>At work, if your job is to move a bunch of heavy things from one side of the room to another, you should use whatever assistive tech you have on hand: a wagon, a forklift ... even an AI-powered robot. But at the gym, it makes no sense for that robot to lift weights for you. The point of weightlifting isn’t to move heavy things across the room; it’s to actually lift those heavy things.

The point of going to the gym isn't to make it easier to lift heavy things at work, it's for self-improvement.

>The writing assignments I give my students are gym tasks, not work tasks... I assign them because the very act of writing, which includes thinking and outlining and drafting and editing, making and criticizing and revising arguments, will help develop the critical thinking skills they will need in their future careers.

I'm sorry but why are we assuming that any of those things are 'critical' skills? I think there's already a strong argument that the need for those skills in the workplace are declining.