect weight gain differently. Also the energy in lipids is more fattening than sugar because metabolism uses 1/3 of the calories to convert to fat. I think this is what these doctors were trying to explain.

Brilliant explanation thank you

You didn't get the point. Dr. Fung uses phrase "not all calories are equal" to explain that consuming 100 Calories of Sugar and 100 Calories of Fat will have different effect on your body because you are consuming different nutrients.

To the credit of Jason, he did state that calories are concept of physics. It is a name given to the measurement of heat energy contained in a given substance. He also states it is not a biophysical concept and I think his argument is that we should not use calories in relation to biophysical explanations. The whole calories in - calories out model of nutrition. To me, in simple terms, that simply states that if the calories going in, are less than the calories going out - you lose weight, or vice versa when the calories are greater than going out. The source of calories in this model does not matter, high fat diet, high carb diet, vegan, carnivore...it does not matter, the response will always be the same. Do not eat enough...lose weight, eat to much...gain weight. The source of the calories, and the induced physiological response, that's a whole different argument and it is not related to calories, it is specifically related to the source of the macro nutrients, from which, we calculate our calories consumed.

Does this mean that when we are in a calorie deficit that serum lipid levels will rise because they are being used for metabolic purposes? And if you take a lipid blood test during lower caloric intake periods one will show elevated triglycerides LDL HDL etc? I agree with you 100% when it comes to being precise about definitions this is a problem in all Fields social, scientific at the everyday level. It's counterproductive.

YOU ARE WRONG. First of all, you are claiming that a calorie deficit is foundational to weight loss. In fact, a calorie deficit will lead over time to a lower metabolic rate, which is why people who lose weight this way invariably put it back. Dr. Fung explains this in many of his videos, but of course you have not chosen to critique one of those videos. Secondly, this does not apply to the ketogenic diet. When you are in ketosis, the body "wastes" a lot of energy, as explained by Prof. Benjamin Bikman in his book "Why we get sick" and in his many podcasts. And I can see that for myself: I use a ketone breath meter, and when I eat fat my breath ketones go through the roof. Breath ketones are unused energy which the body simply excretes. And this is one of many reasons why people lose weight on Keto WITHOUT RESTRICTING CALORIES. Thirdly, your very concept of criticizing people like Dr. Jason Fung, Dr. Ken Berry, Dr. Eric Berg etc. is simply ridiculous, misleading and impertinent. These people are clinicians who have saved thousands of lives. They are putting out free content in order to help millions of people. Of course they may have to oversimplify some details in order to reach more people. Their purpose is to heal people, not to teach biology. And who are you? Are you a clinician? Have you saved anybody's life? Do you even have a personal story of healing or weight loss, like Nicholas Norwitz or Thomas DeLauer? You look like a healthy young guy who has no understanding for what disease or obesity really mean, outside from what you have learned. I have been dieting since I was 15, and that was 42 years ago. I know what works and what doesn't. You are criticising people who saved my life, while my own doctors were busy putting me in the grave... Why don't you go away and come back in 30 years from now, when you'll have a little bit of experience......

I tend to follow your arguments but I have one question. How do we measure the calories contained in Food? If we just burn the foods in an oven and measure the energy I would assume that this result is different from the energy Our metabolism is deriving from the same food, right? So, wenn we say 100ml of olive oil has x calories is that really equal to the energy Our body derives from it Wien digested?

Question: how many ATP molecules per Calorie? Looking that up 1 ATP = 7.3 kcals. 1 ATP I believe = 1 electron exchange (T or F ?), which would mean that there are 137 ATP molecules per Calorie (1000 kcal), and by extension the body runs on 3000 X 137 electrons per day ? , or 411,000 electrons per day. That can’t be right, it should be orders of magnitude greater. Where have I gone wrong?

You're arguing semantics. Technically they're the same, nobody is desputing that, but thats not what is MEANT by it. It's about how the calories are handled by the body. You can gain weight by eating 2000 calories of donuts but loose weight by eating 2000 calories of meat.

The nuances are what matter in this entire discussion. As Ancel Keys demonstrated in his starvation study, the body uses its "stored energy" when there is a lack of exogenous energy, however, the body's de novo lipogenesis mechanism pulls from muscle tissue (especially when insulin is present). Thus, people who reduce their Calories (nutritional energy) experience muscle loss when they do not bring down their insulin levels (Kalm & Semba, 2005; Kwak et al., 2010). Not to mention that the there are many chemical interactions within the body, including those that allow the mitochondria to play against the rules using uncoupling proteins to "make heat" from protons and electrons- for a plethora of reasons (Bertholet et al., 2022; Nicolson, 2014). To this point, when a person consumes junk food, or food that is processed and artificial, they are more prone to put on visceral fat and suffer from a myriad of health conditions, such as Mitochondrial dysfunction and NAFLD/NASH, etc. (Cena & Calder, 2020; Demine et al., 2019). Berthold, A.M., Nile, A.M...Kirichok, Y. (2022). Mitochondrial uncouplers induce proton leak by activating AAC and UCP1. Nature, 606(7912), 180-187. Cena, H., & Calder, P.C (2020) Defining a healthy diet: Evidence for the role of contemporary dietary patterns in health and disease. Nutrients. 12(2):334. Demine, S., Renard, P., & Arnould, T. (2019). Mitochondrial uncoupling: A key controller of biological processes in physiology and disease. Cells, 8(8), 795. Kale, L. M. & Semba, R. D. (2005).They starved so that others be better fed: Remembering Ancel Keys and the Minnesota experiment. The Journal of Nutrition, 135(6), 1347-1352. Kwak, S.H., Park, K.S....Lee, H.K. (2010). Mitochondrial metabolism and diabetes. Journal of Diabetes Investigation, 1(5), 161-169. Nicholson, G.L. (2014). Mitochondrial dysfunction and chronic disease: Treatment with natural supplements. Integrative Medicine (Encinitas Calif.), 13(4), 35-43.

Bait aaaaaand Click The end effect on your health and weight will be different based on the source of your calories; that is what it means when people say calories don't equal calories. At 14:00 when you start addressing the points and saying your body can sense ATP and that is a proxy for sensing calories you are assuming that ATP production would scale linearly with calorie consumption. Is this true? I think your technically correct in some ways but in the context of physiology and the context of people eating about 2000 calories a day, calorie sources are definitely different. When people say all calories are not the same they are not challenging physics, they are saying the calorie sources matter. The video is either geared solely towards getting views or you are responding to a personal and overlay pedantic interpretation of the topic. :P

Practicing doctors like Jason Fung, Berry have learned via theur onw experience and in practice. What they do works and for the majority, more effective long term.

Thankyou. Im grateful for your content and precision of subject matter. It is not semantics. articulated precision is key & sorely wanted.

No mention of efficiency?!! Average net mass retention is the proper way to frame this issue. The chemical energy available in food is largely irrelevant. Anyone who has changed the diaper of a toddler who has eaten a lot of carrots understands why!

Calories in small Coca Cola are the same as the amount of calories in carrots that takes 2 1/2 hours to eat.Calories are calories in the lab

As a fat man getting thin I didn't see much here to help me. I'm coming to conclude on and of myself that we gain weight for several reasons. You fix the reasons and the weight leaves through our lungs and bladder. The biggest reason we store fat rather than burn it is our lack of essential minerals, vitamins, amino acids, & fatty acids. I've seen many of your videos. They lean towards managing dwindling vitality as most doctors do. From a physics point of view, To loose weight requires correcting the engine making it more power hungry. So my plan starts at the soil level with at least 77 essential minerals and ends with fasting so the body can heal. It corrected my core engine and now my weight is melting with the bonus that the more calories I eat the more strength and energy I have. However, toxic foods, food I'm allergic to, and foods containing anti-nutrients should be found and watched as they can break the engine again slowing down my energy burn.

What weighs more, a pond of feathers or a pound of lead? It’s the same argument. A pound is a pound regardless of the mass being weighed. A calorie is a calorie.

I don't think that's what they mean as an overall message, they seem to be focused on the overall effect, as in how easy it is to gain weight, taking in to account, satiety, how easy it is to overeat, addiction and more. The message is definitively not wrong, and will most definitely help people be healthy. At the end of the day your average human does not care, understand or even want to understand. The only thing that can help people is an extreme generalization of what to prioritize eating and what to avoid, with some generalized mechanisms sprinkled on top.

Right at the start you state that the (incorrect) belief that not all calories are equal has been used to justify the conclusion that calories dont matter. I would dispute this, i feel like lots of the communitues that would demonize sugar/fat/processed food would do so under the theorey that this will lower appetite and therefire lower calories. Its just that counting calories is not a long lerm solution to calorie reduction, but focusing on the right foods to lower hunger is a better strategy. Post in any keto or similar forum asking why youre not losing weight and the one of the first questions they ask is how much youre eating. I.e. they do not believe calories do not matter.

"It's a concept of physics, but it's not a physiological concept." How does a physiological concept exist outside of physics?

the different metabolic pathways consume different amounts of energy to result in fat. Therefore calories ARE NOT equal

Thoughts on how toxins can make fat loss extremely difficult as they hold on to fat or slow the fat loss ? This is why many people having toxins exposure are not able to loose fat despite caloric deficit.

"Calories available from metabolic processes" stops just short of the practical truth of the argument. The differences in the foods changes not just energy balance, but also the biggest factor which is behavior. Behavior influences energy balance more than energy balance influences behavior. The kinds of food you eat influence your behavior first; changes to behavior influence how much you eat; how much you eat affects energy balance. If this weren't obviously true, things like Semaglutide and Gastric Bypass would have zero effect. These affect behavior, not energy balance. You can control for calorie count in your study all you want, but pretending that behaviors will be equal regardless of diet in the real world is malpractice.

Fung may be right. You may Both be right, just looking at how a calorie is determined. You determine a calorie to be a unit of Energy derived from breakdown of APT WITHIN the body. how is caloric content within the food determined? if it is determined the way Fung says-by stuff being burnt in a laboratory-setting and the amount of heat produced measured-then He is also right because like He says, not all the caloric content of a food may be absorbed by the intestine, it will depend on the type of food+various other factors. but the entire content is burnt within laboratory-setting during the procedure, no? regards.

What is different in energy balance is when comparing a 25 year old to a 65 year old. Herein lies the difference from the point of energy required to sustain good health. A 25 yer old need to maintain his health and get 3000 calories for his muscle and exercise needs. This is not true for a 65 year old, who needs only 2000 calories for the same needs including autophagy requirements. The 65 year old needs to consume less carbs/proteins to sustaining his health. In this regard, all calories are not the same. There is a physiological difference and not a biochemical one.

If I reduce the number of calories in my food, exercising the same, I lose weight. If I increase exercise, ceteris paribus , same thing. Or I can increase calories or decrease exercise and get the opposite effect. My measurement instruments are somewhat crude - data from MyFitnessPal and readings from my Fitbit smartwatch - but the measurements are pretty consistent and long usage has taught me how to adjust. I keep good records, going back years.. This is just the way it works. For an amateur bodybuilder like me, it’s just axiomatic. I’m 76, btw, so I’ve clocked some mileage on this issue. Thanks for your presentations, Nick. You’re one of my go-to guys.🙏

I've tried many diets and it always comes down to controlling appetite. Whether I eat too many carbs or protein or fat doesn't matter (or don't exercise enough to compensate). If I'm not in a deficit I'm not losing weight. Tough struggle for many of us and probably why the newer anti-appetite drugs like Mounjaro are becoming so popular.

While a calorie is a calorie do our bodies use all calories from different types of food the same? So what kind of nutrition is drawn from a donut the same as a steak?

Units of heat so yes each calories is equal still no utility for fat loss since we aren't closed loop systems

Thank you for the great content. What is the mechanism by which (anecdotal - in my experience) a calorie deficit (say, from 2500 kcal / day to 1500 kcal / day results in weight loss at first but then slows and weight plateaus at the new lower calorie number.

Thats why I kept telling people there's no need to count calories. Just rhat I couldn't explain it well enough. But now I think I can, tnx to you. I've lost 20kg in less then 6 months by implementing autophagy, supplements & lighter diet (less junk food). So no need for counting calories or using a kitchen scale.

It now makes sense why I didn't lose weight without drastically eating less. Even when doing omad. My issue was always being fearful of not eating enough, which I could never figure out, since all I ever heard was if you restrict calories too much, ones metabolism slows down. Very confusing. It led me to wonder - how do bariatric surgery patients lose so much weight? Does their metabolism slow down too? This video did help me immensely. But the mtabolism issue still confounds me. If I truly know what to do, I'll do it. Im tired of being fat!!

I'm amazed at the idiocy of this diatribe. OF COURSE it's about nutrients making calories different. That you didn't get this is astounding. You are proof that all gray matter between human ears are not the same.

Yes, "calorie" is only a measurement of energy much like BTU's It is other factors that determine how much of that energy is able to be used or absorbed by whatever appliance you are using. (think of your body as an appliance too!) If I put diesel calories into an appliance designed to use gasoline, many of the "calories" will not get used. And vice-versa, if you put gasoline into an appliance designed to use diesel, perhaps virtually all of the "calories" will get used but might damage the appliance in the process.

Buttom line, a calorie as a measure of energy is equal, don't matter the food source. However, for the purposes of gaining or losing body fat, not all calories are equal. When you eat food, it generally either get burned up as heat, goes into cells for energy or fat for storage. Depending on the type of food and the amount of food you eat can dictate how that food will be used up in your body. If u eat more energy then you cel.s need the food will float around your blood and insulin will upload it to fat stores, if you change to no carb diet, the body will be loo,ing for carbs else where. Bottom line , keep I suline low, buy either eating less than your body need or get rid of carbs.

~ I like how Nicholas stays with scientific facts and does not over analyze everything. Nice 👌 • Who said this ? " Calories count - but don't count calories. "