
Penn Jillette fasts 23 hours a day to maintain his 100lb weight loss - pseudolus
https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-penn-jillette-weight-loss-20190615-story.html
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vinceguidry
I can't maintain extreme regimes. Some five years ago I used a combination of
intermittent fasting and carb cutting to drop like 40 pounds, I was svelte,
looked better than my early twenties.

But eventually I realized this has to become my mother-effing _lifestyle_ if I
want to keep looking that way. It's not that I can't do it. It's that the
tradeoffs just aren't worth it for me. So I gave it up, piled on pounds for a
few years until I felt the need for another health intervention. what I do now
is to eat more deliberately and pay close attention to the feeling of satiety
so I can stop eating. Pounds are slowly melting away.

My father has the same mindset as Penn. He can't _simply_ watch his eating.
Willpower gets depleted and he finds himself eating the rest of the cookies in
the bag, and the other two bags as well.

For him, he has to cut out everything "bad". He has to frame it in terms of a
moral conflict because otherwise cheat meals turn into cheat days and cheat
days turn into dropping the diet for months until he works up the willpower to
do it again.

He's also an alcoholic, has been dry for 25 years. Still goes to daily
meetings.

When I lost willpower, I gained 20-30 pounds over 5 years. When my father
loses willpower, he gains 50-100 pounds. He might do this twice a year.

All-or-nothing feels like prison for me. It's freeing for the addictive mind.
Once the moral dynamic is surrendered to, agency is found. The non-addictive
mind seeks harmony between competing desires and urges, the desire to have a
fun and varied diet vs the desire to be fit and healthy. Addicts can't have
harmony because they lose willpower faster than they can accomplish goals.
Only in disharmony can they find lasting agency.

~~~
preommr
> I was svelte

Is this just me experiencing the baader-meinhof effect or did you get inspired
to use this after learning about the framework?

~~~
jiveturkey
ironic that you cite 'baader-meinhof' as if it is commonly known, but think
'svelte' is arcane.

~~~
preommr
Anyone on reddit for more than 6 months will be familiar with that term since
it comes up in subs like r/til every other week.

It's definitely not some super common term but I am guessing the overlap
between hn and reddit is large enough that most people here would be familiar
with it.

On the other hand, I don't think I've ever seen anyone use svelte in common
parlance in my lifetime.

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chrisseaton
'Fasts 23 hours a day' makes it sound odd and extreme. It's the same thing as
'eats one meal a day', which sounds much more ordinary.

~~~
axaxs
This is precisely what I was thinking. My father was a hard working fellow,
and only ate one meal a day because it's really all he had time for. Granted,
it was a -huge- meal. Many of his coworkers did the same, yet nobody called it
'fasting 23 hours', but rather, 'eating once a day.'

~~~
fian
While not strictly one meal, many Parisians have a similar approach.

A very light breakfast - jokingly a coffee and a cigarette but may include a
croissant.

Lunch is large, may involve multiple dishes/courses over an hour. After lunch
is "coffee" which may take another hour (essentially to allow proper digestion
before trying to concentrate on work again).

The evening meal is often light. Many people have a snack with drinks while
catching up with friends at a brasserie.

Having spent three months working in Paris, I adopted the above pattern (minus
the cigarettes). I gained no weight while there, despite eating delightful
pastries for breakfast and not doing the 200-300kms per week of cycling I
normally would do at home.

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o10449366
I involuntarily fasted through college simply because I was too poor and busy
to afford full meals multiple times a day. I would often only eat dinner,
sometimes lunch too, but still managed to maintain a healthy BMI and ate
enough to sustain an exercise routine. It took me only a few months to stop
feeling "hungry". Now, many years later, I still have no sense of hunger and
feel like I have much more control over my body and my mind as a result. My
coworkers, on the other hand, seem unable to focus if they don't have lunch by
11 AM.

~~~
Bakary
Based on what I've read on the topic, this isn't actual hunger but appetite.
You can't ignore hunger, and it doesn't go away until you've found food.

~~~
tomp
My personal experience contradicts this. I fasted a few days sometime ago. The
first day was OK, the second was miserable and terrible, but then I got "used"
to it and stopped feeling hungry (or, alternatively, my brain got used to the
stimulus of "hunger" and, even though I could still feel it, it wasn't salient
any longer... à la _neural adaptation_ [0]).

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_adaptation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_adaptation)

~~~
tonyedgecombe
I recently read about an interesting experiment on conscientious objectors
during the war. They were fed a very restricted diet (in terms of calories)
and observed. As it went on they became obsessed with food, they would take
recipe books from the library and even collect cooking implements. I guess
it's not that surprising from an evolutionary perspective.

~~~
DanBC
The famous experiment is the Minnesota Starvation Experiment.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Starvation_Experimen...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Starvation_Experiment)

[https://www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/anorexia/the-...](https://www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/anorexia/the-
minnesota-starvation-study-important-insights-to-help-us-understand-a-loved-
one-suffering-from-anorexia)

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ianai
Everyone is talking about the fasting. It’s not just fasting.

“I went for a radical change in diet — whole-food plant-based, hard-core
vegan, vegetables, no processed food, no sugar. And I limited my eating to
just an hour a day, so I’m always fasting 23 hours.”

~~~
jimmydddd
And if you read the book, it was actually even more extreme for the first few
months. He only ate baked potatoes. Nothing but baked potatoes. Adding salads
later was actually loosening up his diet. :-)

~~~
ianai
Wow, I would think only potatoes wouldn’t work for even a week. Thank you for
the expansion.

~~~
jon_richards
I've heard that potatoes and dairy has all the nutrition you need. You could
eat only that indefinitely and be relatively fine. Maybe not quite as balanced
as soylent is trying to be, though.

~~~
tomjen3
If you dig into the historical sources for Ireland they keep mentioning how
good looking and strong the Irish are compared to the English and Scots. The
Irish diet was potatoes and buttermilk.

~~~
sn9
Oh man you weren't kidding. I put 2000+ calories worth of potatoes and
buttermilk into Cronometer and it was surprisingly complete.

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moltar
The beautiful thing about long fasts is that it’s actually difficult to
overeat in a short window.

And the flip side of that is your blood sugar stabilized so much that you are
actually not that hungry during the fasting window. I mean the hunger is
there, but it’s not panic inducing. It’s just like “meh, I wanna eat, but can
wait”.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
> The beautiful thing about long fasts is that it’s actually difficult to
> overeat in a short window.

Man, people who've never been fat have the strangest ideas.

~~~
prophetjohn
I guess it depends on how short the window and what other restrictions you're
placing (e.g. Penn's diet?). But yeah, I can put down 2000 calories at
McDonald's in about 10 minutes. And I wasn't even _that_ fat at my fattest
(5'10" and 205)

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thebigspacefuck
There's no secret to weight loss. You need a calorie deficit. It is much
easier to get excited about eating only potatoes or going carnivore or eating
one hour a day, but you can also just track your calories and figure out which
foods add to your budget without filling you up. Maybe you didn't realize
peanut butter had so many calories or exactly how much cereal you were eating.
It's definitely easier to go to extremes, but sometimes they can be hard on
you, so it might be worth trying the plain boring thing first, being
consistent about it, and seeing how it works for you. I tried so many
different diets that didn't work before getting a calorie tracking app,
following it, and watching my weight drop exactly as predicted. If you're at a
point where you need to lose a pound a day and have enough fat that your body
can probably live off it for a while, maybe something like this is for you,
but I'd expect most people are better counting calories for a month or two.

~~~
lath
This isn’t true. Not all calories are the same. Some spike insulin, the
hormone that is responsible for storing fat, much more than others. Also if I
eat 1800 carb heavy calories every day, I’m extremely hungry all the time. If
I eat 1800 fat heavy calories every day, I feel satiated. It’s thanks to
ketosis and being fat adapted.

Side note, I lost 80 pounds on a low fat diet, gained it back, then lost 80
pounds on a low carb diet so I know from personal experience.

~~~
Latty
I’m not sure how what you say makes the parent’s post untrue.

I don't know the details of insulin and fat storage, but at the end of the day
if you are at a calorie deficit, you will lose weight—that’s physics. Your
body can’t magic fat out of nowhere.

Your point appears to be that some things are easier to cut out of your diet
than others… which was very much part of what the parent said—they point out
that calorie tracking is the best way to work out what foods are the ones that
work best for you.

The point is not that all calories are equal from the perspective of sating
hunger, but that they are equal in terms of energy input. Knowing that raw
number for everything is the best way to understand what is providing you good
“bang for your buck”.

None of this contradicts what you say, to be clear—it supports it, which is
why I find it odd your post starts with “this isn’t true”.

~~~
lath
What I’m saying is untrue is the notion that weight loss is as simple as a
calorie deficit and tracking calories. It’s not that simple because some
calories make staying in a deficit much harder.

The point is that saying that fat loss is as simple as calories in, calories
out is unhelpful and not really true.

Also the whole point of losing weight is to be healthy. If you lost weight
eating twinkies you might be skinnier but you are going to have a whole host
of other health problems like high blood pressure, cancer, and heart disease.

~~~
Latty
Rather than conflating it all in a way that leads to misunderstanding, why not
say "sure, calories in - calories out defines weight loss, but you need more
than that to be healthy".

The point stands that tracking calories gives you a defined goal. It's not the
_only_ goal for health, but that doesn't make it useless. The parent post you
objected to was not claiming that _what_ you ate didn't matter at all.

You are 100% right that _healthy, sustainable_ weight loss isn't all calories,
but weight loss itself absolutely is - and breaking the problem down into
parts so people understand how to achieve that weight loss rather than having
this arbitrary "healthy eating" idea that is much harder to track is a good
thing. No one is advocating for it in isolation.

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techbubble
I started 16-8 intermittent fasting three months ago. The mornings were
difficult the first 3-4 days because I really used to enjoy a good breakfast.
I also missed my morning chai.

What fixed it was my discovery of Zestea, a high caffeine tea. One cup in the
morning did the trick. I also ate my breakfast at noon (my scheduled break
fast time) for a week. Now, I don’t feel hunger in the AM and sometimes it is
1:30 pm when I have to remind myself to break the fast so I can stay on
schedule.

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mensetmanusman
One meal a day here that always has a large amount of salad. Get by lunch with
just a bit of cheese and apples. Only coffee for breakfast. Works for me,
milage may vary. I really like how an ~2k calorie dinner knocks me out all
night for a deep sleep though.

~~~
ianai
I couldn’t do that. I seem to be metabolically required to eat almost
immediately after waking up. I make breakfast and lunch my meals of the day
and dinner light-just enough to get me to the next morning.

~~~
lath
Once you cut out carbs it’s 1000x easier.

~~~
ianai
*highly processed or low quality carbs

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toyg
Jillette was an indirect catalyst of my "come to weight-loss-jesus" moment
last year, since he triggered the process on someone else I follow who in turn
triggered me. His methods (which he mostly got from Ray Cronise, iirc) are
super-radical and undoubtedly effective, but also hard to follow for regular
people. He has a zealot attitude to this particular topic, which can be very
off-putting, and some of his approach is probably wrong (sure, in old age you
can go vegan and eat once a day, but if you are 25 and moderately active,
that's probably not the best idea).

On one point he is correct though: half the battle is realizing that, in
advanced societies, you are _sold_ food. You are under constant bombardment
from sources telling you to eat this or that, and kept on the leash by sugar
and other addi _c_ tives. In that sense, it's much easier to eat properly in a
less-industrial society, where you're not pursued by food advertisement,
people are mostly _forced_ to cook raw natural food (although this is
changing), and things like "eating out with friends" are rare events rather
than expected social routine.

~~~
VLM
I would agree with and extend your remarks with the observation that eating is
a strongly encouraged activity when you're bored or while socializing, both of
which are not very healthy.

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oftenwrong
One of the great side-benefits of fasting is the amount of time saved on
shopping, prepping, eating, and thinking about what to eat. It adds up to a
significant amount of extra free time.

~~~
Bakary
Meal planning has done this for me. I spend three to five hours per week doing
all of this and it solves the problem of being too tired to cook a healty
meal.

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throwaway8879
I'm on my second year on a 23:1 fast. It's worked out great for me. I did the
whole carnivore diet thing initially but introduced carbs and other things
slowly. Now I pretty much eat anything I want as long as everything fits on
one plate and I've cut down my eating window to 30 minutes instead of an hour.

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jawns
I tried intermittent fasting. (I only cut out one meal, breakfast, and didn't
eat between 9pm and 12pm.) It works okay. Even if you eat a slightly heavier
lunch as a result, you're still probably consuming fewer calories overall.

But it's hard (as all effective methods are). You are aware that you are
hungry.

~~~
H1Supreme
I've been skipping breakfast for about 2 years now, and I don't get hungry
until noon most of the time. The only exception is if I drink alcohol the
night before. If the girlfriend and I drink beers on Saturday night, I'm
usually starving the next morning.

I suppose people are different, but intermittent fasting has worked great for
me. I should mention that I do a mostly low carb diet. I know fasting puts
people in a ketogenic state. So, maybe those two go hand in hand?

~~~
mbroncano
Same here, I always wondered why it was the case that I felt hungry in the
morning after drink a few beers the previous night, as in general I don’t feel
any hunger till noon.

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flyinglizard
“I don’t respect moderation”

What a great quote.

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exabrial
The key for me dropping 28lbs over the last year was calorie counting, after
testing an article here about a guy who lost 100lbs. I can't find the link to
his blog but it was absolutely amazing. Penn is right, the most effective
stuff is the hard stuff, and calorie counting is very hard when there's just
food everywhere.

The key for me to keeping the weight off though is exercise. I discovered
rowing oddly enough, and I'm part of an indoor rowing studio. It's incredibly
competitive but very low impact to your body. You can also burn 400+ plus
calories in 20 minutes which is something sort of extraordinary.

I'm in the best shape of my life. None of my pants fit, even though my weight
loss has leveled out my waistline continues to shrink as I firm up.

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jimmydddd
I highly recommend the book by the way. Very entertaining. In his life, he
spends a lot of time hanging out with interesting people. Really shows how
your career choice influences your whole social circle (e.g., accountant v.
magician).

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sjg007
People should try one of those “healthy for life” meal prep services. You get
a fixed set of calories and 3 meals a day and I consistently lost a few pounds
a week. They work, are slightly expensive but work.

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bobloblaw45
It's interesting to hear the reactions most people have to this type of meal
plan. Humans are pretty much animals that evolved to survive not having a
secure source of food. Yeah we need to eat but spacing your meals this far
apart isn't going to hurt you. I've seen people freak out over this idea but
also jump on gimmick diets and workouts that promise huge weight loss for zero
effort.

I know Penns plan is different but I've done intermittent fasting and found it
super useful in certain situations to regulate calories.

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markdog12
Mad respect. Really like this interview.

Maybe my favorite part is when the interviewer takes the predictable "but
you're special" angle:

> Maybe that’s easy for a renowned Type A guy with a nonstop life of shows,
> acting and bestselling books. But does it apply to the rest of us?

And he just shuts that down

> I don’t consider myself special. For anybody, there’s no pride in doing
> things easy.

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kazinator
Anyone who spends at most one hour eating in a 24 hour cycle fasts 23 hours a
day or more. I don't think it's that uncommon.

Suppose you eat four meals a day, of around 2000 kcal each. That's 23 hours of
fasting.

It's not the amount of time you spend or don't spend eating that matters; it's
the calories. Thousands of calories can be quaffed down in minutes or even
seconds, by a fast eater.

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jmkni
> My first tip is this: “If you take health advice from a Las Vegas magician,
> you are an idiot.”

That’s hilarious, I’ve always respected Penn Jilette (and Teller), the
craftmanship and hard work they put into their act is unique and incredible.

Love the fact that he is so on the ball at 65, I hope to be the same way at
that age and older.

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drieddust
We have a saying in our part of the world which echoes the sentiment. It goes
like this.

Sage eats once, regular folk eats twice, and gluttonous eats all the time.

Sounds like time and again we are rediscovering old wisdom.

Disclaimer: This is not a value judgement as I myself have never followed this
and most people around me are the same.

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Brian_K_White
I naturally eat once a day most days. I don't call it "fasting 23 hours".

This is not an "extreme regime".

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NikolaeVarius
Good for him to keep disciplined.

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vbuwivbiu
Good on him

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kmonad
> All diet is habit. We have the disadvantage of being born in a very rich
> country with food everywhere. And changing your eating desires takes years.

Yeah, very tough. I mean intermittent fasting is probably a great choice to
improve health (even for people with normal weight). Calling being born in the
US a "disadvantage" because there's too much food and wealth reads shrill.

~~~
rubyfan
You’re taking it out of context. I highly doubt Penn would say it as you’re
taking it. In the context he’s talking about weight related health.

~~~
kmonad
I actually provided the context. It's just a silly thing to say, what ever the
context.

