
The Hacker's Diet - jdmoreira
https://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/e4/
======
FidesFacitFidem
How to lose weight the short(ish) version;

1) You need to be in a calorie deficit. (consuming less calories than you use)

2) Use a calorie calculator to find out roughly what your maintenance daily
calorie allowance is. (eg
[http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm](http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm))

3) Eating less calories than this will result in you being in a calorie
deficit and losing weight.

4) Every ~3500 calories under maintenance will result in 1 lb weight loss (so
eating 500 less calories than maintenance per day will result in 1 lb/week)

4a) Likewise when bulking 500 calories per day above maintenance will mean you
put on 1 lb/week (approx).

4b) 250 calories under maintenance per day, 1750 per week and you'll lose 0.5
lbs in that week. (You get the idea..)

5) A slightly higher protein diet will help hold on to muscle mass while
cutting this weight.

6) Muscle mass helps loss weight because the more of it you have the more
calories your body consumes.

7) Some general recommendations on macros (protein = 4 calories/gram, carbs =
4 cals/gram, fat = 9 cals/gram)

\- protein: 0.6g-0.8g/lb of body weight \- fat: 0.4g-0.6g/lb of body weight \-
carbs: fill in the rest of your calorie allowance

Example for 200 lb male trying to eat 2200 calories;

protein: 200 x 0.8 = 160 gram | 160 x 4 cals = 640 cals

fat: 200 x 0.5 = 100 grams | 100 x 9 cals = 900 cals

carbs: 900 cals + 640 cals = 1540 | 2200 - 1540 = 660 | 660 / 4 cals = 165
grams

Therefore the 200lb male will consume 2200 calories by eating 160g of protein,
100g of fat and 165g of carbs.

When and how these calories are consumed doesn't really matter unless your
really care about athletic performance.(1-2% to be gained maybe in meal timing
and nutrient partitioning) So eat how and whatever you prefer. If that means 1
huge meal or 5 small ones no problem.

I'd recommend a balanced diet consisting of fresh natural foods. Also 1 hour
of exercise per day (some days cardio, other days weights(focus on compounds;
squat, deadlift, bench press, shoulder press, pullups, rows)).

~~~
wmil
> focus on compounds; squat, deadlift, bench press, shoulder press, pullups,
> rows

This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine, but recommending pull-ups to someone out
of shape who needs to loose weight is just bizarre.

If someone was a beginner on the bench press, would you start them at 250lbs
and yell at them to push harder? No. That would be stupid and dangerous.

Yet somehow fat people are supposed to will themselves to do a pull up, which
is basically the equivalent.

~~~
will_work4tears
If you "kip up" (jump assist or chair assist) and do a reverse (slowly lower
yourself down) it's easier to do and you can build your way up to doing a full
pull up. I've done this and I've been as much as 65lbs overweight; I'm not
sure how feasible it is for, say, twice that, but at least it's doable at some
point of overweight.

------
anthony_romeo
Well, I lost about 100 pounds. I'm pretty sure I looked at this website at
some point while I was doing this. What I can say anecdotally is that there
are two main issues at play for those who are obese:

1\. Food is too damn good. We've developed food to be tastier and tastier,
setting off more and more pleasure sensations, almost to the point where it
loops back around and becomes disgusting.

2\. Some people under stress do not eat. Other people under stress eat more.
People who eat more when stressed will gain weight, and become more stressed
about their weight gain.

I'm talking about the morbidly obese here, not just people about twenty pounds
overweight.

What I did for myself was to make a few adjustments:

1\. Eat healthier versions of food that I actually like. I mean, sure, a fried
chicken sandwich or a hamburger can be delicious. But so is a turkey sandwich,
or grilled chicken. When I lost weight, I chose the lower calorie options that
I still enjoyed.

2\. Avoid pointless food. French fries are great, but they're just filler.
Soda is tasty (though I actually dislike it now that I've had distance from
it), but it's not substantively adding to my enjoyment of a meal. Stop
focusing on sides and enjoy the main course on its own.

3\. Exercise reasonably and consistently. It's not sustainable to go from
sedentary obesity to daily hill sprints. Start with walking more, move on to
exercise twice a week. Progressively build up from there. Find something you
can enjoy doing (for me, I enjoy lifting weights).

There's a lot more I could talk about (e.g. better sleep, realistic
expectations, tolerating hunger) as well. I can't say I'm perfectly healthy
now, but I've hopefully saved myself from the long-term health effects of
obesity.

~~~
bryanlarsen
I lost about 30 pounds 10 years ago. It was a time when I was fairly active,
but I'm convinced that the main part of the weight loss came from one thing: I
stopped eating French Fries. Replacing french fries with a different (or no)
side had a small effect. But it also altered where I ate. You're not going to
go to McDonald's if you can't order fries.

------
c0nsumer
Seeing this again takes me back. After reading this a number of years ago
(2002 or 2003 or so?) I actually gave my first effort to trying to lose some
weight and get in better shape, which caused me to learn / figure out a bunch
more, and actually start taking an interest in my physical abilities.

While I'm no serious athlete I now enjoy -- and recognize that I enjoy --
getting out and doing things, pushing myself when hiking or biking, and this
has given me the ability to spend good deals of time outdoors enjoying the
world. It's a great change of pace from the almost-completely-computer-focused
stuff I'd done previously.

------
rb2k_
After cross-reading this, my impression is that this was written with the
nutritional knowledge that was prevalent 20 years ago and mostly focuses on
counting calories, not about the nutrients present in the food.

From what I understand about modern nutritional science, this is not all that
useful without having a look at e.g. the amount of carbohydrates and the
glycemic index of the food you eat.

It seems that most studies agree that losing wait is most successful with a
low carb + high protein diet. Most other approaches going with higher carb
content usually just lead to insulin spikes and make you feel hungry at
unnecessary times. Unless you like suffering, have impressive self control and
don't mind what bloodsugar does to your body, that's probably not a good idea.

If you really want to eat carbohydrates, at least make sure you get a good
amount of fiber with them, so it slows down their intake and reduces the
amount of insulin your body fires off in response.

I would say the behavioural part (tracking weight etc) is probably a good
idea. The actual diet part of this should probably be discarded.

~~~
weego
Carbs being bad is very much outdated. As are unsustainable eating methods for
short term benefits. Eating 6 times a day is also seeing some push back as to
whether it is really any healthier. Calorie counting not being important was a
fad (if its possible to have a negative fad). How can you have an ideal macro
split for a diet when each of those macros has a calorie value without also
taking into account your overall calorie needs?

It may become more prevalent that the notion of eating consistently will
change too. You cannot eat at a deficit for any period of time without getting
pretty severe diminishing returns as your body adapts to its in vs out. 5:2 is
a very simple model of calorie cycling, just an unsustainable on.

Protein and calories have the same calorie content per gram, so if you hit
your protein macros then there is no downside to eating carbs, and actually
for active people your gains and recovery will suffer dramatically from lack
of carbs. Overloading on protein has the same downsides as overloading on
carbs in simple calories in vs out terms.

I think it's fairly common knowledge now that fats are largely good (saturated
fats help with testosterone regulation for example) even though food producers
seem to be wilfully slow in catching up (low fat items being filled with sugar
thus making them far more unhealthy).

I'm not sure I entirely buy into the if it fits your macros (IIFYM) way of
thinking, but it's not a bad strategy for a lot of situations.

~~~
rb2k_
I agree mostly. My main point of concern was the "just count calories, you'll
be fine" completely ignores anything we know about a healthy died in terms of
nutrients.

The fat one I find interesting:

> I think it's fairly common knowledge now that fats are largely good
> (saturated fats help with testosterone regulation for example) even though
> food producers seem to be wilfully slow in catching up (low fat items being
> filled with sugar thus making them far more unhealthy).

While these things mostly go over my head, I could get my better half (PhD in
nutritional epidemiology) to make a comment. Her answer:

"Saturated fats are not accepted to be healthy by the scientific community.
Unsaturated fats are healthy, reduce cardiovascular risk, and promote satiety,
so eating some is good, even if they have a higher calorie count per gram"

That being said, this comment mostly targets a healthy diet to prohibit e.g.
cardiovascular diseases. While those usually correlate to reducing weight to a
normal level, they might not be the same :)

~~~
mvanvoorden
"Saturated fats are not accepted to be healthy by the scientific community..."

Why? Because this is plain wrong.

Here some links that are worth checking out on this subject:

Meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies evaluating the association of
saturated fat with cardiovascular disease:
[http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/early/2010/01/13/ajcn.2009...](http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/early/2010/01/13/ajcn.2009.27725.abstract)

Article backed with research: [http://authoritynutrition.com/top-8-reasons-
not-to-fear-satu...](http://authoritynutrition.com/top-8-reasons-not-to-fear-
saturated-fats/)

A personal story: [http://grassfedcrossfit.com/what-a-diet-of-70-saturated-
fat-...](http://grassfedcrossfit.com/what-a-diet-of-70-saturated-fat-does-to-
your-body/)

Some more info: [https://www.bulletproofexec.com/podcast-16-everything-you-
ne...](https://www.bulletproofexec.com/podcast-16-everything-you-need-to-know-
about-saturated-fat-cholesterol-with-chris-masterjohn/)

~~~
rb2k_
I am not an expert in this field (nutritional epi + cardiovascular disease).

Luckily, my significant other is (which is there the quote came from).

Her answer: "The first article shows no association of saturated fats with
cardiovascular disease. No association does not mean healthy." and
"Substituting polyunsaturated fats for saturated fats has been shown to lower
ldl and is associated with lower risk of cardiovascular disease. This comes
from both robust randomized controlled trial evidence, and data from
prospective cohort studies"

I think the whole idea is that people agree that unsaturated fats do have
health benefits. There is no clear evidence that saturated fats do. They might
not actively cause harm, but they also don't have comparable benefits to
health.

------
gitaarik
Many people don't seem to like the approach of the Hackers Diet, as it only
focuses on how much and not what you eat.

I actually really like this approach. Everybody has different ideas about what
is good to eat or what isn't, but in the end, you only lose weight if you eat
less than you burn. The Hackers Diet gives you the freedom to choose what you
think is best to eat, while giving you feedback about what kind of effect it
has on your weight.

Also one very important realization: your fat cells will only release fat when
your blood sugar level is low, and when that happens, your brain will receive
messages you should eat. So if it's strong or not, if you want to burn fat,
you _will_ be hungry. Exercise suppresses this feeling a bit though, but
unless you can do that everyday, it won't be very effective.

~~~
simik
> your fat cells will only release fat when your blood sugar level is low

Nope, it's low insulin that unlocks fat cells, not low blood sugar.

~~~
gitaarik
Ehm, I think you have it the wrong way around. Insulin has the opposite
effect, it will stimulate glucose going to muscles and fat cells.

~~~
natecavanaugh
You're correct. Insulin is the storage hormone, cortisol is the teardown
hormone (putting it all very simply).

------
purplelobster
Don't diet, but eat a healthy diet. By this point I'll get burned at the stake
for this, but there is something to the Paleo diet. Our current diet is a
nightmare in terms of not just weight, but health in general, more
specifically, the rise in auto-immune disease. Research shows that a leaky gut
is a _prerequisite_ (but not only factor) for developing auto-immune disease.
One thing that causes leaky gut is gluten. Grains and seeds contain stuff that
hurts your gut, why? Because grains and seeds have developed a defence for
digestion because they need to come out the other side. I'm not a fad-
following hipster, I just read literature on this, and I've seen first hand
what gluten does to someone who's not even gluten intolerant. My wife has
Grave's disease which is auto-immune. Her options were taking meds that
devastate the thyroid and liver, or operate her thyroid and in the process
likely develop the opposite of Grave's: hypothyroidism. She tried every other
option, including different kinds of diets, until we read about the Autoimmune
Protocol (AIP), which is a strict version of the Paleo diet. Her symptoms
(constant 100-120 bbm heartbeat) went away within days. We've pinned it down
to gluten as the main factor.

Counting calories is an extremely simplistic world view, and while it's very
comforting to have a simple rule to follow, I believe it's a very bad idea to
not care what you put in your body, as opposed to just how much of it.

~~~
acdha
The main reason the paleo people get flack comes from trying to claim
historical accuracy when science has consistently shown that claims about e.g.
how long humans have been eating grain or dairy products are off by thousands
of years.

See e.g. [http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-paleo-diet-
hal...](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-paleo-diet-half-baked-
how-hunter-gatherer-really-eat/) or dozens of subsequent pieces.

The better way to phrase this is to avoid trying to claim unique merit: “This
diet works for me. Maybe it will work for you.” That keeps the truthful part
but drops the magical claims about why everyone else's choices aren't as
valid.

------
mvanvoorden
The exercises in this book are a slimmed-down version of the 5BX plan by the
RCAF. I started doing these about 3 months ago and can really recommend this.
It only costs about 11 minutes of your daily time.

The full version of these exercises have some more variety, as every 12 steps
the exercises get a bit more challenging.

Link:
[http://fit450.com/HTML/5BX_Intro.html](http://fit450.com/HTML/5BX_Intro.html)

------
pakled_engineer
The Peter Jackson weight loss method consisted of replacing editing room trays
of food full of junk with veggies he grazed on instead. There's also the Prof
Might method [http://matt.might.net/articles/least-resistance-weight-
loss/](http://matt.might.net/articles/least-resistance-weight-loss/)

------
this_iswater
Low carb high fat diet. Count your macros, stay in ketosis

~~~
mvanvoorden
Like Keto/Paleo/Bulletproof?

This definitely works! I used to drink coffee with grass-fed butter every
morning when I woke up and also took a few other things of Bulletproof diet to
heart and lost over 30 kilo's in two years time.

Friends of mine are very positive about this and Keto seems to very successful
as well, as seen here:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/keto](http://www.reddit.com/r/keto)

------
JustSomeNobody
My weight is good, so I haven't read much on the actual diet, but I am trying
the ladder. Being a developer, I sit most of the day and for me I have
developed a lower back pain so I figure I need more exercise. Hopefully this
will work out.

~~~
mvanvoorden
The ladder works pretty well, it starts out so easy that it's almost boring
but gets quite some bite when you progress.

I do the 5BX myself though (where the ladder is based on), as I mentioned in
an earlier comment :)

~~~
JustSomeNobody
Yeah, I'm having a problem with the boring part, so really hoping I don't lose
focus. :)

~~~
mvanvoorden
Just keep it up for a few weeks and it becomes a habit. It's now the first
thing I do every morning.

Protip: Make (or find and print) a calendar and hang it in a visible spot. Put
an X every day you do the exercises, and then it's just a matter of not
breaking the chain :)

~~~
JustSomeNobody
I will try that! Thanks.

------
mjklin
For me the main takeaway from this was the "moving average" method to
calculate weight, which smooths daily spikes into a trend curve. An excellent
app for this on iOS is True Weight. Saves you from making calculations.

[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/true-
weight/id287941226?mt=8](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/true-
weight/id287941226?mt=8)

------
michaeljbishop
I used to use this site, long ago and I did lose weight in my 20’s. Now in my
40’s I find it emphasizes a way of thinking that I think is missing the point.

I don’t necessarily disagree with calorie counting, but forcing yourself to
not eat when you are hungry is the key to failure. I think this is at the root
of the low-carb approach in which the foods that you eat don’t stimulate your
body’s fat-making hormones.

If your body is being asked to make fat (through raised insulin levels), it
doesn’t matter how many calories you eat, they are mostly being stored and you
will continue to be hungry.

Low-carb helps you eat fewer calories because more of the calories you eat are
available for energy and your body will signal that you are satiated.

If you want to go _really_ low-carb, you can go into ketosis, where your body
realizes it can also start eating its own fat for energy and promptly does so.
Then you are satiated on even fewer calories because your body can get what it
needs from itself.

I’ve found ketosis to be very reliable and even better, I find I _concentrate_
much better because I’m not so distracted by how I’m going to get my next
snack to much while I code. That concept is no longer a part of my
consciousness. You don’t realize how noisy your brain is around food until
it’s quiet.

------
jgaudette
For those interested in tracking your weight online there is
[http://myhackerdiet.com](http://myhackerdiet.com) It connects to withings too
if you have a wifi scale.

------
skidoo
I survived some lean years on what I called the Yin-Yang diet: black coffee
and white rice. Regular exercise also played an obvious role.

------
lotsofcows
Is there some sort of unwritten rule of dietary advice that one should never
cite one's sources?

