I feel, like a lot of 21st century life is trying to do things artificially. Going to the gym, talking to strangers at the gym, ... these are both artifical replacements for human activity that is missing. You go to the gym because your daily routine isn't active enough. You try to form friendships with strangers because your daily routine lacks real and fulfilling interactions with other people.

Also it's kind of odd how nowadays everyone goes to the gym. Growing up as a late-stage millenial, gym goers were a niche subculture. Now it marketed to everyone everywhere as this integral part of modern daily life.

> "Going to the gym, talking to strangers at the gym, ... these are both artifical replacements for human activity that is missing."

As opposed to what, our ancient hunter gatherer lifestyle? Going to the gym and talking to strangers at the gym isn't an "artificial replacement", it's a genuine activity lots of people do.

> "You try to form friendships with strangers because your daily routine lacks real and fulfilling interactions with other people."

How do you think people make friends? They make friends by interacting with people at shared spaces and activities.

Also it's kind of odd how nowadays everyone goes to the gym. Growing up as a late-stage millenial, gym goers were a niche subculture. Now it marketed to everyone everywhere as this integral part of modern daily life.

Aerobics classes have been a thing for decades. Pumping Iron came out in 1977. When I was in college (UVA, 95-99), there were several good gyms, plus they built a fancy new one about mid-way through my degree.

I suspect you just happened to be in a time/place where gym use was lower than average.

> Also it's kind of odd how nowadays everyone goes to the gym. Growing up as a late-stage millenial, gym goers were a niche subculture. Now it marketed to everyone everywhere as this integral part of modern daily life.

GenX here and I feel the same way. To me, "The Gym" has always been a place where bodybuilders and muscle heads go. In my mind, it will always be a niche hobby like autocross racing or horseback riding. And I know that I'm wrong! Everyone and their mom seems to go to The Gym now! But, it's hard to change the culture and learnings that you grew up with.

> Going to the gym... artificial replacements for human activity that is missing

Compared to what? Even the ancient Greeks and Romans spent a significant amount of time in gymnasiums. Or are you comparing modern times to cavemen?

Boomers and Gen X are riddled with diseases associated with a sedentary lifestyle and poor nutrition/diet. I would like to think the generations are learning from the mistakes of their predecessors. A lot of science has come out about the benefits of resistance training as well, along with the normalization of women doing resistance training in large part due to CrossFit

Indeed, it's the underlying principle of "division of labor".

Karl Marx' coined the term "Alienation" for describing most of the negative societal/human consequences of this principle, leading to isolation of humans "from themselves" (their natural will to construct something whole meaningful, not just complete a task in a process, but also isolation between humans themselves)

If only those treadmills and spinning and repetitive activities could be harnessed to generate electricity or pump water, and really close the loop!