Would you kill one person to save five?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Would you kill one person to save five?". Your opponent's style: Richard Feynman

By looking at your V-TAPER it can be a useful indicator of good health

I have to push back here. Your V-taper tells you almost nothing about actual health. You could have perfect shoulder-to-waist proportions and terrible cholesterol, weak lungs, or a failing heart. A Greek statue physique doesn't mean your arteries aren't clogged. Real health markers are invisible: VO2 max, blood pressure, resting heart rate, metabolic panels. A guy with a mediocre V-taper who runs five miles and sleeps eight hours is healthier than a shredded influencer living on stimulants and six hours of sleep. You're confusing aesthetics with function. That's like saying a car with a nice paint job must have a good engine. Why would muscle shape tell you anything about what's happening on the inside?

Im simply not stating that its perfectly reliable im just stating that it can be useful

Fair enough, but "useful" is doing heavy lifting here. A V-taper correlates with *some* muscle mass, sure, but that's it. You can build shoulder width through isolation exercises while remaining sedentary everywhere else. Plenty of fit people lack dramatic V-tapers due to genetics or training style. If you want a useful health indicator, measure resting heart rate or how far you can walk without getting winded. Those actually tell you something. A V-taper just tells you someone hit their shoulders hard at the gym. That's vanity, not health data. What makes it useful specifically? What health problem does it actually predict or prevent?

Its the ease of just been able to look in the mirror and not needing to rely on anything else, to have an idea of your health. As having a small waist and good muscle mass can have a decent correlation with health

You're conflating correlation with causation. Sure, people who build muscle tend to exercise, which helps health. But the V-taper itself isn't doing the work—the training is. A guy with a perfect V-taper who never does cardio is still at risk for heart disease. And your mirror test fails constantly. Skinny people have tiny waists. Obese people can hide belly fat under loose clothing. You're seeing surface geometry, not metabolic health. If ease is your goal, fine—use your mirror as motivation. But calling it a health indicator is nonsense. It's just vanity with a scientific costume. Real health requires actual data, not wishful thinking in the gym mirror.

Ok but for me specifically when i already know that i have good health markers and i want something more specific like getting an idea of my androgen status without getting blood work its one of the good tools to use. and yes you stated that it being a health indicator can be nonsense however if i can use it to reflect on my androgen status how can you call it completely useless

Now you're moving the goalposts. You went from "useful indicator of good health" to "I use it to guess my testosterone levels when I already have good markers." Those are completely different claims. Fine, muscle mass does reflect androgens to some degree. But a V-taper? That's still crude. You could have high androgens and poor shoulder development from bad genetics or training. Or normal testosterone with elite shoulders from years of overhead work. If you want androgen status, get bloodwork. It costs fifty bucks and takes five minutes. Using your mirror as a proxy is just expensive guessing dressed up as self-knowledge. You're paying in wasted time and false confidence. Why not just test instead of playing detective in the mirror?

Ok but how can you call it useless when theres some partial correlation

Because partial correlation isn't useful—it's noise masquerading as signal. A coin flip has some correlation with heads too. The question isn't whether it correlates, it's whether it tells you anything *reliable*. You already know your health markers are solid. You don't need a mirror proxy for androgens when actual blood tests exist and cost nothing. Partial correlation means you're right maybe half the time, which is worse than useless—it's misleading confidence. I'm not saying ditch the mirror entirely. Look good, feel good. But stop calling it a diagnostic tool. It's just motivation. That's fine, but don't confuse vanity with science.