Dual survival- barefeet= mitochondria have changed

[Drewbot]

On the Discovery Channel, there is a show called Dual Survival, the hippie-minimalist CODY, walks around barefoot, has been doing it for 20 years.

He says his barefoot walking has allowed his Mitachondria in his cells to give off more body heat, than a person who walks in boots.

is this a natural phenomenon, or "Bush Hippie Crap"?

 

[Hellbound]

The later.

 

[SOdhner]

He says his barefoot walking has allowed his Mitachondria in his cells to give off more body heat, than a person who walks in boots.

I'm not an expert but that sounds like absolute nonsense. Walking barefoot is not going to change your mitochondria. Out of curiosity, is he claiming that walking barefoot has just made his feet hotter or his whole body? Has it given him any control over this or any other ability?

 

[Drewbot]

I'm not an expert but that sounds like absolute nonsense. Walking barefoot is not going to change your mitochondria. Out of curiosity, is he claiming that walking barefoot has just made his feet hotter or his whole body? Has it given him any control over this or any other ability?

I only saw the 'Shipwrecked' episode, they are in Nova Scotia in winter, and he claims his Mitachondria have changed, and his cells give off more heat than his partner's cells.

He also claimed that he'd rather have bare feet, than wear boots, because if he puts boots on, and mats down the insulation, he's gonna get frostbite quicker anyway.

 

[Drewbot]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXzVBWc0Nlk&feature=related

4 Minutes, the Mitachondria training claim

 

[Giggywig]

Maybe claiming stupid things is a hobby of his?

 

[Resume]

Actually, I expected more woo from the hippie than just this. Ley lines, vortices . . . like that.

 

[ponderingturtle]

On the Discovery Channel, there is a show called Dual Survival, the hippie-minimalist CODY, walks around barefoot, has been doing it for 20 years.

He says his barefoot walking has allowed his Mitachondria in his cells to give off more body heat, than a person who walks in boots.

is this a natural phenomenon, or "Bush Hippie Crap"?

Well his explanation is crap, but it might have retrained his circulatory system to help avoid frostbite. Studies done with Inuit have shown that they can tolerate much more cold in their hands and have much better blood flow in the cold than say Europeans.

Such a change could be part of acclimatization and not purely genetic so while the stuff about mitochondria is total BS, there could possibly be a real point in there somewhere.

 

[Drewbot]

Well his explanation is crap, but it might have retrained his circulatory system to help avoid frostbite. Studies done with Inuit have shown that they can tolerate much more cold in their hands and have much better blood flow in the cold than say Europeans.

Such a change could be part of acclimatization and not purely genetic so while the stuff about mitochondria is total BS, there could possibly be a real point in there somewhere.

So you're saying he might have better circulation in his extremities, you are not agreeing with the idea that he retrained his mitachondria to generate more heat than his partner? Right?

 

[ponderingturtle]

So you're saying he might have better circulation in his extremities, you are not agreeing with the idea that he retrained his mitachondria to generate more heat than his partner? Right?

Yes. The effect of his claim might be justifiable, but the mechanism is BS.

 

[TraneWreck]

There was a funny story Viking coach Bud Grant used to tell his players to motivate them to play in Minnesota in January:

Bud Grant worked on an oil pipeline in Canada. They would take shifts sitting outside and keeping watch on a certain machine to make sure it didn't freeze. When the thick of winter came, none of the workers were able to stay outside for more than a half hour at a time, so they hired Inuits, who could just sit out there all day.

Grant said they brought in teams of scientists (obviously exaggeration for the story) to study the Inuits and figure out how they could manage that kind of cold. They tested their skin, their blood-flow, their fat stores, everything. The conclusions was that there was nothing at all different about the Inuits, they just expected to be cold.

That's obviously not meant to reject the studies of circulation described above, but I'm suspecting this Hippie's magic powers have more to do with a sort of placebo effect than anything else.

I also remember a story that a member of an Indian tribe in Minnesota told me (probably apocryphal--I think it's been told a number of times). His father had moved off the reservation and they were living in St. Paul, but he would go visit his relatives. He was amazed that they could survive the winter in traditional housing. He was asking someone in his grandfather's generation (they all lived in modern houses now) how they built the traditional structures and how they were able to stay warm.

"Warm?" the old man said, "We were just *********** cold."

 

[roger]

In Nepal all of our Sherpas ran around camp with no shoes or mittens. Asked if they felt cold, they just shrugged and said no. This was in situations where our hands hurt they were so cold. And, to make this clear, they had shoes and gloves, and wore them at other times (on the trails, or when climbing, for example) they just opted not to wear them in these "benign" conditions.

It ain't magic, just exposure. Cut off a beard or your hair and see how sensitive your face or head feels for awhile.

 

[shadron]

In Nepal all of our Sherpas ran around camp with no shoes or mittens. Asked if they felt cold, they just shrugged and said no. This was in situations where our hands hurt they were so cold. And, to make this clear, they had shoes and gloves, and wore them at other times (on the trails, or when climbing, for example) they just opted not to wear them in these "benign" conditions.

It ain't magic, just exposure. Cut off a beard or your hair and see how sensitive your face or head feels for awhile.

Also a nice thick layer of dead skin cells (aka callouses) on the sole pads of the feet.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Take this as an example, after my brother moved from NY to South Carolina when he comes back he is noticeably getting cold a lot more easily than before he moved. He acclimatized to a warmer temperature and is not as comfortable at typical north eastern levels of temperature.

 

[Snak]

I remember visiting my dad on the East Coast in the summer, and walking across the freshly paved asphalt roads en route to the complex's swimming pool. Me and my brother would walk there barefoot, and it was always a challenge between us to see who could walk on the asphalt the longest without the heat becoming too much, and jumping off to the side of the road on to the grass.

The first few days we could barely stay on the sun-baked asphalt for more than a few seconds, but as the weeks went by (and the summer got hotter), we were able to make the whole journey without any serious pain.

This kind of goes hand in hand with the firewalking thread. I bet this guy's feet are like bricks, I bet they've undergone some serious adaptation. Now I'm not a geneticist/bioligist, but I find the claim of changing mitochondria to be a large one, and I'm sure that you can alter a body part by training it without affecting the mitochondria of the cells.

 

[Cainkane1]

You can get parasites from walking barefooted

 

[LTC8K6]

You can get parasites from walking barefooted

Parasites are no match for Ninja Mitochondria...

 

[Soapy Sam]

Your body doesn't alert you when you're cold.
By then it's way too late.

It alerts you when you are in danger of getting cold- ie when your skin detects that air temperature is lower than skin temperature. We are sensitive to temperature differences.

Next winter, when there's ice on the ground and the air temperature is around zero, stick one hand in the freezer for as long as you can keep it there, but at least 3 minutes. Then go outside and put it on some ice. It will feel warm.

(If it doesn't, you may have frostbite. I'm not a doctor. )

 

[Damien Evans]

In Nepal all of our Sherpas ran around camp with no shoes or mittens. Asked if they felt cold, they just shrugged and said no. This was in situations where our hands hurt they were so cold. And, to make this clear, they had shoes and gloves, and wore them at other times (on the trails, or when climbing, for example) they just opted not to wear them in these "benign" conditions.

It ain't magic, just exposure. Cut off a beard or your hair and see how sensitive your face or head feels for awhile.

Oh yeah. I've gone from a number 2 shave to shoulder length hair. Winter is so much better now.

 

[ve2vfd]

I saw that show and though most of it was interesting, I have to admit that hearing bull like that from the hippie dude is pretty consistent with most of the woo being peddled on Discovery networks shows.

Also don't forget that it's above all a TV show with a full crew following them (unlike Les Stroud's Survivorman)... for all we know when the camera wasn't on him he probably had huge down booties on his feet.

Pat