Live data from Hacker News

MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

sciencedaily.com

21–30 of 57 posts

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exercise doesn't suck, land use policies generally just don't prioritize good places for the fun kinds of exercise.

Who does land use right?

I can criticise Australian urban planning for days ... but many visitors to Australia do effuse about how much outdoor recreational space we have and plan for.

Eg: Perth's 7km park: https://www.facebook.com/reel/1362227242068763 and https://www.tiktok.com/@9newsperth/video/7553237387548134712

AU Aintree North Recreation Reserve : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5vYNG2eL9g

Skate parks, woops, river and coastal setbacks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfLa32K74Zw

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#22
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who does land use right?

I can criticise Australian urban planning for days ... but many visitors to Australia do effuse about how much outdoor recreational space we have and plan for. Eg: Perth's 7km park: https://www.facebook.com/reel/1362227242068763 and https://www.tiktok.com/@9newsperth/video/7553237387548134712 AU Aintree North Recreation Reserve : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5vYNG2eL9g Skate parks, woops, river and coastal setbac…

Yet Australia’s obesity rate is around or worse than that of most of the Western states, Minnesota, Missouri and Illinois [1][2].

I don’t think land-use policies are the main cause.

[1] https://data.worldobesity.org/rankings/

[2] https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data-and-statistics/adult-obesit...

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#24
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can criticise Australian urban planning for days ... but many visitors to Australia do effuse about how much outdoor recreational space we have and plan for. Eg: Perth's 7km park: https://www.facebook.com/reel/1362227242068763 and https://www.tiktok.com/@9newsperth/video/7553237387548134712 AU Aintree North Recreation Reserve : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5vYNG2eL9g Skate parks, woops, river and coastal setbac…

Yet Australia’s obesity rate is around or worse than that of most of the Western states, Minnesota, Missouri and Illinois [1][2]. I don’t think land-use policies are the main cause. [1] https://data.worldobesity.org/rankings/ [2] https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data-and-statistics/adult-obesit...

First link has Australia, the country, at 32% obesity Vs. USofA at %41.6.

My only observations, having travelled in both, is that Australia like eveywhere has gotten more urban in past 20 years and I've got a feeling the percentage of Australians significantly past the technical bar of "obese" is very low compared to rates in the US of "well past" "just merely obese".

I'm not sure anyone's broken down the obesity quintile demographics.

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#25

That’s awesome! The benefits of exercise against aging, mental illness, etc are numerous and well documented. Everybody should do it.

If that was true athletes would be the youngest, mentally healthiest, and in many other ways better than average. But that's not the case if you look at them. My guess exercise is beneficial only to some level, after that it has a big toll on everything. Including IQ, mental and general health, and so on.

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#26
post #25

That’s awesome! The benefits of exercise against aging, mental illness, etc are numerous and well documented. Everybody should do it.

If that was true athletes would be the youngest, mentally healthiest, and in many other ways better than average. But that's not the case if you look at them. My guess exercise is beneficial only to some level, after that it has a big toll on everything. Including IQ, mental and general health, and so on.

Being an athlete and doing maintenance exercises are two different levels of exertion.

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#27
post #6

> brains that looked nearly a year younger Seems like a pretty small effect - if I'm 58 and I have the brain of a 57 year old, and to achieve that I did an entire year of exercise (as was done in this study) ... you'd have to evaluate it against many other things to decide if that was really the easiest way to achieve that result. I'm always suspicious of small effect sizes even when they are statistically significan…

>But it just begs the question, if you think that then go measure those things with your study.

Because randomized control, multi-year, longitudinal studies into behavioral interventions in human beings are incredibly annoying and expensive to run if you want to account for the risk of drop outs and/or non-compliance. They hosted twice weekly aerobic exercise classes for the experimental group (dozens of people) for a year! That’s not cheap by any means

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#28
This is from the abstract: Engaging in 12 months of moderate-to-vigorous exercise reduced brain-PAD in early-to-midlife adults. The pathways by which these effects occur remain unknown.

They do not make the claim from the title. Given that the effect is small, it might just be that brain-PAD is sensitive to other factors than age, e.g. exercise. As a matter of fact, this study is decent aupport for that hypothesis.

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#29
post #25

That’s awesome! The benefits of exercise against aging, mental illness, etc are numerous and well documented. Everybody should do it.

If that was true athletes would be the youngest, mentally healthiest, and in many other ways better than average. But that's not the case if you look at them. My guess exercise is beneficial only to some level, after that it has a big toll on everything. Including IQ, mental and general health, and so on.

>My guess exercise is beneficial only to some level, after that it has a big toll on everything. Including IQ, mental and general health, and so on.

What reason do you have for thinking this? As far as I’ve read, there’s no indication that athletes perform worse than the population average on any of these metrics.

Athletes outperformed non-athletes on standardized tests in a 2014 study of Texas high schoolers.[1] Professional soccer players/footballers outperform the population average on a variety of cognitive assessments.[2] Sub-4 minute mile runners have better longevity and lower risk of cardiovascular disease than average.[3] With the exception of contact sports like American Football which involve serious risks of injury, I can’t think of any example of elite athletes that are worse off on quality of life metrics than average people.

[1] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4831893/

[2] https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.2415126122

[3] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38729629/

Re: MRI scans show exercise can make the brain look younger

#30
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can criticise Australian urban planning for days ... but many visitors to Australia do effuse about how much outdoor recreational space we have and plan for. Eg: Perth's 7km park: https://www.facebook.com/reel/1362227242068763 and https://www.tiktok.com/@9newsperth/video/7553237387548134712 AU Aintree North Recreation Reserve : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5vYNG2eL9g Skate parks, woops, river and coastal setbac…

Yet Australia’s obesity rate is around or worse than that of most of the Western states, Minnesota, Missouri and Illinois [1][2]. I don’t think land-use policies are the main cause. [1] https://data.worldobesity.org/rankings/ [2] https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data-and-statistics/adult-obesit...

Why are you excluding the heaviest 2/3rds of the US population from your comparison?
Post reply on HN