What can our evolutionary past teach us about sedentary lifestyles, brain health, and the growing epidemic of age-related diseases? What happens when we strip physical activity from our everyday lives—and how can we reintegrate it?

Dr. David Raichlen is a Professor of Biological Sciences and Anthropology at the University of Southern California. He leads the Evolutionary Biology of Physical Activity Lab, where he studies how our evolutionary history shaped modern human physiology, behavior, and health. His groundbreaking research connects ancestral movement patterns with present-day well-being, including cognitive health and the prevention of diseases like Alzheimer's.

In this episode, we dive into why humans are wired to conserve energy—and why our shift into chair-bound, screen-driven lives conflicts with our biology. Dr. Raichlen explains that physical activity was once inseparable from survival: hunting, gathering, and squatting were daily occurrences, not gym routines. Drawing on his fieldwork with the Hadza in Tanzania, he explores how traditional lifestyles maintain exceptional health despite limited medical care, and why rest today has become dangerously inactive. We explore how our environments—from city infrastructure to classroom design—can either hinder or encourage movement, and why willpower alone isn’t enough to overcome our sedentary default. Most importantly, we ask how evolutionary thinking can reshape not just health science, but how we educate and design our modern world.