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You beat me to this thought, but the difference is that exercise and high-level lifestyle changes will include underlying changes in a million biological factor
by lamename 5y ago
You beat me to this thought, but the difference is that exercise and high-level lifestyle changes will include underlying changes in a million biological factors, including mitochondria.
We see this over and over in press releases when new research is focused on one mechanism (e.g. mitochondria). To me "weird tricks" that capture whole body or lifestyle changes are at least worth paying attention to. While "weird tricks" in the name of a single biological mechanism are indeed overblown (but still worth knowing if you're in to that sort of information).
- nyrulez 5y agoI'd say what lies at top of the food chain of cause and effect is simply coming from "availability bias" i.e. we give more weight to what we know to be true. Yes some things have more downstream effects than others and that's where you get your bang for the buck. Whether mitochondria is just one mechanism or more of an over-arching one is what research is all about. For example, HRV feels like on obscure metric out of 100s of metrics. But it has been shown to now have hundreds of mental and physical benefits including longevity, that we don't necessarily understand why but it still has risen to the top. Same for intermittent fasting and so on. These are indeed "weird tricks" in a pretty literal sense but they do the job in predictable and often dramatic ways.