PNTV: Spark by John Ratey (#113)

Hey, guys, this is Brian with another Philosopher's Notes TV episode. This one is on the great book called the revolutionary New science of exercise in the brain by John Rady, who's a Harvard professor of psychiatry and a practicing psychiatrist and one of the world's leading experts on the science of exercise. Just an amazing book and we're going to go through some of my favorite big ideas here. We'll jump right in. John Ratey tells us to keep our brains at peak performance, our bodies need to work hard. In this book, he says he'll explain the science of how exercise cues the building blocks of learning in the brain. It affects the mood, anxiety and attention, and it guards against stress and reverses some of the effects of aging. And he says, I'm not talking about the fuzzy notion of runner's high. I'm not talking about a notion at all. These are tangible changes measured in lab rats and identified in people. So again, the book looks at the science of exercise. It's amazing stuff. We'll look at how student bodies are transformed not just figuratively, but literally in academic environments in high schools. Really, really cool stuff. How we want to go from the gym to our desk and do our most creative work. First thing, we'll look at cognitive flexibility. Amazing stuff. Stone age activity levels were really high. We've got to come much closer to meeting them. We need to reestablish connections. That's a key for well being. And exercise really helps with that. We'll look at depression. I just got done recording a video on exercise, the number one way to boost your mojo, where I talked a lot about how exercise impacts our mood and depression vulnerability. We we will look at the fact that a little is good and more is better. So let's see how much of that we can get through. Rady again tells us, I want to cement the idea that exercise has a profound impact on cognitive abilities and mental health. It is simply one of the best treatments we have for most psychiatric problems. That's huge. So starting with the transforming student bodies, Rady spends quite a bit of time talking about some amazing research that's done on some schools, high schools, that integrate exercise into their curriculum. One school he talks about In Illinois, only 3% of their student body is overweight when the national average is 30%. That's amazing. They've implemented a lot of these ideas. And what's amazing is not only are they incredibly healthy and fit, they are incredible academic performers. In fact, he goes into the details here. Some of the international tests that are done this School places first in all of the world in their science performance and among the top in the world in other domains. So again, our exercise impacts not just our health and our physiological well being immunologically, but also our academic performance, our creative performance. Truly amazing stuff. Now, that doesn't just work with school kids, of course, that works with us. Now, the high school, they did another set of research studies where they wanted to test literacy. And this school looked at kids who were struggling with literacy and they split them into two groups. One group, right after they exercised, they worked on their literacy and the other group exercised and worked on their literacy later in the day. The last period, guess what? The group, they went from exercise to literacy improved way more than the group that exercised and then did literacy later in the day. So what that means is for us, those of us who are not still in school, if you're still in school, exercise before, your most challenging subject is the short story. And for those of us who go to jobs or who work and create different things or artists or whatever, exercise then create, tackle the most challenging thing we have on our plates or, or if you have a big meeting, you're going to be brainstorming for work out during lunch. Do a short, intense run during lunchtime. That's one of the best ways you can possibly prime your mind. And again, this is backed by research. This isn't speculation. They brought people into a lab and they tested what they call their cognitive flexibility. And what they found was that after just one 35 minute treadmill session, at 60 or 70% of maximum heart rate, they dramatically and significantly increased their creativity relative to a group that just sat down and watched a movie. And the test was really cool. They looked at it and said, hey, come up with all the different ways that you can use a newspaper, for example, right? You can use it to line a birdcage, pack dishes, wrap fish, all these different things. Now, the group that watched the movie performed the same before, immediately after watching the movie and 20 minutes after. But the group that exercised performed significantly better after exercising. It's an amazing finding. It's obvious and common sense when you think about it. What this means is if you have an important afternoon brainstorming session, going for a short, in the afternoon, going for a short, intense run during lunchtime is a very smart idea. Think about that as you approach your workday, tomorrow, next week, et cetera. Next big idea here is stone age activity level. Really cool stuff. Now, the short description is the human body is built for regular physical activity. It's built into our genes. The question is how much? Well, as they say in, as Rady says in this note, if you look at the Paleolithic rhythms, which is the time homo sapiens emerged 2 million years ago until about 10,000 years ago when the agricultural revolution kicked in, we were all hunter gatherers and we all moved a lot. How much? Well, if we follow. Well, they say that today our energy expenditure per unit of body mass is less than 38% of that of our Stone Age ancestors. Less than 38%. And even if we followed the US recommended allotment for exercise, we'd still only have half the energy expenditure for which our genes are encoded. Paleolithic man had to walk five to 10 miles on an average day just to be able to eat. That's awesome. In the video I did on exercise, I mentioned that today I went off on walking. I read this note in preparation and I keep track of how many steps I take every day. It's kind of fun. I always aim to get over 10,000 and do that nearly every day. A lot of times. 12,000, 14,000 steps. Today I walked like a machine, 21,000 steps, 146 minutes in aerobic and walked over 10 miles. And I always go for over five miles a day. We just lost light. That's not good. There we go. Light is back. That's fantastic. So how about you walk more, exercise more, move more. Let's look into some details of what he recommends. He says we want to engage our endurance metabolism to keep our bodies and brains in optimum condition, which basically means we want to walk, jog, run and sprint. He says walk or jog every day, run a couple of times a week, and then go for the kill every now and then by sprinting. If you don't do that, you're disrupting a delicate biological balance that has been fine tuned over half a million years. Not usually a good idea to mess with that. When we do, we see things like what the World Health Organization sees, which is the fact that depression is the leading cause of disability in the United States and in Canada, ahead of coronary heart disease and any cancer and AIDS. That's crazy. 17% of American adults experience depression at some point in their lives to the tune of $26.1 billion in health care costs each year. I've experienced depression. Have you experienced depression or someone you love? Well, I'll tell you what, you couldn't pay me to not exercise now. And I go off in this note about the fact that Talbin Shahar says that exercising, not exercising is like taking a depressant, not a good idea. So if you're feeling funky, get out and exercise. If that just means walking and building up to a point where you can do more, do it. I go off in the video on exercise more about the psychological benefits, but know that there's research done that shows that Zoloft exercise are equivalently effective in reducing depression. Meaning exercise is as effective at reducing depression. That's actually down here. This study talks about how when you move, they followed people longitudinally over a period of time from 1974 to 1983, actually 19, whatever it was, and they found that the people who exercised were 1.5 times. People who didn't exercise were 1.5 times more likely to have depression than their active counterparts. In other words, exercise, exercise, exercise. It is simply one of the best treatments we have for most psychiatric problems, as we mentioned before, as effective as Zoloft. Again, if you have any emotional challenges, exercise, your family or friends do suggest exercise, go out and work out with them. I go off in the note on some more stuff we don't have time for here. He says, a little is good, more is better. This is what he recommends based on everything that John Ratey has read and seen. He says do some form of aerobic activity six days a week for 45 minutes to an hour. Four of those days should be on the longer side at moderate intensity and two on the shorter side at high intensity. On the shorter, high intensity days include some form of strength or resistance training. He says, look, commit six hours a week to your brain. That's only 5% of your waking hours and it's a great investment. Please, please, please make it if you're not already. If you are exercising, how can you turn it up a little bit? And if you aren't exercising? He says the key is to attack the business of starting as a challenge in itself because if you've been sedentary, you feel like you don't have the energy to work out. Totally get it. But you need to make that your challenge. Just starting, It's a little bit of a catch 22, but as you do it, you will get more energy, I promise. And here's the final idea. Aerobic activity has a dramatic effect on adaptation, regulating systems that might be out of balance and optimizing those that are not. It's an indispensable tool for anyone who wants to reach his or her full potential. We go off in the note on the neuro chemical and neurotransmitters that are affected in this whole process, but know that exercise is huge. Hope you're doing it. If not, get on it. And I hope you enjoyed this quick look at Spark. Look forward to sharing more with you soon. See ya.