[HN Gopher] Lose weight the slow and incredibly difficult way ___________________________________________________________________ Lose weight the slow and incredibly difficult way Author : gHeadphone Score : 374 points Date : 2022-09-22 09:04 UTC (13 hours ago) (HTM) web link (nautil.us) (TXT) w3m dump (nautil.us) | causi wrote: | I thoroughly enjoyed What If 2. I was, however, quite | disappointed he chose to mock the "balloon one atom thick" | question instead of answering it. | B1FF_PSUVM wrote: | What was the question? My search-fu is failing there ... | causi wrote: | If you inflated a normal party balloon until its skin was one | atom thick, how large would the balloon have to be? | B1FF_PSUVM wrote: | Thanks, it looks pretty reasonable, except for rearranging | the molecular bonds like atoms were shingles. | | Assuming that was possible, it might be just a matter of | r-squared - supposing we started with a million-atom thick | skin, stretching the radius by one thousand should do it. | scythe wrote: | I assume that's why he didn't bother answering -- you | just take the volume of rubber, divide by the covalent | radius of carbon, and plug into A = 4 pi r^2. | bombcar wrote: | That's sad to hear, a big part of the fun was answering | "stupid/impossible" questions by assuming whatever makes them | impossible was actually possible. | janandonly wrote: | Clever to print one chapter in the Nautilus magazine. | | It's basically free advertisement for his new book. | elil17 wrote: | I hate all these click-bait articles. Losing weight is simple, | it's just CICO. Calories In, Crust of the earth Out | | Edit: I feel like a lot of people are arguing about something | that should be considered totally uncontroversial, basic physics. | Before you get all worked up over this, please look up Yuri | Gagarin. His weight loss journey absolutely proved that it is | possible to lose 100% of your body weight through simple orbital | mechanics and hundreds of people have followed in his footsteps | and experienced similar results. There is not room for debate, | this is a proven weight loss method and what the I'm suggesting | is essentially a very similar thing, but one that could help a | lot more people at once. | oDot wrote: | Someone can correct me here, but I believe CICO is false, due | to the the difference of efficiency in difference foods and the | different people consuming them, leading to significant | differences compared to CICO values. | parker_mountain wrote: | CICO is not false, and that is at most a +-10% variance. Food | absorption is definitely is a part of Calories In. If you're | worried that you're absorbing more or less calories versus | other people, adjust your Calories In. | | More likely, you are miscounting calories - a common mistake | that people trying to lose weight make. For example, you'd be | surprised how many calories are in that packet of creamy | sauce that came with your fast food! | | CICO is hard to stick to, because we are biologically wired | to enjoy high calorie diets. As a result, lots of people have | come up with justifications as to why it wasn't their fault | that they failed to adhere to it. | | The reality is that weight loss is simple. It's very | difficult, especially if you're not willing to completely | overhaul your diet and relationship with food as an American. | francisofascii wrote: | > weight loss is simple. It's very difficult | | Wait, which one is it? Simple or very difficult. Lol. I | think you meant the calorie math is simple. | Kranar wrote: | The opposite of simple is not difficult, it's complex. | The opposite of difficult is not simple, it's easy. | | Simplicity has to do with the effort needed to understand | something, difficulty has to do with the effort needed to | perform an action. It's not unusual that something that | requires little effort to understand requires a great | deal of effort to execute. | TaupeRanger wrote: | Don't eat breakfast and don't gorge on snacks before | bedtime. That will be a huge benefit to most people that | struggle. Now...getting the willpower to stick with it is | another battle... | [deleted] | parker_mountain wrote: | Personally, I drink these 100 cal nutrition drinks for | breakfast, or have a banana, and a sparkling water. | | I've settled on | | - Very lightweight breakfast (~100 cal) | | - Light lunch (~700 cal) | | - Heavy dinner (~1400 cal) | | - Hard liquor only (tall single vodka/soda is my goto) | | You'll notice that's over 2000~ a day. I also walk a lot, | use an exercise bike instead of the couch when watching | TV, and bicycle everywhere I can. On lazy days, I adjust | downwards. | | One thing I've done that's helped a lot is eating a low | carb diet - I did keto, found it was incredible effective | in losing weight, but kinda brutal. Instead, a low carb | (non-ketosis) diet allows for some carbs but | significantly reduces "empty calories". | tsimionescu wrote: | Well, if your going to help us all lose serious weight | via CICO, I think having a big snack here and there is | more than deserved. | | After all, shooting any significant amount of the | planet's crust into space is definitely hungry work... | elil17 wrote: | I would say that overhauling your diet/relationship with | food is really not what it's about. It's about gathering | the necessary energy, resources, etc. to start putting | significant amounts of Earth's mass on an escape | trajectory. | elil17 wrote: | CICO is absolutely true, that's a fact. All you have to do is | look at the basic physics. If you reduce the mass of the | Earth by 50% (without decreasing your distance from Earths | center, a common trap people fall into when they're trying to | lose weight), you will lose 50% of your weight. | | Fad diets and "body mass" are, excuse my harsh language, B.S. | Yes they can contribute to weight loss but they are going to | let you lose 10 or 15 pounds tops. Reducing the weight of the | Earth, on the other hand, can get you to lose essentially any | amount of weight. | sshine wrote: | What a mike drop comment. | | I'm sorry, I went further down the thread, but it never got | better than this. | oDot wrote: | I take full credit for encouraging this | pydry wrote: | The trick to giving up cigarattes is not lighting them, | putting in your mouth and inhaling the smoke. | | CICO certainly isnt _false_. | screye wrote: | I love how you're committed to the bit now. | tsimionescu wrote: | It's the same bit as the article itself, right? | elil17 wrote: | Yes LOL | tsimionescu wrote: | I know you know, I was trying to see if the other | commenter does | screye wrote: | What is an article ? Is that the top comment you see | below the title when you open an HN post ? | elil17 wrote: | I truly find this thread so enjoyable. Just at my desk, | smiling. | jahnu wrote: | There are different ways to measure calories. In a | calorimeter you can measure all the calories in some stuff. | In your body the amount of calories available to your body to | digest is some amount less depending on what that stuff is. | This can vary from foodstuff to foodstuff by (iirc) about | 1-15% | | So one could be more accurate and say Available CaloriesICO I | guess | | Unless you are an athlete or have some condition the simple | CICO rule is accurate enough to be useful. Eat less, move | more, and weight will be lost (or at least gains will slow). | | None of this says anything about each person's own life | challenges that alter how difficult it is to do that. | Scoundreller wrote: | Wouldnt the undigested calories just get added into | calories out? | foobarian wrote: | Now that you mention it, I'm pretty sure modern | calorimeters won't catch the energy available via nuclear | reactions. What if our digestive tracts have evolved some | as-of-yet undiscovered mechanism to tap into that energy, | thereby invalidating all the "CICO" people's claims? Now | that would be a real pickle. | jahnu wrote: | Hark at Nibbler! | elil17 wrote: | I think that the energy density of rocket fuel is pretty | easy to measure. If you're trying to do a food powered | rocket it's true the energy measurements could get more | complicated. | bluGill wrote: | CICO is still true. While some foods can increase metabolism | (the other reply suggested up to 10% - sounds reasonable to | me), that is an increase in calories out. You can also | increase metabolism by exercising, or some drugs. | tsimionescu wrote: | What exactly does food have to do with CICO? | | You're certainly not going to get very far at ejecting the | earth's crust by burning food... | brippalcharrid wrote: | There's no reason why certain physically and | calorifically dense foods (eg. Christmas pudding) | couldn't necessarily be combined with oxidizers and | fitted into solid rocket motors, which could then be used | to launch significant chunks of the earth's crust out of | its gravity well. | selimthegrim wrote: | That's not why I nicknamed my chili recipe Red Mercury. | [deleted] | [deleted] | jasonpeacock wrote: | It's not. What you eat is just as important as how much you | eat. | | The body is complex, self-regulating system with hystersis and | set points. You should go learn about "metabolic syndrome". | | And everyone's body reacts differently, so there's no one | solution. | elil17 wrote: | >And everyone's body reacts differently, so there's no one | solution. | | Absolutely disagree. F = G(m1)(m2)/(r^2). It's that simple, | it's physics. Reduce m1 and your F goes down, same for | everybody on the planet. | aidenn0 wrote: | But how do you reduce m1 without reducing r? TFA | (correctly) points out that many attempts to reduce m1 will | also reduce r, which can be counterproductive. | monknomo wrote: | hollow earth - just find a way to eject the convenient | liquid layer inside the earth elsewhere | aidenn0 wrote: | Sure, there are ways around it, but someone who is only | given the "CICO" advice is likely to run afowl of r | naturally being correlated to m1. | jasonpeacock wrote: | It's not physics, it's biology. There are processes that | adjust and compensate to changes in the body and diet. | | For example, if my BMR is 3600cal, and I don't eat for a | day, why am I not 1lb lighter? | | Or if I fast for 5 days, why am I 13lbs lighter and not | 5lbs lighter? | | Why is it easier for obese people to lose weight initially, | but then harder to lose that last 10lbs? Which is also true | for non-obese people. | tsimionescu wrote: | You're not seeing the bigger picture. If we pull our work | together, we can all collectively lose significant | weight, and all it would take is a few measly kilometers | of the earth's crust being thrown off into space - this | is what this thread is all about! | | Discussing fat loss is really short sighted when ejecting | a little bit of mass could help the entire population | lose some weight forever. | Kranar wrote: | What's hilarious is that jasonpeacock didn't just avoid | reading the article, but it's clear that he also avoided | reading the very comment he replied to. | | It's like people just want to get outraged over nothing. | tsimionescu wrote: | And not once, but twice! | | Even though it's a lot of fun, it's honestly a bit eye | opening to see how little some people engage with the | substance of the comments they are replying to... | jasonpeacock wrote: | ok, jokes on me :) I did the read the article (and have | bought both books). | | but I've seen so much garbage about CICO that I took the | response seriously.. | tsimionescu wrote: | Yes, I've been there once or twice myself, no judgment on | you personally! The amount of people responding this way | was a bit surprising though. I will note that I | completely share your feelings about the boring version | of CICO. | stronglikedan wrote: | > these click-bait articles | | Did you read the article? It didn't seem like click-bait to me. | lovingCranberry wrote: | You didn't get the joke :( | | > Calories In, Crust of the earth Out | [deleted] | elil17 wrote: | I did. It gets into all this stuff about "density" and | "distance from the center of the Earth." I just feel like | that is missing the point. As I said, weight loss is simple | CICO, Calories In, Crust of the earth Out. You don't need to | think about it any more than that, no matter what "scientific | publications" like XKCD tell you. | Melatonic wrote: | Simple does not mean easy. In fact sometimes a simply difficult | problem is the hardest. | elil17 wrote: | That is absolutely true. I'm not trying to tell anyone this | isn't a hard challenge. But I think we can all lose weight | this way given enough effort. | themitigating wrote: | So you provide a single, simple method of weight loss and then | you edit your comment when attacked and add a single case of | weight loss to make your point. You then claim there's no | possibility for debate, it's proven, and you reiterate how | simple it is | poulpy123 wrote: | You misunderstand simple for easy, and the fact that you refer | to physics for something that belongs to biology and psychology | show that you don't really know what you're talking about | tsimionescu wrote: | Weight really has very little to do with biology, and nothing | to do with psychology. It is a simple matter of how much the | earth's mass bends space-time - the more mass we eject of the | earth, the less bent space-time will be in the vicinity, the | less we'll all weight. | | It really is the simplest weight loss method possible, it | will work for everyone living on the planet at once, and the | article presents it (and its difficulties) quite clearly - | not sure why you'd go off topic by talking about biology and | psychology. | jkqwzsoo wrote: | You're totally missing the joke. Read the article and check | back. | make3 wrote: | While this is true strictly speaking, whether weight-loss | actually happens is 99% a psychological thing, and ignoring | that is ridiculous. People aren't magical machines with | infinite, perfect willpower, ignoring that this is the main | factor is completely out of touch. That's what the whole | conversation is about, how to make it easier for people, more | realistic. Find foods that make people feel sated while still | eating less for example. Find ways to make habits. etc. | tsimionescu wrote: | Not really - your psychology really has absolutely nothing to | do with how much force the Earth exerts on you (and everyone | else). CICO captures this perfectly: the more Crust of the | earth Out, the less force the Earth will exert on us, so | we'll all weigh less. No amount of psychology will help or | prevent you from losing those newtons of weight! | d0mine wrote: | If it were that simple you and your car would be able to use | the same fuel--it is likely a bad idea in most cases. | skellera wrote: | I'm surprised how many people stopped reading at CICO. It's | like a meta example of clickbait in 3 sentences. | elil17 wrote: | Yes, next time I get annoyed at someone on HN I plan to | return to this thread and remind myself that I'm in the elite | 1% of commenters who actually read the article and the other | comments before I write something. | sshine wrote: | I'd get offended, but I wasn't paying enough attention to | what the conversation is about to understand what side to | be on! | dnissley wrote: | I think it's more that people did not even bother to open the | article | sagebird wrote: | Why go to space at all? Just stretch your arms until they form | a great circle around the Earth. Where your hands meet, hold a | dumbell the mass of your bodice. Once your hands interlock, you | can safely lift your feet from Earth's tyrannical force and you | will gracefully float like a ring of pure joy. | thfuran wrote: | But what if I don't have a bodice? Do I need to go get one or | can I just skip the dumbbell too? | shadowpho wrote: | 98% of people are unable to follow your "simple" idea. Hence, | it's not simple by definition. | | Furthermore, it's not that simple. Lots of other factors affect | metabolism, hunger and energy levels, all of which have huge | effect on weight loss\gain. | MuffinFlavored wrote: | It's simple by definition but not easy to do. Cravings (fat, | sugar, filling boredom with eating, depriving yourself from | flavor of diet soda/soda) is easier said than done. | elil17 wrote: | It's true, spending time eating can distract from the only | real way to lose weight, which is by reducing the mass of | the planet Earth. Stay focused, everyone! Together we can | do it. | bluGill wrote: | No way, I'm already at a good healthy weight. If I lose | 20 lbs my doctor will get concerned, and I'll end up | spending a lot of time getting tests for various cancers. | dwohnitmok wrote: | If you follow elil17's suggestion your concern is moot. | There won't be any doctors. Anywhere. | squeaky-clean wrote: | > Crust of the earth Out | | Read the linked article, they're making a pun. | throw0101c wrote: | > _Hence, it 's not simple by definition._ | | simple != {easy, convenient, _etc_ } | swyx wrote: | insert obligatory Rich Hickey mention | elil17 wrote: | Exactly, thank you. Simple != convenient is absolutely the | best way to summarize it. Losing weight this way is | extremely inconvenient. It does mean that earth will become | uninhabitable. But that does not mean that it's not worth | the hard work! | function_seven wrote: | You're ignoring genetics. We have evolved to store fat to | survive in harsh conditions, but this does not mean we | can survive a missing crust and exposed mantle. | | Perhaps CRISPR can help? | parker_mountain wrote: | > Lots of other factors affect metabolism, hunger and energy | levels, all of which have huge effect on weight loss\gain. | | Metabolism/energy levels/etc are Calories Out. If your | metabolism is low, your Calories Out is lower. | | Look at BMR, such as | https://www.active.com/fitness/calculators/bmr | | Very simple. CICO. | | e: there are relatively rare medical conditions, such as | water retention, that can affect weight loss. A better term | might be "body fat percentage". But the end result is that if | you want to lose body fat, consistently intake less calories | than your body uses for energy. | elil17 wrote: | I think if we're looking at body fat percentage that's a | very different question, and something that's probably more | in the realm of biology than physics. But weight loss is | simple, it's not going to be effected by medical conditions | or "metabolism" if you can just reduce the mass of the | Earth. | elil17 wrote: | People are always going to make these arguments. Yes, I know | that there's scientific evidence that your mass effects your | weight and that hunger, metabolism, etc. effect your mass. | But we have to look at effect sizes. Whatever diet you try, | you are only every going to have, at most, a modest effect on | your own _mass_ which will indirectly lower your weight. | | I challenge people to go out there and start launching chunks | of matter on escape trajectories from Earth. Yes it is hard, | yes it takes a lot of energy, but you will start reducing the | force of gravitational attraction acting on you. These are | real results, not just a temporary change. | checkyoursudo wrote: | Wouldn't it be easier for me to go live on the moon | instead? Or better yet, a nice, comfy asteroid? | tsimionescu wrote: | Easier, but far more selfish. By helping reduce the | Earth's mass, you not only help reduce your own weight, | but the weight of all current and future inhabitants of | the Earth! | idrios wrote: | I'm inclined to agree with the parent comment on this, | maybe argue they're being conservative. I'd say closer to | 99.999% of people would struggle with this weight-loss | plan, and hurling chunks of matter from your backyard to | out of earth's orbit doesn't sound simple to me. But I'm | not gonna knock an idea before I've tried it. | elil17 wrote: | Fair, but if just 1 person can do it, it works for | everyone on Earth. | idrios wrote: | True. And I suppose it does get easier the further you | go, what with escape velocity going down as you remove | more mass.. | EGreg wrote: | Have you personally shown people how to do this? Can you | link to some testimonials or endorsements from former | clients? | | After all, anyone can say anything, and even point to | lottery winners, but I want to learn from the best what | it takes to actually win the lottery. I myself am not a | success coach but the other day, someone very successful | told me that anyone can succeed at a startup. All they | have to do is get their billionaire parents to give them | a small loan of 10 million dollars, and let them iterate | through and fail a few times. The key is to go back to | the family trough and then you can get bailed out | multiple times. If your parents are not billionaires then | there are ways to fix it. This can work for anyone. He | showed that such an approach actually pays off because in | the end you make back everything you lost AND you can now | afford an amazing car and TV! | | His friend said he was "reducing a hard problem to a much | harder problem". But what does his friend know, he is | poor by comparison and seems bitter | throwaway729562 wrote: | It's simple but not easy. | gloryjulio wrote: | Simple != easy. Simple/complex vs easy/hard if this | illustration helps | gcanyon wrote: | "simple" <> "easy" | gilded-lilly wrote: | I once lost 17kg (50 pounds) by caloric restriction (500cal | deficit per day). I've got news for you: you will be slightly | hungry most of the time. Meals will be the highlight of your | day. | Broken_Hippo wrote: | You only know that _you_ were slightly hungry most of the | time. For _you_ , meals were the highlight of your day. | | But you didn't _need_ to go hungry. Folks lose weight by | caloric restriction and fill up on a lot of fruits and | (non-starchy) vegetables. Some folks have luck with legumes | and beans and filling foods. Some folks snack and don 't | have meals. | | And the experience of hunger changes, too! Sometimes, in | the same person and definitely between folks. | | Examples: I used to smoke. Nicotine is an _excellent_ | appetite suppressant, and honestly made it easier to lose | weight. | | High stress can make me lose most of my appetite or do the | opposite. | | I menstruate. A few days each month, I have indescribable | hunger. It is hormone driven, and unlike other hungers I've | experienced. Suddenly, I feel like I've skipped meals. It | consumes me. I can't do anything about it, but if I eat a | little, I can go back to paying attention to other things. | | Not me personally, but there are a number of drugs that | increase your appetite, too. | | Again, the point really is that hunger isn't as simple as | "you'll be slightly hungry most of the time". | gilded-lilly wrote: | Interesting. You may be right - in fact, I'd never | considered filling up on broccoli or other calorically | thin ingredients to suppress hunger. I was just working | on the assumption that hunger is the body's response to | caloric deficit (in the absence of drugs). | addisonl wrote: | > 98% of people are unable to follow | | This would imply 98% of people are overweight which, even in | America, is far from the truth. | elil17 wrote: | I think they key question is "overweight" compared to what? | Yes, far less than 98% of people are overweight compared to | a baseline created by doctors that was essentially biased | by the existing distribution of weights in western society. | But 100% of Americans are overweight compared to how much | they would weigh if the Earth's mass was reduced by 50%. | parker_mountain wrote: | Yeah, it's much closer to 65%. And it's been constantly | ticking upwards for years. Haha, uh oh. | | e: overweight Americans are about 32.5% of the population. | Obese is another 36.5%. | notyourday wrote: | > Furthermore, it's not that simple. Lots of other factors | affect metabolism, hunger and energy levels, all of which | have huge effect on weight loss\gain. | | It is that simple: people simply are looking for an excuses | why they aren't willing to do it. | | I'm going to again plugin this guy | https://hubermanlab.com/how-to-lose-fat-with-science- | based-t... because his lectures are amazing and he breaks | down the actual scientific consensus on these topics rather | well. He is neuroscientist and tenured associate professor in | the Department of Neurobiology at the Stanford University | School of Medicine who has made contributions to the brain | development, brain plasticity, and neural regeneration and | repair fields. | g_log wrote: | CICO is true, of course, but it doesn't do justice to how | interesting the whole topic of weight loss is. Why do some | people need more food to reach satiety, why do some people move | more, for example. | tsimionescu wrote: | To be fair, in the CICO model, everyone on Earth would lose | the exact same amount of weight, regardless of any of the | factors you mention - or at least, the weight loss we'd | experience from truly following the tenets of CICO could | easily offset any individual mass modification from food or | exercise! | | It's also true that you'd get far more, and quicker, weight | loss by increasing your distance from the earth instead of | reducing the earth's mass, but that seems a little selfish... | iamthepieman wrote: | This is utter trash and clearly you're a shill for the CICO | industry. The real secret to weight loss is CICU Calories in, | Centripetal force Up. This has been suppressed for decades by | rocket scientist, the government, Elon Musk and other elites. | | The only real thing that will be shrinking under CICO is your | bank account as it's drained dry by the subsidies for crust | flingers. | | Under CICU your weight will go down as energy is expended to | increase the rotational speed of the earth. This will not only | leave the crust intact but would also allow us to see multiple | sunsets/sunrises in a single "day". | allsunny wrote: | i get the joke but reminds me of a good talk where some | googlers got a little upset when gary taubes started going into | the problems with CICO thinking. | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6vpFV6Wkl4 | karaterobot wrote: | It's never been this evident to me how few people on HN even | read the comments they spend time replying to. | pid-1 wrote: | Also, you don't need git, just memorize code changes. | [deleted] | secabeen wrote: | My favorite fact about weight loss is that most of the actual | physical loss of atoms is through your breath. | geertj wrote: | Yes! Through CO2 to be precise. | swyx wrote: | so does that mean working out more => more breath/CO2 => more | weight loss? | | trying to reconcile this with the conventional advice that | weight loss is 90% about eating right | nashequilibrium wrote: | I love how he captures it in a balloon during this Ted talk | on fatloss. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuIlsN32WaE | space_fountain wrote: | The problem with working out to loose weight is that your | body knows it takes more calories and so it happily ups | your appetite | jvalencia wrote: | I can't remember where I read it unfortunately, but yes, | breathing harder will contribute to weight loss. | | edit: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/breathing- | exercises-for... | aaronblohowiak wrote: | the fork is mightier than the metabolism! | | the breath thing is how the metabolic waste products leave | the body (when your fat gets broken down eventually the | mass of it leaves your body as co2). | | also, the amount of hours you spend not working out | dramatically trumps the amount of hours you spend not | working out so working out itself doesnt change your mean.. | DiggyJohnson wrote: | I don't see why these things must be as interconnected as | you're question suggests. | | If you have a relatively constant outflow of breath, | measurably but not drastically affected by exercise, the | CICO conception could still account for the net difference | in body mass. | hnuser123456 wrote: | You are always breathing, but you breath about 3x more | while you're working out cardio style, but you're not | significantly changing your average breath rate for the day | unless you're working out for hours daily. 24 "rest-hours | of breath" on a lazy day, 26 "rest-hours of breath" on a | day when you spend a full hour doing cardio/running/etc, so | spending an hour doing intense workouts only increased your | carbon exhaled by 8.3%. Also, somewhere around 2/3 (if not | 3/4+) of the weight you lose per breath is simply water | vapor restored when you have your next drink, not carbon | atoms being attached to oxygen molecules in the air. Also, | working out makes you hungry, rightfully so (in a world | that isn't essentially full of infinite tasty food for | those of us with a little money). The only way to lose | significant weight is to feel hungry, and to stop eating | before you "feel" full. This is de facto psychologically | insurmountable (or nigh unsustainable) to everyone who is | overweight and wants to lose it but just can't bear to be | hungry enough for long enough. Spoken as someone slightly | overweight who just needs to feel a little hungry for a | couple months to get to a much better weight. And of | course, once you've made a habit of eating over your ideal | calories, even after you've lost the weight, your stomach | is still bigger and it's effortless to go back to eating | your usual large-self amounts even after you've lost all | the weight, and go right back to large-self weight. | tsimionescu wrote: | It's important to note that in the method of weight loss | discussed here, you don't have to lose a single atom from | your own body, but your weight can go down by an almost | arbitrary amount. For example, Yuri Gagarin had his weight | reduced to almost 0kg, together with his rocket, while not | losing a single atom (talking about the indie of the cabin, | of course). | | It takes a lot of effort, but you don't have to feel hungry, | and the results will beat exercise by orders of magnitude in | terms of pure weight loss! | ideamotor wrote: | So we should all be wearing masks after-all. | bergenty wrote: | I actually dislike any extended conversation on losing weight. | Just stop eating is basically the answer. It sounds blunt but | it feels like we need to hammer the message in. | torotonnato wrote: | Ehhh too much work, suck out the nucleus with a long straw and | spit it far enough | OkayPhysicist wrote: | The longest possible straw is only like 30 ft long. | perlgeek wrote: | Kind of a meta comment, it's always interesting to see / hear | that when a somewhat well-known author writes a new book, you see | interviews with them cropping up on "all the usual" places, other | outlets write about it etc. | | It's nice with something like "What if? 2", because Randall is an | interesting podcast guest, and there are just so many different | things to talk about. | | It's a bit more annoying in other cases, where within two month | you hear the same author on 5 different podcasts, and the author | says the same thing on each of them. Time to use the skip button. | | I guess that's simply how it works nowadays in publishing: | writing the book is work, but then you also need to spend quite | some time promoting it, in the hopes not only that it boosts | sales, but also that the boosted sales put the book in some | bestseller lists, boosting sales even further. | teddyh wrote: | > _within two month you hear the same author on 5 different | podcasts, and the author says the same thing on each of them._ | | They've received media training to do exactly that, to repeat | their main talking points _no matter_ what the interview | questions are, and normal journalists are trained to ignore it | and just move on to the next question, so it usually works for | them both (but us listeners and readers are left with the | situation you describe). Sometimes, though, the people asking | the questions aren't willing to ignore it, and if the | interviewee does not catch on to this and adjust their answers | accordingly, the interview can go disastrously wrong: | | https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/woody-harrelson-reddit... | toyg wrote: | I know for a fact that publishers will now vet _authors_ as | well as manuscripts. A nice-looking and personable author, | preferably with a well-oiled presence on social networks, has a | much higher chance of getting published than the rest of the | pack; that 's because publishers now "sell" _the author_ as | much as the book. | bombcar wrote: | More importantly to the publisher, the author sells | themselves. Most books are basically flops and so having a | built-in market is a huge advantage for the publisher. | | Also saves them having to do much publicity, too. | ska wrote: | Publishers have always "sold" authors, it's the how that's | changing. In 1990 internet/social presence probably wasn't | seen as meaningful, now it's just one of the standard tools | in the bag. | karaterobot wrote: | If we're selecting for mediagenic authors with a lot of | Twitter followers, we're going to get the culture we deserve. | I grant that publishers have always selected for things other | than the quality of the book alone, just observing that this | has an effect. | ephbit wrote: | Makes me ask myself: which hugely successful works of | fiction (excluding stuff like the Bible) are out there | convincing readers solely through their content because the | author remains anonymous/pseudonymous and how can they | reliably be found? | karaterobot wrote: | First thing that came to mind was Elena Ferrante, but | also one of my favorite authors, K.J. Parker (who is no | longer pseudonymous but was for a long time). | | But why does it have to be fiction, and why does the | author have to be anonymous? There's a big difference | between being anonymous and being a social media | influencer: I'd guess most of the best and most | influential fiction and non-fiction authors have fallen | in that range. | | The thing to avoid is a world where publishers would say | "Sorry, Mr. Faulkner, we won't be publishing your little | book until you get a few more followers." | ephbit wrote: | > But why does it have to be fiction .. ? | | My immediate thought was: would it even work to publish a | non fiction book anonymously? | | > There's a big difference between being anonymous and | being a social media influencer. | | Agree. My reasoning was: even without any digital social | media, charisma (and other factors such as having | connections or previous success) is probably a trait that | positively influences an author's success. If you want | "pure quality of the oevre itself" to speak for itself, | then shouldn't it have been published anonymously? | bluGill wrote: | top web fiction, royal road, and so on - there are a lot | of places budding authors can post their fiction. Since | we are talking about unknown authors the burden is on you | to find them. That means get off the top lists and search | things that are way down in the rankings (most of the | ones on the top of the list will publish on Amazon in the | future as that is where the money is) | digdugdirk wrote: | This is actually one of the more important aspects in | publishing. But its not so much the author themselves being | sellable, its the built in sales they might have from their | social media audience. The conversion rate from marketing to | their own audience is _much_ higher than otherwise, and is | enough for even small publishers to justify an initial print | run of a niche book. | SleepilyLimping wrote: | You must fandom everything you can. | mathattack wrote: | I'd the book is a one-off you see this a lot. The best podcasts | are with people who aren't promoting a specific item, just | themselves as experts. You get more variety that way. In | general if they're on a book tour, I only listen once no matter | how much I like them. | jimmydddd wrote: | Tim Ferriss was one of the first to avoid a traditional book | tour when marketing his first book (4 hr work week). Instead, | he reached out to bloggers, which was a new strategy at the | time. He's written that he would tailor each interaction for | the culture of each blog. So he'd use a portion about fitness | for a fitness blog, and a portion about finance for a finance | blog, etc. At least that mixed it up a bit. | fknorangesite wrote: | > nowadays | | When has it _not_ worked like this? | [deleted] | toyg wrote: | J.D. Salinger. Samuel Beckett. Anybody writing under | pseudonym, a practice that used to be extremely common | (Ellery Queen, etc). | fknorangesite wrote: | Did you think I meant that every single author always goes | on a press tour? If so, why? | perlgeek wrote: | I guess I just wasn't aware of it in the past. Back when I | listened to radio, I wouldn't often come across the author | doing interviews, but then I only switched between 3 or maybe | 4 different stations... | VyseofArcadia wrote: | Hm, I was going to say before podcasts, but then there's TV. | So I was going to say before TV, but I bet it was like this | on the radio. | | Let's go with the 19th century, when it would have been more | difficult to read five of the same interview with someone in | five different newspapers. | VoodooJuJu wrote: | Even the Romans did this: | | https://pressbooks.bccampus.ca/spectaclesintheromanworldsou | r... | ska wrote: | > I guess that's simply how it works nowadays in publishing: | | Not nowadays, this is how it has always worked. Promotion is | always trying to find cost effective ways to raise awareness, | using whatever tools are available in the budget that makes | sense for the project. | | You are listening to podcasts that have a correlation, in the | days before podcasts you might have noticed the same things | with talk shows or magazine articles, the main difference being | you might consume fewer of those so not notice as much. | soneca wrote: | I think it is how it works since always. Book tours on | bookstores and book interviews (newspapers, tv, and radio) are | a way of promoting book sales on launch for some time. Just | added podcasts to the mix. | fasthands9 wrote: | I do sorta wonder how often people are turning down podcasts. | | Will MacAskill was on several of my favorite podcasts lately. | Presumably it makes the interview slightly easier for the | interviewer when there is a clear argument/thesis of the | author but also seems like he would have been just as good of | a guest 4 or 8 months ago (and 4 or 8 months from now) as he | is now. And seeing he always has a desire to promote his | work/his view I don't know why he would ever say no to a | legitimate podcast. | | Was Will saying no to them then? Or asking people to wait? Or | is much of this still sorta random and it takes the | initiative of a third party PR person to connect people? | | (Replace whatever author you are thinking of with Will) | jagraff wrote: | This has been extremely noticeable with the author of What We | Owe The Future, he's been on every podcast I listen to over the | last month or so | TideAd wrote: | In many cases, the point of writing the book is getting the | book tour. | | Ever thought "wow this book really should have just been a blog | post"? Well, there is no such thing as a blog post tour. | lbotos wrote: | depending on the topic a "blog post tour" may be speaking at | conferences. | perlgeek wrote: | What do the authors get out of the book tour? Fame, maybe? | bombcar wrote: | Unless the author is relatively well known, the book tour | often barely pays for itself. In some cases the author gets | to travel "on the company dime" and basically tour the | country/world and have the expenses paid by some book | sales. | | The author may also get a much larger cut of any books sold | during the tour, even without "signing fees" or similar. | bluGill wrote: | They are hoping to get the big break. That can be people | who see them locally buying a copy (most people will buy a | book when the author is there, but may not even look at the | book otherwise, so you can count on a few sales if you | appear in a bookstore), but ideally is moves onto they | actually read the book and like it enough to tell all their | friends. You can get a big bonus if a someone well known | happens to be in the crowd and tells all their followers. | fragmede wrote: | Money, traditionally. | umeshunni wrote: | It's not just for authors. You'll observe the same for new | movies, TV shows, product launches etc. It's not a coincidence | that leaks and behind the scenes articles and videos pop up | when something new is launching. That's just how the PR | machinery works. | lotsofpulp wrote: | These comprise of more than 50% of reddit posts on all the | popular subreddits. You can filter any post title with a | celebrity or upcoming release of media in it as an ad. | spywaregorilla wrote: | > It's not a coincidence that leaks and behind the scenes | articles and videos pop up when something new is launching. | | Can't leak something after it's been released though | yakubin wrote: | There are sometimes leaks of deleted scenes from films. | psd1 wrote: | I bought the director's cut of _Home Plumbing_ and there | were deleted scenes of leaks | VoodooJuJu wrote: | This sounds like advertising 101 for just about anything with | sizeable resources behind it - big movies, AAA game titles, | gladiator matches [1], etc. | | [1] | https://pressbooks.bccampus.ca/spectaclesintheromanworldsour... | adamsmith143 wrote: | >I guess that's simply how it works nowadays in publishing: | writing the book is work, but then you also need to spend quite | some time promoting it, in the hopes not only that it boosts | sales, but also that the boosted sales put the book in some | bestseller lists, boosting sales even further. | | PR Tours for Books have been around for decades. The format may | have changed but the concept has been around for a long time. | andai wrote: | I thought the question was how many kilograms of dirt would you | have to physically carry into outer space (eg. up a really tall | ladder) in order to burn 20 lbs (70,000 calories). | | If my calculations are correct: 1 (kilo)calorie is 4184 joules. | So you need to burn 70,000 * 4184 = 292,880,000 joules. It takes | 9.8 joules to lift 1kg by 1m. Using an "outer space" definition | of 100km (100,000) meters, it takes 980,000 joules to lift 1kg of | dirt to space. | | Dividing 292,888,000 joules (the amount of energy we want to | burn) by 980,000 (the energy it takes to carry 1kg to space), we | get about 299 kilos. You'd have to carry about 300 kg up a ladder | to outer space to lose 20 lbs. (Subtract your body weight, of | course!) | | (Accounting for the fat burned along the way is left as an | exercise to the reader ;) | petercooper wrote: | I'm glad to hear there's a follow up book to _What If?_ ( _How | To_ was also good, of course) - it 's one of the more | entertaining, yet educational, audiobooks I've listened to (and | it really does work well in audio form unlike much non-fiction, | plus Wil Wheaton is the narrator). | causi wrote: | Personally I can't stand Wheaton's narration. He's an | incredible presenter in video content but when he's doing | narration he always does this voice that just _drips_ | arrogance. | throwaway675309 wrote: | I'm in the same boat as you, I don't think that he's doing it | intentionally but I just don't believe he possesses a smooth | enough modulation to enjoy listening for long periods of time | as you would with an audiobook. | chinchilla2020 wrote: | If you change the mass of the earth then you have a new orbit | problem to contend with too. | olddustytrail wrote: | You don't really. Stays the same. | function_seven wrote: | How very heliocentric of you. Some of us worry about the | moon! | Nition wrote: | > You didn't actually need to remove mass from the Earth, you | just needed to go under it. You could've avoided all that work | with a comparatively simple tunnel. | | Or a really tall ladder. | serf wrote: | This whole thread has taught me more about group-outrage and | psychology than physics and weight-loss _by a long shot_. | jeffrallen wrote: | That was.... highly unexpected. | impoppy wrote: | So I wondered if I could lose some weight if I teleported on top | of Everest and started searching for formulas. Apparently, this | question is already answered and the answer is yes - I could lose | half a pound. | | https://www.quora.com/On-top-of-Mount-Everest-is-the-force-o... | | So yeah, if you have resources to shave off that much of Earth | surface, then you have resources to construct a high enough | building to lose those 10 pounds which would have been _a lot_ | easier. | refracture wrote: | His humor goes over my head sometimes but he does such a good job | of making it just digestible enough for the lay-person like me. | Well done! | jon-wood wrote: | His ability to make what is actually quite complex science | accessible is mind blowing. What If, How To, and now What If 2 | are some of my eight year old son's favourite books. I'm | absolutely certain he doesn't really grasp any of the maths, | but he adores when things going terribly wrong as a result of | those maths. | sixstringtheory wrote: | > You could've avoided all that work with a comparatively simple | tunnel. | | Having just dug several holes 3' deep and 8" wide for a small | project, that's definitely still work XD | | I'd actually be interested to read a What If on digging a tunnel | to the other side of the earth. Oh... https://what- | if.xkcd.com/135/ | 988747 wrote: | I guess digging 10-15 meters of that tunnel towards the Earth | core with a shovel would be enough for an average person to | lose 20 pounds :) | d-us-vb wrote: | He just needs to learn the Soleus Pushup. | screye wrote: | so meta. | | meta comment - it this the most memes an HN thread has | tolerated ? | intrasight wrote: | You'd lose about 10% if you ascended to the ISS. Sounds MUCH | easier. | mckirk wrote: | When you see that art style, you know it's going to be good. | xracy wrote: | Could you build a giant space straw that sucks out the molten | core instead of peeling away layers, and otherwise leave the | crust alone so you don't make volcanos everywhere? | mattnewton wrote: | Good news: the crust is still technically there Bad news: a | bunch of it collapsed in the middle and the resulting energy | heated it to make more magma and the crust is unrecognizable | lapetitejort wrote: | Lets just hope it swirls in the right direction with the same | iron consistency so that we can maintain our magnetic field, | or else our distance ancestors (millions of years from now) | might have trouble breathing. | tsimionescu wrote: | I feel an inescapable urge to point out that our distant | _ancestors_ have long stopped breathing, and its our | distant _descendants_ who will slowly lose their atmosphere | as an unfortunate byproduct of this plan. | mattnewton wrote: | Cosmic rays will finally give them all the super powers we | need. I saw it once in a documentary called the fantastic 4 | kadoban wrote: | I don't think the Earth is structurally sound enough for that | to work, at least if you're hoping to make any kind of a hollow | shell. | | If the goal is just to preferentially remove the dense stuff | first, that would likely work. You'd still destroy every part | of the biosphere though. The crust bits shifting into place as | you remove everything below them would be catastrophic, off the | scale earthquakes everywhere and extreme heating and volcanic | activity. | psd1 wrote: | Anyone can lose weight without giving up any of the things they | love! _Here's how:_ | | 1. Live a full life 2. Get in a wooden box 3. Slough away all | your soft tissue - you might like to use it for a worm farm 4. | Welcome to the new-look you! | djmips wrote: | What about adding very low density material to the crust, in | other words - go up? | ouid wrote: | no dice, you'd have to climb it, and that would be exercise. | function_seven wrote: | No need to climb. With the vast resources you have seized for | this project, you can probably have a few of your laborers | carry you up to the new ground plane in a palanquin. | B1FF_PSUVM wrote: | Just build a plinth 364.3 km tall, and place the weight | watcher there. With air and water, if we're being nice. | | (sqrt(190/170)-1) * earth radius | bhaney wrote: | Weird to see this on Nautilus instead of Randall's site where | he's put hundreds of other "What-If"s | | https://what-if.xkcd.com/ | fragmede wrote: | It's publicity for his new book, What If 2. | https://xkcd.com/what-if-2/ | [deleted] | otikik wrote: | I contest that our own bodies are part of Earth's crust and thus | a more efficient way to do this would be removing mass from our | own bodies exclusively. | | Depending on your constitution, the simplest way to achieve this | is cutting one or two of your legs off. | aidenn0 wrote: | There's an old joke "Want to know how to lose 10lbs of ugly | fat? Cut off your head!" ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-09-22 23:00 UTC)