I'm kind of late coming into this discussion, but I did read the whole thread. Very interesting. As for the above comment, don't you think that's kind of rude?

As far as the rest of the thread is concerned, I believe that calories do matter to an extent. It's just a matter of finding your own individual amount, as opposed to going by a very generic formula like 10X or 12X. I like the Harris-Benedict formula, it is very accurate!