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Most cycle-commuters will tell you cycling to work is the best way to get to and from work and it's probably doing you some good. However a recent major study, published in the British Medical Journal, suggests that the health benefits are staggering, slashing the risk of heart disease and cancer. FTFA:
Research has consistently shown that people who are less physically active are both more likely to develop health problems like heart disease and type 2 diabetes, and to die younger. Yet there is increasing evidence that physical activity levels are on the decline.
The problem is that when there are many demands on our time, many people find prioritising exercise difficult. One answer is to multi-task by cycling or walking to work. We've just completed the largest ever study into how this affects your health.
You can read an article here at The Conversation website and you the original research is here at the BMJ website.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Friday September 08 2017, @03:07PM (9 children)
Then the same thing is true of those activities while driving or walking on the street in a city. Drivers distracted by smartphones crash and are injured or killed. Pedestrians absorbed in their smartphones get run down or fall into open sidewalk grates. Why is listening to music or a podcast while cycling more menacing than those two?
It's possible to choose a happy medium of earbuds that don't cancel out all external noise, yet are audible enough to give you the benefit of information or entertainment. You will still hear a honking horn or bike bell because those signals pierce by design.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Friday September 08 2017, @05:57PM (3 children)
No, it's not possible to choose a happy medium. Bikers and drivers need to pay attention to what they are doing and not be distracted. Less of an issue for people walking. Not sure why you brought that up?
This is a bad argument. Bad, distracted drivers running people over due to their arrogance and luxury distractions doesn't make the same behavior OK for cyclists. They are moving road hazards so you deserve to be as well? No. Get your shit together and concentrate on the task at hand.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Phoenix666 on Friday September 08 2017, @08:15PM (2 children)
So, presumably you militate against people listening to music while they drive or walk, because they need to "concentrate on the task at hand?"
The most important sense in avoiding crashes is sight. If you're watching where you're going and checking your six before changing lanes or turning, you're doing the most important thing from the perspective of safety. Listening to music or the radio while you do those things might--might--slow your response time, but they could also make the road safer by keeping the listener's blood pressure down. I know that listening to classical music while I drive helps me resist road rage.
Whatever the case may be, you're not going to win the battle against people listening to sounds other than ambient noise or refraining from talking to other people in the car, etc. You'd be beyond tilting at windmills with that.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @08:57PM (1 child)
You just can't help some people. Like motorcyclists that ride without helmets... so with bicyclists that cut off one of their main senses. That makes no sense, man.
You are in the most dangerous position of anyone on the road, so you need to be extra aware of your surroundings. Don't lull yourself; you may have an accident coming your way.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:06PM
So we'll see you standing on the shoulder of the highway, then, holding a giant sign that says "TURN OFF YOUR RADIO! CONCENTRATE ON THE TASK AT HAND!!!" and shaking your fist, right? Those people are moving geometrically more tons of mass at much higher speeds with a much, much greater kinetic energy than all the cyclists in the world taken together (and that's saying something given how many biking Chinese there are...).
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 09 2017, @12:44AM (1 child)
True, but when you are riding a bicycle the stakes are dramatically higher. I predict that you are going to end up an organ donor sometime in the future. Just sayin'.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:08PM
If you persist in your entrenched, sedentary lifestyle, "I predict that you are going to end up an organ donor sometime in the future. Just sayin'."
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Saturday September 09 2017, @06:33AM (2 children)
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:03PM (1 child)
So cyclists should stop wearing helmets because it might impede their hearing? I'm guessing not. It's a trade-off, right?
If being able to listen to music/news/podcasts/whatever gets more people cycling to work, and the more cyclists commuting to work the safer they all are, then maybe it's worth the slight loss in perception of ambient noise. Trust me, if a car honks at you or another bike dings its bell at you, you hear it if you're wearing normal ear buds listening at a normal volume.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:53PM
Yes. Statistically, if you wear a helmet you are more likely to be involved in an accident, less likely to suffer a fatal injury (increased protection makes a smashed skull less likely) but more likely to suffer spinal injury and permanent paralysis (the increased radius of your head adds torque on your neck to any head impact, making a broken neck a lot more likely). Overall, wearing a helmet makes you slightly more likely to suffer a permanently debilitating injury and, by a slightly smaller margin, slightly less likely to suffer death.
Part of the problem is that it makes you less safe but doesn't make you feel less safe. You get something similar if you try playing sports at twilight: you feel as if you can see about as well as normal, but your depth perception is a lot worse and so you're much more likely to injure yourself (or someone else). You'll know when a car honks, but you won't know until that point where the car is, and so your reaction to that noise may well be exactly the wrong one.
sudo mod me up