I think 4kg over 3years is a huge difference for many people. Not for morbidly obese maybe. Anyway, here it matters that difference exists.

There are many ways to make this difference in energy balance, by changing the kind of food eaten, while keeping the same intake volume, by changing the intake volume, or by adding an additional activity, like brooming.

Reducing intake by 100kcal by changing volume while maintaining composition is always going to be carbon wasteful. Do we agree on this?

There are many advisable ways to reduce the carbon effect. By changing the kind of food eaten, for sure. But also, but replacing manual brooming with less carbon-consuming process. One way does not cancel the other, does it?

By the way, we should be clear that instead of brooming one should not go for a run on something. Conversely, replacing some of the health-motivated physical activity with brooming is not a bad idea at all, that’s a large part of the reason I still do it. Still, both sport and manual brooming are somehow wasteful.

Sorry for the long silence. The adaptation works in reaction to large persistent changes, not small 100 restriction as you are proposing. This also makes sense intuitively, large changes cause reaction while “slow and steady” achieves long term goals.

There are, apparently, discussions referencing just the 100 reduction effect:

https://www.prima.co.uk/diet-and-health/diet-plans/news/a40499/100-calories-weight-loss-study/

They refer to actual research I could not yet access due to paywalls. I will try to find it.

I hear you, but scientists specifically study how metabolism adapts, for example the study you quote. And, as far as I see so far, they find that the adaptation just does not work like you think it does. You may choose to insist on your intuition despite empirical evidence against it. But I hope you realise this can lead to your expectations, based on this intuition, clashing with reality.

I am talking about the fact that 5% add up, both over a single day and over multiple days, which cannot be neglected since it makes a significant impact over enough time. You seem to be saying that there is a threshold of spending below which the spending is equal to zero and does not accumulate, right? That would mean that MR adjustment is exactly compensating small increases in energy spending.

Thanks for the link! I read the paper to the best of my ability, I am not a biological kind of scientist, but I do not find an indication in it for this kind of adjustment you are talking about. The main conclusion seems to be that MR adjusts after major weight loss. Even after this adjustment, I would deduce, adding 5% would help to limit weight loss.

Do you have a reference which would support your idea that there is a threshold (I guess you are saying it is somewhere between 5% and 20%?) below which energy spending is exactly compensated by MR and hence does not accumulate? Seriously, maybe it exists, I just never heard of it.

My statement is based on energy conservation, which is also a clear assumption in the article. The net effect on the intake-spending balance can be modified by MR adjustment, but it just does not seem to work the way you propose it does.

My weight goes up and down by some 10% every couple of years, I cycle and run (ultramaraphons) and climb and more, and I track and analyse both food and spending with common tools and myself. Which is why I am acutely aware of how at least my body behaves in this respect. And I see people around me who do similar things.

Your point seems to be based on the idea that if it is 5%, it is the same as zero, because metabolism compensates (?). I do not know if this is the case at all or if this is relevant enough to change this 5% number. If this is the case, it is a factor, but it is something peculiar.

Instead, I find, that while a single 10hr trail run spends days worth energy of usual activities, several 5% factors each day, which grow from habits like brooming or taking a walk instead of taking a bus, quickly exceed, or at least strongly contribute to, extreme individual spendings. Also while a long event seems to cause immediate weight loss, it is almost entirely water. So it is a bit hard for me to believe these small spendings are zero. In fact, I find that people often underestimate how simple habits change weekly calorie spending. At least for me, these things make much of a difference in the weight change.

And yes, I have some brooms, and I broom for some 15min a day probably, plus maybe 1h per week.

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I think we did not really estimate here, there is just intuition. I made these estimates before for electric bikes vs human powered, and found that, somewhat counterintuitively, electric bikes may quickly become less carbon-consuming.

I do not accept the idea that brooming comes for free. If you add 15 min moderate activity of brooming per day, you may spend, say, 100kcal. If you add it to your daily routine, you need to compensate with food or loose weight. Energy balance in humans is tricky, which is one of the reasons people find it hard to control their weight. But things like replacing a 15min couch sitting with brooming make a difference for weight. Because they consume energy. Or do you continue to propose that replacing the couch sitting with brooming has zero energy and diet difference activity, is “basically free”? To be clear.

Vacuums help to save time. Carbon impact of vacuums and replacing human-powered activities with solar-electricity-powered ones is not especially studied. Which is why I think intuitive understanding here is lacking. Someone should develop it, maybe write a blog post or a paper.

This is not imaginary, growing replacement of human work at scale has a real impact on carbon consumption. My point is that in some cases, e.g. with electric bikes or vacuum cleaners, human power, even plant-supported, can be more vastful.

It is not at all obvious to me why it is a win for the broom. Humans are a lot larger than a robot and there is a lot of wasteful body movement. Production costs are a factor, but why 50 years and 5? Or 1? We agree at least that production costs excluded, solar powered robot is more green than a human broom? If so, what remains is this time to offset production.

If you stop brooming you will either gain weight or reduce carrot consumption, no need for custom control. Or you can do something else with time and energy previously reserved for brooming, maybe even something that results in an overall more green world?

You collect them stirckly yourself? No carbon-consuming tech involved?

I do not want to descend into some kind of “but there is always some carbon” point, I just want to point out that a robot powered by, say, solar electricity can be more green than a human-powered broom, production costs included.

Neither of the two is perfectly green, but a solar-powered robot is more efficient in leveraging solar power than human growing and eating plants.

Or do you think this is necessarily not so?

Green? Like solar? Are you photosynthesising?

Cats are already smart enough, they just find it easier to access the technology using their chips.

Please don’t insult cats, it’s cats who are smart enough to know how to use their chips! Robots and chips just react as they are programmed.

So I have a cat chipped 15 years ago, and she can still operate modern devices with it - open doors, get food from a robot.

Not all tech goes obsolete fast, there are legacy compatibility layers!

Actually I like the very fact that it is paid. Supporting the developer, and some sort of accountability.

Also, after trying connect, liftoff, jerboa (all perfectly good apps), etc I find that sync is most smooth and customizable.