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Comment by tomjen3 | Hacker News Reader

I must have seen a million of these "benefits of exercise" posts by now - everybody seems to think that exercise is a good thing, but making another post isn't going to change anything, people are still not going to exercise; making a drug that simulates the effects of exercise would change everything.

So why aren't people working on that?

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They are, but it takes years to get from "tested on mice" to "safe for humans".

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/0403/03.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25949447/#slice-2

When it does happen though, I think it'll be a massive breakthrough for public health. There are tons of diseases whose prevalence would be slashed just by raising the fitness level of the general population.

So why aren't people working on that?

I would hope they are. Of course if something like that actually comes out there will be lots of pushback from those with overdeveloped Protestant work ethics. No pain no gain, it's "cheating" to just take a pill, etc.

At least hear in the US, I've never seen the public apposed to taking the easy way out. Witness the massive(no pun intended) diet and weightloss industry.

Oh, but the situation is even worse than that-- the Protestant work ethic already caught you (or us, or many people, whatever).

I'm talking about the assumption that exercise is some sort of pain for gain tradeoff that you would suffer through in exchange for a later reward, but is itself unpleasant or undesirable without the health benefits. This insiduous paradigm seems to be everywhere in (at least) American culture.

And so the magic pill already exists! And there's no patent. No copay. No HMO can deny you it. And it's fun!

How about using electricity to make your muscles move without effort on your part? (Of course this won't do anything for your central nervous system or coordination.)

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