It's depressing that people continue to ask the wrong question. The right question is: how do I lead a healthy life? This involves understanding inputs and outputs, and what the human body is evolved to do. When we focus on superficial aspects like external appearance we automatically set ourselves down the wrong path, with inevitable results. Seeking to "lose weight" is an error. Seeking to live a healthy life continuously, year after year, decade after decade, is the only viable approach. But everyone wants an instant fix, a magic solution, so there will always be charlatans and sincere-but-ignorant people ready to offer us "help."