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25% don't exercise? That's too low. Over 60%+ of adults are overweight or obese. Mind you, that doesn't stop you from exercising. But it seems highly unlikely o

25% don't exercise? That's too low. Over 60%+ of adults are overweight or obese. Mind you, that doesn't stop you from exercising. But it seems highly unlikely only 1 in 4 doesn't exercise. This is why self reporting is bad.

shishy 5y ago
Aren't people who exercise (bodybuilding) generally considered overweight (defined as having a too high weight for a given height?) I noticed the same as you pointed out but figured that might help explain some of that difference
- dpark 5y ago
  No. You have to have a ton of muscle to flip the bmi scale into overweight. Certainly professional bodybuilders will do that. Casual bodybuilders generally don’t. The set of bodybuilders who have enough muscle to put them into the overweight category is a tiny portion of the population. There is a larger portion of the population who has a lot of muscle and a lot of fat, but that’s still pretty small.
  - shishy 5y ago
    fair enough! those communities always seems bigger when you're surrounded by them... :)
  - s1artibartfast 5y ago
    BMI is just a very rough approximation used to fit body fat. Any amount of muscle can slip someone into the overwight category if they are already close. For a 5-10 male, the difference between dead center normal BMI and pre-obese is 20 lbs, not a crazy amount for a casual but consistent weightlifter. BMI 'works' because it just looks at the total population, and doest care if it doesn't fit edge cases.
    - dpark 5y ago
      > Any amount of muscle can slip someone into the overwight category if they are already close. Yeah, but that’s hardly the muscle at fault. If someone has 20lb of extra fat and 10lb of extra muscle, it seems a lot more honest to say the fat is why the person’s BMI is high. To be clear, BMI is definitely a very “rough and dirty” estimate. Certainly there are healthy people with a BMI classified as overweight.
- austhrow743 5y ago
  Like 1% of people who exercise are bodybuilders.
  - redisman 5y ago
    And the performance enhancing drugs and bulks are not exactly known to be great for their hearts. See Rich Piana for example
- voldacar 5y ago
  Massive roided up bodybuilders are like 0.1% of the population max. And those guys should be probably more worried about the effects of steroids on the heart than having too much body mass
- smileysteve 5y ago
  When the survey is BMI, then yes, individuals outside the standard height and with greater than average muscle mass will fall in the overweight range. But, when considering the population rather than the individual, these outliers become insignificant.
dpark 5y ago
I agree with this. Their definition of “doesn’t exercise” must be too narrow. “Well, sometimes I walk as much as a quarter mile” is insufficient to count as exercise. I would expect that 25% of people are effectively completely sedentary and a much larger chunk of the population fits in the “doesn’t exercise” bucket.
klondike_ 5y ago
It takes a LOT of exercise to burn the calories consumed with one can of soda. Overeating and poor diet is a bigger factor in obesity than exercise
- nradov 5y ago
  It would take the average American man about 12 minutes of running at a moderate pace to burn the 155 kcal in one 12 oz (355 ml) can of Coca Cola. https://keisan.casio.com/exec/system/1350959101 https://keisan.casio.com/exec/system/1350959101
  - xedrac 5y ago
    I think the focus on "burning" calories completely misses the mark. It gives people the misconception that food is nothing more than calories, and they can just "burn" off the excess, despite the fact that our nutritional needs become more important with exercise.
    - josephcsible 5y ago
      But isn't too many calories a way, way bigger problem today than not enough micronutrients is? If we could make the former way better at the expense of making the latter slightly worse, it seems like it'd be a no-brainer.
      - xedrac 5y ago
        Yes, for certain. I am more alluding to the false belief that you can just out-exercise a poor diet. For example, many polyunsaturated vegetable oils oxidize very quickly in your body, sending free radicals on a rampage and causing inflammation. This "cost" is not accounted for in a calorie. And the effect becomes even more important when you introduce the stress of exercise into the equation. https://www.openventio.org/Volume1-Issue6/Oxidation-of-Polyunsaturated-Fatty-Acids-and-its-Impact-on-Food-Quality-and-Human-Health-AFTNSOJ-1-123.pdf https://www.openventio.org/Volume1-Issue6/Oxidation-of-Polyu...
    - 5y ago

shishy 5y ago

Aren't people who exercise (bodybuilding) generally considered overweight (defined as having a too high weight for a given height?) I noticed the same as you pointed out but figured that might help explain some of that difference

dpark 5y ago
No. You have to have a ton of muscle to flip the bmi scale into overweight. Certainly professional bodybuilders will do that. Casual bodybuilders generally don’t. The set of bodybuilders who have enough muscle to put them into the overweight category is a tiny portion of the population. There is a larger portion of the population who has a lot of muscle and a lot of fat, but that’s still pretty small.
- shishy 5y ago
  fair enough! those communities always seems bigger when you're surrounded by them... :)
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  BMI is just a very rough approximation used to fit body fat. Any amount of muscle can slip someone into the overwight category if they are already close. For a 5-10 male, the difference between dead center normal BMI and pre-obese is 20 lbs, not a crazy amount for a casual but consistent weightlifter. BMI 'works' because it just looks at the total population, and doest care if it doesn't fit edge cases.
  - dpark 5y ago
    > Any amount of muscle can slip someone into the overwight category if they are already close. Yeah, but that’s hardly the muscle at fault. If someone has 20lb of extra fat and 10lb of extra muscle, it seems a lot more honest to say the fat is why the person’s BMI is high. To be clear, BMI is definitely a very “rough and dirty” estimate. Certainly there are healthy people with a BMI classified as overweight.
austhrow743 5y ago
Like 1% of people who exercise are bodybuilders.
- redisman 5y ago
  And the performance enhancing drugs and bulks are not exactly known to be great for their hearts. See Rich Piana for example
voldacar 5y ago
Massive roided up bodybuilders are like 0.1% of the population max. And those guys should be probably more worried about the effects of steroids on the heart than having too much body mass
smileysteve 5y ago
When the survey is BMI, then yes, individuals outside the standard height and with greater than average muscle mass will fall in the overweight range. But, when considering the population rather than the individual, these outliers become insignificant.

dpark 5y ago

I agree with this. Their definition of “doesn’t exercise” must be too narrow. “Well, sometimes I walk as much as a quarter mile” is insufficient to count as exercise. I would expect that 25% of people are effectively completely sedentary and a much larger chunk of the population fits in the “doesn’t exercise” bucket.

klondike_ 5y ago

It takes a LOT of exercise to burn the calories consumed with one can of soda. Overeating and poor diet is a bigger factor in obesity than exercise

nradov 5y ago
It would take the average American man about 12 minutes of running at a moderate pace to burn the 155 kcal in one 12 oz (355 ml) can of Coca Cola. https://keisan.casio.com/exec/system/1350959101 https://keisan.casio.com/exec/system/1350959101
- xedrac 5y ago
  I think the focus on "burning" calories completely misses the mark. It gives people the misconception that food is nothing more than calories, and they can just "burn" off the excess, despite the fact that our nutritional needs become more important with exercise.
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    But isn't too many calories a way, way bigger problem today than not enough micronutrients is? If we could make the former way better at the expense of making the latter slightly worse, it seems like it'd be a no-brainer.
    - xedrac 5y ago
      Yes, for certain. I am more alluding to the false belief that you can just out-exercise a poor diet. For example, many polyunsaturated vegetable oils oxidize very quickly in your body, sending free radicals on a rampage and causing inflammation. This "cost" is not accounted for in a calorie. And the effect becomes even more important when you introduce the stress of exercise into the equation. https://www.openventio.org/Volume1-Issue6/Oxidation-of-Polyunsaturated-Fatty-Acids-and-its-Impact-on-Food-Quality-and-Human-Health-AFTNSOJ-1-123.pdf https://www.openventio.org/Volume1-Issue6/Oxidation-of-Polyu...
  - 5y ago