If you're going to read just one book on food and dieting, I suggest The Hungry Brain by Guyenet ( @whsource).

I think this book nails most of the causality behind obesity, though it's perhaps a bit weak on the effectiveness of keto. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hungry-Brain-Guyenet-Stephan-Ph-D/dp/125008119X

In fact I can even suggest a specific chapter. Let me describe it here.

Guyenet tells a story about some primitive African hunter gatherers and their typical day.

Basically, these people are constantly thinking about how to maximize their calorie intake per unit time, and constantly evaluating options for what they should do based on calories/time.

Surprisingly, highly refined sugars are found in their environment in the form of honey (honey is essentially pure liquid sugar).

Hunter-getherers have to take the honey from bees, which usually entails getting stung by the bees. Smoke sticks help somewhat, but not entirely.

Your brain evolved in an environment where the reward of honey was counterbalanced by the excruciating pain of bee stings. Yet you still have to like it enough to go for it.

Honey (and things like Nutella or other sweets) are essentially exploits for the human brain.

When hunter-gatherers find honey, they gorge on it. The drink a pint of honey on the spot after raiding the bee nest.

These people have absolutely no restraint when it comes to eating.

But, because of the implicit reproduction/starvation balance of the environment ...

... days when they gorge on honey are balanced by "bad days" where they happen to not find any food and go hungry, and bad seasons where they are unlucky with climate patterns and die of starvation.

For these people, pure honey is healthy food because they are permanently at risk of starvation.

Unfortunately, our brain's algorithms evolved in that kind of environment, so the subconscious mind activates the same rewards when modern humans find honey/chocolate/etc.

And of course, they don't come with a consciously accessible "off switch".

It gets worse than that though.

The brain also has low-level, subconscious algorithms for assessing the value of food that are based not just on the calorific value of the food, but also on the amount of work required to get that food.

In other words, your brain is pre-loaded with a subconscious algorithm, which cannot be deactivated, that makes you want food more when :

(1) that food contains more concentrated calories
(2) that food is physically close and easy/cheap to get

Let me restate that: your brain is hacked at a low level so that sweet foods being close to you makes you want them more.

And in the wild, you have to like this stuff enough to bear a couple of bee stings to get it.

The primitive tribes that Guyenet relates drink pure honey by the liter and gorge on many kilograms of fat.

"The idea of moderation in eating is totally alien to hunter gatherers"

BUT

Some days they're hungry for the whole day. Or maybe they don't eat for 2 weeks.

These tribes who gorge on fat and honey have 11% body fat (males)

These Hazda men are ripped and they would probably struggle to understand what a "diet" is. They don't have a gym subscription. Their life is a gym.

But according to Guyenet these people don't use up more calories than we do. The crucial difference is that the Hazda and other primitive tribes go hungry and sometimes they starve to death (which is how their population is controlled in the long term). Food is not a certainty.

So what's the practical takeaway from this?

You are running on corrupted hardware. millions of years of evolution are pushing you towards eating food that's both calorie dense and close/convenient. These are like computer viruses for you.

Avoid having these foods in your sight. Treat them as if they are unexploded bombs or poison. Run away from them.

Unfortunately the modern western food environment is infested with them. Do anything you can to isolate yourself from it.

Calories-in/Calories-out is wrong.

All calories are not equal, because calories in calorie-dense foods activate your evolved instinct to gorge.

This means it's best to simply remove calorie-dense foods from your life.

It's also best to reduce the variety and taste of foods that you eat (though keep an eye on micro-nutrients).

Soylent for breakfast is way better than cereal. Lean chicken is better.

Right now I think that meal-prep is probably the best way to insulate yourself from the modern toxic food environment, though in the long-term it may be best to try to set up a permanent default food stream via recurring internet orders.

Bonus photo of Hazda woman gorging on honey whilst the bees sting her (or at least threaten to do so!)

How many modern westerners would eat honey with a bee who they just robbed on their forehead? You would if you were hungry though.