Calories count, period. I have put on approximately 15 pounds of weight (prolly 75% of which is muscle, the rest fat) eating strict paleo. In fact, for three months of that I was eating nothing but animal products (no dairy though).

You can put on weight by eating a whole lot OF ANY SUBSTANCE.

The important point is only that that threshold point of the amount of calories that is above maintenance is going to be lower when carbohydrates enter the picture. With only protein and fat in the diet you simply get more leeway. But you will most definitely still gain weight if you eat 7,000 calories of coconut oil and ribeye. Try it.

Proof is in the pudding, and it took me a bunch of self-experimentation to really believe this. I read GCBC thoroughly and come from a WAP background.

Try it out:

1) try eating only oatmeal or some other bad food but only in the 1500 calorie range. You will lose weight.

2) on the other hand, try eating huge amounts of fat and protein, way above maintenance like in the 4000-5000 cals range. You most definitly WILL gain weight.

In the end we see that alas moderation in quantity is STILL A FACTOR. Not the most important, but totally relevant.

I found him intriguing. Boght his 2 books and I'm going through them right now. There is definitely value in them.

http://www.byebyecarbs.com/about/energy-medicine/

This Greg Ellis?

Umm, yeah, I think whatever he says automatically gets disqualified on account of him being a complete lunatic. Homeopathic products are purely energy? WTF? Homeopathic products are water. The end. Should I even get into his autism lunacy? Vaccines? Really? We're stil on that? Gee, it has nothing to do with the kids getting an imbalance of n-6 fats while in utero and during development, screwing up brain development? Yep, I'm sure it is the vaccines and the energy.

The guy goes from a PhD in physiology to believing in energy medicine and homeopathy? He probably has a brain tumor or had a cerebral infarc. Leading causes of magical thinking among former scientists. That, or they're cynically trying to make money off people.

Great answer, Aravind. And Robb Wolf has also recommended to people that they reduce calories to lose weight if they're not as active - using himself as an example in the last podcast.

Greg Ellis's discussion with Jimmy Moore in the recent Livin' La Vida Low-Carb was great - nice that someone's been working on this so long and is here to help out some of the newer scientists who are working on the problem of the high-carb low-fat diets.

Gary Taubes never said calories do not matter. The point is using calories in/out to "explain" weight gain is a tautology. Acknowledging this does not invalidate the First Law of Thermodynamics. It is an attempt to shift ones focus on the hormonal impacts of macronutrient consumption. The focus on gluttony/sloth - eat less/move more - has not yielded any consistent long term results since you are fighting your natural set point. By adjusting the macronutrient composition and more importantly, avoid Neolithic Agents of Diseases - you can shift the hormonal response in your favor

Also, Kurt Harris, Peter at Hyperlipid, Stephan Guyenet have never said calories do not matter. See the following - http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2011/03/fasting-insulin-and-weight-loss.html

The first line is "I think that it might be a good idea to state here that I'm a calories-in calories-out sort of a person". Then the rest of the articles focuses on macronutrient consumption, hormonal response, satiety, etc.

We did not evolve with bomb calorimeters and so counting calories is futile and doesn't work. It's not that calories don't matter, but what is actionable by using a tautology to improve oneself...nothing.

This was the point of Taubes as I have understood it.

My 2 cents Aravind