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Furniture in general is detrimental to people's general fitness. I'm convinced its primary purpose is class signaling and generating unnecessary business for t

Furniture in general is detrimental to people's general fitness. I'm convinced its primary purpose is class signaling and generating unnecessary business for the economy. Sells bigger homes and office spaces, you need to haul all this junk around whenever you buy it or move it, and it needs to be manufactured and bought in the first place. If you think about what furniture actually does, it's pretty obvious. It deprives you of an entire range of natural movements and postures a life without furniture forces you to experience regularly. I've lived without furniture or even a bed for over a decade, and am now middle-aged, and the difference is very obvious when I socialize with folks especially when we're playing board games on a floor or hanging around a campfire. My flexibility and comfort at squatting and sitting indian style or really any position on the floor is equivalent to that of a child. Most american adults I know can't comfortably sit indian style if they can even get into the position at all, and often need help getting up from the floor or at least let out quite a grunt in struggling to get back up. In any given day I'm getting up and down from the floor dozens of times. Go do some burpees and see how significant that can be vs. using a chair. I leap up from the ground like it's nothing at all because it's the normal. Another thing I've learned from one of those investigations of regions with the most oldest living people is many of them have cultures without furniture, where everyone uses the floor primarily and preserves the ability to squat and get up from the floor independently into old age.

jolmg 7y ago
I get your point, but "furniture in general" might be too broad. For example, I can't see how bookshelves nor kitchen cabinets are detrimental. I think the point of most furniture is to enable people to take better advantage of the vertical space they have available. Your comment makes a good point of chairs, beds, and other furniture you can sit on, but I don't think it applies to all furniture in general.
- newnewpdro 7y ago
  You're right, I tend to not include cabinets and bookshelves in my mental model of furniture, just elevated objects people sit/rest on/at. Though one can argue even those forms of furniture are problematic, using vertical storage space more efficiently can encourage hoarding of unnecessary junk. I'm certainly guilty of hoarding books I rarely touch, but it doesn't seem as harmful to one's health/fitness.
  - magduf 7y ago
    Without furniture, how exactly do you propose that I use a computer workstation with 3 large monitors? Sit it all on the floor? That sounds like an ergonomics nightmare. Some of the furniture we have now is because pre-technological humans simply didn't do many things we do now.
    - jolmg 7y ago
      Yeah, saying no furniture kind of distracts from their point, which is that not getting frequently up and down from the floor probably causes our loss to easily do so as we get older. As to being able to have a computer workstation that lets you work as you're sitting on the floor, the japanese seem to have many options[1]. I imagine newnewpdro is not against furniture like this. You can have good posture while sitting on the floor, too. [1] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=japanese+floor+computer+desk&t=ffab&iar=images&iax=images&ia=images https://duckduckgo.com/?q=japanese+floor+computer+desk&t=ffa...
voisin 7y ago
What do you sleep on if not a bed? Do you have a floor cushion or yoga mat?
- newnewpdro 7y ago
  Nothing really, just a clear spot on the floor, preferably carpeted or with an area rug so there's some thermal barrier. One of my ex's liked the rigid ~2" thick tatami mats you can find on Amazon. It would be neat to have an entire room's floor covered with them wall to wall, but I've never lived with such a setup. Spills and such mishaps seem like they'd be unnecessarily costly, but I do believe that's a conventional Japanese style of interior flooring, which they'd traditionally sleep directly upon. Personally I favor an area rug on a hard, finished floor. It's easily taken outside and shaken clean/hung in sunlight for a day, and can be trivially rolled up out of the way, to make the durable floor space available for other uses. They are also very affordable, so replacement cost is minimal for the inevitable spills/stains etc. The thick rigid Tatami mats are large and cumbersome to stow and transport, more costly to replace, etc. Another advantage to being acclimated to this sleeping style is you can sleep anywhere with some clean floor space as comfortably as if it's home. Folks who are accustomed to cushy beds tend to be miserable on camping trips for the bad sleep alone. Edit: Full disclosure; I've found myself frustrated in hotels with filthy carpeted floors on multiple occasions, where I caved and slept miserably in the bed only to wake up with a stiff neck and back pain, so it's no panacea. I now strongly prefer camping in my clean tent and sleeping bag to hotels. YMMV
  - jolmg 7y ago
    Do you sleep well on floors made of stone, concrete or ceramic tile? They feel way harder than wood. A lot colder, too.
    - newnewpdro 7y ago
      It makes no difference with a substantial area rug, I'm currently using one with a grippy porous rubbery backing which forms quite the thermal barrier.

jolmg 7y ago

I get your point, but "furniture in general" might be too broad. For example, I can't see how bookshelves nor kitchen cabinets are detrimental. I think the point of most furniture is to enable people to take better advantage of the vertical space they have available. Your comment makes a good point of chairs, beds, and other furniture you can sit on, but I don't think it applies to all furniture in general.

newnewpdro 7y ago
You're right, I tend to not include cabinets and bookshelves in my mental model of furniture, just elevated objects people sit/rest on/at. Though one can argue even those forms of furniture are problematic, using vertical storage space more efficiently can encourage hoarding of unnecessary junk. I'm certainly guilty of hoarding books I rarely touch, but it doesn't seem as harmful to one's health/fitness.
- magduf 7y ago
  Without furniture, how exactly do you propose that I use a computer workstation with 3 large monitors? Sit it all on the floor? That sounds like an ergonomics nightmare. Some of the furniture we have now is because pre-technological humans simply didn't do many things we do now.
  - jolmg 7y ago
    Yeah, saying no furniture kind of distracts from their point, which is that not getting frequently up and down from the floor probably causes our loss to easily do so as we get older. As to being able to have a computer workstation that lets you work as you're sitting on the floor, the japanese seem to have many options[1]. I imagine newnewpdro is not against furniture like this. You can have good posture while sitting on the floor, too. [1] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=japanese+floor+computer+desk&t=ffab&iar=images&iax=images&ia=images https://duckduckgo.com/?q=japanese+floor+computer+desk&t=ffa...

voisin 7y ago

What do you sleep on if not a bed? Do you have a floor cushion or yoga mat?

newnewpdro 7y ago
Nothing really, just a clear spot on the floor, preferably carpeted or with an area rug so there's some thermal barrier. One of my ex's liked the rigid ~2" thick tatami mats you can find on Amazon. It would be neat to have an entire room's floor covered with them wall to wall, but I've never lived with such a setup. Spills and such mishaps seem like they'd be unnecessarily costly, but I do believe that's a conventional Japanese style of interior flooring, which they'd traditionally sleep directly upon. Personally I favor an area rug on a hard, finished floor. It's easily taken outside and shaken clean/hung in sunlight for a day, and can be trivially rolled up out of the way, to make the durable floor space available for other uses. They are also very affordable, so replacement cost is minimal for the inevitable spills/stains etc. The thick rigid Tatami mats are large and cumbersome to stow and transport, more costly to replace, etc. Another advantage to being acclimated to this sleeping style is you can sleep anywhere with some clean floor space as comfortably as if it's home. Folks who are accustomed to cushy beds tend to be miserable on camping trips for the bad sleep alone. Edit: Full disclosure; I've found myself frustrated in hotels with filthy carpeted floors on multiple occasions, where I caved and slept miserably in the bed only to wake up with a stiff neck and back pain, so it's no panacea. I now strongly prefer camping in my clean tent and sleeping bag to hotels. YMMV
- jolmg 7y ago
  Do you sleep well on floors made of stone, concrete or ceramic tile? They feel way harder than wood. A lot colder, too.
  - newnewpdro 7y ago
    It makes no difference with a substantial area rug, I'm currently using one with a grippy porous rubbery backing which forms quite the thermal barrier.