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The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

well.blogs.nytimes.com

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Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#11

Post by benihana »

For me it always comes back to: what are people's long, long term goals. Overall? Is it a longer life? Do you want to live an extra five years? I personally don't think that's a good goal. I'd much rather be in good shape, mobile, healthy and relatively pain free for my 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and as far into my 70s as I can manage than to increase my lifespan from 85-90.

It's way less about eking out a few more years of keeping death at bay and way more about feeling good while I'm a mobile, mentally healthy adult.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#12

Post by ghthor »

BSousa wrote: post #4
ChrisNorstrom wrote: post #3

I think a lack of exersize throughout the day is why guys today are going bald earlier than in previous generations. I think high intensity exercises for 3 min every 1-2 hours throughout the day is reversing my hair loss. I'll be making a blog post on it soon with evidence of my progress. Since August of 2014 I had been losing my hair. More and more of it was showing up in the sink drain. Earlier this year I got worr…

I started losing mine at 17 and I worked out/moved a lot at the time (played 2 sports + fun activities) so I doubt there is a connection there.

Male pattern baldness is directly linked to testosterone. I believe is also linked to stress. If you're TOO active and causing high levels of cortisol in your system then you'll probably go bald early.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#13

Post by niels_olson »

tempestn wrote: post #5

Now we need someone to combine these two to give us a picture the whole parameter space. Wouldn't a 3d graph by awesome here? Premature death rate on the Z axis, minutes of weekly exercise and percentage that is beyond a given intensity threshold on the X and Y? You could then compare that to the same thing, except using average intensity as the metric instead of amount of time spent over a threshold. 450 minutes per…

Reading the abstracts, the measurement the US study uses for "dosing" is metabolic-equivalent hours per week. The Australian study uses "vigorous".

If you want to grade your activities of choice to METs, there are various sources to do estimate them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_equivalent

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#14

Post by niels_olson »

31reasons wrote: post #7

Studies like these always make me think how little we know about human body. I wonder when are we going to stop doing these kind of studies and learn from human body as purely engineering system. By simulating it at a molecular level and understanding it that way. Where are the chips that mimic cells and help create complete simulation of a trillion+ cell system? We need Elon Musk of human body :)

> simulating it at a molecular level

It's a work in progress

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2014/ph240/milic1/

Eukaryotic cells are much more complicated though. It has been estimated we have done 1% of the biological experiments necessary to figure out how a human actually works.

Anybody want to fund my prostate cancer biomarker discovery project?

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#15

Post by glibgil »

benihana wrote: post #11

For me it always comes back to: what are people's long, long term goals. Overall? Is it a longer life? Do you want to live an extra five years? I personally don't think that's a good goal. I'd much rather be in good shape, mobile, healthy and relatively pain free for my 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and as far into my 70s as I can manage than to increase my lifespan from 85-90. It's way less about eking out a few more years of…

Yes, I want an extra five years. I'm working on a difficult project that I might not finish before I die. Five more years would really help me.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#16

Post by glibgil »

melling wrote: post #8
31reasons wrote: post #7

Studies like these always make me think how little we know about human body. I wonder when are we going to stop doing these kind of studies and learn from human body as purely engineering system. By simulating it at a molecular level and understanding it that way. Where are the chips that mimic cells and help create complete simulation of a trillion+ cell system? We need Elon Musk of human body :)

How about simply being able to better monitor/measure changes in the body?

How about that.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#17

Post by nostromo »

benihana wrote: post #11

For me it always comes back to: what are people's long, long term goals. Overall? Is it a longer life? Do you want to live an extra five years? I personally don't think that's a good goal. I'd much rather be in good shape, mobile, healthy and relatively pain free for my 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and as far into my 70s as I can manage than to increase my lifespan from 85-90. It's way less about eking out a few more years of…

Young people say this a lot, but I don't hear people in their 80s say it.

When my grandpa was dying in his mid-80s, it really hit home for me how scary it is. Even if you've had a fulfilling, long life, dying still sucks. For young people, another year of life for an 80 year old doesn't seem like much, but to an 80 year old it means the world.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#18

Post by RankingMember »

glibgil wrote: post #15
benihana wrote: post #11

For me it always comes back to: what are people's long, long term goals. Overall? Is it a longer life? Do you want to live an extra five years? I personally don't think that's a good goal. I'd much rather be in good shape, mobile, healthy and relatively pain free for my 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and as far into my 70s as I can manage than to increase my lifespan from 85-90. It's way less about eking out a few more years of…

Yes, I want an extra five years. I'm working on a difficult project that I might not finish before I die. Five more years would really help me.

"Duke Nukem Forever: Part Deux" developer spotted.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#19

Post by lkesteloot »

corin_ wrote: post #9
nidieunimaitre wrote: post #6

I always wonder to what degree this kind of study might invert causality: that is, people who are subclinically "ill" may be less likely to exercise in the first place because it is harder or less pleasant for them. Someone with, for example, undiagnosed but significant cardiovascular disease (unfortunately very common: in many cases the first sign anyone recognizes as concerning is a heart attack) is likely to have…

Or indeed other causes which could create an accidental correlation. The more you eat the fatter you're likely to be, the fatter you are the harder exercise is, the less of it you're likely to do. The more you smoke, the more out of breath you'll get when exercising, the less of it you're likely to do. These are two examples I personally feel contribute to my not getting as much exercise as I did 10 years ago. If I d…

A well-run study should control for weight and smoking. But the undiagnosed cardiovascular disease can't be controlled for. Exercise is much harder for me than for others, for example, and I don't know why.

Re: The Right Dose of Exercise for a Longer Life

#20

Post by paulsutter »

benihana wrote: post #11

For me it always comes back to: what are people's long, long term goals. Overall? Is it a longer life? Do you want to live an extra five years? I personally don't think that's a good goal. I'd much rather be in good shape, mobile, healthy and relatively pain free for my 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and as far into my 70s as I can manage than to increase my lifespan from 85-90. It's way less about eking out a few more years of…

What part of the article gave you the impression that an exercise related reduced chance of death in a given year would cause a person to be in worse shape or less mobile/healthy/pain free? Your conclusion is counterintuitive, so I can only assume you have an interesting basis for your position.

I ask because a naive reader might assume that you're just making a dismissive middlebrow comment. Which would fall into the category of gratuitous negatively, and I can't imagine you'd be doing that.

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