It’s a good question. A tough question. And I was thinking about it. Lol.
Well the initial sentence I can’t really agree with. I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibility that slavery in the Americas and those who were enslaved can’t be considered an arbitrary group and that their traits and the traits they have at this point in time that are a result of their history have some impact on present day success in some sports. But as I have learned I think that extrapolating that to blacks in general are better at sports in general is incorrect because of the diversity of who is lumped into the black category in America.
So since I can’t accept the initial premise I can’t even try to pretend to know how picking cotton helps one dunk a basketball.
With Africa being the source continent and supposedly the most genetically diverse it would seem likely that some random tribe/ethnic group would have the traits that would give a slight advantage in some field and that that random tribe would be African.
But anyways, I’d never claim that event X results in event Y in broad human history terms because it’s too convoluted and impossible to prove. We can’t even get climate right! And the math there is easier. I am content to argue that we don’t precisely know. We can’t precisely know, but that it is logical that a real input has a real impact on a real output even if we will never know what or how much.
The butterfly effect is real in nature and we are part of nature.
I took that to mean he’s short, or fat, or maybe even really skinny. Some body-types just don’t go with swimming.
And, again, why “reject” this claim? What the hell do we know about him? Give me a “cite?” that you’re a “Dr.” It should never even have been made into an issue.
The Steeler’s Troy Palumalu is one. I know there are a few others. You can see some here.
In my searching I saw someone claim that Jason Sehorn was the last white cornerback. If that’s true, wow! That was like 10 or 12 years ago. Can that be right?
Not sure why you’d assume that. Also not sure why “fat” and “skinny” are genetic bars to being an athlete. I’m pretty fat. If I worked out like Michael Phelps, I don’t know that I would win any swimming medals, but I can guarantee you I wouldn’t be fat any more.
Because he’s using it in support of an argument, when it really doesn’t support his argument? He’s basically saying, “I’m not an Olympic-class swimmer, therefore I don’t have the genes to be an Olympic-class swimmer.” I’d hope that most people on this board would not let such poor logic pass unremarked.
I’m not 100% on this, but I’m pretty sure I read that he’s a doctor in Newsweek.
That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying part of the reason I’m not an Olympic record setting swimmer is that I don’t have the genes for it. Could be like that one slow dude that almost couldn’t finish from some little country and be “olympic class.” But no. Genes are part of it. Not the whole picture.
How are things that are near certain poor logic? The whole side of 100% cultural is the poor logic side. Those proponents are the ones who need the so-called ‘cite.’ Far less evidence or reason for that matter than for my claim that I couldn’t set Olympic records in swimming due to genetics. Some people can honestly make that claim. Midgets for example. If I were a midget than my claim would definitely be true.
Point being, the intellectual contortions to ignore basic reality such as humans are physical beings subject to the laws of physics and wanting it more won’t make you 8" taller. People need to read the articles on the Kenyan tribe to see that some genetic component to physicality is not some form of voodoo. Genes in combination with environment build a body. You need both. And they both have an impact. The burden of proof is not on the more sensible point of view. Especially in the face of a shabby false dichotomy style argument.
I already answered this argument by using the example of France. First, I gave a link to the French 100 meters championship : all runners except one were black. So, I would have to assume that they’re turning to this sport because they’re disfranchised and so on. Why would they pick an unpopular sport that isn’t going to bring them fame and wealth, who knows? I of course expect that they would do the same wrt more popular sports, like, say, soccer, which has a lot of appeal for everybody and quite clearly in particular with disvantaged youth. And…indeed, you can see that a very disproportionate part of the French team is made up of people of non-european stock…except that : only some of them are black. More are of “Arab” stock.
How comes? How comes that only black disadvantaged youth are attracted to 100 meters race, and that you can’t find a single disadvantaged youth from North Africa interested in and succeeding in this field? How comes the disadvantaged blacks don’t utterly dominate soccer too?
That disadvantaged youth are attracted to some sports and are overrepresented in them is quite obvious. But it doesn’t explain why disadvantaged blacks specifically are dominating some specific sports.
That short distance race is completely dominated by people with west African ancestry is blatantly obvious all over the world. People trying to explain it away seem to be willingly blind to this obvious fact, and frankly they’re the one who needs to provide strong evidences if they want to support an alternate explanation. And in particular not an explanation that makes sense only in an American context, but one that applies too to the Caraibes, Brazil, the UK, France, etc…since this domination is present wherever there’s a sizable population of west African stock.
Especially ridiculous when they come close to state that there’s no difference in gene frequencies between different populations. And invoking racism doesn’t help. There’s nothing the slighest bit racist about noticing that there are physical differences between human populations, that some genes are common in population A, uncommon in population B, and essentially non-existent in population C. And it’s pretty much obvious too that in high-level sport the slighest advantage (a better speedo for swimmers, better blood oxygenation for cyclists, being left-handed for tennis players, etc…) will make the difference between being good at the sport and being a world-class athlete. If there’s a mutation that gives a 1% advantage in a discipline and is present in 1/1000th of some west African population (and not elsewhere), you can be pretty sure that at the world/olympic level, almost every single athlete in this discipline is going to be of west African stock (which is incidentally the reason why I’ve no interest in high level sport. Basically you need to be a freak to succeed at this level).
The higher prevalence of some gene or another in west Africa to explain this obvious dominance in short distance race makes perfect sense, is perfectly in agreement with science, and satisfies Occam’s razor. If some people want to offer an alternate hypothesis, they should make sure theirs makes as much sense, applies equally well to all observations (not just wrt basketball in the USA) and, preferably, is as simple as the most obvious one.
I can’t see why people would argue so strongly against it except if motivated by some misplaced anti-racism. Made even more obvious by the fact that they wouldn’t deny that Pygmies are unlikely to be tall, that Eskimo are more stocky, and would have no issue if someone stated that, say, eastern Anatolians are dominating wrestling. That’s just a “we must never aknowledge that there could possibly be any difference of any kind between blacks and whites in the USA”.
It is not “blatantly obvious”. Sprinting is not dominated by actual West Africans, the people who would have the most “west African ancestry” of any population.
But it is blatantly obvious that the fastest sprinters in the world have West African ancestry. Why you consistently try to push back on this is quite odd.
Most of them probably do, but then many or most of them probably have European (and other) ancestry as well. Maybe it’s the combination? Or since so many come from Jamaica and other Caribbean islands, maybe there is something about the culture (nutrition, sports traditions, etc.) in Jamaica and the Caribbean that is involved?
While I agree with this, I find it quite odd that you always feel the need couch it in these terms. The point is that if you DON’T have West African ancestry, you shouldn’t be thinking about winning elite sprinting competitions or playing a speed position in the NFL. So, it may be the West African ancestry alone, or it may be that in combination with other factors, but the West African ancestry is the necessary ingredient. You can try to obfuscate that all you want, but it doesn’t change the facts.
His point is that while you have identified West African ancestry as a variable, you have not isolated it. It could be that there’s a particular recessive gene from England that causes awesome sprinting, that spread on Jamaica because of the founder effect.
You can’t draw good conclusions from loosey-goosey observations. You may have demonstrated that the world’s top athletes are black, but I have yet to see evidence that their African ancestry plays a role.
Again, I’m not saying that it doesn’t: it’s possible. I’m saying that this has not been demonstrated, and in order to demonstrate it, you would have to eliminate the other factors, both cultural and genetic.
I’m sure you realize that this sort of attitude means that fewer white people will attempt such feats, even if they might potentially have the ability. Anecdotally I’ve seen it myself – high school football coaches (not all of them) I knew would ask the best white athletes to play QB, and dissuade them from RB/WR/DB, with the reverse for the best black athletes. Steve Young would have made a terrific RB or WR (and likely DB too) – he was an incredible athlete, as were/are many other white football players that may have been encouraged to play ‘white’ positions.
Or it might have something to do with attitudes like the above.
Considering how many millions of white Americans have some significant amount of West African ancestry (including myself and all the descendants of my “white” grandfather), if there is any special genes for sprinting (or other athletic benefits) that are unique to West African ancestry, then there would be plenty of white Americans who had them, and who could excel at these sports. That there, on the face of it, appear to be none at all at the top levels of sprinting (despite the fact that there should be many white Americans who should have these genes) provides some indication that people who identify as “white” might be dissuaded from certain athletic activities for some cultural reason that has nothing to do with genetics. And if this is so, then the fact that sprinting appears to be dominated by people who identify as black might be as much or more an indication of the culture of sprinting and sprinting-training as an indication of any genetic factors due to ancestry.
I’m sure you realize that this sort of attitude means that fewer white people will attempt such feats, even if they might potentially have the ability. Anecdotally I’ve seen it myself – high school football coaches (not all of them) I knew would ask the best white athletes to play QB, and dissuade them from RB/WR/DB, with the reverse for the best black athletes. Steve Young would have made a terrific RB or WR (and likely DB too) – he was an incredible athlete, as were/are many other white football players that may have been encouraged to play ‘white’ positions.
Taking good athletes out of the pool to play quarterback doesn’t account for the discrepancy in numbers.
The numbers say there should be. But the FACT that there isn’t is the astounding thing. Culture really has squat to do with this. Take the U.S., as it is a place with a good amount of diversity. Look at grammar schools, middle schools, high school and colleges. Sprinting takes virtually no training’s a very low acquitted-skill endeavor. Kids are zipping around playgrounds and they know pretty early on who the fastest kids are. Bu the time kids are in high school, any scuffling that might occur is done. Kids are competing for one of 22 positions on the football field. The positions that need really strong, hard to move bodies get filled by the strongest, hardest to move kids. The positions that benefit most from all-out speed, wind up being filled by <drumroll> the fastest kids. Now when you look at the team that takes the field, guess what. The speed positions are filled almost exclusively with black kids. As the level of competition goes up, the discrepancy just becomes greater, where in the NFL there are 0 white cornerbacks. I think it’s the same for safeties. On offensive there are virtually no white wide receivers, or running backs. And of the white running backs, I think all of them play fullback, where size/strength is more important than speed.
You can conjure up any manner of scenarios you want, but the fact is: if you do not have at least some West African heritage, it’s very, very, very unlikely that you will be playing a speed position in sports.
Now that is would be striking if the sub-populations that the athletes come from were equal in size, but there not. Blacks make up just about 14%(?) of the population in the U.S., but in certain positions in the NFL, and on elite sprinting teams, they make up bear 100% of the roster.
Running does that. It is a low-skill endeavor, meaning that it takes very little training to enjoy about 99% of your ability. It is universal; white kids and black kids play running games all the time. In fact, right now way more white kids are running around playgrounds and playing on football teams, from Pop Warner through high school. But 5, 10, 15 years from now when they’re of age to play in the NFL, you still won’t be seeing whites at the speed positions or on the Olympic springing team.
You are assuming that someone with a talent for running will pursue it. That is laughably far from true. Lots of people pursue other interests, or squander their talents.
No, but it’s a cultural factor that could indeed explain part of the discrepancy (for football, anyway). Similar factors might be involved in other discrepancies (if white athletes are encouraged to play tennis or other sports, for example, rather than track sprinting).
You can’t know this for sure. And considering how concentrated Jamaicans are among top sprinters, it seems pretty premature to eliminate cultural factors as even a part of the explanation.
If coaches keep this in mind, then it makes even the white athletes who are capable of playing such positions (like Steve Young) less likely to.
Yes, and it’s an interesting disparity. But it’s not at all conclusive that culture doesn’t play a role, much less that differing genetics based on ancestry play the entire role.