few clarifications based on comments

_posts/2020-06-11-biohacking-lite.markdown

@@ -83,7 +83,7 @@ Since I am a computer scientist it is hard to avoid a comparison of this "energy
 
 > So... a few textbooks later we see that to lose weight one should eat less and move more.
 
-**Experiment section**. So how big of a deficit should one introduce? I did not want the deficit to be so large that it would stress me out, make me hangry and impact my work. In addition, with greater deficit your body will increasingly begin to sacrifice lean body mass ([paper](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615)). To keep things simple, I aimed to lose about 1lb/week, which is consistent with a few recommendations I found in a few [papers](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4033492/). Since 1lb = 454g, 1g of fat is estimated at approx. 9 kcal, and adipose tissue is ~87% lipids, some (very rough) napkin math suggests that 3500 kcal = 1lb of fat. The precise details of this are [much more complicated](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21872751), but this would suggest a target deficit of about 500 kcal/day. I found that it was hard to reach this deficit with calorie restriction alone, and psychologically it was much easier to eat near the break even point and create most of the deficit with cardio. It also helped a lot to adopt a 12-8 intermittent fasting schedule (i.e. "skip breakfast") which helps control appetite and dramatically reduces snacking. I started the experiment in June 2019 at about 195lb (day 120 on the chart below), and 1 year later I am at 165lb, giving an overall empirical rate of 0.58lb/week:
+**Experiment section**. So how big of a deficit should one introduce? I did not want the deficit to be so large that it would stress me out, make me hangry and impact my work. In addition, with greater deficit your body will increasingly begin to sacrifice lean body mass ([paper](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15615615)). To keep things simple, I aimed to lose about 1lb/week, which is consistent with a few recommendations I found in a few [papers](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4033492/). Since 1lb = 454g, 1g of fat is estimated at approx. 9 kcal, and adipose tissue is ~87% lipids, some (very rough) napkin math suggests that 3500 kcal = 1lb of fat. The precise details of this are [much more complicated](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21872751), but this would suggest a target deficit of about 500 kcal/day. I found that it was hard to reach this deficit with calorie restriction alone, and psychologically it was much easier to eat near the break even point and create most of the deficit with cardio. It also helped a lot to adopt a 16:8 intermittent fasting schedule (i.e. "skip breakfast", eat only from e.g. 12-8pm) which helps control appetite and dramatically reduces snacking. I started the experiment in June 2019 at about 195lb (day 120 on the chart below), and 1 year later I am at 165lb, giving an overall empirical rate of 0.58lb/week:
 
 <div class="imgcap">
 <img src="/assets/bio/weight.png">
@@ -140,4 +140,4 @@ Clearly, my actual weight loss (red) turned out to be slower than expected one b
 **(later edits)**
 
 - discussion on [hacker news](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23501021)
-- if you'd like to shortcut my rambling my TLDR final diet in order of importance: Eat only from 12-8pm. Do not drink any calories (no soda, no alcohol, no juices, avoid milk). Avoid processed food (follow Michael Pollan's heuristic of only shopping on the outer walls of a grocery store, staying clear of its center). Avoid sugar like the plague, including to a slightly lesser extent natural sugar (apples, bananas, pears, etc - we've "weaponized" these fruits via strong artificial selection into actual candy bars), berries are ~okay. For meat stick to fish, occasional chicken is okay, avoid beef/pork. Avoid carbohydrates and "empty calories" (bread, pasta, potatoes, rice), replace with fats and proteins.
+- my original post used to be about twice as long due to a section of nutrition. Since the topic of *what* to each came up so often alongside *how much* to each I am including a quick TLDR on my final diet here, without the 5-page detail. In rough order of importance: Eat from 12-8pm only. Do not drink any calories (no soda, no alcohol, no juices, avoid milk). Avoid sugar like the plague, including carbohydrate-heavy foods that immediately break down to sugar (bread, rice, pasta, potatoes), including to a lesser extent natural sugar (apples, bananas, pears, etc - we've "weaponized" these fruits in the last few hundred years via strong artificial selection into [actual candy bars](https://www.sciencealert.com/fruits-vegetables-before-domestication-photos-genetically-modified-food-natural)), berries are ~okay. Avoid processed food (follow Michael Pollan's heuristic of only shopping on the outer walls of a grocery store, staying clear of its center). For meat stick mostly to fish and prefer chicken to beef/pork. For me the avoidance of beef/pork is 1) ethical - they are intelligent large animals, 2) environmental - they have a large environmental footprint (cows generate a lot of methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas) and their keeping leads to a lot of deforestation, 3) health related - a few papers point to some cause for concern in consumption of red meat, and 4) global health - a large fraction of the worst offender infectious diseases are zootopic and jumped to humans from close proximity to livestock.