I believe that the citizens of Great Britain are becoming lazier and fatter already and perhaps the same trend might apply to other developed countries such as America. AI might make things worse. We are told that the improved lifespan of the typical American has flatlined and retracted perhaps because of obesity and partly because of the Covid pandemic.
Obesity affects every part of the body and can lead to many diseases. But the underlying cause of obesity is attitude. You’ve got to go back to attitude to ask why people become lazy and in being lazy they become obese, often seeking pleasure in eating. What else is there to do? When you are not working and have a livable welfare income, you’ll eat for entertainment in front of the tele.
Of course, I’ve got to be fair and mention people who become obese because of medical reasons and I’m sorry for them. But there is an article in The Sunday Times today about a borough in Liverpool, UK where there are 98 takeaways but only two greengrocers and where half of all children are overweight.
Knowsley, Liverpool is the second most deprived borough in England where people live off takeaways. They’ve lost the art of cooking; buying raw foods and making their own meals cheaply. The driving force behind this lifestyle shift is laziness.
If you are being a little bit cruel (or a realist) as I am in this article, you could argue they’ve become very lazy, living off welfare and buying takeaways. It’s reached catastrophic proportions because even the kids are having gallstone operations which is in operation normally for middle-aged and older people. It was virtually unheard of in children and the cause is childhood obesity.
Obesity affects both the poor and well-off but more so the poorer communities. The high Street in Knowsley, Liverpool has been described as a “food desert”. You cannot buy an apple in Knowsley.
The point I’m making here is that there is a general trend in the UK towards laziness and obesity which has been highly exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic when the government was overly generous in dishing out furlough money at 80% of the usual income. The citizens were on an 18-month paid holiday and they lost the habit of working.
The effect is seen today with 2.4 million people off work on long-term disability who might be working. The government is worried because there is a shortage of people in the workforce for businesses to employ. They’ve been told to work at home and if they don’t their benefits will be reduced or stopped.
So, the general trend is towards laziness in Britain in my view and AI will make it worse, also in my view. If you ask AI what they think about AI causing laziness, they hedge their bets. They say it can work both ways. It can help in healthcare and have positive impacts on health and wellness. But its impact on lifestyle choices “depends on how individuals choose to engage with and utilise the technology”. If the general mentality is to be lazy AI will be used in the wrong way and make us lazier.
RELATED: Artificial intelligence (AI) will usher in an era of better diagnosis of companion animal illnesses – a benefit, yes, but unless we change our attitude, I see increased obesity.
AI will do all the routine tasks in the future. It will do all the routine workforce tasks and in many other tasks in day-to-day life. Life will become less physical and less active. We already have many machines to make life less active such as washing machines and dishwashers but it’ll be a big step further down that road when AI greatly infiltrates our lifestyles.
My argument is that the British are going to become even lazier and even fatter unless dramatic steps are taken to change attitudes. It’s a massive problem because the NHS is already broken, failing in so many ways and unable to cope. Obesity as mentioned creates many health problems including gallstones.
Children admitted to hospital because of conditions linked to obesity have increased more than fivefold in the UK to 9,431 in 2022 which includes 806 kids aged four and under!
Cat caregiving
What’s this got to do with cats?! It’s got everything to do with everything. Obesity leads to ill health and ill-health means poorer quality cat caregiving across the board. You cannot look after a cat to a high standard if you are ill. Everything that humans do affect cats in one way or the other because they live in our world, a world of our making and if it’s good they have a good life and it is bad they experience the opposite.
