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In the first paragraph the article mentions how childhood obesity is a growing global concern, and physical exercise may help decrease some of the effects of childhood and adult obesity. However, the article never touches on childhood obesity again. I would like to add the following content:
Childhood obesity has drastically increased in the past 3 years. One out of every three children is overweight and obesity is linked to risks of diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, liver disease, and hypertension. At age four, a child who is obese faces a 20 percent likelihood of being overweight as an adult. Physical exercise plays a vital role in decreasing the growing epidemic of child obesity. Children who participate in physical exercise experience greater loss of body fat and increased cardiovascular fitness. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, both children and adults should do 60 minutes or more of physical activity each day. Implementing physical exercise in the school system and ensuring an environment in which children can reduce barriers to maintain a healthy lifestyle is essential.
DeMattia, Laure, and Shannon Lee Denney. “Childhood Obesity Prevention: Successful Community-based Efforts”. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 615 (2008): 83–99. Web.
There is still more content I would like to add to the article. For example, the nutrition section only contains two sentences and I would like to add to this section such as including foods to avoid in order to maintain a physically fit lifestyle. However, I did not research sources regarding nutrition prior to writing my lead section. The most challenging part was the information I added was from the United States and dealt with issues in the U.S. I also realized I may have to research new sources in order to avoid bias opinions. However, if I continue to use issues and data from the United State’s demographics I will need to make this clear in the article. --Devours2 (talk) 14:16, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
Proposed Changes
In the first paragraph the article mentions how childhood obesity is a growing global concern, and physical exercise may help decrease some of the effects of childhood and adult obesity. However, the article never touches on childhood obesity again. I would like to add the following content:
Childhood obesity has drastically increased in the past 3 years. One out of every three children is overweight and obesity is linked to risks of diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, liver disease, and hypertension. At age four, a child who is obese faces a 20 percent likelihood of being overweight as an adult. Physical exercise plays a vital role in decreasing the growing epidemic of child obesity. Children who participate in physical exercise experience greater loss of body fat and increased cardiovascular fitness. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, both children and adults should do 60 minutes or more of physical activity each day. Implementing physical exercise in the school system and ensuring an environment in which children can reduce barriers to maintain a healthy lifestyle is essential.
DeMattia, Laure, and Shannon Lee Denney. “Childhood Obesity Prevention: Successful Community-based Efforts”. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 615 (2008): 83–99. Web.
There is still more content I would like to add to the article. For example, the nutrition section only contains two sentences and I would like to add to this section such as including foods to avoid in order to maintain a physically fit lifestyle. However, I did not research sources regarding nutrition prior to writing my lead section. The most challenging part was the information I added was from the United States and dealt with issues in the U.S. I also realized I may have to research new sources in order to avoid bias opinions. However, if I continue to use issues and data from the United State’s demographics I will need to make this clear in the article. --Devours2 (talk) 14:16, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
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This article was well done all sections were over-represented.````
It appears to be 2 primary studies (1 on animals, 1 on humans) with different methodologies published in a single article. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 12:49, 25 July 2016 (UTC)
New section
We would like to suggest an addition to this page. We believe there are different cultural motivations for exercise. We want to address these variations in a new section of the Physical Fitness Wikipedia page, titled "Sociocultural Variations". We have researched cross-cultural differences and found that many people in other countries, such as Colombia, Cambodia, Sweden, and China, use fitness as a more social activity that occurs in public settings outdoors. We want discuss these differences in motivation for exercise. Toricarson17 (talk) 18:14, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
This is a promising addition, and timely. Relates to recognition by national parks services in the US and the UK that np users are increasingly not representative of shifting demographics (i.e., they remain mostly white). Lots of recent news articles on this. Booming trends in triathlon, marathon running, crossfit, etc. also may not reflect demographics in the US. Fewer sources, but still some, on this. Drewdeecopp (talk) 20:58, 9 December 2016 (UTC)
^Lindholm ME, Giacomello S, Werne Solnestam B, Fischer H, Huss M, Kjellqvist S, Sundberg CJ (September 2016). "The Impact of Endurance Training on Human Skeletal Muscle Memory, Global Isoform Expression and Novel Transcripts". PLoS Genet. 12 (9): e1006294. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1006294. PMID27657503.((cite journal)): CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link)
Even if it was properly referenced, what does it have to do with exercise? People play loud music while painting houses. People play loud music while driving cars. Or welding. Or doing data entry. Or washing dishes. Or lying in the sun trying to get a tan. Do we need a "noise-induced hearing loss during X" section in hundreds of articles? I say it's a WP:COATRACK. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:24, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
Requested move 20 March 2018
The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the move request was: Move. !Votes were pretty evenly split, but in my assessment, the support !votes had stronger arguments. Chiefly, they pointed out that Exercise already redirects to this article, meaning that moving it (or leaving it) wouldn't have any effect on the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC issues. Most participants who cited these primary topic issues didn't address this, and few presented arguments or evidence that "Exercise" should be the dab page. Several support voters made compelling policy arguemnts invoking WP:COMMONNAME, WP:PRIMARYTOPIC and the WP:CRITERIA, and the pageview evidence clearly shows that this article is more sought than all others combined. I note that after No such user introduced the page view counts late in the discussion, all following comments supported the move. All this taken together, I find consensus to move the article. Cúchullaint/c17:04, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
The result of the move request was: no consensus. Not seeing general agreement in this debate to rename this article as proposed, so we'll keep the long-term stable title for now. As is usual with a no-consensus outcome, supporters can perhaps strengthen their args and try again in a few weeks to garner consensus for this name change. Have a Great Day and Happy Publishing! (closed by page mover) Paine Ellsworthput'r there22:42, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
When a word has several meanings, the titles of the Wikipedia pages should be specific regarding which meaning. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:55, 20 March 2018 (UTC)
This is untrue. When a topic is already established as the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, there is no need to qualify it with an extra disambiguator, even if there are other meanings. For example London is not housed at London, England, even though other cities with that name exist. — Amakuru (talk) 13:08, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
Sorry for being unclear. It didn't occur to me that anyone would think that anything other than Exercise (mathematics) is the primary topic. Clearly other people have different interests than I do. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:55, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
@Guy Macon:WP:NWFCTM. You (well, not you specifically; this applies to everyone) are biased by their own personal environment, but Wikipedia has to take an unbiased global approach. –IagoQnsi (talk) 16:31, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose – This would make sense if "Physical exercise" were the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. But I don't think it is. It would have to be "highly likely—much more likely than any other topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term." I don't believe that's the case here. Kendall-K1 (talk) 15:29, 20 March 2018 (UTC)
@Artix Kreiger: The other uses of "exercise" are indeed "common" in a certain sense, but the physical exercise use is so so much more common. For something to be the primary topic, it doesn't have to be the only popular instance of that title; it just has to be the one that is used for that name so much more than the others. This is why "Birmingham" is about the English city, even though Birmingham, Alabama is also a very very common topic. –IagoQnsi (talk) 16:23, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
IagoQnsi, I would personally love to see Physical exercise to stay as it is. The page was there for a long time and the redirect was created in 2013. Despite the prevalence of physical exercise, the mathematics and military exercise are still common. Artix Kreiger (talk) 17:00, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Comment - several !votes above seem to be based on the existence of other types of exercise, and supporting the retention of "physical" for that reason. But that is irrelevant, because exercise already redirects here, and the proposal to change to a no-primary-topic situation was rejected at Talk:Exercise_(disambiguation)#Requested_move_21_March_2018. So the arguments should be based solely on what is the concise and common name for *this* article, not regarding whether other topics may also qualify for the title "exercise". For people who wish to view one of the other types of exercise, a simple hatnote along the lines of This article is about physical exercise. For other uses see Exercise (disambiguation) is sufficient for them to understand and navigate. They don't need the extra "prompt" of having Physical in the title as well. See Enclosure, Resonance and Evolution for other examples where the article is at the base primary topic title even though other topics exist. — Amakuru (talk) 17:08, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
Frankly, having both reviews run separately is dodgy - there should be one, unified discussion, where either this page moves to exercise or where exercise points to the disambig and this page retains it's title. Currently, both suffer from low numbers of participants, and effectively splitting them between two makes them less useful. Allowing whichever happens to close first to dictate the other, when they're clearly interrelated, is poor practice.HCA (talk) 22:04, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose - The word originates from Latin meaning "to work at", and there are plenty of alternative meanings. We also do not go by simple webpage counts or such metrics. As I pointed out elsewhere, if we did rely simply on google hits, cosmetics fans would be rather surprised with what becomes to undisputed primary page of facial. HCA (talk) 22:04, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
I'm confused about what I said too. I think my comment is missing a not, which I will add now. What I meant was that it is untenable to argue that "physical exercise" is not the primary meaning of "exercise", but then have the exercise title redirect to physical exercise. — AjaxSmack23:51, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Support per WP:CRITERIA. This isn't a primary topic discussion, its a choice between two titles at which this topic is already primary, so the discussion should be about which title is the fittest, and "Exercise" meets the criteria the best. All other uses on Exercise (disambiguation) derive from the physical fitness activity. "Mental exercise" (which actually redirects to Cognitive training) says this explicitly - "a hypothesis that cognitive abilities can be maintained or improved by exercising the brain, in an analogy to the way physical fitness is improved by exercising the body.". This same analogy is the root of the other uses: Exercise (mathematics) is a subset of mental exercises, Military exercise is meant to preserve the fitness of a combat unit, Exercise (options) means to put into active use as in physical action, and Exercises (album) comes directly from the physical activity as shown in the album cover art. -- Netoholic@04:39, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Support per the first of the two major aspects listed at WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Physical exercise is not the only type of exercise that is very common, but it is far and away the most likely thing that a user is looking for if they just type "exercise" (with no qualifying words). A user looking for any of the other terms would likely type "mental exercise", "military exercise", etc, rather than just "exercise".
User:HCA contends that we shouldn't consider what search engines say, but I disagree: just like search engines, we are trying to pick the topic that is the user is most likely looking for (per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC). And everysinglesearchengineI can thinkof returns results only for physical exercise and none of the other terms. And as for the example of "facial"? With safe search disabled, DuckDuckGo and Bing return a mix of sex and cosmetics articles, rather than showing only the sex act. (I exclude Google because they have some filtering on even when you disable safe search.) –IagoQnsi (talk) 05:44, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
@Artix Kreiger: No, but it requires some reasoning. It's impossible to have a discussion if one side won't say anything. And on that note, I just noticed your earlier 'oppose' and have now responded to it above. –IagoQnsi (talk) 16:23, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Speedy support - it's already primary topic. Put it this way: if you were a normal reader looking for any of the other meanings of "exercise", you typed in "exercise", and you landed on this page... you'd probably think "uh, hmm, well, yeah, that makes sense". WP:ASTONISH nearly requires this. Red Slash09:14, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Reluctant support. While I agree with HCA that this discussion and the one at Talk:Exercise (disambiguation) shouldn't have been separated, that's water under the bridge. And while the word has several meanings, only the physical exercise is commonly referred to just "exercise" without context, and by pagevies [2] it appears to be what users want and editors link to – that's whopping 5300 monthly hits (however they came about). Even if one could reasonably disagree that it's not the PRIMARYTOPIC, it's certainly a reasonable setup, so at the time it's best to move the page, admit "defeat to status quo" and move on. No such user (talk) 11:40, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Comment I've already voiced my support above, but I realized that no one has brought page views into the conversation. Since WP:DETERMINEPRIMARY suggests that page views are worth considering when determining a primary topic, here is a link comparing all of the entries on Exercise (disambiguation): [3]. Physical exercise is clearly the most popular page, by nearly an order of magnitude. (Feel free to fiddle with the options on the PageViews tool to see that this is true, no matter how you adjust the date range and whatnot. I do have a strong opinion, but I have not manipulated the data to fit my bias.) –IagoQnsi (talk) 16:39, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
@Artix Kreiger: I definitely agree that page views aren't the biggest determinant. Nor would I say that of the Google Books results that Amakuru posted earlier, or of the many search engine links that I posted earlier, or of any other single factor. But when you have all these factors all pointing towards moving the article, then it starts to indicate that it might be the right answer. Especially when there are few factors that support the opposite conclusion. The only real arguments I've seen for 'oppose' in this thread are:
"I don't think of physical exercise as the primary topic" (WP:NWFCTM)
"The title has been 'physical exercise' for a long time" (WP:CCC)
"'Exercise' originally meant 'to work at', not specifically physical work" (WP:DETERMINEPRIMARY—see the Boston example)
I believe that basically sums up all of them (but please correct me if I missed something), and I don't find any of these arguments particularly convincing. The 2nd one I listed maybe has a tiny bit of value, but on its own, I think it's nothing compared to the factors weighing in favor of the move. –IagoQnsi (talk) 18:50, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Support It's the primary topic, as signified by the redirect, and common name. Wikipedia policy clearly supports this move. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:03, 7 April 2018 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
Animal research
The section below was removed for discussion per WP:BRD. This is low-quality primary research on animals, containing obscure speculations with little relevance to anything needed for the encyclopedia, WP:PRIMARY, WP:MEDANIMAL. --Zefr (talk) 14:45, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Physical exercise has been shown to benefit a wide range of other mammals, as well as salmon, juvenile crocodiles, and at least one species of bird.[1] However, several studies have shown that lizards display no benefit from exercise, leading them to be termed "metabolically inflexible".[2] Indeed, damage from overtraining may occur following weeks of forced treadmill exercise in lizards.[2] A number of studies of both rodents and humans have demonstrated that individual differences in both ability and propensity for exercise (i.e., voluntary exercise) have some genetic basis.[3][4] Several studies of rodents have demonstrated that maternal[5] or juvenile access to wheels that allow voluntary exercise can increase the propensity to run as adults.[6] These studies further suggest that physical activity may be more "programmable" (for discussion, see Thrifty phenotype) than food intake.[7]
References
^Owerkowicz T, Baudinette RV (2008). "Exercise training enhances aerobic capacity in juvenile estuarine crocodiles (Crocodylus porosus)". Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology A. 150 (2): 211–6. doi:10.1016/j.cbpa.2008.04.594. PMID18504156.
^ abGarland T, Else PL, Hulbert AJ, Tap P (1987). "Effects of endurance training and captivity on activity metabolism of lizards". Am. J. Physiol. 252 (3 Pt 2): R450–6. PMID3826409.((cite journal)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Acosta, W.; Meek, T. H.; Schutz, H.; Dlugosz, E. M.; Vu, K. T.; Garland Jr, T. (2015). "Effects of early-onset voluntary exercise on adult physical activity and associated phenotypes in mice". Physiology & Behavior. 149: 279–286. doi:10.1016/j.physbeh.2015.06.020. PMID26079567.
^Zhu, S.; Eclarinal, J.; Baker, M. S.; Li, G.; Waterland, R. A. (2016). "Developmental programming of energy balance regulation: is physical activity more "programmable" than food intake?". Proceedings of the Nutrition Society. 75 (1): 73–77. doi:10.1017/s0029665115004127. PMID26511431.
False. This research is high-quality and relevant, and any further removal of peer-reviewed research for reasons amounting to nothing more than anthropocentric bias will be considered vandalism and reported as such. This page is NOT titled "Human exercise", and the question of whether other animals benefit from it is one which can and does occur to laypeople and potential readers, as well as researchers, as the papers, all in high-quality journals, proves. Furthermore, the fact that the answer to this question is NOT "they're just like humans", but instead shows that the effect of various training regimes are variable across the phylogeny, with some species responding only minimally to conditioning, proves that this question is neither trivial nor uninteresting. Your deletion will be reverted, and unless you can come up with a justification other than "It's not humans and it's not in Nature or Science", then any further deletion will be reported to administrators. HCA (talk) 14:59, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Read WP:MEDANIMAL and WP:PRIMARY. The literature you cite is not a systematic review or meta-analysis, defining it as primary, preliminary, and non-definitive, and therefore is unencyclopedic, with low likelihood it could be replicated. Each of the statements and sources used leads only to speculation about why it's relevant; again, unencyclopedic. Talk about it here, obtain consensus from other editors, if possible, WP:CON, and then we can possibly re-enter a modified version. But as the section stands now, it's pure conjecture based on weak non-review sources. --Zefr (talk) 15:13, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Wrong again. Seriously, step out of your biomedical bias and realize that not everything is about humans. These are direct studies of animals for the purposes of understanding the animals themselves, not humans. Now, I realize this may the shocking, staggering, and beyond your possible understanding, but not every field has 50,000 active researchers and billions of dollars in funding, and that doesn't mean the research is "preliminary" or "non-definitive" or any such nonsense. In fact, the so-called replication crisis is mostly in your field, not mine - every time someone's followed up on anything I've written, I've been proven right, how about you? That your field is such a mess of terrible experimental design and tortured statistics, leading to studies that don't replicate, doesn't mean you should assume those of us who do higher-quality science need to use your convoluted workarounds.
More directly, do not apply the rules of one project to another. This is not, as I have said, "Human exercise", something you seem deliberately unaware of. Maybe you want to downplay the importance of animal research and in vitro studies for human topics, but this is also within the scope of numerous animal projects which are interested in animals for their own sake. Because we can actually do manipulative experiments, control things you never can in humans, and use terminal experiments, we get MUCH better results. You want to delete this section, then find any papers which contradict the ones cited (therefore indicating the necessity of a meta-study). Until then, you don't get to delete our sections. Or, if you do, I get to delete Homo sapiens because the type specimen was never preserved and deposited in a museum, making the entire species nominum nudum. Or perhaps I should apply the Feynman criterion, so widely used in physics ("What I cannot create, I do not understand"?) and insist your results are worthless until you can directly create the phenomenon in question, regardless of the ethics involved regarding human experimentation. See how ridiculous it gets? Now quit pretending that the conventions of your field are universal and restore the valid content which you deleted. HCA (talk) 15:36, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Warning editor HCA about personal attacks and insults per WP:TALKNO. Your argument is founded in primary research. Find reviews and your position may be acceptable and selectively edited. --Zefr (talk) 15:44, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Not every field publishes massive reviews every 6 months. Read WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD. This means you have no basis. WP:MEDANIMAL is inapplicable because this is not about inferring human results, but rather about understanding the animals themselves, and WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD clearly and unambiguously allows the use of primary sources such as these in exactly these circumstances. HCA (talk) 15:53, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Incorrect. That you cannot or will not see beyond the conventions of your own field should not be our problem. Would you accept a physicist deleting this entire article for "failing to pass muster" because nothing it in has a formal mathematical proof?HCA (talk) 16:56, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
Ok, let's summarize. So far, you have claimed that:
The animal data violates WP:MEDANIMAL. This is unambiguously wrong, as that policy only applies to using animal and in vitro studies as citations for what happens in humans, not for studies about the animals themselves.
The references violate WP:PRIMARY, except the policy itself states "Policy: Unless restricted by another policy, primary sources that have been reputably published may be used in Wikipedia, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them.[4] Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. A primary source may only be used on Wikipedia to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. " All of these articles conform to these criteria. This point is also explicitly refuted, by name, in WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD.
The inclusion of animal research is somehow in violation of WP:UNDUE. This is flatly false, as this policy only applies to areas of uncertainty and disputed opinion (hence why it's a sub-page of WP:NPOV, not about content balance. The page is Exercise not Human exercise.
That it somehow violates WP:NOTJOURNAL, which doesn't even talk about this topic - instead, it's about making sure articles are accessible to lay readers.
That the content is WP:FRINGE. Again, this is flatly incorrect, as the policy refers to ideas within a field which have little or no empirical support or support from the scientific community, such as flat-earthers, moan-landing hoaxers, or people who think pineapple belongs on pizza. It does not refer to valid scientific fields which simply have fewer researchers or lower citation counts.
That the content violates WP:SCICON (which is NOT an official policy page), yet there is no evidence that any of the citations removed are disputed, or that any controversy exits.
That the content is ineligible because they are not review papers or meta-studies. There is absolutely no WP policy which states this, therefore this objection is invalid. Meta-studies are more common in some fields than others - in my experience, they're very common in both biomedical and ecological fields because both suffer the problems of being unable to control huge numbers of confounding variables (in the former due to ethical constraints of working with humans, in the later due to the pragmatic difficulties), while in fields where most variables can be controlled and effect sizes are often very large, they're rare or nonexistent.
Unless you can provide a valid reason for the removal of this material, and directly quote an applicable WP policy, the material will be restored. HCA (talk) 11:13, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Summarizing: The section is a minority fringe view on exercise: 1) it is based on preliminary lab research and assumptions/opinions with no weight of significance to the general encyclopedia user (WP:UNDUE: "Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all"; Jimbo Wales: "If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small minority, it does not belong on Wikipedia, regardless of whether it is true or you can prove it"), 2) there are no reviews on its importance for understanding exercise in general (WP:MEDANIMAL, WP:SCICON; if animal exercise and your speculations had significance for the general understanding of exercise, there would be a good review), and 3) it adds no relevant context for the general article. Rather, the section hangs like an odd addendum and conjecture in a journal discussion or textbook chapter, WP:NOTJOURNAL #6 ("present facts, not to teach subject matter. It is not appropriate to create or edit articles that read as textbooks"), WP:NOTEVERYTHING: please apply the first 3 sentences. There appears to be little interest in supporting the section for inclusion in the article, i.e., no WP:CON: "Consensus can be assumed if no editors object to a change", which is the case here for my removing the section. I'll join the discussion if other editors do, but for now I have discussed this enough. --Zefr (talk) 16:20, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Once again, wrong on every count. Let's do a point by point refutation.
WP:UNDUE does not apply. This policy is about sides on a debate, NOT the relative importance of certain fields or the balance of content of an article. The quoted sections are not "views", they are empirical research into specific animals, and, while it is a smaller field, it also a small fraction of the article. So your assertion is flatly incorrect.
"there are no reviews on its importance for understanding exercise in general (WP:MEDANIMAL, WP:SCICON; if animal exercise and your speculations had significance for the general understanding of exercise, there would be a good review)". Once again, I refer you to my first comments: Not everything is about humans. I literally do not care about human responses to exercise, because I don't study humans. I do work on a wide range of species (spanning 7 classes and 3 phyla), and consequently, I need to know whether I can expect an animal to improve in performance over the course of an experiment. Hell, the simple fact that the entire lede incorrectly makes general statements as if mammalian exercise response were the only thing that matters means that I have more cause to edit this article and fix such flaws than you do to delete this material. If you want this article to just be about humans, propose a move to Human exercise; until then, this claim is also invalid.
"it adds no relevant context for the general article." The fact that you think placing a physiological phenomenon in its evolutionary context is "not relevant" is just about the most damning thing I could imagine saying about your perspective, and you said it for me. "Nothing in biology makes sense except in light of evolution." - Theodosius Dobzhansky. The fact that exercise does not affect extant reptiles nor amphibians suggests that, rather than being "universal", everything in the entire page represents a specialist state which independently evolved in two extant endotherm lineages, suggesting all sorts of fascinating questions about the origins of exercise training, why it converges in birds and mammals, whether they clades are truly identical, etc. That you, personally, do not find it interesting does not mean that nobody else does, as clearly indicated by the fact that people are conducting active, funded research on the topic.
Consensus is pretty obvious. There is none, and there never will be, because your view is based only on your own personal preferences, not genuine WP policy, given your inability to correctly read and cite said policies.
This content will be restored in one week unless you can correctly cite a valid reason. If you remove it again, I will bring this straight to WP:ANI. Your personal biases are not cause for removing valid, appropriately sourced and cited content. HCA (talk)
3O Response: Here is your third opinion. There are two issues at hand. 1) Any text that violates Wikipedia policy must be excluded. This is a clear line, either/or matter. 2) Just because text meets our policy doesn't mean we have to include it. This is a subjective, gray-area editorial issue of whether or not the text improves the article enough to earn the space it takes up.
WP:MEDANIMAL doesn't apply here and that WP:Primary appears to be being upheld. The only problem I see with these sources is that only the abstract is available for some of them. However, Wikipedia does not require all sources to be available online, so if HCA says "I read the whole article for source [1] and the claim about salmon, mammals and a bird is in the body, and I read the whole article of source [2] and the expression 'metabolically inflexible' is in there even though it's not in the publicly available abstract," then it would be normal for us to take his word for it (to the point where we usually don't even ask). HCA, please say "I read the whole article beyond the paywall and the information I cite is in there." Regarding Zefr's concerns about attribution, I suppose we could rewrite it as "One study by Smith et al. of the This University found that exercise had no effect on iguanas, but the studies by Jones et al. of the That University and Kim et al. of the Institution of the Other Thing found otherwise" to be extra conscientious.
I think the text improves the article. It could use some copy editing, but the idea of a having a section on non-human animals seems appropriate to me. A single, small section is not WP:UNDUE in this article. If HCA did indeed source it properly, I call it a clear net plus.
If this non-binding opinion is not enough for you two, then I recommend an RfC. My view is that the RfC should be worded to deal exclusively with the editorial issue of whether this article should have an "In non-human animals" section at all (#2) and not the sourcing (#1). If I am wrong and they really are as glaring as Zefr thinks, then at least some RfC respondents will spontaneously comment on them without being prompted. Consider the text, "RFC: Should the article 'Exercise' include the section 'Non-human animals'?"
Anything else ...speaking as someone who just got here, HCA, it looks like you're being kind of heavy-handed with Zefr. Darkfrog24 (talk) 02:38, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Thank you. I've read these papers, and all say what is claimed. In fact, this area of research is close to my own, and I'm also familiar with several other papers on this topic, including taxa beyond these (amphibians and fish, more data on birds and lizards), which I'll add once the semester is over and I'm done with grading. HCA (talk) 10:37, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Animal research 12 May 18
Removed from the article again, as there has been no Talk discussion consensus on what to include. Offering a revision below. --Zefr (talk) 15:10, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
Within mammals, exercise training produces similar effects to humans, including in dogs [1] and rodents [2]. A number of studies of both rodents and humans have demonstrated that individual differences in both ability and propensity for exercise (i.e., voluntary exercise) have some genetic basis.[3][4] Several studies of rodents have demonstrated that maternal[5] or juvenile access to wheels that allow voluntary exercise can increase the propensity to run as adults.[6] These studies further suggest that physical activity may be more "programmable" (for discussion, see Thrifty phenotype) than food intake.[7] When rodent running wheels are placed outside, wild mice will voluntarily use them for comparable durations to laboratory mice, despite lack of any prior experience with these devices.[8]. Artificial selection experiments on mice has shown significant heritability in voluntary exercise levels[9], and "high-runner" lines show differences in VO2max[10], hippocampal neurogenesis[11], and muscle morphology[12]. The effects of sprint-speed training are less well-studied, though there is a negative correlation between artificial selection for endurance and sprint speed[13].
The effects of various exercise training types are heterogeneous across non-mammals, and sometimes inconsistent. No effect of endurance training has been found in most studies of lizards[14] (but see [15]), leading them to be termed "metabolically inflexible".[16] Indeed, damage from overtraining may occur following weeks of forced treadmill exercise in lizards.[16] Sprint training has never been found to have an effect in lizards.[17]
While studied less often, frogs show modest improvements with exercise.[18][19] Exercise training in fish shows some minor improvements on endurance, but far less than seen under comparable training regimes in mammals.[20][21]
Among archosaurs, both crocodiles and birds show improvements in aerobic capacity following exercise.[22][14] Eared grebes present an extreme version of this effect in wild populations, with prolonged periods of low exercise leading to large losses in flight muscle mass and consequent loss of flight ability; subsequent voluntary exercise bouts lead to full recovery of both muscle mass and sufficient flight ability for migration.[23]
^Acosta, W.; Meek, T. H.; Schutz, H.; Dlugosz, E. M.; Vu, K. T.; Garland Jr, T. (2015). "Effects of early-onset voluntary exercise on adult physical activity and associated phenotypes in mice". Physiology & Behavior. 149: 279–286. doi:10.1016/j.physbeh.2015.06.020. PMID26079567.
^Zhu, S.; Eclarinal, J.; Baker, M. S.; Li, G.; Waterland, R. A. (2016). "Developmental programming of energy balance regulation: is physical activity more "programmable" than food intake?". Proceedings of the Nutrition Society. 75 (1): 73–77. doi:10.1017/s0029665115004127. PMID26511431.
^ abGarland T, Else PL, Hulbert AJ, Tap P (1987). "Effects of endurance training and captivity on activity metabolism of lizards". Am. J. Physiol. 252 (3 Pt 2): R450–6. PMID3826409.((cite journal)): CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Gallaugher, P.E., Thorarensen, H., Kiessling, A., Farrell, A.P., 2001. Effects of high intensity exercise training on cardiovascular function, oxygen uptake, internal transport and osmotic balance in Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tschawytscha) during critical speed swimming. J. Exp. Biol. 204, 2861–2872.
^Butler, P.J., Turner, D.L., 1988. Effect of training on maximal oxygen uptake and aerobic capacity of locomotory muscles in tufted ducks, Aythya fuligula. J. Physiol. 401, 347–359
Most of the new section is unusable primary research. This is not a journal discussion, but encyclopedic information is needed. If to be included at all, the section might state:
Within mammals, exercise training produces similar effects to humans, including in dogs and rodents{ref: such as what?} The effects of various exercise training types are heterogeneous across non-mammals.{ref: how?} No effect of endurance training has been found in most studies of lizards.{ref: why does this need to be stated?} Crocodiles and birds show improvements in aerobic capacity following exercise.{ref: what is the context for this, and why is it related to general understanding of exercise?}
That is all I see as potentially useful, but only if the discussion can be improved. Overall, the references are too preliminary and too weak to support the information as encyclopedic. --Zefr (talk) 15:10, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
Consensus to keep the section. There is also consensus that the section needs development, and that if it does grow a lot, it might be best split off into its own article, with only a short summary and reference here. But until then, the section can be developed here. The original two disputing editors have changed their dispute from whether to have this section into a dispute on just how to develop it, but that's a separate matter. --GRuban (talk) 16:49, 25 July 2018 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The section of exercise responses in non-human animals has been deleted multiple times by User:Zefr, despite lacking any WP Policy basis for doing so (see above for prior mis-interpretations of policy), and despite being extensively referenced using peer reviewed papers. User:Zefr continues to insist on inappropriately applying criteria from a different field of science to these, as well as simply dismissing anything not concerning humans as unimportant or uninteresting. In spite of 3rd opinion, User:Zefr continues to remove this fully-referenced material, and refuses to engage in productive discussion while slandering other fields they perceive as 'lesser' areas of science. HCA (talk) 17:06, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
After looking at the content that was removed [4], this seems outside the scope of this article, as I don't think people would go to an article on exercise to read about the effects of exercise in frogs vs dogs vs rodents vs birds vs crocodiles. As written that section seems like random trivia, but that's mostly because the content seems unstructured. You could probably develop it more and write an article like Animal exercise and put a link to that in the see also section here. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 00:55, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
It needs to be worked on, but without evolutionary context, the rest of the article is mere trivia about a single species. Without evolutionary context, there is no biological knowledge, period. HCA (talk) 16:18, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
That section doesn't include any phylogenetic context, so I didn't perceive it as making a statement about evolution. It just seems like a comparison across animal species. Again, I think if it were developed more, it could be placed in a new article about animals if it focuses on comparisons, or possibly this article if it focuses on evolution. I would suggest looking for reviews on the evolutionary role of physical exercise if you're interested in writing about that though. IMO, that might be an interesting topic to read about if there's been adequate research in that area. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 17:50, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
Why bother? User:Zefr will just swan in and delete the whole article because there isn't a meta-study with 100,000 citations. HCA (talk) 01:11, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
The evolutionary biology of exercise would be pertinent to this article, so I'd support including that. What you originally wrote doesn't cover evolutionary biology though; it's just a comparison of the effects of exercise on fitness across species without any evolutionary context. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 01:31, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
I think a short section on exercise in animals is appropriate, but it should be referenced to secondary rather than primary scientific sources. More detailed information could be included in an article called Exercise in animals or similar, as suggested above. CapitalSasha ~ talk05:02, 16 May 2018 (UTC)
I think an "exercise in non-human animals" section is appropriate. It would be extra conscientious to phrase the text to specifically acknowledge the primary sourcing ("one study says," etc.) rather than anything that implies an existing scientific consensus, but the section does not need to be omitted until secondary sourcing is available. Darkfrog24 (talk) 20:24, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
Given that this whole page, excluding that section, only states information that pertains to the topical scope of "exercise in humans", I don't see how a section on "Exercise in non-human animals" would not merit an independent article given that the relative number of potential factual statements that can be made about that topic is far more considerable than that pertaining to "exercise in humans". In other words, that section topic has a much broader scope than the scope of the statements in the rest of the article and includes all factual information relevant to:
Imagine how bloated this article would be if an analogous table to the one in Exercise#Health effects were reproduced for rats, frogs, mice, and dogs. (for the sake of argument, assume that this information is readily available; NB: the only row cell in that table which is not applicable to non-human animals is "Ability in activities of daily living"), or a similar set of species. The evolutionary biology of exercise is an entirely different and much narrower topical scope that directly pertains to exercise in humans; hence, that section topic would suitable for this article IMO. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 03:21, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
Seppi333, CapitalSasha, and Darkfrog24 make good points. I think an 'Exercise in non-human animals' section is appropriate. It need not be perfect, it should be allowed to grow as long as it does not mislead. If it gets too big, it can be move to its own article. --Nessie (talk) 14:56, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
Keep the section. The article is called "Exercise", not "Exercise in humans". However it could be improved, and should use more secondary and fewer primary sources. I think the sentence "there is a negative correlation between artificial selection for endurance and sprint speed" should be removed. If I breed mice, or horses, for success in running marathons, I'll get creatures that are less good at sprints. This has nothing to do with exercise. Maproom (talk) 06:56, 20 May 2018 (UTC)
Pruning done here to maintain the principal areas of understanding, although the absence of reviews on the acute exercise or training effects on different species, physiological effects, hereditary adaptation, etc. leaves the overall section weak. Notably, there are no good reviews to use on the two most trained animals – racehorses and greyhounds. --Zefr (talk) 19:18, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Do not keep deleting stuff without discussion. There are clearly a diversity of viewpoints here about what does and doesn't belong, yet you refuse to actually discuss, only cut. Get consensus before any future modifications! HCA (talk) 23:17, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
It's been sufficiently discussed, positions consolidated, and a revision is offered. Proceed to edit what has been provided. That's what a collaborative encyclopedia is about, WP:5P, or take a break, WP:DISENGAGE. --Zefr (talk) 23:40, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Fine, let's go point-by-point. I've re-added the stuff about the artificial selection experiment in high-runner mice. This is a hugely influential study with dozens of papers directly on these mice themselves, and directly assessing the genetic basis of exercise (something that is impossible to truly do in humans). It reveals a number of interesting results, and crucially, has built-in replication - there are 4 selected lineages (not just one) with four neutral-selection matched lineages (to control for drift). HCA (talk) 00:12, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
Meaning no offense to my colleagues here, but I think the appropriate solution has been completely missed: Looking at this article and how the topic is framed, I can't help but feel that the animal exercise content is completely out of place. The issue is one of nomenclature; the term "exercise" actually has a span of interrelated but discrete meanings, only one of which is fully embraced by this article: exercise as a conscious activity conducted for some pragmatic gain or another. The lead pretty much sets the tone for this article's focus, despite competing definitions:
"Exercise is any bodily activity that enhances or maintains physical fitness and overall health and wellness.[1] It is performed for various reasons, including increasing growth and development, preventing aging, strengthening muscles and the cardiovascular system, honing athletic skills, weight loss or maintenance, and also for enjoyment. Many individuals choose to exercise publicly outdoors where they can congregate in groups, socialize, and enhance well-being."
That emphasis is quite distinct from "exercise" in the sense of physiological taxation--although clearly the article does touch upon this broader meaning, throughout. However, I would suggest that the ideal location for the discussion of research regarding exercise in animals is actually a closely related article: exercise physiology. The focus of that article on underlying physiological principles and the associated fields of empirical research seem like a much more natural fit/context for the content in question. Snowlet's rap19:22, 14 June 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.