Only if you think the journey doesn't contribute to the lifetime. Exercise is net beneficial and you meet nice people along the way.

You can't evaluate bicycle's efficiency in the city only by looking at the rider's consumed energy. There's a lot of other things to it. In a modern city using a bike takes the same amount of time as using public transport. And you exercise while riding and you don't burn any additional energy and you take less space.

Ok, now for the people using motor vehicles instead of their own muscle power, account for the time wasted at the gym for the equivalent exercise. Or for time at the hospital, due to their sedentary lifestyle. Then account for the various types of pollution and destruction caused by motor vehicles.

Or, you know, just appreciate this 2D chart for the two dimensions of factual information it is able to convey effectively.

The time isn't wasted, it's saving you time in gym and hospital and prolonging your life.

Yeah I’m not sure why they picked these animals specifically. Seems like there would be some interesting data for big creatures (hippos, rhinos, elephants, whales), or unusually slow ones (tortoises, sloths).

Nothing on this chart surprises me, with the exception of salmon but that’s purely because I don’t really have any preconceptions about how efficient swimming is, beyond it feeling harder than walking in a human form.

Salmon is also a weird one to pick given their breeding method, you’d expect them to perhaps have some unusual adaptations as result of needing to swim hard upstream from time to time.

They aren't saying that dogs are incredibly inefficient – looks like dogs are right where they "should" be based on their body weight. The point of course stands that bikes need a flat ground to be efficient, but this isn't some sort of competition or measure of moral worth. It's just an observation that given that we've already filled human-inhabited spaces with nice flat surfaces, cycling happens to be a really efficient form of locomotion. Fish also need to be in water to be able to move at all, but that's immaterial for the purposes of the chart.

> Pure efficiency in locomotion is a terrible measure, is a person on a bicycle more efficient traversing a forest?

Quite possibly. I would imagine it depends on the forest. I've been in forested areas on the mountain bike and you can cycle through these areas fine.

> It's the classic physics issue - you are ignoring air resistance, but in this case you are ignoring everything other than a perfectly paved road.

Rolling resistance is mainly down to the types of tyres used, how wide they are and how much they are inflated. Surface doesn't make that much of a difference IMO unless it is on a really lose surface e.g. loose gravel, mud or ice.

The biggest improvements to cycling efficiency is usually either being in a recumbent bicycle (less air resistance as you are led down) or by being in a more more Aero position with lycra on. But air resistance only becomes a big thing past 20mph or if you are wearing clothing that is really baggy.

Bicycles are the most efficient forms of transport in energy per mile. They are often the fastest in built up areas as well.

Since it's a glider, did they incorporate the effects of thermals into the efficiency numbers? That would be a bit like comparing it to a sailing ship with a small external motor.

> The average salmon weighs more than the average rat. Am I missing something?

an average rat typically weighs less than 1 pound, while an average salmon weighs several pounds.

You can sail around the world without spending any fuel.