If you mean control as in choice between &quot;little less likely&quot; and &quot;little more likely&quot; then yes, everyone can control diabetes and obesity. But in fact, you can control your risk of dying in a terror attack much more than risk of getting diabetes! Just never visit big malls, never attend mass events, never use public transport. Better yet, move to a village far away from city and always travel by your car. There, you&#x27;ve reduced your risk of dying in a terror attack to pretty much zero.<p>&gt; <i>Is it complete control? No, it&#x27;s very near that.</i><p>It&#x27;s definitely nowhere near that, especially in terms of things like diabetes (partially genetically determined) or heart attacks. You&#x27;d have to go to absurd lengths to control those near-completely. For instance, we know of one good way of controlling obesity, and that is to lock everyone in Nazi-style death camps. You won&#x27;t get obese if you&#x27;re fed 1500 kcal a day. You also won&#x27;t be very happy.<p>The widespread belief that we have so much personal control over those diseases is probably one of the biggest reasons why they haven&#x27;t been solved yet.