Exercise all in the mind

Early-morning runners are a common sight. Left foot in front of right foot in front of left foot, day after day. As an amateur philosopher, I am forced to wonder, why follow the fad? What is the point?

My philosophical eye questions if physical fitness actually matters. It's to do with the idea of "scepticism", the idea that we just can't know anything. Scepticism suggests that to know something you have to be certain of it.

And to be properly certain, to know something in the truest sense, you need to have proof. That's the sticking point with which I am concerned.

Observe the sceptic's argument: can you prove and thus be certain that you are not a brain in a vat - that your entire life is not a figment of your imagination?

No. It is possible - not to be confused with likely, mind you - that your life as you know it is basically a remake of the Matrix. You cannot prove that your body, or anything at all, for that matter, exists. It could all be a figment of your imagination. And as long as that cannot be disproven, you may as well be a brain in a vat. No proven body, no proven exercise need, the perfect excuse to ignore push-play.

But not exactly - scepticism's deeper than that. All you can possibly know is that thoughts exist. You cannot know whether your entire world exists. More than that, you can't even know whether "you" exist. By "you," of course, I mean something like your soul - whatever it is that makes you who you are.

The reason you cannot know that "you" exist is the simple point that you cannot prove that "your" thoughts belong to any entities at all - let alone one entity, let alone "you."

It could be that thoughts exist independently of thinkers. It could just be coincidence that "your" thoughts seem like they belong to "you." Ultimately, you don't necessarily exist.

Scepticism argues that no matter how certain we are of something, we can never be more than 99.9 per cent sure that it is not a figment of our imagination. We can't know it, at all. So how can fitness have any sort of point if we cannot know even that we exist in the first place?

The answer is simple. Studies consistently show that physical exercise releases endorphins, giving us a sense of satisfaction. Now, while we may doubt we actually exist in the strictest sense, our thoughts do even if we're not there to think them. Being good people, surely we want our thoughts to appear "happy"? That's the kind, generous way to think. And, after all, statistics suggest that higher rates of "happy" thoughts lead to benefits to our imaginary selves, such as higher life expectancy.

It is pretty obvious, then, that fitness does have a point. That point is not to get fit. That point is to slave away in the cold winter mornings so our thoughts may enjoy the fruits of our imaginary endorphins and we may live long imaginary lives. So run hard.


Morgan Watkins, Year 13, Wellington College