The Expedition: June Edition
A fantastic workout, stats on marriage and money, the ideal number of pushups, ChatGPT and BS, and more.
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Today’s post: The Expedition
This monthly series is a journey into thoughts, opinions, ideas, observations, studies, facts, figures, etc.
Good ones, bad ones, insightful ones, dumb ones, and ones you can use to live better.
It’s a roundup of all the worthwhile stuff I’ve encountered in the last month. The Expedition is a bit of an island of misfit toys. But, hey, the greatest journeys are winding.
This month, we’re covering:
- Numbers on:
- Who commits suicide and why.
- The amount of pushups that reduces heart disease risk.
- Money, marriage, and happiness.
- Who wins marathons.
- How changing the speed of videos impacts information retention.
- The truth about expensive treadmills.
- How much time we spend online.
- A wild and clever three-part challenge.
- A fun read about ChatGPT and its propensity for bullshit.
- A thought-provoking read on a surprising source of a hidden health threat.
- How to survive—and thrive—this Godforsaken heatwave.
- A wild map on weight changes.
- A tough, fantastic workout I did while traveling recently.
- An important parting quote.
- An even more important parting question.
By the numbers
9
Times higher risk of suicide faced by divorced men compared to divorced women. Relationship problems are the main reason for suicide, accounting for 40 of suicides.
96
Percent less at risk of having a heart attack firefighters were if they could complete more than 40 pushups compared to their co-workers who could complete fewer than 10.
Half
Married couples need to make half as much money as a household to get the same level of happiness a single person gets. For example, married couples who make $100,000 a year as a household generally report having the same level of happiness as a single person making $200,000.
60
Percent of major marathon events in the last 30 years that have been won by Kenyan runners from the Kalenjin tribe. They make up just 0.08 percent of the world population.
0
Difference in the ability to retain information experienced by people who watched videos of academic lectures at 2x speed compared to those who watched videos at 1x speed. Performance declined past 2x speed.
0
Difference between curved, non-motorized treadmills and motorized treadmills in how they replicate running outside.
This one is a bit niche, but a major marketing claim of (very expensive!) curved, non-motorized treadmills is that they mimic the biomechanics of running outside better than standard treadmills. This study found that claim may not be true.
41
Percent of American adults who say they're online "almost constantly." Hi, Scarcity Loop.
9-9-9
That's 9 ski runs, 9 holes of golf, and 9 innings attending a professional baseball game—all in a single day. It's a challenge created by Coloradans.
Cities where you could accomplish this glorious feat: Denver, Salt Lake City, Seattle, Reno, and Phoenix (there are probably more, but those five seem like places where it would be easiest to pull off this feat).
A fun read
Paper title: ChatGPT is Bullshit
Paper abstract:
Recently, there has been considerable interest in large language models: machine learning systems which produce humanlike text and dialogue. Applications of these systems have been plagued by persistent inaccuracies in their output; these are often called “AI hallucinations”. We argue that these falsehoods, and the overall activity of large language models, is better understood as bullshit in the sense explored by Frankfurt (On Bullshit, Princeton, 2005): the models are in an important way indifferent to the truth of their outputs. We distinguish two ways in which the models can be said to be bullshitters, and argue that they clearly meet at least one of these definitions. We further argue that describing AI misrepresentations as bullshit is both a more useful and more accurate way of predicting and discussing the behaviour of these systems.
A thought-provoking read
Article title: Recycling Plastic Is a Dangerous Waste of Time
Well, that title doesn't pull punches. This read came across my feed. The problem is microplastics, which new research is showing are linked to various health problems.
The author makes two main points:
- Recycling is a major contributor to microplastics in our air and environment.
- There are better things we can do to re-use our plastics—by using them as fuel.
Pull quote:
According to an emerging field of study, the facilities that recycle plastic have been spewing massive amounts of toxins called microplastics into local waterways, soil, and air for decades. In other words, the very industry created to solve the plastic-waste problem has only succeeded in making it worse, possibly exponentially so. While the study that kicked off this new field received some press coverage when it appeared last year, the far-ranging import of its findings has yet to be fully integrated into environmental science. If the research is even close to accurate, and to date it has not been substantively challenged, the implications for waste management policies across the globe will be game-changing.
A tough workout I did
I recently wrote about my talk on Mental Toughness at MTNTOUGH's TOUGHFEST.
The next day, I was scheduled to appear on the MTNTOUGH Podcast. I arrived at the MTNTOUGH lab a couple of hours beforehand to sneak in a workout.
Sarah from MTNTOUGH saw me preparing some weights and said, "Do you need a workout?"
I wanted a calm morning. But it was Friday—and Fridays are for Burning the Ships. So I said yes. It was a begrudging yes, but a yes nonetheless.
Here's what Sarah created for me:
