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Being Colder May Be Good For Your Health
An anonymous reader writes: If you live in a developed nation, you're probably pretty warm throughout most of the day. Enclosed spaces, thick clothing, and heating devices do a good job to keep the cold away. But this hasn't been the case for most of human history. Even in warmer climates, humans often had to deal with chilly nights and tough winters. That's where our metabolic system evolved, and now people are doing research to figure out if that's a better natural state for maintaining our health.
One recent study found that "when people cool their bedrooms from 75 degrees to 66 degrees, they gain brown fat, the metabolically active fat that burns calories to generate heat." Another showed that "even after controlling for diet, lifestyle, and other factors, people who live in warmer parts of Spain are more likely to be obese than people who live in the cooler parts." The article talks about people letting their house temperatures drop into the 50s and wearing ice vests during the day, all in the name of further research.
One recent study found that "when people cool their bedrooms from 75 degrees to 66 degrees, they gain brown fat, the metabolically active fat that burns calories to generate heat." Another showed that "even after controlling for diet, lifestyle, and other factors, people who live in warmer parts of Spain are more likely to be obese than people who live in the cooler parts." The article talks about people letting their house temperatures drop into the 50s and wearing ice vests during the day, all in the name of further research.
I live in Thailand. Don't really see obese people here. It's hot. Very hot.
For non-Americans (and other Fahrenheit speakers, if any): approximately between 19 and 24 degrees Celsius.
he asks his mom "Am I a penguin, mom?"
"Of course you are, dear."
A few days later, "Is dad a penguin too?"
Yes, son, dad's a penguin. I'm a penguin. And so are you."
A few more days,"Mom, are grandma and grandpa penguins?"
"Of course they are. We're all penguins, and their ancestors are penguins as far back as you can find. Why do you ask?"
"Because I'm fucking freezing!"
In the living room I've got the windows closed, no heater yet, and it's 65. In the bedroom the window is open and it's in the 40s. I love snuggling under my pile of blankets, and sleep much better that way than I do in the summer when it's 80 in the bedroom.
I like cold, I sleep without a blanket (just a sheet), I walk outdoors without a jacket most of the year, but the only problem I never solved is hands and feet. Exposed to cold, their temperature tend to adjust to external temperature, which hurts with temperature below 10 degree Celsius.
What about the previous 2,000,000 years, how did these brown fats help the primitive man whose main problem was finding enough calories to eat?
Kept you from freezing to death.
What is this all about proving that it's 100% diet, despite all the studies to the opposite?
Learn to love Alaska
The summary claims "Good For Your Health" but only considers one aspect. Shame on them...
http://www.webmd.com/hypertens...
I keep my house at 62F during the winter, and it never ceases to amaze me when my guests demand the heat be turned up. It's as if they don't understand that there are real costs involved when warming a space up. Besides, those who are cold can add any number of layers of clothing, those who are too warm can only strip so far.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
That's 12.8 - 18.3 deg Celsius for the rest of us.
(My indoor thermometer says 22 deg C at the moment)
Tim Ferriss talks about this in The 4-Hour Body. It's one reason competitive swimmers are in such good shape: it's not just the exercise itself, it's being in water that's much colder than body temperature. One of Ferriss's weight-loss tips involves using ice-packs.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
I dunno how valid what TFA has to say, but I do know that I sleep more soundly in a room that's ~60-65F, and getting enough and high quality sleep has much bearing on your general health.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
This study is interesting, but I'm way more interested in the affect of conditioning and body temp regulation. I grew up in the US and all of houses/apartments always had good temperature control as well as ceiling fans in rooms. I got use to living in places where if the temperature was above say 70F, there was a fan running, the air in a room was circulating.
When I studied abroad in Japan and then moved there I discovered this wasn't the case and constructed a theory that early life conditions on body temp are 'imprinted' in a way. Japanese tend to let rooms run very hot. In the Summer/Winter rooms and trains are kept at about 28C maybe 30C (possibly higher in the winter), and I always found these miserable and always resulted in me sweating. I always noticed though that most other (Japanese) people never had this problem though, even in a room thats almost as hot as a mid-summer day in the winter, people would have 2-3 layers of clothes on and would be fine. I knew I wasn't alone either because in talking to other westerners living in Japan I learned that many of them had the same issue too. The only reason I've been able to come up with was that it had to do with how they were raised early on and the kind of temp. environment they are use to living in.
So I'd be curious to see if these physical effects in the study aren't something that isn't tuned by early conditioning.
If true, that may help explain why the southern US has more obesity than the north, aside from obvious education/income/cultural factors. It also would imply that global warming would lead to global fattening, which has already been seen.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
German researches found already similar clues about brown fat. At home my work room temperature has been around +15C (59F) during winter, just to cut heating costs of the old house. It's great to see, that it's not the only benefit.
Jump in the ocean, in the middle of summer and let it take the heat out of you. Even better if you can swim, tread water and catch waves - you will feel incredible - that is why I love (and fear) the ocean.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
"when people cool their bedrooms from 75 degrees to 66 degrees, they gain brown fat..." I don't really want to gain fat of any color. I'm pretty good at that no matter the temperature.
I think you are on to something. I do have another anecdote to add.
- My home was heated, but my bedroom formed ice on my bed (yes the matress actually froze to the wall). I was sick almost all the time. really.
- I'm cold nearly all year long in Canada, inside or out.
- I have friends that are similar. One has moved to the Carribean for the heat, and really thrives there too. The others complain like me.
- I prefer desert environments (dry, hot 40 degrees C (105 F)) and I do much better there.
I think this study may be revealing something that is more about what people are used to, than what is 'best'. To me, whatever climate that you actually *do* things in, is the climate you should be in. If you go to a hot climate and stop moving, then it is not 'good' for you. If you are trapped in a cold climate and stop moving, then it is not 'good' for you.
I don't think it is imprinting per se, but maybe a kind of pre-disposition.
I'm cold now. it is probably around 26C (78F).
All they are saying is that people that are in the south of spain are fatter. Go to Morocco, and I suspect the over-weight thing disappears. The correlation is meaningless.
Benjamin Franklin certainly felt that colder was better. He slept with the window open even in the dead of winter (seriously annoying his travel mates when they had to share rooms in crowded Inns).
I knew mum was wrong when she told me to go easy on the air conditioning.
There's been a marked trend here in the UK for people to have warmer and warmer houses. The thermostat in mine's set to 18C (64F), as it has been for the last 30 years. Meanwhile my friends' houses get warmer and warmer - up to 25C in some cases (77F). There's a perinneal struggle in the office at work too, with my preference for the temperature to be set to 18C, while the boss would rather have 25C. So we have a compromise of 22C, which is still warmer than the neighbouring IT classrooms (yes, I work in a school). Those classrooms are set to 19C or 20C.
66F (18.8C) is _cold_? It's a nice warm temperature - it might feel a little bit cold if you spend all of your time simply sitting in one place, but even with minimal movements it's just fine.
As a child I lived in a house made of logs and had to wear woolen socks during winters - the floor was too cold otherwise. The air temperatures at night was around 14C - I slept just fine, but I hated to wake up and dress quickly. To this day, I prefer sleeping with the air conditioner set to 16-17C, though I program it to go back to 22C around the time to wake up.
Life expectancy for inuits is still about 65 years, over a decade less than in general population (Inuit lifespan stagnates while Canada's rises). Diabetes is more common among them than in general population, too.
There are many factors that contribute to this (access to health care, etc.) and I don't claim to be expert in the subject. Still, I'd be quite hesitant to look at them as an example of healthy lifestyle or something.
Honestly, 20ÂC (68F) in normal lifing space and 16/18ÂC (60/64.4F) for the bedroom are already communicated for decades as a good environment. So what is new?
On a side note: I know Slashdot is an US based site.However, Fahrenheit is only used in the US and some territories where you go for holidays. Is it so impossible to at least add the celcius values in brackets?
What about the previous 2,000,000 years, how did these brown fats help the primitive man whose main problem was finding enough calories to eat?
Kept you from freezing to death.
What is this all about proving that it's 100% diet, despite all the studies to the opposite?
It's not 100% diet, but diet is 100% of what you can do about it.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
but diet is 100% of what you can do about it.
And exercise is the rest.
but diet is 100% of what you can do about it.
And exercise is the rest.
Not if you're unmeasurably lazy like me.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
Yeah there are. This story seems kind of bunk to me.
You do know that's because infant mortality was higher, right?
you know that's bullshit, right?
or you consider vaccines something that save mostly infant lives?
where did this tidbit pop up lately, since wackos are repeating it all over the internets lately? for some reason they think that adult life expectancy now is the same as 200 years ago when that's bs. and as for nutrition, the beds from 120 years ago in my home country weren't small because they enjoyed sleeping in too short beds.... they were small because they ate poorly..
I guess it's the same wackos who like to say shit like "cancer is a modern disease", as if cancer started appearing only when they got advanced enough to make classifications for it..
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
It is said that "warm blooded animals use up to 25% of their daily calories to keep their body temperature constant".
So, to lose weight, I try to keep my bedroom as cold as possible. Use as little blankets as possible. When you wake up "cold" during the night, that means your body has already been burning fat trying to keep warm for about an hour. It makes a noticable difference in the effort I otherwise have to spend in maintaining or losing weight.
And exercise is the rest.
The human body is so efficiently optimized to run on as few calories as possible that exercise simply is not effective as a counter to overeating. The calories in a piece of cheesecake would take hours of moderate exercise to burn off. Of course exercise has many benefits, especially in keeping the cardiovascular system in shape which mitigates some of the risks of obesity even if not loosing weight.
... 75 degrees to 66 degrees, ...
When the article talks about temperatures, they are of course referring to the Kelvin scale, not Celcius, hence the numbers that looks a bit on the high side. (*BING* *BING* Alert: You Have Witnessed A Joke *BING* *BING*)
A completely sedentary person may burn 2000 kcal/day. An hour of exercise can increase that to 2500 kcal. That's significant enough. Of course, it doesn't mean that you can eat 3000 kcal/day. Strenuous of exercise, like weightlifting, can also increase metabolism for up to 48 hours after the actual exercise.
I think part of the story is that when you live in the more northerly regions, where seasons are more pronounced, you have to rely more on meat as a food source, and therefore have to process more saturated fat; this, on the other hand, tends to be balanced out by the need to spend more energy on keeping warm - thus it is a great advantage to be able to produce brown fat even as an adult. This may be an adaptation along similar lines as the ability to digest milk - all children can do this, obviously, but adults in cultures that have had no dairy farming generally can't; this is relatively new mutation, something like a fewish thousand years old. Anecdotally, I have noticed how many of my friends from Africa are absolutely freezing when they come to UK, even when I feel moderately warm - they probably have very little brown fat compared to me.
why it's always so cold in our Enterprise Command Center...it must be part of out new Employee Health benefits!
"cancer is a modern disease" those people must not know about cancers found in Egyptian mummies. Cancer has existed since organisms have had specialized cells.
A completely sedentary person may burn 2000 kcal/day. An hour of exercise can increase that to 2500 kcal. That's significant enough. Of course, it doesn't mean that you can eat 3000 kcal/day. Strenuous of exercise, like weightlifting, can also increase metabolism for up to 48 hours after the actual exercise.
Of course you can eat 3000kal/day, you can also eat 4000 if your metabolism is fully functional it will not store excess fat unless you are stressed. Eating and exercise is not enough to explain the obesity epidemic, it is just the only two things worth talking about to stop it, as the we do not have enough information about the factors that influence the metabolism.
Of course you can eat 3000kal/day, you can also eat 4000 if your metabolism is fully functional it will not store excess fat unless you are stressed
Nonsense. Metabolism is mostly driven by demand (how much you move), and only to a small degree by available calories. Your argument also make no sense from an evolutionary survival perspective. Excess calories should be stored as fat to survive future times where food may be scarce.
Am I the only one reading it as Being a Coder May Be Good For Your Health?
Isn't that near the boiling point of water?
How about using actual units in a "scientific" article?
People sat up when they slept back then too, so the beds didn't have to be as long since they weren't lying down. Many people had lung diseases and would cough flem and mucus when lying down and in the morning, but sitting up the mucus didn't come up so they thought lying down was the problem.
It's the coldest hour of the end-of-December day and the current outside temperature here is 19C. The interior temperature is about 25 because the heat from yesterday's sun is still lingering in the building. Heat hasn't kicked on in about 2 weeks.
Spend enough time in that sort of environment and your internal thermosensors reset. Working at a company office desk, I spent a great deal of time contemplating setting fire to to whatever I could burn to keep warm. The temperature? 72 degreees Fahrenheit. Good enough if you're an executive wearing a 3-piece suit and wandering around annoying the grunts, but Bob Cratchitt frigid if you're just sitting there pushing paper and bits.
I can tolerate cooler these days, though. Used to be my summer A/C setting was 83F (27C). Now I prefer it a degree or 2 colder.
No such thing as brown fat. Its muscle tissue that has its mitochondria uncoupled via thermogenin. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T...
Its how animals survive in frigid environments.
http://www.livescience.com/105...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
Probably because it has some basis in fact.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
On average, a WHOLE HOUR of EXTRA exercise will be a roughly even trade for a slice of cheesecake.
Yes, but that doesn't mean that exercise doesn't work. It means that you can eat a free piece of cheesecake for every day you do an hour of exercise. Or you can skip the cheesecake, and loose 500 kcal per day, which adds up to a pound in a week. Or you can skip the exercise, eat the cheesecake, and gain that pound.
And you seem shocked at a WHOLE HOUR. It's not that much, especially if you can combine it with other things like commuting or shopping. And if you're really stressed for time you can do a shorter, but more intense, workout. Most people have enough time though, just the wrong priorities.
I wish the article said something about which parts of Spain, because with the exception of the Pyrenees it doesn't really make sense to talk about the "warmer parts" versus the "cooler parts". There are the parts which have much more seasonal variation - and so are warmer in summer and cooler in winter - and the parts which are more moderate all year round. This is influenced by altitude and proximity to the coast, so probably also has a good correlation with humidity. And I'm sure there are even more confounding factors which could be added to the list.
The body burns fat to stay warm. No shit. It's not as if a calorie being defined as an amount of energy to heat up water or the extensive use of animal fats as fuel could have made that more obvious.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
So, when we call an ultra-thin, almost anorexic actress a cold bitch, we might actually be right?
Sure there are different kinds of fat. I just kind of doubt the production of the types of fat is that temperature sensitive.
And you seem shocked at a WHOLE HOUR. It's not that much, especially if you can combine it with other things like commuting or shopping. And if you're really stressed for time you can do a shorter, but more intense, workout. Most people have enough time though, just the wrong priorities.
You could also find something you enjoy doing, so that WHOLE HOUR turns into ONLY AN HOUR. There is a curve to getting into physical activity, for example many people hate running at first. But if you're able to push through so you can run a couple of miles without feeling like you're going to fall over, you'll find you may actually enjoy it. There are tons of things you can do that are fun that have the side benefit of being exercise. Just put some effort into it and find something you like.
when people cool their bedrooms from 75 degrees to 66 degrees
75'c is cool? And what exactly does a cool 66 degree angle have to do with anything?
An anonymous reader writes:
A typical American writes for other typical American readers:
NB: Written with a hint of sarcasm for the rest of the world to enjoy.
I usually keep my house around 15C (60 F), which is nice and toasty when it is about -20C outside.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
You do know that's because infant mortality was higher, right?
you know that's bullshit, right? or you consider vaccines something that save mostly infant lives?
where did this tidbit pop up lately, since wackos are repeating it all over the internets lately?
I dunno. Looking at my family history, if you discount injury, or war death, the men lived to be around 85 years old.
My parent's generation, with modern medical care, better safety, and maintenance pharmaceuticals lived to be - around 85 years old.
Indeed along with our longer average lifespans, there appears to be a new preening mouse among us. The people who believe they are all going to live forever, or at least live completely healthy in a 20 year old lifestyle until they die peacefully and painlessly in their sleep at 150 years old.
We see some of this in the illogical idea that women can and should wit until their mid-40's to start bearing children. I watched a TED talk where a lady (I think she was a shrink) was promoting the idea that it's actually healthier. Anyone want to make book on the likelyhood of these middle aged people seeing their grandchildren?
Let's not forget there are still people semi starving themselves in the notion that it will keep them living longer.
It is hoohaw to believe that cancer is a modern disease of course. But people believe in a lot of hoohaw, like a prey animal diet is somehow better than a diet that an alpha predator has evolved to use, or that you should drink a huge lot of water, or like a fellow I knew, believed and practiced getting all his fluid intake from what he ate. No drinking straight water. This one is right up there with the woman who rand a food cart in town who was a fruitarian. (She did make some kickass vegan sammies though). All believe they are doing something to make them live longer
Regardless, you don't think that reducing infant mortality will tend to increase the average lifespan? Perhaps there is some confusion with the likely length of life at any particular given age?
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Half of the state of Florida stays stinky hot almost 365 days a year. It's 85F outside my door right now. We would need to develope a sleeping box that is well insulated with its own cooler as trying to run an AC to take a home to 66F would bankrupt most people. I usually set my AC at 77F to keep my electric bill at a sane level.
I would probably sweat to death at 75. I keep the bedroom at 63. That's enough to get cozy under the blankets, but not freeze if you have to get up in the middle of the night. I find it implausible that a large number of people sleep at 75 degrees (except in summer), so dropping that to 66 and remaking at the results is rather academic.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
When it's colder, I'm more upset, more irritated and that puts and keeps me in a poor state of mind. A little more paranoid, a little more apprehensive, a little more concerned about being able to stay warm.
In winter times, this is important, because it brings one (me) closer to depression and depression is a big demotivator.
While being colder may be physically better for you, mentally, it can be more of a problem that it is a benefit.
Just my personal 2 cents on the matter adjusted for inflation.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Centigrade, Farenheit or Kelvin?
Have gnu, will travel.
Although burning calories is an important part of exercise, more important is the hormone signaling effects that occur. If you want to lose fat rather than just weight exercise is a key component.
My younger brother was actually one of the test subjects in this study. One thing that isn't mentioned in the source article, but is mentioned in here http://www.nih.gov/researchmat... is that all the subjects got to sleep in at night was a thin bedsheet, and a hospital gown to sleep in. He said the cold month was pretty miserable, especially towards the beginning. Its not like turing your heat down to 62 and then sleeping under a down comforter, it is basically being miserably cold, forcing your body to produce fat to allow you to keep enough heat to actually sleep.
I don't know about you, but I plan to live forever. Or die trying.
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
Evolution demands people eat all they can when they can, store it all as fat, move only to get more food and then get ridiculed on Slashdot by those that don't understand evolution, while pontificating on evolution.
Learn to love Alaska
Minus 2. Would that be about 271 or 253 kelvins?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I live in Minnesota, the land of Winter Snow and Ice. We have 8 months (9 really) of wonderful glorious winter!
In Saint Paul, MN we celebrate winter with a Winter Carnival, Torch light parades, ice sculptures and occasionally an Ice Castle!
Don't get me wrong, Minnesnowta does have summer too! Last year it fell on a weekend and everyone was happy about that.
All I'm saying is if Fat Bottom Girl's make the world go around then Minnesota is spinning like a top. So this story about the cold making us thinner can't be true. Just say'n.
Stay Calm and put another log on the fire!
built on the pluses of cold air cures: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
you're one of those metal beetle people, aren't you?
During the winter I keep my home at 55 degF and don't even bother with sweaters or other outer wear unless I'm not active (e.g., watching TV). Given that it was -11 degF last night, it makes a big difference in the heating bill. But mostly it's what I prefer.
A completely sedentary person may burn 2000 kcal/day. An hour of exercise can increase that to 2500 kcal. That's significant enough. Of course, it doesn't mean that you can eat 3000 kcal/day. Strenuous of exercise, like weightlifting, can also increase metabolism for up to 48 hours after the actual exercise.
Of course you can eat 3000kal/day, you can also eat 4000 if your metabolism is fully functional it will not store excess fat unless you are stressed. Eating and exercise is not enough to explain the obesity epidemic, it is just the only two things worth talking about to stop it, as the we do not have enough information about the factors that influence the metabolism.
I'd argue we do have enough info on metabolism. It was a hell of a large part of my studies (biochem) in 1 and 2nd year and that was in the 90's and understanding has increased not decreased since then. We know a hell of a lot and understand it extremely well right down to the molecular physics of excatly how it does that not just the fact it does.
The problem is most people I know outside of those education subjects and careers don't know it, including a health care professional who is an expert nutritionalist who I've had to give extra info to a lot as she admits she never heard that but comes back surprised after research at it being well known. People want simple answers and the human body is complex; we want magic bullets, instant solutions, and 1 word answers is my guess at the real problem.
Of course you can eat 3000kal/day, you can also eat 4000 if your metabolism is fully functional it will not store excess fat unless you are stressed
Nonsense. Metabolism is mostly driven by demand (how much you move), and only to a small degree by available calories. Your argument also make no sense from an evolutionary survival perspective. Excess calories should be stored as fat to survive future times where food may be scarce.
that isn't true, it is not that simple. Muscles actually prefer burning fats at rest and storing glucose from (or converted to from) food as glycogen so there is a store for aerobic erxercise but more importantly for the brain since fats can't cross the blood brain barrier. We need the fats to store fat soluble vitamins too. There are many many factors driving metabolism, the basic ones are activity, hormone levels (made more complex in that some like hgh's have insulin effects), food types eaten and fast periods (including hour(s) long not just days/weeks/months), climate, daylight length, genetics etc etc so it gets complicated and no generalisations can be made.
Most people ask nutritionalists and personal trainers who understand very little and some of it they know the right answer but their reasoning is wrong so they form extra conclusions which are crap. What you really need is to be asking biochemists and molecular biologists and the like those questions or medical practitioners strong in those areas.