13 comments

  • jsw97 an hour ago

    19 subjects, assigned sedentary or active based on habitual physical activity levels. Subjects were screened on basic health measures.

    The problem with this is that people are sedentary or active for a variety of health-related reasons that are not captured in any screen (esp. the crude one used in this study). As a predictive study, this is fine, sedentarism predicts a lot of bad things. But it doesn't, on its own, suggest that becoming active is helpful. See also grip strength and mortality.

  • nine_k an hour ago

    > mitochondria, which process energy within cells, showed a significantly decreased capacity to burn both sugar and fat in healthy individuals who get less than the recommended 150 minutes of exercise a week.

    150 minutes a week is about than 22 minutes a day. Like 11 minutes twice a day. This looks like a really low effort to rid oneself of the risk of early decline.

      sidewndr46 23 minutes ago

      I've seen studies like this before. They'll suggest that as little as 15 minutes of exercise significantly improves health in some group they studied. My initial assumption was they added 15 minutes of additional exercise. No, they studied people who did literally nothing. Then had them exercise 15 minutes a day.

      As you might guess, their outcomes improved greatly.

        SchemaLoad 20 minutes ago

        This is sadly not a rare type of person. I'm worried my parents fit this description, they drive everywhere and work an office job. I'd guess on average they get 0 minutes of exercise a day.

        I think people get this image in their head that someone who doesn't exercise ever is this comically fat unemployed person when in reality it's the average office worker who isn't fitness minded. A good chunk of HN users wouldn't be getting 15 minutes of exercise a day.

        free652 20 minutes ago

        15 mins of walking or exercise. I did 2 hours of walking 15k steps and it's barely moved my required cardio load to 10 and I need over 200 weekly.

      SchemaLoad 25 minutes ago

      A lot of people who use a car to get around will spend most days doing literally no actual exercise. For someone who lives in a more walkable area, 22 minutes of exercise is just living live normally without actively "exercising".

      andy99 10 minutes ago

      I understood that (a) it’s vigorous activity and (b) there’s some minimum duration for it to be effective. So in practice it’s 1/2 hour of running a day (with a couple rest days) or equivalent level. This is something I’d guess less than 10% of the population gets.

      I look at the 150 minute recommendation and worry that it’s so high a lot of people will just say forget it (similar to what I’ve seen about sodium and sugar guidance).

  • Herring 34 minutes ago

    I'm confused. The study doesn't mention "Zone 2" even once ...

  • wonderwonder 31 minutes ago

    Seems like a potential use for peptides like Mots-C or SLU-PP-332

      jr3592 28 minutes ago

      It would be cool if one could safely adapt to modern life (lots of sitting, required focus over long sessions) without having to spend time exercising if they don't want to (to be clear, some people want to). Imagine if you could just take something to get all the benefits of exercise, without having to actually spend the time. That'd be pretty great for everyone if it truly was safe and without downsides (skeptical).

        SchemaLoad 24 minutes ago

        What if we could just lay in a pod 24/7 taking peptides and nutrient supplements while having an endless stream of instagram reals beamed in to our eyeballs on our Meta Raybans. That way we would never have to do pesky things like go outside or move.

        fhdkweig 22 minutes ago

        They make stationary bikes that fit under a desk. I've never used or seen one, but they exist. I considered getting one during 2020, but they seemed impossible to source.

        https://duckduckgo.com/?q=desk+stationary+bike

          wonderwonder 6 minutes ago

          they make walking pads as well for the desk; I've never used one but have seen some people who seem happy with them