They are not restricting their calories either. Some of those guys eat 6000 cals per day. I had some Mexican plumbers and electricians working in my condo this week and those guys can eat!

For physical exercise to make a large difference, it has to be combined with caloric restriction or carb and caloric restriction to a lesser extent. People in Africa aren't skinny simply because they walk all the time, they walk all the time and don't eat enough calories to gain weight.

And when the 300 lb person walks to get the morning paper, he/she is burning twice as many calories as the 150 pound person. Overweight people get lots of exercise just in routine activities. The extra exercise doesn't make then lose weight.

You do realize that in point #3, that "attractive" is purely subjective. I can't say I find the really buff guys attractive as they tend to be really high maintenance. Noticeably buff would be a good third category (minus the attractive).

In my view, exercise is most valuable to maintain and sculpture one's physique, especially resistance workouts. I will readily agree that reducing bodyfat % to around 5% requires both rigorous physical exertion combined with low-carb eating at a level slightly below calorie equilibrium.

This has little bearing for most people embarking on weight loss. Initially, for the moderate to severe overweight, cutting the carbs will have much larger effect than exercise. Of course, ideally, engaging in both will result in the fastest weight loss possible while sparing as much muscle loss as possible.

However, the overriding factor is dietary change. For most people, that alone will allow for "normal" weight loss much more so than increase physical activity.

Of course, once body fat reaches around 10 - 12% (for men, and about 15 - 18% for women), then exercise takes on a crucial role along with monitoring calorie intake, in my view.

To be sure, there is a definite element of subjectivity in making judgments about who is and is not attractive, but I disagree the quality of being attractive is purely subjective. For example, you rarely see obese people depicted in great art or in TV and magazine ads designed to sell things through sex appeal. Rather, certain body types and physiques are displayed over and over again. There is a reason for that, namely, that artists and marketers understand which physical types are considered attractive by most people's standards.

That said, I do think you do make a fair point; we've all got our own ideas of what's attractive. All I'm trying to say is that nobody gets to category 3 without rigorous exercise, so telling people not to exercise is patently wrong advice for anyone who wants to keep weight off and become noticably buff.

I think a large part of the disagreement here may be over what constitutes exercise. When I read the claim that studies allegedly show that exercise provides no benefit for fat loss, the first thing I want to know is what did the researchers define as exercise?

If we're talking about 20 minutes of strolling 2 or 3 times a week, well of course that's going to be worthless. If that is the definition of exercise for purposes of this discussion, then I agree you might as well not do it.

My concept of worthwhile exercise for fat loss is 40 minutes or more of rigorous cardio exercise that gets your heart rate elevated and keeps it elevated the whole time you're exercising and leaves you drenched in sweat from head to toe when it's over. In my experience, there's value in this type of exercise in conjuction with a LC diet for fat loss. It's one of the main reasons I'm not pushing 300 any more.

"I have to agree with that. For most people, it will require caloric restriction and possibly more movement. In the undeveloped world, people do more physical labor and walk more. Our ancestors also did more physical labor and walked more. The studies based on exercise 3 times per week may be misleading in that regard. That's really not much exercise compared to years of physical labor and walking daily. "

I agree. I always say no amount of exercise makes up for a desk job! We don't drive at all and I haven't since my early 20's for alot of reasons, but a major component is because I simply by default walk much more than the average person and it has kept me much healthier over the years (not thinner, mind you). It's unbelievable how stupid people think walking is, despite all the evidence.

I don't really buy the stuff about Africans all being thin - there are tons of very heavy people in Africa - many of them like the huge Nigerian traditional women, are much healthier than us. My friend just got back with pictures of her husband's family in Tanzania where they live in a rural community and farm - they are not thin and they eat a lot of carbs on their traditional diet.

Janine

I don't think all Africans are thin either. It is a huge continent. I was referring to thin people in the undeveloped world who are not meeting or exceeding their basic caloric requirement and some places in Africa came to mind. That's probably because I spent a summer in Malawi and have those images seared into my mind.

I never equated being overweight to being unhealthy until I started paying attention to some of the crazy news stories which came to my attention here. Sometimes I wonder if the entire obesity epidemic isn't a bigger, fatter lie than the low-fat dogma.

See now, you just changed the assertion....the question isn't whether exercise has no effect on fat loss or not.....Taubes is clear when he's asserted that exercise does not increase weight loss - and that is the difference, a big difference.

There is good data that shows that some types of exercise change the composition of the weight lost - more fat, yet on the scale it is similar, in that the weight lost between groups is not statistically significant.

Ever hear of Peter Rubens?

"Sometimes I wonder if the entire obesity epidemic isn't a bigger, fatter lie than the low-fat dogma."

Yup - and it's so sad because it messes up people's thinking. I took a Mommy's boot camp class at my local playground last night organized by some local moms. The one whose husband does the training said she was really dismayed because people assumed she was fit because she remained thin even after she stopped working out to have kids. She could have easily bought into that, as many people do, but she had the sense to know it doesn't work that way and she had to do something for her health. It works the other way, too - heavy people underestimate all the time how fit they are, just because of how they look and they don't sign up for things just because of their weight. I definitely think it's possible to be fit and fat - I see very brave people doing it all the time.

I think that mortality from all causes is lowest among people who are in the overweight category.

Janine

Janine

I found a good article in Scientific American titled Obesity: an Overblown Epidemic:

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id...-overblown-epid

There is an argument in support of why the US needs to improve its educational system.

Ya think?

I barely paid attention, skipped most of my classes and STILL knew who Rubens was. Apparently, I accidentally learned more in high school during the late 70's early 80's than kids are being taught NOW!