Analytic Fitness™ Reborn

My Mission Statement [Updated Again]

Hi folks.

Years ago, I used to train, eat, sleep, and blog about it. Then it occurred to me that there was really nothing special about what I wrote, and I quit doing it for a while. But I still entertained the idea that I could contribute to fitness information in a way nobody else does. I just had to find the right way. Eventually, I found it. Analytic Fitness™ (see below) was born and lived for a while.

Then I got leukemia, and went through a string of treatments. I trained for a while and almost started an outdoor gym for cancer patients with wrecked immune systems, but I lost a training buddy to leukemia. Then, I lost interest in writing about training, in posting about it on social media, and eventually in it, period.

Then COVID-19 hit and everybody had to train like cancer patients with wrecked immune systems. And a few dedicated souls started showing up every day at my place for my training advice and my outdoor gym equipment.

Eventually, I thought I might be joining them again. And maybe start writing about training again.

What’s old but still stands: Analytic Fitness™, the 1-minute version

This blog started of a crusade against science-based fitness bullshit. And since:

the blog was from day one intended as a rigorous philosophical effort. And if you wonder how something can be “science-based” and bullshit at the same time you should definitely check the Science and Bullshit of Lifting series, starting here.

Analytic Fitness™ is the label I pinned on this rigorous philosophical effort (I did not trademark the stuff for real, but I may one day). In a nutshell, Analytic Fitness™ applies the methods of analytic philosophy to fitness-related topics to bring science-based fitness information you wouldn’t find anywhere else.

This blog was conceived of as a vehicle for this brand Analytic Fitness™ and the older posts (prior to May 2021) are a reflection of that project.

There’s also a still-existing Patreon I originally set up to support posts of 1.500 words or more that take some digging (worth 8-10 minutes of reading time for readers but a few hours of research at my end). I’m considering changing that somewhat but for the time being, it will have to wait a bit. You can still subscribe over there but it’s kind of obsolete.

What’s new: Analytic Fitness™ 2.0

In the past years, I’ve moved away from philosophy and closer to (theoretical) cognitive science. This meant, in a nutshell, less fetishism about stuff analytic philosophers care about (like “conceptual analysis”) and more attention to what cognitive scientists care about (like empirical validation).

But I’m still a theorist, and every good theory begins with a model. And unsurprisingly, I have come up with a model for training people too. Based on the anecdotal evidence at my disposal, it fricking works. It’s also COVID-19 compatible and budget-friendly:  it can be done outdoors at an appropriate social distance, there’s very little gym equipment needed, and there are DIY replacements for nearly everything.

So I figured that time was right to write about it.

Ways you can support us

There used to be a Patreon for the blog because, well, everybody has one. It was a per-post affair with a mix of feel-good rewards and actually useful stuff (like free access to otherwise paywalled research literature) but I haven’t updated it in years so it ended up obsolete as hell and Patreon un-published it.

I’ll update things over there as soon as I’m done updating some content here.

If you live in Southern Sweden, you can join us for training. If you stick around for long enough, we’ll ask you to contribute with some equipment. But we have about 1 square meter worth of storage space, so don’t worry, that would not dent your budget.

Oh, and we’ll say ‘thank you’, too.