Hm. I'll go ahead and google it, if I find anything interesting I'll add an edit on this post later.
I'm honestly curious about genetic links with regards to obesity though. There were kids I knew at school that drank, smoked, ate complete shit and got through a 2 litre of coke a day and they weighed about 140 lbs. Then there were the kids who excercised and ate healthy and were nicknamed Chunk. I understand part of it based off of your lifestyle choices, but there seem to be cases where people just naturally veer towards one side of the equation.
I could go off about natural selection and stuff now, but I really doubt I'm coherent enough to pull it off.
Edit: Wow typos. Also, if hunger is hormone based wouldn't it theoretically be possible to just administer an artificially created hormone? Going to look into this. Work is pretty dull again.
Arasaki on
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KageraImitating the worst people. Since 2004Registered Userregular
But as the study shows it's not just well-to-do people who are obese but even the poorer families too.
And they buy TVs from Walmart.
It was a lot cooler back in the day when poor people were starving. Now they are not only fat but they are buying televisions! We gotta put a stop to this.
Look, I grew up in a world where poor meant you had to eat out of the trash goddammit and that's a world that makes sense.
This whole 'poor people not having distended stomachs and bony fragile arms' just makes the world not make sense.
What's next? Poor people voting?
Kagera on
My neck, my back, my FUPA and my crack.
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MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
Something to think about. Taxing isn't the answer, but switching off is probably a big part of it.
I don't know if switching off is the answer, so much as requiring less of ourselves. People would probably sleep better if they didn't have to take home overtime or cram for exams.
Something to think about. Taxing isn't the answer, but switching off is probably a big part of it.
I don't know if switching off is the answer, so much as requiring less of ourselves. People would probably sleep better if they didn't have to take home overtime or cram for exams.
I'm curious how you would go about forcing this adjustment.
It's less of what people expect of themselves, and more what is expected from them (or what they perceive is expected of them). My best friend from school works in London as a banker, and he usually does a stupid number of hours (70+ a week, excluding travel time) just to keep his job.
Something to think about. Taxing isn't the answer, but switching off is probably a big part of it.
I don't know if switching off is the answer, so much as requiring less of ourselves. People would probably sleep better if they didn't have to take home overtime or cram for exams.
This doesn't really make sense; I mean first you're talking about 'having' to do things, implying a primarily external influence, and then you're switching to declaring those work patterns internally motivated and therefore our fault for not opting out.
Something to think about. Taxing isn't the answer, but switching off is probably a big part of it.
I don't know if switching off is the answer, so much as requiring less of ourselves. People would probably sleep better if they didn't have to take home overtime or cram for exams.
This doesn't really make sense; I mean first you're talking about 'having' to do things, implying a primarily external influence, and then you're switching to declaring those work patterns internally motivated and therefore our fault for not opting out.
I think by "ourselves" he means "the concept 'society' personified".
ViolentChemistry on
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MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
This doesn't really make sense; I mean first you're talking about 'having' to do things, implying a primarily external influence, and then you're switching to declaring those work patterns internally motivated and therefore our fault for not opting out.
I'm talking about the economy being geared towards sleep deprivation. We (in the US) work more overtime and take fewer vacations than most of the rest of the first world, for instance. We also sleep less. I don't think the two phenomena are unrelated.
I wasn't really assigning blame for the situation, just saying that I don't think switching off our electrical doodads is going solve it.
This doesn't really make sense; I mean first you're talking about 'having' to do things, implying a primarily external influence, and then you're switching to declaring those work patterns internally motivated and therefore our fault for not opting out.
I'm talking about the economy being geared towards sleep deprivation. We (in the US) work more overtime and take fewer vacations than most of the rest of the first world, for instance. We also sleep less. I don't think the two phenomena are unrelated.
I wasn't really assigning blame for the situation, just saying that I don't think switching off our electrical doodads is going solve it.
I wasn't contesting that, though. I've pointed out several times that many of the electrical doodads we could probably stand to spend less time around aren't recreational ones. More are only used because we're too tired to do anything much but too wired to sleep, and our work and study habits can be held largely responsible for that.
That said though, what's actually wrong with recognising that 20-50 hours a week in front of one screen or another isn't ever going to be healthy, and that ditching the recreational component in favour of conking out before the bats do is a more practical response than quitting your clerking job? Its kind of a no-brainer, reluctant as most of us are to actually do it.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Prices incent behavior. Just making people take the time to cook isn't really going to do anything, since Hamburger Helper is probably the easiest thing to cook. And granted that there are massive grey areas there in terms of "healthy" or "unhealthy" foods. Still, it's possible to draw some broad lines.
Prices definitely incent behavior, but I think it's fair to assume that they will incent it along the path of least resistance. What's easier, buying a cheaper version of the same shit you always buy, or switching up your lifestyle?
To the extent that the cigarette taxes work - and I think it's a very small extent - it's based on the fact that it's a fucking huge tax, larger than the price difference between most competing brands. I mean, we're talking $2-3 a pack on a $5 pack of cigarettes.
Like I said, if the tax is ginormous - like a 30% tax on junk food and teevees - I can see it having a disincentive effect. Otherwise, it'll just promote cheaper brands.
How does the US justify massive taxes on stuff like cigarettes and alcohol? In the UK it's pretty clear cut - cigarette smoking leads to an increased load on our National Health Service, ergo the smokers pay more to contribute towards the cost of that extra load (or stop smoking because it's to expensive, thus reducing the overall load). In the US, you have a private health industry payed for via health insurance. I can see the insurers charging a higher premium to high-risk candidates such as smokers, but how does the government justify the levy?
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
I don't read much anymore because I'm too busy poasting at you?
(people don't tend to stay up till 4am reading much. Its harder brain-work than levelgrinding in WoW or whatever the kids are doing these days)
I stay up on weekends reading. Especially if I just got a new book. I have to finish it the day of purchase, so I usually buy them on Fridays and just read until I either pass out or finish them.
I'm a pretty nocturnal person though, if I had the choice I'd stay up most of the night and sleep during the day. I just feel more awake at night.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
manwhat right back at you. You've honestly never read a novel in bed where you just can't stop reading 'just one more chapter' and then suddenly it's 4am and oh fuck I've got work in the morning?
Although I'm not even sure the reason for being sedentary should even be relevant. If they want to tax video games because they make you sit still for long periods and that unhealthy then they should really tax anything that makes you sit still for long periods. Things like office jobs and driving jobs (trucks, taxis etc.) are well documented as leading to obesity. Maybe that's more of a health and safety thing - they should start fining offices that provide their workforce with chairs. Class action lawsuits against employers because my white collar job made me obese.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
manwhat right back at you. You've honestly never read a novel in bed where you just can't stop reading 'just one more chapter' and then suddenly it's 4am and oh fuck I've got work in the morning?
Sure, but I've never done it night after night.
Although I'm not even sure the reason for being sedentary should even be relevant. If they want to tax video games because they make you sit still for long periods and that unhealthy then they should really tax anything that makes you sit still for long periods. Things like office jobs and driving jobs (trucks, taxis etc.) are well documented as leading to obesity. Maybe that's more of a health and safety thing - they should start fining offices that provide their workforce with chairs. Class action lawsuits against employers because my white collar job made me obese.
I'm not arguing in favour of taxing anything. sin taxes are stupid. I am, however, pointing out that frothing denial about the amount of screentime the average person gets per week and the attendant health consequences is, well, fucking retarded. You're allowed your vices, just don't quibble when someone points out that that's what they are. And don't put all the blame on Evil Farmers or whateverthefuck when you're getting 4 hours a night downtime.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
I think the videogame industry is probably a pretty sweet target for a new tax:
*Small number of producers and distributors to focus on (compared to say taxing farmers or booze)
*The consumers are not politically important or important (maybe a decade of the Wii/aging of the C64 generation will change this)
*A lot of people will just accept the proposition that game playing kids results in fat kids without really thinking about it
*The consumers are not politically important or important (maybe a decade of the Wii/aging of the C64 generation will change this)
Huh? I think anybody who grew up playing on C64s is of voting age by now. Most people in their 20s/30s that I know play some sort of computer games, even if it's just casual gaming.
I think the real reason for this is dumb people mouthing off about something they have no knowledge of other than stereotypes and assumptions.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
You can read a book on the treadmill at the gym. I've seen 'em do it!
*The consumers are not politically important or important (maybe a decade of the Wii/aging of the C64 generation will change this)
Huh? I think anybody who grew up playing on C64s is of voting age by now. Most people in their 20s/30s that I know play some sort of computer games, even if it's just casual gaming.
I should have put "deemed" in between not and politically as while we can vote we are not really courted.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
I damn well have. 'Time Spent per week' is the defining difference.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
I damn well have. 'Time Spent per week' is the defining difference.
Except that the only reason screens have taken over time spent per week is because all that desk-work used to be done on paper before something more efficient came along. It seems to me your problem ought be with a lifestyle of sitting all the time rather than with electronic media in particular, because electronic media doesn't actually cause it nor is it the only thing that "supports" it. Time spent per week sitting, as opposed to time spent per week using electronic media. The latter is a symptom of the former, not the other way around.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
You can read a book on the treadmill at the gym. I've seen 'em do it!
You can play a DS while riding a stationary bike, too.
Besides, what if I'm reading virtual books in Oblivion? Or heck, playing almost any PS2-era jRPG? Am I reading or playing video games? Why should paper books be exempt but not eBooks?
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
You can read a book on the treadmill at the gym. I've seen 'em do it!
You can play a DS while riding a stationary bike, too.
If you're ADD enough most of your papers are written on your feet...
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How does the US justify massive taxes on stuff like cigarettes and alcohol? In the UK it's pretty clear cut - cigarette smoking leads to an increased load on our National Health Service, ergo the smokers pay more to contribute towards the cost of that extra load (or stop smoking because it's to expensive, thus reducing the overall load). In the US, you have a private health industry payed for via health insurance. I can see the insurers charging a higher premium to high-risk candidates such as smokers, but how does the government justify the levy?
Ostensibly it's because of the increased social costs from things like smoking and drinking, which put a drain on the system overall, including public components like Medicare.
In reality, the government will levy a tax on anything they can get away with. People hate smokers, so selling a tax on the filthy bastards is easy. It's not like the money goes principally towards prevention and treatment. Like I implied earlier, some of the revenue from the cigarette tax gets doled out as subsidies for tobacco farmers. Governments just like taxing shit, and they will tax whatever we let them.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
I damn well have. 'Time Spent per week' is the defining difference.
Except that the only reason screens have taken over time spent per week is because all that desk-work used to be done on paper before something more efficient came along. It seems to me your problem ought be with a lifestyle of sitting all the time rather than with electronic media in particular, because electronic media doesn't actually cause it nor is it the only thing that "supports" it. Time spent per week sitting, as opposed to time spent per week using electronic media. The latter is a symptom of the former, not the other way around.
To approach it from another perspective, electronic media disturbs sleep patterns by making it more difficult for the body to fall asleep. This is why people find it more difficult to fall asleep right after, say, playing video games, as opposed to after reading books.
Aside from that however I find myself agreeing with you (interestingly enough). I think Cat is trying to say that the average person spends far more time in front of electronic media than reading books - even though both involve sitting down - so electronic media is somewhat more problematic. Which is a reasonable assumption but I don't think it justifies attacking electronic media.
[
How does the US justify massive taxes on stuff like cigarettes and alcohol? In the UK it's pretty clear cut - cigarette smoking leads to an increased load on our National Health Service, ergo the smokers pay more to contribute towards the cost of that extra load (or stop smoking because it's to expensive, thus reducing the overall load). In the US, you have a private health industry payed for via health insurance. I can see the insurers charging a higher premium to high-risk candidates such as smokers, but how does the government justify the levy?
Ostensibly it's because of the increased social costs from things like smoking and drinking, which put a drain on the system overall, including public components like Medicare.
In reality, the government will levy a tax on anything they can get away with. People hate smokers, so selling a tax on the filthy bastards is easy. It's not like the money goes principally towards prevention and treatment. Like I implied earlier, some of the revenue from the cigarette tax gets doled out as subsidies for tobacco farmers. Governments just like taxing shit, and they will tax whatever we let them.
Would it be more acceptable if 100% of the tax revenue went to prevention and treatment?
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway ). Is the problem that people don't sleep and spend all day on their ass or is the presence of electronic entertainment media the problem?
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
I damn well have. 'Time Spent per week' is the defining difference.
Except that the only reason screens have taken over time spent per week is because all that desk-work used to be done on paper before something more efficient came along. It seems to me your problem ought be with a lifestyle of sitting all the time rather than with electronic media in particular, because electronic media doesn't actually cause it nor is it the only thing that "supports" it. Time spent per week sitting, as opposed to time spent per week using electronic media. The latter is a symptom of the former, not the other way around.
To approach it from another perspective, electronic media disturbs sleep patterns by making it more difficult for the body to fall asleep. This is why people find it more difficult to fall asleep right after, say, playing video games, as opposed to after reading books.
Videogames are not the only electronic media, it's not only not unheard of but is actually even rather common for people to put on a movie to fall asleep to. That remains the easiest way for me to get to sleep if I'm wired. Also that isn't "why", it's not an explanation. It's just a claim backed by another unsubstantiated claim. The only "why" in your entire post is implied rather than stated, and it's "because I said so". And I don't find it any more difficult to fall asleep playing a videogame than reading a book, I was unaware that that was even something there's data on. Shit I actually have trouble making myself sleep when I'm not sleepy yet without some manner of distraction, be it a book a game a movie or someone with a really boring monotone voice.
[
How does the US justify massive taxes on stuff like cigarettes and alcohol? In the UK it's pretty clear cut - cigarette smoking leads to an increased load on our National Health Service, ergo the smokers pay more to contribute towards the cost of that extra load (or stop smoking because it's to expensive, thus reducing the overall load). In the US, you have a private health industry payed for via health insurance. I can see the insurers charging a higher premium to high-risk candidates such as smokers, but how does the government justify the levy?
Ostensibly it's because of the increased social costs from things like smoking and drinking, which put a drain on the system overall, including public components like Medicare.
In reality, the government will levy a tax on anything they can get away with. People hate smokers, so selling a tax on the filthy bastards is easy. It's not like the money goes principally towards prevention and treatment. Like I implied earlier, some of the revenue from the cigarette tax gets doled out as subsidies for tobacco farmers. Governments just like taxing shit, and they will tax whatever we let them.
Would it be more acceptable if 100% of the tax revenue went to prevention and treatment?
While it would be morally acceptable, the revenue that the government receives from cigarette taxes is just too big for them to actively (at least more than it is doing right now) try and squash it.
It's not an unsubstantiated claim. There have been many scientific studies suggesting that exposing oneself to TV or computer monitors right before sleep adversely affects not only the ability to fall asleep, but also the quality of the sleep.
A recent article by Nakamori Suganuma and colleagues at Osaka University published in Sleep and Biological Rhythms (2007, Volume 5, pgs. 204-214) found that teens and adults who used media more before going to sleep slept less than those who used less media. Strikingly, over half of those who used media 3.5 hours or more before going to bed reported that they did not sleep enough due to their media use. In addition, the younger subjects in the study reported that media was more a factor in their lack of sleep than the older subjects. The most commonly reported medium used prior to going to bed was accessing the Internet (38%) followed by watching television (25%) indicating that these two activities may be causal factors in sleep deprivation.
I always read in bed because it helps me wind down and sleep. Going straight from TV or Computer to bed leaves me feeling far too awake, unless I'm completely and utterly exhausted
It's not an unsubstantiated claim. There have been many scientific studies suggesting that exposing oneself to TV or computer monitors right before sleep adversely affects not only the ability to fall asleep, but also the quality of the sleep.
They all suggest not watching TV or playing intense games before bed.
My bedtime routine consists of an hour of leisure reading or "dessert" reading before I go to bed. Usually Black Library stuff ("Descent of Angels" at the moment"). If I read anything to heavy it excites my mind to much, hence my doctor telling me I have "adrenaline insomnia" because I get to excited about certain topics, AKA politics and what not, that I have to read something that doesn't engage the creative part of my brain.
Falling asleep to movies, the telly, or video games is not uncommon, but at the first hints of getting sleepy I usually /save or log-off. The more tired I am, my performance slips, irratibility ensues, and then I usually die or suck in spectacular fashion.
I remember playing Final Fantasy Seven for five days straight, no sleep. I was a Squaresoft POW.
But I digress. This is an issue of medicine, of course it is. But it is also a parenting issue. How do you reconcile one with the other before the product becomes "harmful"?
I seriously doubt there will be a day when your government will allow me to breed, but if so the children will not be on the computer/console system in excess. There is a balance that needs to be struck.
Lastly... has there ever been a baby sitter or nanny invented that can ensnare the imagination, capture the attention, or demand the time of a child like a Xbox 360 or Wii? It's too easy for parents today to just let their kids fall into an autistic trance in front of the telly. That's three to four hours of gaurenteed peace from the little rug-gremlins.
It's not an unsubstantiated claim. There have been many scientific studies suggesting that exposing oneself to TV or computer monitors right before sleep adversely affects not only the ability to fall asleep, but also the quality of the sleep.
A recent article by Nakamori Suganuma and colleagues at Osaka University published in Sleep and Biological Rhythms (2007, Volume 5, pgs. 204-214) found that teens and adults who used media more before going to sleep slept less than those who used less media. Strikingly, over half of those who used media 3.5 hours or more before going to bed reported that they did not sleep enough due to their media use. In addition, the younger subjects in the study reported that media was more a factor in their lack of sleep than the older subjects. The most commonly reported medium used prior to going to bed was accessing the Internet (38%) followed by watching television (25%) indicating that these two activities may be causal factors in sleep deprivation.
They all suggest not watching TV or playing intense games before bed.
It's true. I'm stuck in front of a computer all day at work and I can never get any sleep in the office.
All that first report seems to suggest is 'it is difficult to fall asleep while doing something' (like blogging or myspacing). Well, duh. It's difficult to fall asleep doing anything, because you're focusing on doing it rather than relaxing. So yeah, sitting in front of your computer reading the internet or playing games isn't likely to result in you sleeping. What the other links suggest is doing relaxing things before bedtime (one of them even recommends computer games). Playing exciting games or getting involved in an internet debate shortly before lights out is obviously going to get the adrenaline going and result in you taking longer to relax and fall asleep, but so is reading an exciting novel.
Either way, I'm not sure how sleep deprivation leads to obesity. (Ok, I do know how it does, sleep deprivation leads to stress, leads to weight gain, but I don't think that's the angle the video game tax is taking, so I'm not even sure why we're discussing it any more. The issue with books was that people generally read books in a sedentary state, so they aren't any better than video games for our physical health).
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I'm honestly curious about genetic links with regards to obesity though. There were kids I knew at school that drank, smoked, ate complete shit and got through a 2 litre of coke a day and they weighed about 140 lbs. Then there were the kids who excercised and ate healthy and were nicknamed Chunk. I understand part of it based off of your lifestyle choices, but there seem to be cases where people just naturally veer towards one side of the equation.
I could go off about natural selection and stuff now, but I really doubt I'm coherent enough to pull it off.
Edit: Wow typos. Also, if hunger is hormone based wouldn't it theoretically be possible to just administer an artificially created hormone? Going to look into this. Work is pretty dull again.
Look, I grew up in a world where poor meant you had to eat out of the trash goddammit and that's a world that makes sense.
This whole 'poor people not having distended stomachs and bony fragile arms' just makes the world not make sense.
What's next? Poor people voting?
I don't know if switching off is the answer, so much as requiring less of ourselves. People would probably sleep better if they didn't have to take home overtime or cram for exams.
I'm curious how you would go about forcing this adjustment.
This doesn't really make sense; I mean first you're talking about 'having' to do things, implying a primarily external influence, and then you're switching to declaring those work patterns internally motivated and therefore our fault for not opting out.
I think by "ourselves" he means "the concept 'society' personified".
I'm talking about the economy being geared towards sleep deprivation. We (in the US) work more overtime and take fewer vacations than most of the rest of the first world, for instance. We also sleep less. I don't think the two phenomena are unrelated.
I wasn't really assigning blame for the situation, just saying that I don't think switching off our electrical doodads is going solve it.
I wasn't contesting that, though. I've pointed out several times that many of the electrical doodads we could probably stand to spend less time around aren't recreational ones. More are only used because we're too tired to do anything much but too wired to sleep, and our work and study habits can be held largely responsible for that.
That said though, what's actually wrong with recognising that 20-50 hours a week in front of one screen or another isn't ever going to be healthy, and that ditching the recreational component in favour of conking out before the bats do is a more practical response than quitting your clerking job? Its kind of a no-brainer, reluctant as most of us are to actually do it.
11:16pm!
(people don't tend to stay up till 4am reading much. Its harder brain-work than levelgrinding in WoW or whatever the kids are doing these days)
I could have sworn you went to college...
studying=/=reading for pleasure. Unless you're one of those people. I don't think you can lump in novel-reading with Quake solely on the basis that one sits down to do both, sorry.
How does the US justify massive taxes on stuff like cigarettes and alcohol? In the UK it's pretty clear cut - cigarette smoking leads to an increased load on our National Health Service, ergo the smokers pay more to contribute towards the cost of that extra load (or stop smoking because it's to expensive, thus reducing the overall load). In the US, you have a private health industry payed for via health insurance. I can see the insurers charging a higher premium to high-risk candidates such as smokers, but how does the government justify the levy?
Wait, what are those people?
And why not? We're talking about physical health, not anything to do with brain-enrichment (because of course electronic entertainment media can't possibly provide that anyway
I stay up on weekends reading. Especially if I just got a new book. I have to finish it the day of purchase, so I usually buy them on Fridays and just read until I either pass out or finish them.
I'm a pretty nocturnal person though, if I had the choice I'd stay up most of the night and sleep during the day. I just feel more awake at night.
manwhat right back at you. You've honestly never read a novel in bed where you just can't stop reading 'just one more chapter' and then suddenly it's 4am and oh fuck I've got work in the morning?
Although I'm not even sure the reason for being sedentary should even be relevant. If they want to tax video games because they make you sit still for long periods and that unhealthy then they should really tax anything that makes you sit still for long periods. Things like office jobs and driving jobs (trucks, taxis etc.) are well documented as leading to obesity. Maybe that's more of a health and safety thing - they should start fining offices that provide their workforce with chairs. Class action lawsuits against employers because my white collar job made me obese.
The problem is that people have never spent the sheer amount of time reading stuff that they do typing data, watching oprah and stabbing orcs. Thus, the health consequences just aren't the same.
I'm not arguing in favour of taxing anything. sin taxes are stupid. I am, however, pointing out that frothing denial about the amount of screentime the average person gets per week and the attendant health consequences is, well, fucking retarded. You're allowed your vices, just don't quibble when someone points out that that's what they are. And don't put all the blame on Evil Farmers or whateverthefuck when you're getting 4 hours a night downtime.
11:44pm, I'm taking my own advice. Have fun y'all.
Except that you haven't established why paper-books deserve to be categorized seperately while lumping WoW in with AutoCAD with talk-TV with film with etc. Your starting point has books already "obviously" distinct from all those activities which are "obviously" not sufficiently distinct from one another to warrant drawing any distinctions.
*Small number of producers and distributors to focus on (compared to say taxing farmers or booze)
*The consumers are not politically important or important (maybe a decade of the Wii/aging of the C64 generation will change this)
*A lot of people will just accept the proposition that game playing kids results in fat kids without really thinking about it
Huh? I think anybody who grew up playing on C64s is of voting age by now. Most people in their 20s/30s that I know play some sort of computer games, even if it's just casual gaming.
I think the real reason for this is dumb people mouthing off about something they have no knowledge of other than stereotypes and assumptions.
You can read a book on the treadmill at the gym. I've seen 'em do it!
I should have put "deemed" in between not and politically as while we can vote we are not really courted.
I damn well have. 'Time Spent per week' is the defining difference.
I used to do that all the time.
Except that the only reason screens have taken over time spent per week is because all that desk-work used to be done on paper before something more efficient came along. It seems to me your problem ought be with a lifestyle of sitting all the time rather than with electronic media in particular, because electronic media doesn't actually cause it nor is it the only thing that "supports" it. Time spent per week sitting, as opposed to time spent per week using electronic media. The latter is a symptom of the former, not the other way around.
You can play a DS while riding a stationary bike, too.
Besides, what if I'm reading virtual books in Oblivion? Or heck, playing almost any PS2-era jRPG? Am I reading or playing video games? Why should paper books be exempt but not eBooks?
If you're ADD enough most of your papers are written on your feet...
Ostensibly it's because of the increased social costs from things like smoking and drinking, which put a drain on the system overall, including public components like Medicare.
In reality, the government will levy a tax on anything they can get away with. People hate smokers, so selling a tax on the filthy bastards is easy. It's not like the money goes principally towards prevention and treatment. Like I implied earlier, some of the revenue from the cigarette tax gets doled out as subsidies for tobacco farmers. Governments just like taxing shit, and they will tax whatever we let them.
To approach it from another perspective, electronic media disturbs sleep patterns by making it more difficult for the body to fall asleep. This is why people find it more difficult to fall asleep right after, say, playing video games, as opposed to after reading books.
Aside from that however I find myself agreeing with you (interestingly enough). I think Cat is trying to say that the average person spends far more time in front of electronic media than reading books - even though both involve sitting down - so electronic media is somewhat more problematic. Which is a reasonable assumption but I don't think it justifies attacking electronic media.
Would it be more acceptable if 100% of the tax revenue went to prevention and treatment?
Videogames are not the only electronic media, it's not only not unheard of but is actually even rather common for people to put on a movie to fall asleep to. That remains the easiest way for me to get to sleep if I'm wired. Also that isn't "why", it's not an explanation. It's just a claim backed by another unsubstantiated claim. The only "why" in your entire post is implied rather than stated, and it's "because I said so". And I don't find it any more difficult to fall asleep playing a videogame than reading a book, I was unaware that that was even something there's data on. Shit I actually have trouble making myself sleep when I'm not sleepy yet without some manner of distraction, be it a book a game a movie or someone with a really boring monotone voice.
While it would be morally acceptable, the revenue that the government receives from cigarette taxes is just too big for them to actively (at least more than it is doing right now) try and squash it.
Here is one such study.
A more detailed explanation of the same study.
Also, check these out.
http://www.sciencenewsforkids.org/articles/20060913/Feature1.asp
http://stress.about.com/od/lowstresslifestyle/tp/better_sleep.htm
http://www.wikihow.com/Sleep-Better
They all suggest not watching TV or playing intense games before bed.
My bedtime routine consists of an hour of leisure reading or "dessert" reading before I go to bed. Usually Black Library stuff ("Descent of Angels" at the moment"). If I read anything to heavy it excites my mind to much, hence my doctor telling me I have "adrenaline insomnia" because I get to excited about certain topics, AKA politics and what not, that I have to read something that doesn't engage the creative part of my brain.
Falling asleep to movies, the telly, or video games is not uncommon, but at the first hints of getting sleepy I usually /save or log-off. The more tired I am, my performance slips, irratibility ensues, and then I usually die or suck in spectacular fashion.
I remember playing Final Fantasy Seven for five days straight, no sleep. I was a Squaresoft POW.
But I digress. This is an issue of medicine, of course it is. But it is also a parenting issue. How do you reconcile one with the other before the product becomes "harmful"?
I seriously doubt there will be a day when your government will allow me to breed, but if so the children will not be on the computer/console system in excess. There is a balance that needs to be struck.
Lastly... has there ever been a baby sitter or nanny invented that can ensnare the imagination, capture the attention, or demand the time of a child like a Xbox 360 or Wii? It's too easy for parents today to just let their kids fall into an autistic trance in front of the telly. That's three to four hours of gaurenteed peace from the little rug-gremlins.
It's true. I'm stuck in front of a computer all day at work and I can never get any sleep in the office.
All that first report seems to suggest is 'it is difficult to fall asleep while doing something' (like blogging or myspacing). Well, duh. It's difficult to fall asleep doing anything, because you're focusing on doing it rather than relaxing. So yeah, sitting in front of your computer reading the internet or playing games isn't likely to result in you sleeping. What the other links suggest is doing relaxing things before bedtime (one of them even recommends computer games). Playing exciting games or getting involved in an internet debate shortly before lights out is obviously going to get the adrenaline going and result in you taking longer to relax and fall asleep, but so is reading an exciting novel.
Either way, I'm not sure how sleep deprivation leads to obesity. (Ok, I do know how it does, sleep deprivation leads to stress, leads to weight gain, but I don't think that's the angle the video game tax is taking, so I'm not even sure why we're discussing it any more. The issue with books was that people generally read books in a sedentary state, so they aren't any better than video games for our physical health).