There is actually a new company, Proteus (http://www.proteus.com/), which has addressed a similar problem. Basically, they've developed a way to make a drug pill "smart" by embedding a tiny disposable transmitter in the pill. It uses stomach acid to create an "in-situ" battery and then transmits a unique ID to a receiver patch worn by the patient. Something like this perhaps could scale in the future if we could "pepper" FOOD with such nanotransmitters (eg a populate a food item with a certain density of transmitters to indicate calories).

I tend to just pay attention roughly to what I eat, and not eat foods that are generally bad for me/empty calories. However on some days I'll consume twice the amount of "recommended daily calories" for an adult my size. Yet I remain an 140lb adult male.

There are no hard/fast rules for calorie consumption, and I don't believe a calorie counter will help. In-fact, it is the precise quantification of food that leads to poor diets/eating habits.

EDIT: My fear is that focusing on only a small part of nutrition will further harm the nutrition of individuals. If we place too much attention on calories other things can be overlooked such as vital fats and acids or minerals. I'm trying to make the case that increased awareness and education of food and the human diet/nutrition is more important than counting calories. As someone points out below, there are many situations where calories are not labeled. In my case, I'm aware of what food is decent, and what food is junk and this allows me to forgo strict quantification of the food I consume. I know that food from most food chains is generally junk. This extends beyond the nutrition of the food as well. Food chains typically source their food from the cheapest distributors, and these are often the same distributors that end up distributing massive quantities of contaminated foods.

Here's another case. I could potentially consume 5 sodas in a single day and remain under my caloric restriction, but I would have consumed a ton of empty calories. A calorie monitor is not able to help in this case, but my own awareness of health and nutrition keeps me from doing this.

The issue of health is far larger simple quantification of a few metrics. It is within any individuals ability to determine for themselves general effects of the food they are consuming.

For some of the best arguments contrary to my own: http://www.foodpolitics.com/tag/calorie-labeling/

Just because you don't need to count calories to maintain your weight doesn't mean it isn't a useful tool for many people.

The idea that the precise quantification of food that leads to poor diets/eating habits is rather obsurd given that most diets unfortuantely don't actually do that. Most diets are composed of ridiculous rules like "Don't eat any carbs!" or "Eat only cabbage!" Tracking what you are eating and not going over a calorie limit is one of the most reliable ways to lose weight if you actually do it. Most people, "dieters" included, have absolutely no clue how many calories they eat every day.

I guarantee that anyone who wants to lose weight can do so if they eat fewer calories than they use in a day. Losing weight is that simple. It's not necessarily easy, but it is extremely simple.

I didn't mean diets in the restrictive sense, but rather as a description of any type of food a person generally eats.

I agree completely that weight loss/control is about caloric spendature in relation to caloric intake. However in the US we have more labeling and discussion about calories than any other country that I'm aware of yet we remain an overweight nation with nearly 2/3 of our population being over weight, and 1/3 being obese. I don't feel as though further quantification on the consumer side is going to remedy the situation.

Many social situations and small restaurants/cafes exclude calories. And many calorie labels have awkward 'amount of servings' that make it hard to calculate for the average American to calculate actual calories. Someone who may have a daily muffin from some no-name cafe may think it's only 250 calories from their previous label experience and then are surprised to find out it's actually 700 calories for example.

Another example is a bottle of ice tea might say '4 servings per bottle' and say 30 calories/serving. Missing those small numbers is easy to do and I know of people thinking they're only consuming 30 calories vs. 120 calories.

The cheapest food is also very unhealthy, while in other countries it is opposite. That along with a car and sit in an office culture leads to part of the obesity epidemic today.

A magic automatic calorie counter would decrease the effort to diet significantly and would still be a great educational tool for many people.

I saw a demo awhile back of an app that would try to estimate calories based on pictures of food. It was wildly inaccurate. For people who are determined to make it work, counting calories requires an obsessive mindset that will weigh a handful of nuts before eating them.

This is one of the few use cases where Soylent ( the pseudo food ) may be superior. Because you can guarantee that you are eating x calories per day and only x calories per day.

But then, you'd be living on soylent...

>> However on some days I'll consume twice the amount of "recommended daily calories" for an adult my size. Yet I remain an 140lb adult male.

That's the thing - some days. People who are overweight generally do it every day.

And I'll also assume you're ~ 25 years old and your metabolism hasn't started slowing down yet.

I think obese and many overweight people are aware that they consume more food than the average person. What is the obese person going to do at 6pm when they've received the notification that they've consumed too many calories?

There are much larger issues than calorie counting that cause 2/3 of the U.S to be overweight. Agricultural corn subsidies for starters, a defunct FDA, poor education, lack of strong culinary traditions and a lack of preventative healthcare all play into a massive amount of people being overweight.

Not to mention a culture that encourages people to spend money on things that allow them to live a sedentary lifestyle.

If you drive to work, take the elevator, sit in front of a computer all day and then watch television to relax... then; duh. You're gonna be chubby, even if you only eat organic salads from Whole Paycheck.

If you walk or bike for local trips, stand or take frequent stretch breaks while at work, always take the stairs and garden in the evenings you're going to much more fit even if taquitos are a food group as far as you're concerned.

Habits are the key. Figure out how to shift your default behaviours and you will effect change.

Your body has a "set point" that is resistant to this kind of disruption. If you gradually increase calories and do it regularly, that's how you gain weight.

I remained slim despite eating some very rich restaurant meals every so often until I started drinking and eating similar food at home nearly every day.

> And I'll also assume you're ~ 25 years old and your metabolism hasn't started slowing down yet.

Would his age tell you much, really? I know people who are frustrated that they can't gain weight. Me, on the other hand, feel that I can't eat snacks, desserts etc. or other 'empty calories' without gaining weight. And that's been the case since I was 20, or my teens.

I started counting calories because I find that it makes sense to fight fire with fire, in a way. The caloric density, abundance, and low price of food in western countries is only possible because of technology, and so a little bit of technology (a smartphone app with a big library of foods, barcode scanner, etc.) goes a long way to counter that.

A better approach is to stop counting calories altogether and realize that by simply focusing on calories rather than how your body processes & utilizes food is a completely outdated way of looking at nutrition.