Bodybuilding Classic Physique Division Offseason log

On the one hand, getting a PhD (in the natural sciences at least) proves that you're incapable of appropriately evaluating financial risk-benefit and are willing to endure possibly indefinite indentured servitude, so maybe that predisposes you to just t-shirt cannon out kids and figure it out later. On the other hand, I'd have to imagine being a PI's bitch for 7+ years until they allow you to get a degree that only guarantees you the ability to live in a tent and adjunct at Southwest Montana State has to be the most testosterone depressing career possible for an educated man, so even if you could find a woman that doesn't correctly see you as totally pathetic, you'll be making some IVF company rich after you try and fail for five years. Maybe the NIH should commission a study to try to settle the debate?

You guys are all over thinking this.

Technological advancements, especially birth control, have really turned everything upside down. The idea that someone like you (Emoken) that has had as many sexual partners as you have and no offspring would have been unthinkable even 75 (or whatever) years ago.

Of course, without birth control all your partners would have insisted you commit to them or would have found a different mate who would, so your personal mating dynamics would have been very different most likely.

So you can see how birth control really through a wrench in the whole thing.

But nature generally has a way of sorting things out.

The people that keep procreating (for whatever reason) will pass on their genes, and the ones that donÂ’t wonÂ’t. And the species will evolve.

And your guess is as good as mine how human interfacing with robotics are going to play a part in human evolution. (It seems this could turn everything upside down at least as much as birth control did).

Yikes, probably varies a lot by field of study. Chat-gpt really tried to dodge me when pressed.

Now to ask the depressing and self-critical question: How many men just ended up with high educational attainment not because of high cognitive ability but because of low opportunity cost due to being unattractive with the opposite sex and seeing educational attainment as a path toward competing in the mating and dating market? Am I among this group? (yes)

Not a dig at you, just an acknowledgement that my old man (a PhD hard scientist himself back when it actually meant something) was right.

The average time to get a doctorate in chemistry was six years back when I could have considered going, and it was longer for biology; I get the idea things have gotten even worse since then, though I can't say I've paid particular attention. Both from a personal perspective (I was clearly burned out on academia in general and doing something like that wouldn't have been a good idea plus I clearly wasn't interested in laboratory research) and from a financial perspective ("So you're going to make 28k per year to be some moron's lab technician for seven years until he lets you leave, then you need to go do 2-3 years of postdocs after that to be employable - you're going to be in your early 30s before you ever have a real job and will be forgoing the most important career development and financial years of your life for what?") it just . . . wasn't for me.

This is all part and parcel to the free federal money Goodhart's Law-ing almost every academic credential, so it's not even effective at measuring what it used to measure . . . Then you have the second order effects that we're all talking about regarding the effects on mate preference for women (cue "up and to the right") and just how increased education and work participation affects family planning and on and on and on.

But, to jdock's point, the largest effect is almost certainly from birth control; I saw a recent blurb from Rob Henderson that I didn't fact check (i.e. feel free to deboonk if wrong) that much/most of the decline in overall birth rate is due to the dramatic decline in teenage and early 20s motherhood, as the phenomenon of woman having fewer children over their reproductive lifetime than they'd prefer is, for various reasons, apparently reasonably universal. Quite an interesting subject all around.

i would assume that if you had a phd in chemistry you'd either be in an unrelated field, clearing 6 figures as a professor or clearing mid 6 or higher working for a pharmaceutical company

not a terrible outcome so long as you can remain in field

also, dated a woman for 5 years, 4 of which she refused birth control and we did nothing but the pullout method - maybe my autism superpowers my ability to pull out but it was never a problem - it was however very unsatisfying to have to temper down and time it towards the end each time instead of boring away and going full release but still way better than using a condom and for whatever reason she said using birth control was an impossibility for her - for all i know she was hoping i'd slip up

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In the Los Angeles area it looks like most of the jobs being offered on Indeed that involve a PhD in chemistry are around 60k-100k/yr.

My experience when I briefly looked for biology related jobs in private industry before deciding to do something else was similar pay range.

Keep in mind in this part of the world rent on a 2 BR apartment outside an ethnic ghetto is probably at least $3k/month, condos start at $500K and houses closer to $1 million, so even a $100k/yr salary (which is like $60k after taxes and SS) doesn't go very far.

I do hope you were spraying your conkers exclusively in her face?

I just always assumed that the only reason people did PHDs was as a marginally society-acceptable excuse for not entering the work force?

This is a cool sentence. But if you zoom out, isn't civilization/society itself just a tacit agreement that we'll all sublimate our instincts to maximize reproductive fitness (things like murder and rape can be very fitness maximizing, for instance) in order to work toward some 'greater good' arbitrarily defined by humans themselves? Earlier in our evolutionary lifespan this greater good was obvious; dominate all other species on the planet and use our superior intelligence and capacity for communication to do so. Culture could be loosely defined as "the set of values a society pursues alternative to everyone having a free for all of maximizing reproductive fitness' and alignment with those values is awarded status.

Maybe I am using reproductive fitness in an inappropriate way.

But to your broader point, it does seem like as we progress and continue to innovate, behaviours which maximize status and material well being seem to increasingly diverge from those that maximize reproductive fitness. Arguably this is more true for women than it is for men. I double checked and overall still educational attainment has a positive correlation with fertility in men, but the correlation isn't particularly strong. It has a stronger negative correlation in women.

It feels hypocritical to be watched Based Camp podcast episodes and pondering about fertility while being 36 never married and childless but here I am... I'm definitely developing into exactly the type who'd be able to father a child at 44 with a woman 10+ years my junior. My 2/10 looks 46 year old phd chemistry colleague (I am dead srs, weird coincidence that chemistry has been our punching bag) has a 29 year old Thai wife pregnant with their first child.

I think this is a fair assessment of my actual reasons for pursuing a PhD.

she wasn't a fan of that but i managed to distract her enough to get away with it a few times

for the most part it was keep some tissues nearby on hand and void into that or pinch off and drop in the toilet (i'll forever be able to tell if a toilet has been recently jizzed into because even after a single flush there's usually enough "foam" in the bowl afterwards that are the remnants which didn't quite go down on the first flush but just became a foamy froth which clings to the surface)

The problem isn't a chemistry PhD per se, but more that the academic overproduction of "elites" mediated by nondischargeable undergraduate loans and 65% overhead on NIH grants has made it so the vast underclass of PhDs that are little more than glorified technicians that got an achievement award have a reach of professional and life expectations that vastly exceed their intellectual grasp. The true 3+ sigma scientists that would have thrived in the 60s and 70s graduate environment ("figure out a truly useful thesis project and finish it in four years or we'll wash you out") will always be fine, even in this economy, but the PhDs that are lab monkeys that worked "really hard" for eight years on some derivative problem their PI gave them while getting their name on 25 non-reproducible and/or irrelevant papers are correctly seen by industry as not appreciably better than a bright 22 year old with a BS (who also has salary demands much more commensurate with the value they bring). What fw said is also true - naked credentialism, perceived social striving, and avoidance of reality are also reasons why one might pursue a route like this, though a non-hard science is probably more conducive to living an "academic lifestyle".

interesting, sounds kinda like lawyering these days where more lawyers graduate each year than there are openings so once the cream of the crop are funneled out, it becomes a dog eat dog world to choose between ambulance chaser, glorified paralegal, or washed up doing something else unrelated

'smart' law grads don't enter law, but use the structure and discipline of how they studied and presented arguments to go into more interesting fields.

same with accountants IMO, albeit I do think there's probably more value in doing a few years in an accountancy firm to use that to get into a bank/better paid financial institution that still values and can use a good trained accountant's brain in more creative and lucrative ways

oh for sure, like my buddy who is the president of a construction company knew that was a viable pathway if he went to law school first, passed the bar just to prove he could and never practiced for a day just went directly into that construction president position he'd been groomed for

Deload session Upper

incline db: 30kgx10x2
pulldowns (normal rather than v handle) 80kgx10x2
cable flies: 3 sets of 15
HS low rows: 1.75ppsx14, 11

EZ curls//cable hip height behind the back delt raises: 3 rounds

appetite still crashed from superdrol. I think I took a total of like 5 doses before it screwed up my stuff. It's okay, coincides nicely with when I should really be deloading anyway. When was my last deload? Like before my 2nd Thailand trip? Long time. The best way to prevent injuries is to deload before something hurts not only when it starts to hurt.

I finally reached 2 minutes hanging from a pullup bar.... with straps... without straps I can do about 90 seconds but even with straps grip is still very much a challenge.

I had a really good session today. Quads it's like I never really give more than 6/10 so I'm not mentally burned out and nothing hurt so I just went full speed.

Cable curls: 25x23, 12, 13
pushdowns: 32.75kgx26, 2 more sets kinda forgot

dual handle facing away cable curls: 8.75kgx18, 14, 12
Db skullcrushers: 10kgx22, 11, 10

Leg extensions: man I straight up fo75g rgot the exact weight but it was like more than last timex20, 14, 15
Lying ham curls: 46x15, 9, 7
Leg press (paused): 4 ppsx22, 15, 10
adductor abductor superset: 4 rounds

Next upper session on Saturday I'm still going light then fully back in action on Sunday and I'll do paused sldl starting at 115kg and work my way back up in 5kg incremenents.

Today's food

75g green beans+250 rice+200g chicken breast for meal 1, 2, 3, add 12g of fat from guac to 2 meals and 12g fat of butter to the other one, 1 very big apple and 2 small servings of frozen raspberries.
75g carb of gummy candies pre workout
200 chicken breast 250 white potato+12g fat from guac
a DQ mint chocolate chip ice cream dessert.

very accurate although at my gym the old men train in the mornings. Too many teenagers and youngins in the evenings

It would be even better if TRT was in quotes, but yes, it appears directionally true in my observation as well.

My gym recently had this is a monthly challenge. Most people were around 45-60s. Record when I tried it was 70s and I did it for 90s. Won a free weekly guest pass so my dad won’t have to pay for the gym when he comes to visit lol. Forearms burn fir like 5 min after

That's interesting, man. Alexander Bromley talked about 2 minute hold as if it was some easy to meet intermediate strength standard, but i think even for a pullup god like myself it's not easy unless you've been training hangs specifically for several weeks or months. It's not something that comes just from your general training grip strength. I'm using it for decompressing my spine/elbows/shoulders and also because I suspect doing this will help with my internal rotation issues and maybe alleviate some of that pec/bicep tendon pain I've had the past 12 years. NFI if it's owrking, but the decompression while gaining weight is never a bad idea.

Yesterday did an upper deload at a new gym included in my membership and machines were slightly different. Nothing was worth logging other than that I worked up to 80kgx8x2 incline barbell. Given that I got 45sx12, I think getting 100kgx10 should be realistic next Saturday.

Today lower real training session

Cable curls: 25x26, 14, 11
pushdowns: 32.75kgx27, 16, 11
dual handle cable curls: 8.75kgx20, 15, 11
db skullcrushers: 10kgx25, 14, 11

Leg extensions: 45kgx25, 15, 14
Seated ham curls: 77.5kgx13, 71kgx10
paused rdl (glute focus): 115kgx15, 12
lying ham curl: 32kgx12, 7

Some messing around with hip thrusts and abductor machine. I just figured out our hip thrust machine can even be adjusted for taller people (I am very tall here) and it feels pretty good. I don't really see where i can fit it in my current programming, unfortunately.

I will probably still in offseason for the rest of this month instead of rushing into prep and doing 22-24 weeks. I really don't think I'm going to need more than 20. I've guinea pigged retatrutide on 2 clients and it might be enough of a game changer to where it's totally un-necessary for me to do a super long diet. From a similar starting point as now I was ready in about 15 weeks with ~5 days off where I was eating in a huge surplus around 2/3rds in. I could prob get this done in 14-15 from my current bodyfat but I'd rather be cautious and give myself a full extra 4-6 weeks. An extra 8 weeks is a bit excessive though.

Changing to 3x/wk was a game changer and taught me a few lessons about training and recovery. Swapping to upper lower was an even bigger game changer that has taught me even more good lessons about what I can feasibly recover from within a single session. I wish I could go back several years and train upper/lower 3-4x/wk from then

rosemary leaves still on the steak probably an abomination but whatever. Kindabad that its cooked 'unevenly'. Working on my technique still. I'm not using the oven, just salt brine 24-36h, fry each side flipping every 90 seconds for first flip and every 60 seconds for 2 more flips each side, then reduce heat to medium/low, butter, rosemary, optional garlic, butter baste for 1 more flip each side on low heat. I'll try out a proper sear next time with the oven but I'm expecting a bit less drastic crust this way

Guys on the Chinese internet are using "eat steak" as an insult/derogatory term for Chinese women who date or marry foreigners.

But anyway that's not all that relevant I just wanted to share some pics of a really great ~750g ribeye I made today.