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More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

news.northwestern.edu

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Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#21

Post by Swenrekcah »

jprete wrote: post #18
Swenrekcah wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do these studies so that you can then use it to actually improve society by, let's say increase and improve our green spaces. When someone asks you why you're wasting time and money on a silly childish thing like a greener city instead of more asphalt for Business Inc. you can point to this study.

Doing crap studies to argue from the authority of science has gradually eroded that authority. I don’t know that this study is crap, but it fits the pattern on the surface: “Correlate politically valuable thing A with biomarker B, observe that B is correlated with universally valued C, totally ignore statistics to infer that A causes C”. I say this as someone who actively believes it’s healthier to live in or near gr…

Sure, but the problem with crap scientific studies is not studies or science, it's the crap.

Allowing lazy content pushers to 'report' on studies without understanding any of it is much more of a problem than any study, however flawed.

That and unscrupulous politicians and megacorps is what has eroded the trust in our society, not only of science but almost anything.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#22

Post by tenpies »

Mizoguchi wrote: post #19

I don't see in the paper they adjusted by family size. They mention socioeconomic status but that isn't the same thing. Would it be possible people living in urban areas close to parks have less kids or no children at all? Usually real state closer to parks within the city permiter are much more expensive, the same money buys you less square footage. I have done my own study with 7 siblings in my family half with chi…

The parenting factor is actually quite interesting because while I think most of us would agree that parents look older faster, the overall trend is that they make up for it by living longer than their non-parent peers.

It's not a huge difference: 2 additional years in men, 1.5 in women; but it's significant enough[1].

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[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28292784/

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#23

Post by alliao »

correlation does not equal to causation I'd insert the hand clapping emoji if I could; probably why it isn't allowed here. This isn't too dissimilar to people who eat salmon live longer despite higher mercury content detected in blood. it's not the salmon rather it's the fact that they are able to consistently able to afford salmon.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#24

Post by CalRobert »

LatteLazy wrote: post #17
Swenrekcah wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People do these studies so that you can then use it to actually improve society by, let's say increase and improve our green spaces. When someone asks you why you're wasting time and money on a silly childish thing like a greener city instead of more asphalt for Business Inc. you can point to this study.

But we already know green spaces are nice. And this study does not prove anything about them being good for people. Maybe instead of X USD on this study we should have spent that money on an actual green space somewhere...

Not everyone agrees. Land is a scarce asset and plenty of people would rather have something else, like parking.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#25

Post by schrectacular »

LatteLazy wrote: post #2

We need to stop doing these pointless studies. Everything is linked to everything, showing it is is a waste of money because (1) we already know and (2) we can't use this info because we don't know what causes what. But people would rather click on these pieces and feel good having their assumptions confirmed that learn and actually improve our society.

You might enjoy this conversation, which goes into why we get so many papers like this:

https://www.econtalk.org/adam-mastroianni-on-peer-review-and...

TLDR; the incentives are all aligned for researchers to do very narrow, marginal work.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#26

Post by 7952 »

alliao wrote: post #23

correlation does not equal to causation I'd insert the hand clapping emoji if I could; probably why it isn't allowed here. This isn't too dissimilar to people who eat salmon live longer despite higher mercury content detected in blood. it's not the salmon rather it's the fact that they are able to consistently able to afford salmon.

Correlation with other factors can also hide interesting science and understanding. There may well be mechanisms at play that we don't understand.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#27

Post by WesolyKubeczek »

blitzar wrote: post #10

Farmers look famously young for their age ... put a 30 year old farmer and a 40 year old lawyer in a room together and you might mistake one for the others father.

I would say that that lawyer was the farmer’s son, of course

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#28

Post by jlpom »

alliao wrote: post #23

correlation does not equal to causation I'd insert the hand clapping emoji if I could; probably why it isn't allowed here. This isn't too dissimilar to people who eat salmon live longer despite higher mercury content detected in blood. it's not the salmon rather it's the fact that they are able to consistently able to afford salmon.

Maybe also the higher OM-3 intake offset the effects of the mercury.

Re: More green spaces linked to slower biological aging

#29

Post by hombre_fatal »

alliao wrote: post #23

correlation does not equal to causation I'd insert the hand clapping emoji if I could; probably why it isn't allowed here. This isn't too dissimilar to people who eat salmon live longer despite higher mercury content detected in blood. it's not the salmon rather it's the fact that they are able to consistently able to afford salmon.

You’re making a claim about how mercury should be impacting people that eat salmon that I wouldn’t grant.

It might just be the case that salmon consumption under some threshold confers benefits that outweigh suspected detriments especially when a population tends to replace salmon with worse food.

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