BBC Article: Bike Now to Avoid Senility

gds said:

Sure there are economic disparities all over the place. Rich/poor. 1st
world/3rd world. White/black. I understand these issues. I am simply
suggesting you add. Old/Young.

The point surely being we are trying to eradicate these first three
disparities so why add to a list we are trying to eradicate?

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

Tony Raven said:

gds said:

Sure there are economic disparities all over the place. Rich/poor. 1st
world/3rd world. White/black. I understand these issues. I am simply
suggesting you add. Old/Young.

The point surely being we are trying to eradicate these first three
disparities so why add to a list we are trying to eradicate?

So we should have another goal as well.
I am suggesting that in fact we are over allocating resources to the
elderly at the expense of the young. So, yes I would like to eradicate
that disparity as well.If it doesn't get added to the list then it will
never get fixed.

Tony Raven said:

gds said:

Sure there are economic disparities all over the place. Rich/poor. 1st
world/3rd world. White/black. I understand these issues. I am simply
suggesting you add. Old/Young.

The point surely being we are trying to eradicate these first three
disparities...

Well, perhaps some people are. There are many people who realize the
disparities will be around forever, even as they work to reduce them.

And there are _definitely_ people trying to accentuate, _not_
eradicate, the "rich/poor" disparity.

- Frank Krygowski

In uk.rec.cycling Buck said:

Elisa Francesca Roselli said:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4304822.stm

Quoted message said:

Yet another article filled with bad science. I don't doubt there is a
correllation between exercise and lowered risk of dementia. But they
failed to establish a true cause and effect relationship. This is a
typical ecological fallacy.

Quoted message said:

The true cause of the lowered risk may be eating habits. Perhaps it is
more frequent washing (exercisers get stinky and probably wash more
often). Maybe it is that exercisers have a lower exposure to chemical
propellants because they are less concerned with their state of their
hair - it's going to get messed up anyway, right? The point is that
there are a lot of differences between exercisers and non-exercisers
that are not accounted for in the article. If the researchers did
attempt to control for this, it certainly isn't presented in the bbc
article. If so, then this is just another case of the public press
butchering good science because they don't know how to report it
properly.

On the other hand, experiments with the effects of exercise on elderly
rats' brains do tend to suggest that exercising more both improves
cognitive skills (e.g maze learning abilities) and grows the brains a
bit in a general way. You're still allowed to kill rats and cut their
brains up after exercising them in the interests of science.

--
Chris Malcolm [email hidden] +44 (0)131 651 3445 DoD #205
IPAB, Informatics, JCMB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JZ, UK
[http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/cam/]

In uk.rec.cycling Ambrose Nankivell said:

"David Martin" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Bill said:

I am a relative 'junior' at 57 but I do know that I would go
nuts sitting around with old people staring out the window at nothing,
or wheel chairing it, or hobbling around with walkers. If I ever get
that way I want out, not looking forward to living decay. I have
encountered some men older than myself (70's and one 80's) bicycling and
chatted ending the conversation with an encouraging word to keep on
riding.
Age is an attitude I am at odds with.

I find the Obituaries column in the CTC mag somewhat uplifting. All
these regular cyclists still going into their 80s and beyond..

Quoted message said:

Except for the disproportionate number who are hit by a truck when in their
80s. You wonder if there's a truck repellent muscle that wears out by the
time you get past your three score years and ten.

Could it be a balance thing, that elderly cyclists are more prone to
wobbles? I recall a long time ago a doctor posting here that IIRC
nobody over the age of 50 could stand on one leg with their eyes
closed. As usual this turned out to be a couch potato statistic that
didn't necessarily apply to cyclists, but there is a tendency to
degeneration of balance with age.

--
Chris Malcolm [email hidden] +44 (0)131 651 3445 DoD #205
IPAB, Informatics, JCMB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JZ, UK
[http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/cam/]

Chris Malcolm said:

Could it be a balance thing, that elderly cyclists are more prone to
wobbles? I recall a long time ago a doctor posting here that IIRC
nobody over the age of 50 could stand on one leg with their eyes
closed.

I certainly can, so whoever it was was talking bollix(TM).

Quoted message said:

As usual this turned out to be a couch potato statistic that
didn't necessarily apply to cyclists, but there is a tendency to
degeneration of balance with age.

Ah, it applies to everyone over 50 apart from those who can stand on
one leg with their eyes closed. :-)

--
Dave...

Chris Malcolm said:

I recall a long time ago a doctor posting here that IIRC
nobody over the age of 50 could stand on one leg with their eyes
closed. As usual this turned out to be a couch potato statistic that
didn't necessarily apply to cyclists, but there is a tendency to
degeneration of balance with age.

I am over 50 (57) and can stand on one leg with my eyes closed in the
dark if need be, so what the heck is the correlation here? Maybe the
average couch potato over 50 can't do it but then there is this attitude
thing again. I have been showing my grandkids how to do head stands by
putting their hands between their knees and rocking over onto their
heads and then bringing their feet up. You don't think 'that' takes
balance? Try it, and you will know that doctor is a paid quack.
No, not bragging about being super Bill, just that I have kept in practice.
Bill Baka

Bill <[email hidden]> whizzed past me shouting

Quoted message said:

Chris Malcolm said:

I recall a long time ago a doctor posting here that IIRC
nobody over the age of 50 could stand on one leg with their eyes
closed. As usual this turned out to be a couch potato statistic that
didn't necessarily apply to cyclists, but there is a tendency to
degeneration of balance with age.

I am over 50 (57) and can stand on one leg with my eyes closed in the
dark if need be, so what the heck is the correlation here?

It's now been shown that balance is a 'use it or lose it' thing.

Older people who 'keep in practice' like Bill will have better balance
that those who don't mess about standing on one leg or doing headstands.
As we get older, we tend to get more solemn and to play about less, and
for most people that's the main reason our balance deteriorates.

The French woman who died at the age of 123 was still riding her bicycle
at the age of 100.

--
Sue ];(🙂

I'm 50 and I can type standing on one foooooooooooooooo

in message <[email hidden]>, Sue White

(') said:

Bill <[email hidden]> whizzed past me shouting

Quoted message said:

Chris Malcolm said:

I recall a long time ago a doctor posting here that IIRC
nobody over the age of 50 could stand on one leg with their eyes
closed. As usual this turned out to be a couch potato statistic that
didn't necessarily apply to cyclists, but there is a tendency to
degeneration of balance with age.

I am over 50 (57) and can stand on one leg with my eyes closed in the
dark if need be, so what the heck is the correlation here?

It's now been shown that balance is a 'use it or lose it' thing.

Older people who 'keep in practice' like Bill will have better balance
that those who don't mess about standing on one leg or doing
headstands. As we get older, we tend to get more solemn and to play
about less, and for most people that's the main reason our balance
deteriorates.

Well, I'm still under fifty (by four days), and I've tried it and I can't
- at least, not for more than a minute or so. So just riding a bike
regularly clearly isn't necessarily sufficient exercise of the balance
system.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; When all else fails, read the distractions.