Slashdot Mirror
Fat Geeks Healthier Than You Thought
DoubleWhopper writes "Sound the trumpets! Being a fat geek may not increase your risk of death after all. According to this ABC News article, a re-examination of the available data suggests obesity is still a health risk, but the 'pleasantly plump' among us 'do not have the same health risks as obese individuals.' But, from the article: 'People shouldn't think that this study gives them a free trip to the pork rind buffet.' Believe what you want, but you'd better hope I don't get to the Twinkies aisle before you."
Great. Now I can live a long, sexless life!
Your market has a Twinkie AISLE!?
All this says is "REALLY fat people are more unhealthy then fat people." Well duh. We already knew that one. Sheeesh.
Reduce your risk of death? Let's leave religion out of this one, shall we?
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
"but you'd better hope I don't get to the Twinkies aisle before you."
:)
To bad for you...I work at a convenience store and already have the twinkies i want
First Rule Of Fat Club Is You Don't Talk About Fat Club.
According to this ABC News article, a re-examination of the available data suggests obesity is still a health risk, but the 'pleasantly plump' among us 'do not have the same health risks as obese individuals.'
First off, there seems to be some number-shuffling here. This is a very politicized and personal topic for a lot of people, and different motivations are behind the different studies. This particular study has been trumpeted by the main-stream media (it's been out for a few days now) because it is different and will attract reader's interest. The scientists that told us that having a BMI over 25 will most likely still stick to their guns and say that we should be healthy. The danger of this study is the attitude that we even saw in the original post:
But, from the article: 'People shouldn't think that this study gives them a free trip to the pork rind buffet.' Believe what you want, but you'd better hope I don't get to the Twinkies aisle before you.
Come now, you may not be at as high a risk as previous studies had indicated - and may be even better off than an unhealthy skinflint, but there is no rational way that binging on the Twinkies aisle will benefit your health whatsoever. I know it was flippant and humorous, but it's still a dangerous idea to think that you can eat Joe Lois, maintain a BMI of 29 and be healthy. Indeed, it's not the BMI - it's the food you eat, the nutrition, etc.
"There's no success like failure, and failure's no success at all."
- Bob Dylan
Great! Now they just need to account for prolonged monitor radiation and celibacy.
These studies just give people a reason to keep eating badly.
But, from the article: 'People shouldn't think that this study gives them a free trip to the pork rind buffet.'
Yeah, because people really listen to stuff that they don't want to hear.
"The best predictor of obesity is being overweight," said Charles Clark, professor of medicine and pharmacology at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis. "The younger you are when you become overweight the more likely that you will become obese."
Anyone gone to their local middle school recently and looked at the weight of the kdis there. I deal with them almost every day, and I can tell you, the younger they are, the fatter they seem to be getting. Even the anorexic ones.
NOPE!
I suggest you read Slashdot
being overweight gives you a greater chance of having diseases like high blood pressure and cholesterol which in turn lead to heart attacks... you can be a lightweight and still have high blood pressure and cholesterol and keel over if all you're eating are twinkies and pork rinds
However, fat geeks will always have another thing to consider. Darwinian death. Eat those twinkies, my pretties... just means more pussy for me!
"You know why you do not see me styling wit my homies? Because I have no homies!!" -Mojo Jojo
It's losers, here this might help...
You: loser
Your mom: loose
DoubleWhopper writes...
Heh.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Fat Geeks get no lovin' from the opposite sex, and women are a surefire way to go to an early grave!
Take my wife... please.
har
Sure, this is great news for a good portion of the American population, a country with a ridiculously high rate of obesity and overweight individuals. However, one has to question its objectivity and scientific basis. As one poster already pointed out, the story merely suggests that somewhat fat people are more "healthy" than obese people. I for one am not the skinniest geek, but I don't really think this is the right kind of motivation for me to read in wanting to shed a few 'extra' pounds. :)
I maintain a reasonbly healthy diet, try to balance my nutrition and exercize when I can.. but in this fast-paced go-go-go environment of urban America it's very difficult to stay ahead physically, financially and maintain one's sanity. While I don't doubt that I'm relatively healthy, I also think that I could be more healthy.
We geeks tend to sit down for the majority of the day and feel our asses grow as we're emmersed in various technological endeavors. This is all fine and dandy, but as my doctor pointed out recently, it's best to shed those extra pounds while we're still young as the older we get the harder it gets to rid ourselves of them as our metabolic rate slows down. So I would suggest to my fellow geeks to do what you can when you can and take articles such as these with no more than a grain of salt. In two weeks there may be another study that says otherwise. Besides, who can believe any story about how much food we should eat that's posted on a site whose founder is some random taco!
shop.envescent.com - Computer hardware and more.
Being a fat geek may not increase your risk of death after all.
Last I knew, the human race had a 100% mortality rate. Being "pleasantly plump" might exempt some of us from death?
Last time I frolicked out in public I got arrested, maybe I'm doing it wrong.
I'm a skinny geek you insensitive clod!
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
Yup, it's that new Fatkins diet thing.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Douglas Adams died exercising in the gym. I think that says something important to us all ... ;-)
Try weightlifting. Years ago, I was barely eating anything and I wasn't exercising (at my worst point I was eating a Reser's burrito a day (I know, that's pretty bad, but I just wasn't hungry!)), and getting dizzy occasionally. Weightlifting, through stimulating my body for growth, made me HUNGRY. Now I eat frequently, have huge amounts of energy that keeps me going all day long, and am happier.
If you weightlift, you will start getting into the habit of eating more. Just remember to drink plenty of water throughout the day (sometimes dizziness can be brought on by lack of fluids), and hopefully take vitamins.
My thought is it relates more to lifestyle and fitness level than anything. For example, my mother is overweight and has been all her life. Yet she is the most active person I know. She has tremendous energy and gets an incredible amount done every day. So yes, she is quite overweight, but she's very fit.
Same goes for her father, who was a big heavy Wisconsin farmer. He used to laugh about doctors telling him to lose weight for better health and a longer life. My grandfather just shrugged and said "I've buried all my skinny friends." He was overweight all his life too, but being a farmer he was very fit.
Of course these are individual cases and anecdotal evidence is pretty worthless. I just want to say that being overweight and being out of shapeare two different things. Some fat people are in better shape and more fit than some skinny people. Not all, obviously. It must come down to genetics to some degree, but also how fit they are and how much exercise they get.
This research probably doesn't mean you can stock up on twinkies and mountain dew. It just means you can be fit and healthy even if you are fat. But being fat certainly doesn't mean you're healthy!
There are different ways of being overweight. You know those guys with the hard round gut? That's bad. You know those soft flabby guys (but not too flabby), well that's not quite as bad (IIRC).
What really bothers me is I'm starting to see teenagers who have the physique of a 45 year old man with the stereotypical beer gut. That's not just bad, it's really really sad. Their parents should know better.
-- Microsoft is the most expensive commodity operating system and office suite vendor in the marketplace.
Show me the death stats for people based upon exercise and nutrition INSTEAD of focusing on the weight of their corpse.
I'm betting that doing it that way would show a more understandable progression (ie. the healthier you keep yourself, the longer you will live).
But that kind of research won't get the headlines.
And the average person who reads that will only remember and believe what he wants to ("being fat means I'll live longer").
There seems to be a number of factors that can contribute to being skinny: smoking and poor diet offer different challenges.
If you're smoking, quit. You will soon replace your smoking with snacking and fill out in no time.
If you are young and not eating well, which seems to be the case, you've got to worry. It seems that people like this have a tendency to just go to obesity once their metabolism slows down.
So just start working on eating regular, healthy meals that are easy to make and eat. I'd stick with stuff like pork stir fry, it's easy to make, easy to store and reheat and has a lot of good fat calories. London Broils are also a good source of calories and nutrients. Don't over cook your food, use real butter, drink whole milk and stay away from prefab food -- it's all salt and no helpful calories. -- at least not the right kind.
Eat breakfast every morning, and go for a walk or some other sort of exercise daily to get your body hungry. Also work on drinking more water, this will help open up your ailementary canal to more food.
Good luck!
It seems to me Slashdot is constantly posting excuses. We see stories on why it's ok to fail tests (thinks outside the box), have a short attention span (Computer distractions), be overweight (see above story)... usually for reasons that amount to nothing more than a poor excuse.
Look, if you WANT to enjoy food more than the average person and are willing to accept that a bigger mass and some common sense health issues may follow, go for it! Be happy about it. If you WANT to do 15 things at once and check your email 25 times a day, knock yourself out.
But man... I give it 3 days before Slashdot posts a story linking IM's and Emails to Twinkie consumption.
Odwalla sells nutrient-dense food bars that will raise your blood sugar enough to keep you from passing out all the time. I'm underweight myself and often can't be bothered to get myself some real food; these work great for those times.
Drinking a six pack of dark ale daily will raise your caloric intake significantly, too.
there's more than one way to do me.
It doesn't really matter if you're skinny, plump, or fat until you actually reach the "obese" limit. But even if you aren't obese, that doesn't mean you're living healthy. Everyone remembers that kid who ate nothing but fries, ho-hos, and mountain dew but still weighed 140 pounds at 6' tall all through high school and college (perhaps some of you were that kid). The damage done to that body is way beyong someone who eats fresh fruits, vegetables, and whole foods but weighs in at 220 pounds and 6' tall. Just watch your diet and do some exercise during the week. If your metabolism is a little slow and you hold onto a little more weight, it's fine.
Salt very unhealthy!
;P If you cant fit through the door frame, you dont eat there. Yeah, obscene fat and skinny are both dangerous and I believe, unhealthy. Im in the middle, and I cosider it safe.
(Let alone salt-NaCl- is used in neural ransmission and digestion)
Salt's now found healthy.
Butter found to be Unhealthy!
(Yet margarine is found to be more unhealthy due to trans-fats)
Butter is now not as bad as people think.
Eggs cause Cancer (or evil of the day)!
(Yet, eggs have many nutients found healthy to digest, along with good studies)
Eggs arent as bad as everybody thught.
Sugar causes hyperactivity!
(Yet, high glucoce levels promote higher insulin and other somnabulic factors, found to put you to sleep)
Sugar doesnt cause hyperactivity.
Of course, add this to the "X causes Cancer of the Week" and you might as well dismiss these types of (cough)scientists. Hell, for years now, thes etypes of people go after coffee and try to find some sort of demon in it.
The only bad people I see are those reallllly big people at the all-you-can-eat buffets. The best solution for that is have a regulatory door size
I wake up hungry, but for some reason I can't eat in the morning. I'm so repelled by food that I can't pack a lunch even when I know I'm going to be hungry later.
Because of this, I generally try to eat a good meal right before I go to bed.
there's more than one way to do me.
Overweight people may live longer
But experts pointed out that the study only looked at how long people lived and not at obesity-related diseases.
Sucks for those fat people who aren't geeks.
Since when are there committees that study specifically fat geeks and their lifestyle!?
Oh well, what the hell
You all can kiss the fattest part of my ass.
At the same time!
The heck, you don't need weightlifting. You need to do 10 pushups,abs and sit-ups a-day.
I weight 65kg. Maybe that's skinny for you, but before exercise, I weighted 55kg.
Then i began weightlifting, and my chest got less flat, I gained biceps (look ma, I have muscles!), and my neck stopped looking like Shaggy from Scooby Doo.
Eat more meat, and replace those empty calories with whole-wheat bread. Sugar won't make you more muscular.
They have pork rind buffets? Like... an entire buffet of pork rinds?
Why wasn't I notified?
I say just get them all into LARPing. Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt!
If I want a big steak, I'm gonna have a big steak. And mashed potatoes. And gravy. And I'm gonna wash it down with some good wine, and maybe even Vodka if I'm in the mood. If I die when I'm 60, so fuckin' be it. At least I will die knowing what a good steak tastes like.
I don't want to live till I'm 100 years old, because I know with social security system the government is putting in place I'll have to live under the fucking bridge if I live too long. And I don't want my kids to spend their hard earned cash on keeping me alive or paying for the nursing home. If I'm ever not able to take care of myself, give me the god damn shotgun and go somewhere for five minutes.
Considering that the leading causes of death such as heart disease, cancer, stroke and diabetes still have such intimate relationships with weight, I would still rather be thin than chronically sick.
Study after study has been confirming the links these diseases have with being overweight. When you consider quality of life arguments against controlling weight (i.e. - denying yourself those delicious delicacies), also consider the huge benefits in reduced medical expenses and better overall well-being you will enjoy.
That being over weight, monitor radiation, bullets, speaking out against Microsoft, and years and years of drinking soda isn't what kills people....It's a proven fact that DEATH kills people, little piece of lead or whatever aint the problem.
Perhaps you should check for Hyperthyrodism.
Good luck.
Adolfo
I think its all about metabolism. I do all of the cooking for my household, because my wife can burn Kool-Aid. I cook with olive oil, real butter, pork fat, duck fat, etc.
I eat whatever I want to and I'm still a relatively thin guy who is staring 35 in the face. I find this surprising considering that I sit in front of computers all day for a living.
I suppose it all comes down to genetics and metabolism. Of course, I could die tomorrow of a heart attack. Inject that mayonnaise directly into my arteries, please.
I eat a Big Mac about every three months. When I eat it I wonder why it's been three months since I had one, but after finishing I know why it's been so long. Have you seen the documentary Super Size Me ?
SiO2
Carl, this bar says 'South Bronks Parasite Diet' not Paradise! Great episode of Aqua Teens
Frylock: "We should have cloned twenties, Jackson wouldn't have given a fuck."
When one dies, nothing happens. Only relatives of this someone let out their sigh of relief and go on with their lives.
And yeah, if I have to eat only vegetables and run 10 miles every day just to live 10 years longer, fuck it. I'd rather die sooner.
So what if some study says you can be healthy at "X weight". It doesn't matter. If you're happy with your body then your happy, end of story. If you arn't start eating fruit instead of snack food (and dont eat for the sake of it, eat when your hungry, you'll be surprized how little that is). Then walk the damn dog for 10-20 minutes a day. Thats a walk int he park or across a field. I've been doing this got 6 months and I've lost 4 stone (google it to work out your measurements). It's fucking easy if you just try.
I like muppets.
It turns out vegetable shortening is bad for us, but eggs and meat are not. (trans fat and cholesterol ratios)
It turns out Scotch is bad for us, but Vodka is not. (urethanes)
Just recently, they're starting to question the safety of Triclosan, a very common ingrediant in soap and toothpaste (chloroform inhalation)
Recently, people are starting to recognize that not all carbohydrates are created equally (e.g. the glycemic index).
The only conclusion is that science is really a long way from catching upto reality. It would be interesting to see how much of the current heart disease "epidemic" was caused by the refined-food revolution of the 20th century (sliced white bread, shortening, etc.).
-- Microsoft is the most expensive commodity operating system and office suite vendor in the marketplace.
> slightly "overweight" people actually have a lower mortality rate (read as: they live longer) than people in the "ideal weight" category.
This proves that our perception of "normal" body is actually abnormal. No wonder so many women (and men for that matter) suffer from the abnormal "normal" image.
My off-beat theory: some couture designers and mass-media artists have somewhat skewed perception of their taste of what beautiful people should look like (somewhat adolescent and boyish), and present that to the media. People then believe that's the norm.
I like plump. I guess I have normal "abnormal" image.
If he doesn't want to be killed by high cholesterol, he just needs to smoke more.
paintball
Maybe they don't live longer because of health reasons - maybe they live longer because they're sedate, and you're much less likely to die while sitting on your couch watching TV than, say, goig outside.
paintball
I can't stress how much truth there is in this statement. I was starting to get really fat, and my grades, productivity, and personal opinion dropped like crazy. Since then, I started eating healthy, lifting weights, and running as often as I can (ideally daily). In about a month I lost five pounds! :-)
I took a scientific approach. I attempted to running (~2.5-3mi) as often as I could - forcing myself to do the exercises rather than do something else (e.g. gotta do this homework assignment or research paper). Furthermore, I made sure my heart rate was within my target range so as not to tire myself out. I also lifted weights and joined the wrestling club. (Even though I wrestled in high school, I was horribly out of practice and shape by now.)
Each time I ran I would record estimates of my time, distance, calories burned, and average heart rate. However, I made it a point not to measure my weight since that depressed me in the past. The numbers recorded would probably not be accurate or precise; however, the trend would be after enough data was collected. (For the geeky, the error of an average of measurements is proportional to the rms of each individual measurement's error.)
With the exception of a small breakfast, I never ate until after running. I also attempted to balance my energy burned from running with the calories consumed during lunch after the exercise (I went to Subway). With the addition of wrestling (two times/week) and weight lifting (three times/week), I lost lots of weight without thinking about it. Furthermore, I believe that I didn't lose muscle mass since I kept lifting weights (at 80% max).
More importantly, my self confidence rose and I found I was ten times more productive than before. I programmed much more in the last month than the previous quarter year. My grades improved as well. I can hardly believe how good this exercise makes me feel too. It is so much better than alcohol (which really doesn't do much to me), food, or wasting time playing computer games to releave stress. It is great!
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.
- Jerome Klapka Jerome
There are three general things that will help you avoid obesity:
- Excercie, as you mentioned
- Diet (or lack thereof)
- Metabolism
Plenty of people can maintain a good body weight merely through metabolism or eating less. Excercise is certainly not required, and is actually probably the least likely of the three to be effective by itself.
paintball
I'm going to assume that this is the same study that this All Things Considered story was talking about. If so, ABC seriously screwed up it's interpretation of the study. As I recall, the study showed that OLDER people who fell into the moderately overweight category actually lived longer. The researcher NPR talked to said that this made sense because having a little extra reserve fuel stored as fat could make a difference in allowing the body to sustain itself while fighting off a disease at that age. If this is the case, then the government's one-size-fit's-all method of determining what is a "healthy" weight has to be reconsidered. It can be done...the USDA just did it with the food pyramid. It's now 1 of 12 (I think) possible pyramids depending on certain factors in your life.
Please, please do not take this as a licence to eat huge amounts of unhealthy food, and not exercise your body.
I know most people understand this but please moderate yourself. There are many more studies that show eating healthy, combined with exercise will make you live longer (not ignoring obesity-related diseases http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4468001.stm). I know more then enough people who have diabetes to say; 'you are damaging your body by continuously eating foods that have low nutritional value'. I know that some foods just taste good, but you have to moderate yourself. Skip the Big bag o' chips for the small one with an apple on the weekend, start slowly.
Just make a change.
If only more people followed the example, we'd be all set.
There's no guarantee that healthy eating habits will lead to painless death, either. :0)
Anyone know why ABC news uses Flash to display the title of their articles?
Nah, I think that the secret to a long life is to laugh a lot and not take things too seriously. Exercise is overrated and directly related to the "look good, feel good" mentality (which is mantra for movie stars, womens' magazines and musclemen wannabes).
All that extra physical movement wastes potential mental energy. I know this to be true because I haven't moved from this horizontal position (screen projected on the ceiling) for two years.
Why is everyone trying to contradict the ultimate conclusion of this study:
the lowest mortality risk is found in the 'overweight' category
This means that overweight people are healthier than normal people and all the abuse they have taken over the years amounts to a fad.
Face reality: all that eating rabbit food and taking high priced vitamins and buying high priced exercise machines has been a waste of money and effort.
Two twenty-something marathoin runner types. Dead from cancer.
Two thirty-somethings dead from cancer.
One marathoin runner killed on the road, same for another serious bike rider.
All my tubby frieds are doing fine.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
What a load of rubbish, but I expect no less from ABC:
1) Health risk is proportional to obesity
2) Less obese people have less of a health risk than very obese people (which follows from 1)
3) Less obese people have (virtually) no health risk???
Can anyone say "non sequitur"?
The vast majority of the population in the western hemisphere is overweight, including myself. We should not try to justify our poor health habits, however, by pretending that they don't exist.
You can be whatever weight you want - after all, who really gives a damn apart from you? But kidding yourself into thinking that there will be no consequences attached to this choice will bite you in the ass in the long run.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
luckily i live in amsterdam where there are amazing local farmers markets and the EU is doing its best to keep the very worst of US food practices at bay, despite incredible pressure. but don't get me started there. man if ever a country needed a 'truth and reconcilliation comission' it's the USA.
I used to have a better sig than this, but I got tired of it
I was ten times more productive than before.
Jarrod, does this 10x factor have anything to do with your income-earning ability since appearing in the commercials?
Subway is owned by Doctors Associates, but the shareholders are not doctors.
Okay, lets say you were 50-100 lbs overweight, but you put in at least 3-5 miles walking per day. Or even just standing still. All your muscles are working no matter what, such as your legs, supporting that weight (compare that to military training, they can at least drop that weight once they're done hiking).
So who the hell decided that living under such conditions is unhealthy? Compare the above to the skinny guys who have no real exercise habits, who sit on the couch all day eating and drinking junk food and soda. Ironically we hear more about them dropping dead the moment they get their first taste of real exercise.
Now while muscle is denser and heavier in weight than fat, unless you're a body builder, there's no way you could match the weight you would be carrying if you were overweight or obese. In addition, your options for exercise are more limited, since that build requires constant maintenance(and risks of transitioning from musclebound to lardbottom are actually higher).
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
I didn't RTFA, because I already know why fat geeks live just as long as professional basketball players, on average. The fat geeks die younger than the players would without STDs, but the players balance the field out a bit by getting laid all the time by all sorts of women. Just enough of them pick up the hiv or the clap to drop the average life expectancy to equal with the technically less healthy fat geeks.
Problem is, you people in the States are fucked when it comes to walking. Your cities have been designed around driving for so long that in most places, walking to nearby stores isn't even possible.
Sidewalks are uncommon. Freeways with no pedestrian crossing are common. Parking lots with steep edges and no entrance for pedestrians are common.
If you live right in the urban or student center of any large city, you're ok, and if you live in a small town you're fine, but most of the population lives in the enormous suburbs, where you haven't got a hope.
Biking's nice, but it takes a lot of maintenance to do safely. Vests, lights, frequent tune ups, riding only at the right hours, balancing any loads, carrying non biking clothes with you if you need to go somewhere a little more formal, finding a place to lock it safely, removing the seat to carry with you, locking both wheels...
The exercise lifestyle is no longer a reasonable suggestion for most Americans. That means exercise really is going take either deliberate concentrated effort or addictiveness. Thank god for DDR... it's not perfect, but it shows the way forward.
Oh, and as others have said, once you're already fat the kind of moderate exercise that walking errands provide won't do you any good. It's only a maintenance technique, which is hardly useful for the two thirds of Americans who already have the problem.
Seriously.
I'm not Jarrod, nor have I ever been in a commercial. Being a college student, I wish I had his income to pay my tution! ;-)
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.
- Jerome Klapka Jerome
Light breakfast
Salad for lunch or dinner
Reasonable meal with protien and carbs the rest of the time
Run 3 times a week, lift twice a week. Running = 40 minutes, lifting = working major muscle groups another, half hour a day.
Have a few hardy meals a week, enjoy yourselves.
No regular soda, no candy. No fast food.
If you like those, sorry, find an endorphin high, find a food high, find somethign to take you off the urge of crap.
You might have to sacrifice an hour of MMPORPG a week, maybe an hour of non-profit coding. But isn't not beign a fat ass, being someone people can appreciate, being someone you don't have to meet online worth it. Comment me down if you will for being unrealistic and being unappreciative of people that "are big boned" but dammit this is somthign I overcame and you can to. I council poeple at my work at this all the time, I've helped at least half a dozen coworkers lose FIFTY pounds EACH, you CAN TOO!!!
The whole study was based off of BMI values, which makes the study pointless. Joe Sixpack could be "overweight" on the BMI chart, but have low body fat, while Joe Keg could have nearly no muscle, and have a much higher body fat percentage. Who lives a healthier life (physically, maybe not practically), a football/soccer (depending on location) player, or an office worker that never exercises other than walking down to the water cooler?
The only reason why we're seeing 'high rates' of obesity over here is because Americans are hell bent about measuring everything and collecting statistics. And then they go "OMFG, 70% of the population is not all skin and bones, gotta do something about this". Granted, I haven't been in every US town and haven't measured everyone's weight, but from what I saw abroad, there aren't less fat people in Europe for example, especially in Eastern Europe.
It certainly makes you healthier if you do it right and I agree it's worth walking and cycling around but do you have any idea how much exercise you have to do to over and above normal in order to burn off calories?
20 minutes of walking, 70 kcalories so a *single* mars bar with 230 kcalories will be burned off in about *an hour* of walking, around 3 miles.
A 6 minute mile, 100 kcalories so you need to run 2 and a half miles to burn off a single mars bar.
And we're not even talking about large numbers of calories here. 1 lb of fat is around 4000 calories, or *40 miles* of running.
Or, you can *STOP STUFFING YOUR FACE WITH CRAP*, do some occasional form of exercise you enjoy to keep your muscles marginally toned and heart beating and allow your natural metabolic processes to burn fat for you.
Deleted
the classic hollywood ripped six pack look is impossible to maintain, or healthy to do so. people don't think of the stress and strain it puts on your body. people who aren't stressed and live comfortable lives and are happy live longer. i suspect content slightly over weight geek would definately live longer due to the low impact life they lead.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Funny how when people poo-poo the BMI they always cite how the following categories of people show up as overweight...
1. Bodybuilders (e.g. Arnie).
2. Sub 5'7 men (Tom Cruise, Mel Gibson)
3. Really tall guys.
4. Fat stars that cinema goers think are thinner than they are (Russel Crowe, Mike Tyson).
1-3 ARE UNUSUAL CASES (4 is just laughable): If you fall into these categories, the BMI will be unrelable, but for 90% of men (I have never looked at the figures for women) if your BMI is over 25 you are overweight. Or maybe its all rubbish, but don't trust silly examples like the parent post.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"Being a fat geek may not increase your risk of death after all." i would be far more interested in the implied ability to evade death at all.
I wonder where this idea comes from actually. I've been working as a SW Engineer for 10 years now + 4 years doing Comp Sci in university, and I have to say that none of the places I have been in have had many fat or unfit people. Certainly no more than the average population. So where does this apparent stereotype originate? Is the fatness among geeks just an American thing or what?
Many people confuse being obese with being morbidly obese ( i.e. Al Roker, Michael Moore, Ariel Sharon etc).
FWIW, you do not have to be as overweight as you think to be considered obese. Having a BMI of at least 30 qualifies as obesity.
One word of caution. The BMI is criticized for not differentiating between weight from lean tissue and weight from fat.
However, you shouldn't let the criticism make you ignore the BMI scale. Oceania doesn't have a muscle building epidemic, it has an obesity epidemic. It is still a good tool for giving people a perspective on various body weights:
BMI Scale http://www.consumer.gov/weightloss/bmi.htm
Fat people are healthier than obese people. Who would have thought?
But that doesn't change the fact that you're still a disgusting fat slob.
Losing weight is as simple as making sure that energyIn < energyOut.
Another poster posted a message about how to slim down for those people interested.
It sounded complicated. It involved paying money and it involved downloading PDF files.
In the spirit of free(dom) software I decided to post some notes on the subject I gathered from a National Geographic article:
Notes I have taken from:
National Geographic. August 2004. Pages 46 - 61.
"Why are Americans so fat" by Cathy Newman.
1 in 3 Americans is obese, twice as many 3 decades ago
15 percent of children are overweight or obese, a three fold jump from 1980
Being overweight is associated with 400,000 American deaths per year.
Being overweight increase the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes,
colon cancer, breast cancer, and endometrial cancer.
The Center For Disease Control reports that adult women are eating 335 more
calories per day then they did in 1971.
Adult men are eating an extra 168 calories a day.
1 pound of fat is about 3500 calories. An excess of 250 calories a day will
put on 26 pounds a year.
Being overweight or obese is a matter of taking in more calories then are used.
Most overweight and obese people are out of caloric balance,
but only by a tiny amount of calories per day. A 250 calorie deficit per day
will subtract 26 pounds a year.
A calorie is a calorie is a calorie.
The effects of bariatric surgery can be thwarted by people snacking lightly,
but continuously throughout the day.
The United States, Russia, Thailand, South Africa, Egypt, Turkey, Germany
and the UK have the highest obesity rates.
France ( yes France ), Italy, Switzerland, Scandinavia, Pakistan, India, China,
Colombia, Brazil and a handful of African countries have the lowest
obesity rates.
Yes, it's normally spelt 'Tao' in the Western Alphabet, and technically, the movie is called 'Tao... ,' but at least in Mandarin the word begins with a sort of sharp 'D' sound so the GP is fair in what he says.
a la "Osama" vs. "Usama", "Gadaffi" vs. "Qadaffi", I guess.
Guess this is not dissimilar to the Japanese use of the (supposed) 'r' sound, which is meant to be more like a cross between a western 'l' and western 'r'. In a reversal of the mistake many English-speaking Japanese make (mixing up ls and rs), a (supposed) stereotypical 'gaijin' mistake in Japanese is making the 'r' sound too hard (see here and here).
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
It's about lifestyle too.
Pizza and Coke is common components, along with not being very physically active... That's stuff that can be really unhealthy, for the cholesterol levels etc.
Often, obesity is a consequence of these things too, so I don't really get why they're saying it's not an unhealthy sign.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
A cheap sweetner used in many food products and mostly associated with the non-food product of softdrinks or sugar water.
Research has shown that HFCS can contribute as much as 1/3 to high triglicerides (FAT) in your blood and body.
Having never weighed above 140 in my pre 40 years, I was supprised to be scaling out at 200 a couple years ago. Both my Family doctor and Chiropractor wanted me to lower my triglicerides, lose weight. Otherwise my family doctor was going to put me on meds for that besides colesterol.
I heard about the report, took HFCS out of my diet, dropped 30 Lbs and have pretty much kept it off with any effort. Just the decision to not eat food with HFCS in them.
Good food actually taste alot better.
So it really depends on what you are eating to be a bit overweight, as to how healthy you are...
Hmmm, don't geeks generally eat the wrong foods?
Fat people who exercise regularly are more healthy than skinny people who don't.
I find it hard to believe Italy is among the lowest when it comes to obesity, or atleast I doubt it will remain so. In 2002 Italy had the highest amount of overweight/obese children in all of Europe, at above 30%.
I'll have to agree that the true conclusion of this article is that BMI is often a poor way to establish someone's body fat percentage. I'm technically overweight, though that's primarily because I lift weights nearly every day. My height hasn't changed any since I started, but I went from 165 lbs to 190 lbs. The BMI index, coupled with an "overweight" rating system considers me the same as someone who's had one too many doughnuts.
Personally I'd like to see a move to a different measurement system. The catch is that other methods to determine body fat tend to be expensive or annoying.
Have you ever seen really fat people in their 20s? Of course. 30s? yep. 40s? ditto. 50s? err - a few. 60s? a couple. 70s? Hmm can't think of any.
No matter how you live there is certainty of death :)
I can hardly believe how good this exercise makes me feel too. It is so much better than alcohol (which really doesn't do much to me), food, or wasting time playing computer games to releave stress. It is great!
What he said.
I never really started getting in shape until a couple years ago (age 29). I was out of shape in a scrawny way rather than a fat way though.
The reason people give up on exercise and hate doing it is that for the first week or two, it SUCKS-- if you haven't been in the habit of exercising. The first time I went running I got half a mile before I nearly collapsed, and then I could barely walk 2 days later. So I can see why so many people avoid it.
Same thing with weightlifting-- delayed onset muscle soreness is a bitch and you literally won't be able to move a couple days after you first start with weights.
Once you push yourself through the initial struggle, that's when you start feeling the benefits of the endorphine release, and you learn to feel the "good" kind of muscle soreness. You start to crave exercise. (This is why some people actually get addicted to exercise, which can also be unhealthy)
It's probably harder to get through the dietary changes. You pretty much NEED to give up soft drinks. Soft drinks are 100% pure crap for your system. Even beer is better for you (and I still have beer on the weekends). Just eliminating soft drinks, drinking lots of water instead, and avoiding the deep fried stuff makes a huge difference, you don't even necessarily have to count calories.
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
From my reading of the article, it makes me wonder if the body mass index (BMI) thresholds we use are wrong.
The body mass index (for those who have been living undar a rock) is a composite measure that relates body weight to height. It is your weight in kg divided by the square of your height. As an example, I weigh 64kg, and stand 1m64, making my body mass index 24.0kg/m^2.
Medicine has used the body mass index as a means of classifying people, by setting thresholds that mark the boundary between ideal weight, healthy weight, overweight and obese. Presumably they have worked it in the other direction too, but I expect they must deal with more overweight and obese people than underweight. As I used to be overweight, I don't have any info on the underweight side.
Anyway, at present, the thresholds are that 20-22 is ideal weight, 20-25 is healthy, 25-35 is overweight and 35+ is obese.
Around this time last year, I started following the Hacker's Diet with the goal of getting my weight down to the ideal (which, for my height, would be in the 54-59kg range). As I started to get close to 60kg, though, my wife complained that I was starting to look "skin and bones" and asked me to stop. I put some weight back on and have stayed more or less static at my current weight.
But between my empirical experience that I just related to you, and the reading of this article, I am led to wonder if perhaps this set of thresholds that are used to classify BMI are off and that a re-adjustment may solve the problem.
www.wavefront-av.com
Need to mod myself "-1: Wrong, wrong, WRONG!".... The threshold for obseity is 30, not 35.
www.wavefront-av.com
without people telling us that we're a freak. A fat girl can be very beautiful, but that thought seems to be forbidden in our world. We geeks don't mind to be different, but it's amazing how negative people respond if your girlfriend is fat.
Sorry poster, your risk of death, and mine, and anybody's is 100%.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
Fat-based soap is man-made, too, but there is a limit to just how much processing is good. Soap is a good example, because fat-based soap works just fine for everyday hygeine, but going too far is where the problems creep in. Wheat flour is another good example, where basic milling is needed to make bread, but going too far makes white bread with its very high Glycemic Index.
People shouldn't be turned off by the term 'fat-based' or 'lard-based', by the way. Good ol' everyday Ivory soap is made from vegetable oil and animal fat (many popular soaps are).
-- Microsoft is the most expensive commodity operating system and office suite vendor in the marketplace.
The JAMA article that describes this study is publically available. Linky, linky!
We can all sleep soundly now ... lets give a big round of applause to /. for making us this way. Keep up the good work!
I am Spartacus
One of the "secrets" of being fit is the pleasure exercise confers on everyday day living. Things are a lot easier to do, and you feel and look better. Sport and exercise is a lot of fun too. Many of us "fit" people take these so-called health studies "with a grain of [ unhealthy ] salt".
http://www.alkalizeforhealth.net/Lsweetdebate7.htm r s.htm
http://www.mercola.com/2000/dec/3/sucralose_dange
Heh, checking the links I just noticed the second one (on sucralose/Splenda) is currently censored because of legal actions in the U.K. Oh well, you can do a google search on something like "splenda dangers" and find plenty of stuff.
I'm not giving an opinion on the veracity of the linked articles, just showing that, at the very least, some people have acute negative reactions to the chemicals used as artificial sweeteners, and the long-term effects of using them regularly are pretty much unknown.
zero carbs!
Actually, the ideal is .7 and yes, it's possible to achieve this with some padding. Though not an excessive amount of padding...
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Same thing with weightlifting-- delayed onset muscle soreness is a bitch and you literally won't be able to move a couple days after you first start with weights.
I wish to God I could get that far; my problem with weightlifting was that I could either push a weight or not; eventually I'd run out of strength, but I never got the feeling that my muscles were being pushed.
(The one case where I *was* getting the feeling of burn- gluts and upper legs- was where I seemed to be getting better results)
Eventually I got pissed off at the amount of time I was wasting (weightlifting) in the gym for minimal return, and stopped going.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
If chicks don't dig you, maybe you're looking in the wrong places??? I could never attract the popular chicks on account of my "nice guy" syndrome. So I had that pain, too. What worked out for me was hanging out with girls who were the less glamorous, down to earth, and/or studious types, and then things just happened. So maybe you have to put yourself in the right places first?
... maybe joining a sports group or heading down to the cafe regularly.
But this is a passive point of view. What about the active approach? Do you have yet to go to them? I know that, being in my 30s and out in the real world, if I were looking, I'd have to get out there
"The best predictor of obesity is being overweight"?!
What the hell does that mean? In my case, the best predictor of fitness was being overweight. I think the best predictor of obesity is utter lack of physical activity coupled with utter denial about what goes into one's mouth.
Please stop stalking me, bro.
Sign up for an online dating site (with no evidence to back this, I'd suggest one that specifically targets your local area, e.g. boston.com if you live in Boston), be completely honest (although tactful in how fast you deliver all of the gory details), and prepare to lower your standards for physical characteristics. You really should be able to meet someone that you get along with provided you live in a reasonably well-populated area, and provided you aren't such an asshole that nobody can get along with you.
I wish to God I could get that far; my problem with weightlifting was that I could either push a weight or not; eventually I'd run out of strength, but I never got the feeling that my muscles were being pushed.
I've run into that before... it means you're doing something wrong, regarding form or technique, or you need to switch up your routine, or you're overtraining. I've done a fair amount of research over the past year, though I'm not an expert. I learned enough to know that you can't just go blindly in and start pumping away, there are right and wrong ways to doing things-- otherwise you'll just be wasting time and getting frustrated.
For the longest time I couldn't increase my weights with the bench press, then I discovered I was using a hand position that didn't give me the best leverage so I was running out of steam early.
Anyway, you won't get that "burn" feeling unless you're doing a high amount of reps, which is good for toning and endurance, but not building strength and size. If you increase the weight, and take each set to failure (use a weight where you can go 6-8 reps before failing) you won't feel that hot burn during the exercise but you will notice improvements. The main thing is you have to eat a TON of protein in order for it to do any good, generally at least 1g per pound of lean body weight per day.
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
I've run into that before... it means you're doing something wrong, regarding form or technique, or you need to switch up your routine, or you're overtraining.
Pretty damn sure it wasn't overtraining. It didn't feel like it, and my programme was such that there was at least two days between training a given muscle group.
Whether or not the burn was meant to be present, I wasn't getting the results. And it didn't *feel* like my muscles were being 'pushed'; it felt like they just ran out of steam.
I suspect my problem was 2/3 motivation; I was working on my own, and it's easy to get into a rut of not pushing yourself.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
so my "belly of knowledge" wont really hurt me too bad :-)
Power to the Penguin!
actually i don't think the "american dietetic association" is government - i think it's a professional organization. still susceptible, perhaps, but...
who is she? leave a comment!
Make sure that it's 100% fruit juice. That's natural sugar. You'd be suprised how some fruit juices are only 10% juice. That means that they probably have high fructose corn syrup.
most geeks are pretty fit actually, they have massive muscles on 1 arm. primarly use is mastabation. if you masterbate enough im sure that would be enough to stay healthy
I'm kind of like that. I used to take pride in being the most unathletic and physically inflexible person I knew. At six years old I couldn't touch my toes, and I always placed last in athletic competitions. Recently, though, I've gotten more flexible and may even have improved my overall athletic ability. Waaaa! I've lost my identity.
In Wisconsin this is entirely true, unless your from West Allis heart attack capital of the U.S.; then you're screwed. Height weight ratio's are not designed for ethnic or environmental body differentials. The German/Scandanavians heritage of WI and MN leads to many otherwise healthy indiviuals (heavy laborers and farmers) to beleiving they are fat.
My arguement, you live next to a Great Lake, you'll need that extra level of insulation to.
--"Sorry for the inconvience." Gods Last Words to his Creation
DNA, So Long and Thanks for all the Fish
Ugh the last thing one needs is to find a religious nut at a church.. I do agree with the meet more women advice though; go to a bar or something. That's what I would have done, but I'm not 21 yet. Curse this stupid country and its arbitrary, petty drinking laws.
The easiest way is college, but that's just a 4-8yr window, depending on what sort of degree you're getting. Being a second year student at a university, I still hadn't found a girlfriend until just a month ago. I actually met her through thefacebook.com, which is an interesting new social phenomenon altogether.
Don't despair -- there's someone for everybody; the world population is in the billions and there are more women than men. The problem is taking full advantage of this huge search space and not getting too intimidated in the process.
Seems kinda, uh, opinionated.
First, they pimp the food triangle. Now, the current one is way, way, better than the older one- but these are the guys that would pimp the older one too, because it's what the government says is best.
Well, we know that one was wrong now!
They talk about flouride as if it were necessary (they imply it's a nutrient!) but it really just replaces calcium in your teeth, making them softer and less hospitable to bacteria. Certainly not something that is necessary, more of a hack. Here in America I get wacky looks just for saying that (usually with a "purity of our natural essences" crack), but in Europe, how common is Flouridation?
Oh yea, right. It's very rare, having been tried and found wanting.
This site claims to have the truth. They're a lot more reasonable sounding than most quacks, but they have their agenda, and it sure isn't neutral.
When people start talking about quality of life arguments, I always figure they're visualizing having to go on a bran-only diet with the occasional bland diet drink. While I'm sure diets like that exist (probably for the sake of rapid reduction in extreme cases if nothing else, I suspect that the majority of time, there's a perfectly viable diet that is tasteful as well as healthy. It may not be as rapid, but it will work itself over time and, more importantly, it keeps the situation from getting worse. Personally, I'm not about to start counting calories or running marathons, but I do maintain a certain variety of food, don't eat more than I need to to keep from getting hungry, and I engage in moderate exercise, maybe 15-30 minutes per day. I could be living healthier, but in my view, I'm living healthy while still living happy.
This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.