On more exercise to burn calories

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A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals that, regardless of body size, individuals burn a similar number of calories daily, measured through the Doubly Labelled Water method on a diverse group of 4,213 subjects. The findings indicate that total energy expenditure, combining basal and physical activity energy, remains consistent across different lifestyles, challenging the notion that exercise alone can combat obesity. The research suggests that dietary choices, particularly the consumption of ultra-processed foods, play a more significant role in weight management than exercise. While exercise can increase calorie burn, the effort required to offset high-calorie junk foods is substantial. Ultimately, the study emphasizes that managing diet is crucial for addressing obesity rather than relying solely on exercise.
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TL;DR Summary
A recent article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences takes a close look at the role of Exercise on weight loss.
A recent article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) takes a close look at the role of Exercise on weight loss.
There is Washington Post coverage of this report.

The study uses the Doubly Labelled Water method to measure the daily "total energy expenditure" (TEE) of the 4213 subjects of the study.

Those subjects were selected from "a wide spectrum of economic development, including hunter-gatherers, pastoralists, farmers, and people in industrialized countries".

The surprising result: For a given body size, We all tend to burn the same number of calories each day.
The total of the basal energy expenditure and physical activity energy expenditure tended to remain steady.

There are many practical corollaries.
If you are interested in the article, I suggest reading either the PNAS or the Post reports. There is a lot of detail - too much to properly summarize.
 
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Essentially, we are what we eat, not how we exercise. Eating ultra-processed foods leads to obesity.

Exercise won't solve the obesity problem since we all burn roughly the same number of calories per day.
 
jedishrfu said:
Exercise won't solve the obesity problem since we all burn roughly the same number of calories per day.
Typical junk foods have so many calories that it's almost impossible to burn them off in any case. It is easy to consume 5,000 calories in a day, and you would have to ride a stage of the Tour de France to burn that off! These numbers have always been clear.

That said, it's possible to burn more calories by exercise - it's just that the amount of exercise is out of proportion to what you might expect.
 
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I have found that exercise can act as a reducer of hunger and thus has other effects on this whole relationship.
 
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