There’s a weird thing in the Midwest where I grew up where people talk about exercise as if it’s unhealthy (and basically nobody exercises).

Then you come to the Bay Area and see just how much people can really exercise. Older people exercising here seem way healthier than where I grew up.

Still when I go home if I say I run 3mi a day people say things like, “that’s bad for your knees” etc. or look at you like you’re crazy. In the Bay Area it’s like I don’t work out at all by comparison.

That was my experience, too. I ran one leg of the Big Sur marathon relay. My local friends were like “next year you’ll do a half!” My childhood friends were like “so you never, ever have to do that again, right?”

My grandfather lived in 98 never exercised in his life. I know it’s an anecdote, but it’s still data.

My grandfather lived into his 90s and as far as I know never "exercised". But during a lot of his life he split firewood and worked 8-hour shifts at a factory (before walking home for an hour or so) and did a lot of other things that would be much more vigorous than regular exercise. A different anecdote.

> I know it’s an anecdote, but it’s still data

That's useful if it's about a subject where there's no studies.

But this is whether exercise improves quality of life. There's no shortage of studies about it. Implying that a single anecdote is still data is the bad kind of technically true.

I would link to one of those studies, but there's too many of them and I admit I don't know what to choose.

https://scholar.google.com.sg/scholar?q=physical+activity+qu...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01674...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00917...

I’ll find you a couple tens of millions of people who didnt exercise who died well before 98

It's quality of life too. For pretty much every human, finding a way to get outside and breath hard is going to feel good. You're gonna sleep better etc.

Yeah we all know people who drink 3 cokes a day and aren't fat etc... but I know if I drink a lot of beers or cokes or whatever I feel terrible. When I go for hill sprints I feel amazing after.

It's clearly a good habit in a healthy life.

I never exercised for 20 years. My back did hurt so much that I had to roll out of bed every morning. I started exercising two years ago and now this is no longer an issue.

He must have had some kind of exercise, even if it was labeled as "chores" or "job".