Day 59: down 10.6 lbs.

Via this post in the Seth Roberts forums I came across another set-point-based weight loss method. Survival of the Thinnest is a book by David Hariton published in 2004 that says 30 minutes of aerobic exercise, every day, will lower your "lipostat" which is apparently the same thing as the "set point" described in the SLD book. And like SLD, it has a genetic component to the theory.

Keep in mind that I haven't read "Survival of the Thinnest," and the web site isn't all that detailed, so I may have much of this wrong.

Anyway, in the forums, this was roundly attacked, using mostly straw man arguments. The method is described as 30 minutes of aerobic exercise every day. Several people chimed in to say things like 20 to 30 minutes 3 to 5 times a week doesn't work; or diets in women's magazines say to walk or run, and that doesn't work; or (and this one really cracks me up) the people caught up in the running craze of the 80s aren't all thin. Well, some of them are! I'm guessing the ones that run every day are a lot thinner than the ones who don't.

I've mentioned before that nine years ago I lost a lot of weight -- 32.5 lbs. in 60 days. I did it by running about 30 minutes virtually every day and eating healthier foods. I didn't go hungry, or count calories or grams of fat or carbohydrates. Just from the brief description on that forum post and the Survival web site, that may just match exactly what Hariton says in his book. I plan to read it and find out. I'll let you know.

tags: diet, weight loss, Shangri-la Diet