396 FAT METABOLISM. OBESITY 



Corpulence and Overfeeding. For the rest, it should be 

 understood that we can explain very well (even in persons 

 who are not customarily large eaters) an accumulation of 

 fat by the summation of very small amounts of food beyond 

 the maintenance requirements. Carl von Noorden 37 illus- 

 trates this point by the following proposition: A healthy 

 man weighing 70 kilograms, who uses 40 calories for each 

 kilogram per diem, in all, therefore, 2,800 calories, will gen- 

 erally regulate his intake of food involuntarily according to 

 the actual requirements of his body ; and is able thus, even 

 with entirely free choice of food, to keep himself in average 

 state of nutrition for many years. A small daily excess of 

 food of only 200 calories will result, if we presume that it is 

 converted into fat and deposited as such, in a yearly gain in 

 weight of eleven kilograms. One would be surprised to learn 

 to how small a quantity of food these 200 calories corre- 

 spond: 1/3 liter of milk, or 4/10 liter of light beer, or 90 

 grams of rye bread, or 25 grams of butter, or 100 grams of 

 fat meat. What fat man would dare then to disclaim the 

 possibility with quiet conscience that at least at times he has 

 not been guilty of overeating? 



Moreover, if this is to be properly appreciated, we must 

 also take into account the relation between " ballast " and 

 "live substance " in the body. "The relation between bal- 

 last and live substance, ' ' says H. Friedlander, ' i is variable 

 in individuals at different periods of age. . . . Abnor- 

 mally fat animals, like whales and seals, as well as ab- 

 normally fat men, contain to the unit of weight less active 

 substance than lean animals of the same age period; the 

 complaint of many fat persons can be understood when they 

 declare that they continue to put on weight with an absolutely 

 lower ingestion of food. In ratio to their small proportion 

 of live substance the ingested food is frequently not small, 

 and a portion of it is still available for weight increment. ' ' 38 



87 C. von Noorden, Handb. d. Pathol. d. Stoffw., 2d ed., 2, 190, 1907. 



88 H. Friedenthal (Nicholas Lake in Berlin), Centralbl. f. Physiol., 23, 437, 

 1909. 



