> [!summary] Progressive Summary # Structured Notes ## Definitions interoception - how the messages from our body feeds into our inner lives ## Chapter Summaries ### Chapter 1 - Why We Move > That which we call thinking is the evolutionary internalisation of movement. > – Rodolfo Llinás The sea squirt has a very simple nervous system consisting of a brain and a nerve cord. This allows it to make decisions as it swims around. As soon as it finds a suitable rock, it attaches its head to it and digests most of its nervous system. Rodolfo Llinás used the example of the sea squirt to illustrate the point that the function of a nervous system is for movement. We think in order to move away from danger, and towards where living is easier. Movement is too dangerous to attempt without a plan. Nervous systems are expensive to run. Our brains consume 20% of our energy. [[Brains are 2% of body weight but consume 20% of energy]] The brain has 86 billion neurons and over 100 trillion connections, and is the most complicated object we know. Our outer cortex is very wrinkly, because as it expanded, the only way it could fit in our skull was by folding. Robert Barton, an evolutionary anthropologist at Durham University, thinks that our brains grew more complex because of brachiation, a type of movement involving swinging arm over arm in trees, the way gibbons do. He published a paper in 2014 arguing that this skill in physical gymnastics led to our ancestors' ability with mental gymnastics. The part of the brain that is responsible for these super-fast movements is the cerebellum. In the late 1990s and 2000s, we discovered that the cerebellum is also involved with thinking and feeling, and that only a small part of it deals with movement. Barton believes that brachiation tied together movement, forward planning and fear of falling from a great height, and this set us up for sequential thinking, from understanding rules of language ### Chapter 2 - The Joy of Steps In 1842, more than 5 years after Charles Darwin came back from his Beagle voyages, he moved his family out of London and into the quiet English countryside, where he created a gravel path around his home that cut through a rolling meadow and some woodland. This would be his "thinking path", and where his theory of evolution took shape. In 2017, David Rachlen and Gene Alexander published a paper that made the case that we evolved to "think on our feet". [Raichlen 07/2017 - Adaptive Capacity: An Evolutionary Neuroscience Model Linking Exercise, Cognition, and Brain Health](zotero://select/items/1_27Q2X3BT) ### Chapter 3 - Fighting Fit [Holloway 06/1988 - Self‐Efficacy and Training for Strength in Adolescent Girls ¹](zotero://select/items/1_VJSMU3LS) - Jean Barrett Holloway did a study which showed that adolescent girls were able to increase their self-esteem and general effectiveness in life through weight training Muscle weakness is linked to a greater chance of dying from any cause. Greater bodily strength is linked to better memory, and grip strength is associated with a healthier hippocampus. Our body's homeostatic system consists of 3 parts: - hormones released in the bloodstream - nerve signals to and from our organs - physical feedback from our muscles, bones and other tissue Adding capacity to bones, muscles and other weight-bearing tissues of the body adds to our sense of being effective out in the world. People who do more more physical activity score higher on a scale of "global self-efficacy" - their sense of how much control they have over their lives. Strength training has faster and more powerful effects on self-esteem than improvements in cardiovacular fitness or other forms of exercise that focus on balance or flexibility. > Poor mental health might be part of the price we pay for a cushy life of sofas and supermarkets. Our muscles never use 100% of the capacity available to them. When we begin exercising, many of our gains comes from unlocking this spare capacity. Motor eurons start growing into our muscles and connecting to more fibers, generating more force per contraction. Humans are the best throwers in the animal world, thanks to the elastic tissue in our shoulders. (Author references this Kylie Minogue concert for its displays of movement and strength - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUPeJTs3JXw&t=2585s) There was a boxing school in the Grenfell Tower in London called the Dale Youth boxing club. In 2017, a fire broke out and destroyed the club. Roger Robinson wrote a book of poems about the fire called A Portable Paradise. ### Chapter 4 - Slave to the Rhythm # Rough Notes # Quotes