The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body • Hacker News Board

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#101

Post by dpritchett » Wed, Dec 15, 2010, 3:36 PM UTC

steveklabnik wrote: post #92

jonhendry wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he doesn't feel that as a wholly empty accomplishment, he must be a sociopath. He didn't prove his ability to fight was superior. He didn't prove his mastery of martial arts was superior. He proved his ability to push his opponent over the line. If there were no line, he'd be crushed.

Nope, his ability to fight _was_ superior. He used every advantage possible while staying within the rules of the game. That's how competitive games are played.

Perhaps, but only in a fleeting "I'm the reason they patched that map exploit in 4.01" sort of way." Exploiting a one-time temporary imbalance in a game system doesn't make you a lifelong great player. As an illustration, who's the more respected NBA champion, Kevin Garnett or Kobe Bryant?

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#102

Post by runjake » Wed, Dec 15, 2010, 4:18 PM UTC

khafra wrote: post #100

runjake wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

8 weeks according to him. Try it and get back to me. You aren't going to go from a 5k to a 50k in 12 weeks and remain injury-free, sorry.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2009/sep/15/eddie-izzard-c... 5 weeks training, 43 marathons in 50 days.

5:48 marathon was his fastest time, according to that article. That's A LOT of walking. And that was his best time.

This is more akin to hiking a flat version of the Appalachian Trail than running 50 km straight.

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#103

Post by alexyim » Wed, Dec 15, 2010, 8:35 PM UTC

Bystander wrote: post #98

alexyim wrote: post #30

In this article, http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sports_body_trai... It claims that your body can only synthesize about 2 pounds of dry muscle mass per month. 34 pounds in 28 days is roughly a pound of muscle per day . I've always found myself wanting more evidence to back that up, or even just seeing more examples of people saying they've done that. The closest I've heard to getting that kind of result a…

I can refute that claim: I went to Marine Corps bootcamp (PI SC), weighing approximately 127 lbs. I left (3 months later) weighing 142lbs - 15 lbs in 3 months. I think if I had gone on double rations I could have gained more.

Refuting what claim?

It's also important to note that there's a difference between dry muscle mass and what you read on your scale after you've taken away body fat (that's presumably "wet muscle" - I don't know the exact word for it). So in your case, you might've gained a bit of fat (let's say 2 lbs for sake of argument), which means you gained 15-2/3 = 4.3 lbs of "wet muscle", which is entirely possible according to this article. You'll definitely gain more weight if you doubled your rations, but I suspect that will shift your muscle-to-fat gains ratio much more towards gaining fat.

I've also made similar gains at one point, going from 140-155 in 3 months. I did this through a diet of ~3600-4500 calories, and I gained a bit of fat too probably from overshooting my caloric intake near the end at 4500. Granted, my diet wasn't perfect, but it was pretty regulated so that's why the original claim's rate of muscle gain draws my attention.

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#104

Post by alexyim » Wed, Dec 15, 2010, 8:48 PM UTC

Bostwick wrote: post #69

alexyim wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can synthesize more than 2lbs of muscle per month, if the muscle you're synthesizing has been in a trained state previously. Do you have a link to that by any chance? It does make sense though. Perhaps that's what happened with him, but without that key bit of info it's fairly misleading.

Start with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_Experiment . Then read http://blog.legendarylife.com/the-colorado-experiment . Anecdotally, here's one guy's attempt at repeating the Colorado experiment. http://www.placeintheground.com/2008/07/21/testing-out-the-c... http://www.placeintheground.com/2008/09/25/colorado-experime... Re-reading this makes me think that Tim Ferriss is probably advocating the Colorado Expe…

I see. The experiment seems ill-conceived in the first place, along with the guy's attempt to repeat it.

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#105

Post by tyrmored » Wed, Dec 15, 2010, 9:38 PM UTC

I bought Ferriss' book on a whim at an airport. I have no qualms in saying I think it's perhaps the worst waste of $20 in my life. The guy's a charlatan.

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#106

Post by jonhendry » Thu, Dec 16, 2010, 4:59 AM UTC

steveklabnik wrote: post #92

jonhendry wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he doesn't feel that as a wholly empty accomplishment, he must be a sociopath. He didn't prove his ability to fight was superior. He didn't prove his mastery of martial arts was superior. He proved his ability to push his opponent over the line. If there were no line, he'd be crushed.

Nope, his ability to fight _was_ superior. He used every advantage possible while staying within the rules of the game. That's how competitive games are played.

I have a lot more respect for something like Doug Lenat winning a 1981 Traveller (pencil & paper RPG) Trillion Credit Squadron space navy warfare competition by using an AI program to come up with a strategy that followed the rules but was totally unlike what anyone else was doing: building massive numbers of small, cheap, individually weak, disposable/suicidal ships, rather than designing a smaller traditional fleet of big, expensive, powerful capital ships.

http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?t=14095

For one thing, the strategy he came up with is not unlike the use of suicide bombers in real life conflicts. I expect something similar will apply when large numbers of small, cheap autonomous drones start being deployed. It has real-world applicability. It was also effective, I believe, in EVE Online. Plus, it was an interesting application of technology. It wasn't just "shoving".

By comparison, Ferris' shoving tactic is virtually useless outside of the context of a ring-based martial art competition. (Maybe if you got in a fight on the edge of a cliff, or on the roof of a building, or next to a pool of sharks...)

Re: The 4-Hour Body: (Quickly) Hacking The Human Body

#107

Post by jonhendry » Thu, Dec 16, 2010, 5:04 AM UTC

jonhendry wrote: post #60

gursikh wrote: post #34

Every Tim Ferris thread I see on HN, has nigh 10 - 20 posts that all essentially say: "Tim Ferris is a charlatan. He's relies on spin and marketing to sell his products. His methods encourage people to be lazy and not make a genuine effort to reach their goals. His advice is counterproductive." But while Tim makes every effort to support his claims using facts, anecdotes and citations these sorts of comments are rare…

"every effort to support his claims using facts, anecdotes and citations" Has anyone ever bothered to verify those facts and citations? I mean, do his sources actually support his claims?

I ask because it's not unheard of for a mass-market work to include lots of citations allegedly in support of points made in the text, but when tracked down, actually contradict the author's points.

eg: Ann Coulter, http://mediamatters.org/research/200608070002

Most of the time nobody bothers to check. Reviews will mention "19 pages of footnotes" or similar to suggest the author's arguments are well-founded. But sometimes the footnotes are just a smokescreen.

If Ferris cites scientific papers, are they in credible journals? Have they held up? Do his sources actually support the claims? I dunno. I was wondering if anyone had checked.