3 ms·

As soon as I saw the headline, I thought to myself "well yeah, Americans have also never been fatter," so the conclusion wasn't much of a surprise. Interesting

by spyhi 9y ago

As soon as I saw the headline, I thought to myself "well yeah, Americans have also never been fatter," so the conclusion wasn't much of a surprise. Interesting that it's affecting men so much more. This isn't the only study that indicates fatness is impacting aggregate performance, either. The US DoD has actually identified American obesity as a potential threat to national security and readiness. [1][2] [1] https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/policy-dose/articles/2016-04-05/obesity-is-a-national-security-threat https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/policy-dose/articles/20... [2] (PDF) http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a547350.pdf http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a547350.pdf

trentmb 9y ago
> I thought to myself "well yeah, Americans have also never been fatter," Do fat Americans run?
- eesmith 9y ago
  Some do. But "fatter" != "fat". http://www.webmd.com/men/news/20041027/average-weight-for-americans-growing-heavier#2 http://www.webmd.com/men/news/20041027/average-weight-for-am... points out that Americans are over 10kg heavier than the previous generation, but that's classified as "overweight" not "obese".
  - revelation 9y ago
    It's not a discrete scale, ceteris paribus every single kg will make you slower and increase injury risk. It's continuous.
    - eesmith 9y ago
      If you wish to phrase things that way then feel free to reinterpret the discussion chain thusly: 1) spyhi used a continuous scale: "also never been fatter" 2) _qhtn switched to a discrete scale: "Do fat Americans run" 3) I replied to that question, that yes, "fat Americans run", objected to _qhtn's discretization of a continuous scale, and gave a pointer to a paper regarding BMI, which assigns categories like "overweight" and "obese" to the continuous scale. Your comment comes across like you think I didn't know the difference between continuous and discrete, when that was the point of my response.

by spyhi 9y ago

trentmb 9y ago

> I thought to myself "well yeah, Americans have also never been fatter," Do fat Americans run?

eesmith 9y ago
Some do. But "fatter" != "fat". http://www.webmd.com/men/news/20041027/average-weight-for-americans-growing-heavier#2 http://www.webmd.com/men/news/20041027/average-weight-for-am... points out that Americans are over 10kg heavier than the previous generation, but that's classified as "overweight" not "obese".
- revelation 9y ago
  It's not a discrete scale, ceteris paribus every single kg will make you slower and increase injury risk. It's continuous.
  - eesmith 9y ago
    If you wish to phrase things that way then feel free to reinterpret the discussion chain thusly: 1) spyhi used a continuous scale: "also never been fatter" 2) _qhtn switched to a discrete scale: "Do fat Americans run" 3) I replied to that question, that yes, "fat Americans run", objected to _qhtn's discretization of a continuous scale, and gave a pointer to a paper regarding BMI, which assigns categories like "overweight" and "obese" to the continuous scale. Your comment comes across like you think I didn't know the difference between continuous and discrete, when that was the point of my response.