I'm guessing that you meant this in a semi-humorous and hyperbolic way rather than a mean way, but it would probably be good to review the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. A comment like this wouldn't need too much to come across as friendly rather than aggressive.
GLP-1s disprove this to an extent. Personal responsibility is based on a fallacy, it’s just brain chemistry.
So give everyone GLP-1s to cast the shadow of personality responsibility (reduction in adverse reward center operations, broadly speaking) through better brain chemistry. Existence is hard, we can twiddle the wetware to make it less hard.
The only thing that GLP-1 agonists prove is that CICO does indeed work - if you force yourself into a caloric deficit through the inhibition of hunger hormones using drugs that you will lose weight. It has nothing to do with people choosing to eat highly processed unhealthy foods over healthier options. When you're on Ozempic or peptides like Retatrutide/Tirzepatide you don't think "I will not eat a bag of chips today because it's unhealthy and calorie dense", you simply don't think about eating because your feeling of hunger is inhibited.
> Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) are increasingly used for type 2 diabetes and obesity treatment. Their effects on appetite and satiety are well established, but less is known about their associations with food purchases. Case reports and small observational studies suggest that GLP-1RA initiation is associated with altered preferences from highly processed, energy-dense products to minimally processed foods. We examined whether initiation of GLP-1RAs for treatment was associated with changes in nutritional quality and processing level of supermarket purchases.
> Changes in purchasing patterns after GLP-1RA initiation were seen across most nutrient categories. Opposed to comparisons, after the first prescription, participants purchased fewer calories, sugars, saturated fats, and carbohydrates, alongside modestly more protein. The share of ultraprocessed foods also decreased. Although modest at the individual level, these changes may accumulate at the population level, particularly given increasing GLP-1RA use.
> The only thing that GLP-1 agonists prove is that CICO does indeed work
This is incorrect, as demonstrated over and over again. For many people's bodies, consuming less will result in the body changing its metabolism to burn less, and not dipping into fat stores. Conversely, for many people's bodies, exercising more does not in fact change their metabolism and the amount of energy they burn. (There are studies that going from "zero" to "not zero" makes a meaningful difference, but "not zero" to "quite active" often doesn't.) "CICO" is not useful or actionable for many people.
That fallacy is "free will", which as we know doesn't exist at least in the way we think it does. Society's reckoning with the idea of free will as something fictional is on par with our upcoming intelligence reckoning, evolutionary reckoning and heliocentric reckoning.
The consistency that I'm hearing from all across patient groups is gain of control, whereas previously, there was a loss of control… All of a sudden they're able to step back and say, 'oh, well I had this shopping phenomenon that was going on, gambling, addiction, or alcoholism, and all of a sudden, it just stopped,'
- Dr. Gitanjali Srivastava, Vanderbilt Medical Center
If a company put a giant a giant bollard in the middle of the interstate and someone hit it, are you saying that the company bears zero responsibility for that?
Are millions of people voluntarily paying money to hit the bollard daily or thereabouts when not hitting the bollard is free and takes less time out of their day?
Yeah it would be better if everyone just didn't eat crap but crap is what people want.
Having briefly experienced weight loss drugs - and the bliss of that constant “EAT!” voice in your head just going quiet - I’m pretty convinced most humans have a genuine genetic predisposition to overeating.
And when you zoom out to the population level, the “we’re all autonomous individuals” argument gets a lot shakier.
Like yeah, at the individual level you have agency, you make choices, fine. But at scale? We are absolutely at the mercy of whoever has figured out how to tickle our monkey brains in just the right way to get us buying their fattening food.
Humans and dogs: how many dog owners have to store their dog’s food in a bin the dog can’t get into? How many can’t leave more than one meal’s worth of food out at a time?
Until the past century or so, “eat up the available food while available” was generally a plus for survival for most populations - a person who could keep some of that excess around on them was more likely to survive a famine than their leaner peers.
Even my grandmothers (born in early 1920s Texas) remembered not always getting as much to eat as they wanted as children, and it wasn’t because their mothers were afraid of them getting fat - there just wasn’t any extra food. One of them likely did have a caloric deficit a few times here and there around age 10-12, and it showed: she was rather small.
One of my grandfathers lied his way into the Army at 16 just to be one less mouth for his mother to have to feed.
We’re really not that far separated from “eat all the food” being a health benefit.
I'm guessing that you meant this in a semi-humorous and hyperbolic way rather than a mean way, but it would probably be good to review the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. A comment like this wouldn't need too much to come across as friendly rather than aggressive.
GLP-1s disprove this to an extent. Personal responsibility is based on a fallacy, it’s just brain chemistry.
So give everyone GLP-1s to cast the shadow of personality responsibility (reduction in adverse reward center operations, broadly speaking) through better brain chemistry. Existence is hard, we can twiddle the wetware to make it less hard.
The only thing that GLP-1 agonists prove is that CICO does indeed work - if you force yourself into a caloric deficit through the inhibition of hunger hormones using drugs that you will lose weight. It has nothing to do with people choosing to eat highly processed unhealthy foods over healthier options. When you're on Ozempic or peptides like Retatrutide/Tirzepatide you don't think "I will not eat a bag of chips today because it's unhealthy and calorie dense", you simply don't think about eating because your feeling of hunger is inhibited.
You are incorrect. GLP-1s modify food desires as well. “Will power” is merely hormone levels in this regard.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle...
> Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) are increasingly used for type 2 diabetes and obesity treatment. Their effects on appetite and satiety are well established, but less is known about their associations with food purchases. Case reports and small observational studies suggest that GLP-1RA initiation is associated with altered preferences from highly processed, energy-dense products to minimally processed foods. We examined whether initiation of GLP-1RAs for treatment was associated with changes in nutritional quality and processing level of supermarket purchases.
> Changes in purchasing patterns after GLP-1RA initiation were seen across most nutrient categories. Opposed to comparisons, after the first prescription, participants purchased fewer calories, sugars, saturated fats, and carbohydrates, alongside modestly more protein. The share of ultraprocessed foods also decreased. Although modest at the individual level, these changes may accumulate at the population level, particularly given increasing GLP-1RA use.
2 replies →
> The only thing that GLP-1 agonists prove is that CICO does indeed work
This is incorrect, as demonstrated over and over again. For many people's bodies, consuming less will result in the body changing its metabolism to burn less, and not dipping into fat stores. Conversely, for many people's bodies, exercising more does not in fact change their metabolism and the amount of energy they burn. (There are studies that going from "zero" to "not zero" makes a meaningful difference, but "not zero" to "quite active" often doesn't.) "CICO" is not useful or actionable for many people.
11 replies →
> Personal responsibility is based on a fallacy,
That fallacy is "free will", which as we know doesn't exist at least in the way we think it does. Society's reckoning with the idea of free will as something fictional is on par with our upcoming intelligence reckoning, evolutionary reckoning and heliocentric reckoning.
Wisdom comes with time, lived experience, and an open mind. Stay curious.
https://xkcd.com/1053/
1 reply →
Eh? I mean, this sounds potentially interesting but I don’t understand it!
“We fixed the glitch.”
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12742762/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S003193842...
https://time.com/7340807/history-debate-insurance-glp-1s/
https://recursiveadaptation.com/p/the-growing-scientific-cas...
The consistency that I'm hearing from all across patient groups is gain of control, whereas previously, there was a loss of control… All of a sudden they're able to step back and say, 'oh, well I had this shopping phenomenon that was going on, gambling, addiction, or alcoholism, and all of a sudden, it just stopped,'
- Dr. Gitanjali Srivastava, Vanderbilt Medical Center
1 reply →
Read my comment more carefully.
If a company put a giant a giant bollard in the middle of the interstate and someone hit it, are you saying that the company bears zero responsibility for that?
Are millions of people voluntarily paying money to hit the bollard daily or thereabouts when not hitting the bollard is free and takes less time out of their day?
Yeah it would be better if everyone just didn't eat crap but crap is what people want.
Having briefly experienced weight loss drugs - and the bliss of that constant “EAT!” voice in your head just going quiet - I’m pretty convinced most humans have a genuine genetic predisposition to overeating.
And when you zoom out to the population level, the “we’re all autonomous individuals” argument gets a lot shakier. Like yeah, at the individual level you have agency, you make choices, fine. But at scale? We are absolutely at the mercy of whoever has figured out how to tickle our monkey brains in just the right way to get us buying their fattening food.
Humans and dogs: how many dog owners have to store their dog’s food in a bin the dog can’t get into? How many can’t leave more than one meal’s worth of food out at a time?
Until the past century or so, “eat up the available food while available” was generally a plus for survival for most populations - a person who could keep some of that excess around on them was more likely to survive a famine than their leaner peers.
Even my grandmothers (born in early 1920s Texas) remembered not always getting as much to eat as they wanted as children, and it wasn’t because their mothers were afraid of them getting fat - there just wasn’t any extra food. One of them likely did have a caloric deficit a few times here and there around age 10-12, and it showed: she was rather small.
One of my grandfathers lied his way into the Army at 16 just to be one less mouth for his mother to have to feed.
We’re really not that far separated from “eat all the food” being a health benefit.