> Other people are, in fact, questioning CICO. Look at the other commenter talking about base metabolism changes.

I disagree. CICO is fundamental physics. Just because metabolism changes does not mean you can produce more energy than you take in. CICO always applies, and it's so 'duh' that it's nearly pointless to discuss in my mind.

Their points about metabolism changes is that the details matter. Finding a way to break the cycle will yield more gains with the population than telling people to starve in a desert.

Metabolism changes are metabolism changes. What does the food you eat have anything to do with that, in practice? As far as I can tell, the mix of carbs/fat/protein has little to do with how much your body “compensates” from a surplus/deficit. If you don’t meaningfully have control over that, the only other real lever is how many calories you eat. Finding a way to lower calories without satiety problems or food noise issues ultimately is the solution. Some people do it via lots of low caloric foods (veg, mainly) that still have high satiety. Some people do it with Ozempic. Some people just aren’t bothered nearly as much by a caloric deficit no matter what they eat.