relatively fat as they are just sugar (carbohydrate), fat and water. June 19, 2012 @ 2:39pm by oatsofwrath Tom, I know how much I eat. I have health issues that require me to pay close attention to what, when and how much I eat, so I have a pretty good idea. How have you determined that it's "extremely rare" that fat is determined by something other than diet and exercise? Perhaps you might be interested in the work of Rudolph L. Leibel, who found that metabolic processes largely counteracted the effects of dieting, one key reason why dieting doesn't work for many, if not most people. Or how about Jeffrey M. Friedman, who stated (in an article published in Nature) that the heritability of obesity "ranges between 70% and 80%...Indeed, the only trait with consistently higher heritability than obesity is height". And what about starvation syndrome? The role of gut bacteria in shaping metabolism and appetite? Polycystic ovary syndrome is quite common in women and is linked with obesity. Heck, even sleep patterns are thought to have an effect on weight. No, it's not as simple as energy in, energy out, and there is a considerable body of scientific, peer-reviewed studies demonstrating that. Weight is actually incredibly complex and affected by a bunch of different factors, some of which we understand, some of which we don't. By all means, let's talk about our health, the food we eat, whether we're getting enough exercise, etc. But framing the discussion as one