Kids. They always seem to have boundless energy, right? Us grown-ups can 
hardly keep up with them. Why is that?



Watch a bunch of people standing in a queue. Everybody's pretty annoyed 
to be there, right? Everybody's looking around and shuffling their feet 
and generally bored. But everybody, none the less, is quietly and 
patiently waiting.

Except the guy who has a kid with him. Because us adults will grudgingly 
stand there, staring into space and thinking about... Charlotte Church, 
or Match of the Day, or Chaotic Nonlinear Dynamical Systems, but a kid? 
Kids literally cannot *bare* being bored FOR EVEN ONE SECOND! I'm bored, 
I want to do something interesting NOW!! And kids can't. Stay. Still. 
For. One. Second. They must move. Constantly. All the time. And so this 
kid will hop on one foot. Play with the inevitable collection of crisps 
and sweets on the display stands. Fiddle with his shoelaces. Flap like a 
duck. ANYTHING to avoid staying still.

And what does dad do? "Oi! Behave yourself. Stand still!"

Hypothesis: Once upon a time, we all had boundless energy. And then we 
spent the next 20 years being constantly told "Sit still. Stop messing 
around. Be quiet. Don't touch that. Be patient. Wait. Stop wandering 
around." And so forth.

And we all became so unfit that small children make us feel tired just 
be looking at them.

Think about it. If you were *constantly* moving, every second of every 
day, on the bus, in the car, standing in queues, sitting in the doctor's 
waiting room, sitting at your desk, *almost* doing something, almost 
fidgetting... HOW FIT WOULD YOU BE?! How much exercise is that??

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:12:22 +0100, Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> Think about it. If you were *constantly* moving, every second of every
> day, on the bus, in the car, standing in queues, sitting in the doctor's
> waiting room, sitting at your desk, *almost* doing something, almost
> fidgetting... HOW FIT WOULD YOU BE?! How much exercise is that??

Not a hypothesis.  Proven - as societies, Western societies are very 
sedentary, and as such, obesity hits those who aren't careful about it.

Jim

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Kids. They always seem to have boundless energy, right? Us grown-ups can 
> hardly keep up with them. Why is that?
> 

Judging from my own experience, I'd guess that kids are just miserable. 
I get every bit as fidgety when I have to go shopping with my wife or 
when I have to go to a dance club or when I have to spend hour after 
hour doing things that I don't want to do.

If I'd had a dollar for every time someone remarked what a nice guy I 
was when I wasn't in school, I could have retired when I graduated.

  -Shay

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Jim Henderson wrote:

> Not a hypothesis.  Proven - as societies, Western societies are very 
> sedentary, and as such, obesity hits those who aren't careful about it.

There's no doubt that Westerners are very sedentary.

Most people seem to think that youngsters are inherantly full of energy, 
and that being tired and lathargic is in inevitable consequence of 
growing up. My hypothesis is that this lack of energy is not in fact due 
to age, but to being constantly forced to stand still, sit still, wait 
around, etc.

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Invisible a écrit :
> Most people seem to think that youngsters are inherantly full of energy, 
> and that being tired and lathargic is in inevitable consequence of 
> growing up. My hypothesis is that this lack of energy is not in fact due 
> to age, but to being constantly forced to stand still, sit still, wait 
> around, etc.

I don't know, it seems pets follow the same pattern of behaviour, very 
lively and foolish at the beginning, then settling down gradually. It's 
not that they cannot move around and play anymore, just that they do it 
less often. I don't think it's just us imposing that on them, for 
example cats do that yet they take little heed of our orders ;-) I 
wouldn't be surprised if wild animals did that too.

I think there are other things that might explain the activity of 
youngsters. For one thing, they are growing physically, so maybe the 
body needs this movement to form properly. The brain is also developing 
at this age, and possibly it needs as many stimuli as possible...

-- 
Vincent

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Vincent Le Chevalier wrote:
> 
> I don't know, it seems pets follow the same pattern of behaviour, very
> lively and foolish at the beginning, then settling down gradually. It's
> not that they cannot move around and play anymore, just that they do it
> less often. I don't think it's just us imposing that on them, for
> example cats do that yet they take little heed of our orders ;-) I
> wouldn't be surprised if wild animals did that too.
> 

But they freakin' stay in fit. That lazy-looking cat can still run to
catch a bunch of mice and go hiding to the attic without any problems.
Or that rabbit that never moves can still jump 2+ meters without
pre-acceleration - from right there, where it just sits still.

Every once in a while i wonder how they do it...

-Aero

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Eero Ahonen wrote:

> But they freakin' stay in fit. That lazy-looking cat can still run to
> catch a bunch of mice and go hiding to the attic without any problems.
> Or that rabbit that never moves can still jump 2+ meters without
> pre-acceleration - from right there, where it just sits still.
> 
> Every once in a while i wonder how they do it...

Ever tried to catch goldfish?

6 months of the year, they never go past about 0.02 MPH. But the one day 
you want to catch one... suddenly they can do 4 complete circuits of the 
tank in under 800 ms. o_O

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Thu, 11 Jun 2009 09:46:31 +0100, Invisible wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
> 
>> Not a hypothesis.  Proven - as societies, Western societies are very
>> sedentary, and as such, obesity hits those who aren't careful about it.
> 
> There's no doubt that Westerners are very sedentary.
> 
> Most people seem to think that youngsters are inherantly full of energy,
> and that being tired and lathargic is in inevitable consequence of
> growing up. My hypothesis is that this lack of energy is not in fact due
> to age, but to being constantly forced to stand still, sit still, wait
> around, etc.

Ah, I see - I missed that that was your hypothesis.

I think it's not so much being forced to stand still (I wasn't, but I was 
taught how to behave in public settings, which it seems at least here 
where I live isn't something that is taught enough), but partly a mass-
>engergy conversion.  Kids are small, so doesn't take as much fuel to 
power them as it does someone my shape and size.

A 1500 calorie diet (as an example of pulling a number out of thin air) 
for me is enough for me to probably sit in front of a computer for 8 
hours and that's about it.  If I want to be working out, I need more like 
2500 calories of intake per day.

But for an average 10-year-old kid, 1500 calories is quite a bit and that 
energy has to go somewhere.

Jim

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Jim Henderson wrote:

> But for an average 10-year-old kid, 1500 calories is quite a bit and that 
> energy has to go somewhere.

ADHD stands for attention defeciLETS ALL GO RIDE BIKES!!

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Fri, 12 Jun 2009 18:09:15 +0100, Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
> 
>> But for an average 10-year-old kid, 1500 calories is quite a bit and
>> that energy has to go somewhere.
> 
> ADHD stands for attention defeciLETS ALL GO RIDE BIKES!!

FTW!  Thanks, I needed the laugh today. :-)

Jim

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