Most of us have too much to read, much of it duplicative noise, roo much of it about AI and markets, so something we try to do on weekends is find one thing that rotates our cognitive axes, making us think about the world differently.
A new paper from Herman Pontzer and colleagues looks at the unintended consequences of GLP-1 drugs. Specifically, they are interested in societal consequences of GLP-1s, like potentially exacerbating the loneliness epidemic given the deep role that food plays in socializing.
The underlying framework is one of evolutionary mismatches in three areas: diet, activity, and socializing. These drugs touch directly on all three, sometimes in unpredictable ways, as the authors argue.
One way to think about this, in particular with loneliness, is that we built social life around food, and now we're turning down the appetite dial. While it will have many health benefits, especially if it pulls people away from processed food—which has myriad health consequences, as a new JAMA paper this week shows—and causes them to move more, the mediating effect on socializing is far less certain.
It is something to think about this weekend.