Why are African-American athletes better than white american athletes

Great Debates
101

OK grienspace, I’m not quite ready to join Collounsbury in the pit but I’m within a hairs breadth.

OK, I can get you some facts, even if I can’t get you a clue.
as.sump.tion an assuming that something is true b : a fact or statement (as a proposition, axiom, postulate, or notion) taken for granted
as.sume to take as granted or true
An assumption is not the hypothesis necessary for scientific investigation. An assumption is an ignorant belief that something is true regardless of the facts and logic. You have been making assumptions, which is what is pissing people off on a board dedicated to fighting ignorance. A hypothesis is never assumed to be true. It is there to be disproved. For every scientific hypothesis there is necessarily a null hypothesis which asssumes exactly the opposite. That is how science works.
You and Wolfman are free to hypothesise all you like, but don’t get shitty when your hypothesis is blown to the shit-house by facts and logic.
Assumptions on the other hand cannot be logically made. By definition they require that they be taken for granted with no reference to facts or logic. I assume that what Wolfman meant was that conclusions can be logically drawn ,and this is perfectly true except that in this case the conclusion runs counter not only to logic but to evidence.
I apologise in advance Wolfman if this seems to be a bit strong. My frustration is not directed at you but a grienspace’s wilful ignorance and lack of logic.

Because Negritos are no more valid an example than “Asians” for any number of reasons. We’ve been through all this with the crinkly hair broad nose bit. Re-read the arguments, read the links then get back to me, kay?

Do you know what rhetoric means? It is impossible to conduct a debate without the use of rhetoric. If you could find even one statement made by the scientists on this post that was not based firmly on fact supported by experimental evidence I’m sure you would have brought it to our attention… You can’t so stop making unsupported assertions. It goes no way to eliminating ignorance.

Let me to encourage you to suggest causes for the presence of unicorns in Central Park. There are no unicorns in central park just as and there are no genetic differences mong races. But let me encourage you to continue searching for reasons as to why something that isn’t is. My God I feel like I’m dealing with the Queen of Hearts.

Ah of course, you and yours are the only reasonable people aren’t you? No one has any problem with the nature nurture debate. It is only when you suggest that one factor affects one race more than another that you are arguing against facts and logic. Understand?

How very gracious of you. He can continue after you’ve finished.
This sort of ranting in the face of evidence and logic has no place at SDMB IMHO.

102

This statement can not be supported with meaningful statistics.:frowning: What is more relevant is that these two populations are the only groups which have produce sprinters that can run the 100 metres in less than 10 seconds.

103

To answer this, not only do we not need to look at “race,” we don’t even need to look at biology.

It has been shown, first anecdotally, and later through serious analysis, that athletic positions have been filled by “stacking” them by race for a long time. For years, the outstanding black high school quarterback or pitcher would get to college and his coach would “discover” that he was better suited to be a wide receiver or an outfielder. If he was able to get through college without being reassigned, when the recruiters for the pros turned up, they would make it clear that they were only interested in him if he “discovered” that he was better suited for a career away from the the QB or pitching position. If he was able to get into the pros, he found himself playing backup to the white guy, so that he rarely had an opportunity to demonstrate his skills in a game.

Eitzen and Sanford published their first study on this in 1975 and Eitzen and Schneider followed it up in 1986. Several others began doing serious examinations, notably Richard Lewis in 1995.

Once the “unconscious” stacking had been identified and began to be addressed, it was amazing how many “newly qualified” black quarterbacks could be found, to the point where instead of the single second-stringer in the entire NFL from the mid-70s, the 2000 NFL had about a dozen black quarterbacks–most of them starters. Would anyone like to suggest that there has been a tremendous evolutionary breakthrough in the last ten years that produced these quarterbacks (who could not be found as recently as the early 90s)?

What would seem to make this irrelevant is that the whole list of individuals who have done this is fewer than a dozen and that, with the exception Jim Hines and Charlie Greene in the 60s, it has only been accomplished in the last twenty years. And since Hines’s victory in Mexico helped nurture the mindest that the “fastest” men in the dashes are all of Western African extraction, huge investments have been made to seek out, recruit, and train guys with that background while guys from other ethnic backgrounds have been discouraged from even considering making the attempt.

This would appear to be a case of self-fulfilling prophecy. Perhaps there is something to it, but we are far short of having enough genuine, controlled data to legitimately draw conclusions.

104

Wolfman
I apologise, I appear to have skipped over your second post somehow. Since you’ve read at least some of the links I’ll be happy to respond to your hypothesis.

The first thing to note is that saying ‘oriental’ rather than ‘Asian’ doesn’t clarify very much, since it was fairly much established in this thread that the terms are interchangeable. http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=44652

The first problem we run into is here. You see you’d have to run this out for at the very least two generations. Experiments in animals have found that the size of the mother affects the size of the offspring irrespective of diet, genetics or other environmental factors. It’s hypothesised that this is because a smaller mother has less ability to cope with the stresses of pregnancy resulting in smaller live-weight at birth and hence smaller adult weight. So a small woman will likely have small children regardless of genetics or environment. So allow one generation to increase the adult size of the mothers and then at least one more to eliminate other environmental effects on the children. See how complicated it gets trying to separate nature and nurture.

No, they haven’t and this is the big flaw in your hypothesis. There’s a reason why the Army has an axiom that ‘assumption is the mother of all fuckups’
Statistics have shown beyond any shadow of a doubt that Asians under some definitions are shorter than some northern European populations. There is no way to correlate this to genetics without doing a complete genetic analysis of the sample populations. This has never been done. What has been done is an analysis of various human populations as demonstrated in the links. What this found was that Asians are not genetically anything. There are no Asian genes or groups of genes. On average exactly the same genes will be found in your randomly selected groups of Asians and Northern Europeans. If we accept this as true then how can Asians be genetically taller, shorter or anything else? See the problem here wolfman? Asians are statistically shorter but all the evidence says that it is not in any way genetically caused. I know it’s counter-intuitive but there you go.

I’ll take that bet if you allow three generations living in the same dorm to give time to iron out the environmental effect of having shorter mothers to begin with. I know it’s counter-intuitive but scientific evidence says that I will win.

There are many examples of where short ancestral stock has led to tall descendants that emphasise the importance of environmental factors in determining height.
Australia is the classic example. Evidence suggests that the average height of English people arriving in Australia for the first 100 years of English settlement was slightly shorter than that of modern Japanese. By the time of the Boer war about 130 years after English settlement the average height of Australian men was about 5’ 10”. It’s still around 5’10” today even with 25% percent of the population being of Asian birth or parentage. (Don’t ask for cites for most of this, I’m working from memory)
The reasons: Australians have one of the most protein rich diets in the world, one of the lowest incidences of childhood diseases and are exposed to more hours of sunshine than most nations amongst other things.
Sort of puts things in perspective doesn’t it?

105

Wolfman, your rebuke is well taken, although I do note that I have addressed almost precisely this sort of “hypothetical” before.

However, the factual problems remain. Lamia has already pointed out that you are comparing two different classes here. Asians and specifically Northern Europeans. As to NE being the tallest folks, I think that’s probably not correct. But w/o any data… But no matter, we’ll take this as a given. However, that does not tell us, ipso facto that the difference between group X (NE) and group Y (say south asians) is genetic or entirely genetic. You should note then that your two categories are quite different. Asians covers an immense range of population, NE is somewhat more specific. The variation is going to be quite different. It doesn’t help your hypothesis one bit to say ‘oreintals’ --assuming you mean Pacific Rim inhabitants, the classic idea of the Yellow race? Still a huge variation.

Now then, if we want to take two specific populations, lets say Fujian Chinese and Norwegians — assuming they are known as extremes, this is pure example — and compare them, then we may have some reason to draw conclusions. I’ve said all along specific populations may reflect a certain degree of coherence in some trait distributions, although given overall distribution of variation this is trivial. That’s quite a different proposition from Asians or White or what not.

So, would I bet on Asians? Depends on where you drew your sample from.

So, there, satisfied?

Now Greinspice:

Perhaps you should stop relying on that pathetic waste of paper by Elsine. Do you think I don’t recognize the material? As for the assertion on West African heritage, its fallacious concieved as I have already noted. On culture: do you still not understand? Never mind, question withdrawn.

Regarding the “over-representation” of West Africans: while I am not a sports fan obviously, I am personally unaware of any major West African sports figures other than the football players in the European football leagues, and only one really huge one, George Weah. I’d like to see the assertion backed up.
In general, my pit comments stand.

106

<tweeet> time out. Ok folks, let us not get too excited, OK? And please, Col & gaspode, leave the profanity to the PIT- thank you very much.

Now, there COULD very well be some racial connection in sports. But first of all- there is no such thing as the “negro” "race’- or the Caucasian, or the Mongoloids, etc. It is mostly just a lumping together of folks with some similar exteral features- and these features very likely do not have any discrete genetic racial basis. None.

Continuing along this line- the above is why Col is reduced to tearing his hair when some of you folks think there can possibly be a genetic reason reason why “african-americans” are better at sports- or even certain sports. There can not be. If you think there is- please name the “Pygmy” track & field or Basketball stars.

However, at a smaller level, where Col starts to call them “populations”, but some ‘splitters" amoung the Anthropologists call “races” (Note, Col has agreed with me that several of the more discrete smaller groupings that Anthropologists call “races” have genetic meaning)- there could very well be a “racial advantage”. Thus, let us say that the Swahili are a “race”, and so are the “Pygmy”. They are both african “black” races. However, it certainly appears that there is some genetic difference in height. And, of course, in several sports, including basketball, height is an advantage. Thus, one could say that the "swahili race’ has a genetic advantage over the “pygmy race” in basketball. Several other African tribes also are taller. Some other “races” (inuit & Ainu)- are shorter. Thus, it is possible that the “kenyan runners” are all from the same “population”, ie “race’, and DO posses a “racial advantage”. BUT- it is because of their 'tribe”- not their skin color. And no- all the African “black” races are not geneticly linked- except so far as we all are.

I will say that MOST of the percieved advantages are cultural, or dietary. However, it is not impossible that SOME tribes/populations/"races’ possess an edge in certain sports.

107

To reiterate weeks of postings, this “edge” is far more closely associated with selective recruiting, advanced athletic training, cultural imperatives, performance-enhancing drugs, determination, availability, role modeling, and, of course, physiognomy. There is far more variation between so-called races than within, leading me to wonder why this isn’t more interesting to you.

Grienspice can be forgiven for his bull-headed adamancy.
He–and billions of others worldwide–have been programmed since birth to perceive the world through the distorted prism of “racial” division. Most Western governments, media, key NGO’s and social institutions constantly bombard us with the invidious and scientifically imprecise proposition that the world can be neatly divided into a handful of races, and that meaningful comparisons can be made between these groupings on the basis of intelligence, athletic ability, etc. etc.

Most governments, policy makers, demographers and plenty of social scientists worldwide today still live and breath these simplistic categories of race. This no doubt drives folks like Edwino, Collounsbury, Gaspode, et al. absolutely nuts, but fighting Grienspice is fighting an entire world of similarly minded people whose messages are constantly reinforced by the media.

Hence my analogy to Collounsbury as Sysyphus. In the final analysis, your arguments against Grienspice may be factually based, but the world isn’t ready to hear you–and Grienspice is just the tip of the iceburg. If not race, then nationality, religion, ethnicity or wealth. The desire to differentiate is ages old. Grienspice and his worldview are the products of 20th-century upbringing. Lesson well learned.

108

Sorry I got a little snotty in my last post.

My main supposition is that within any given population, if there is sufficient issolation to cause a superfical characteristic,(Skin color, Eye shape)then there are likely to be other characteristics that have reached a much greater density with in that population. And to just dismiss out of hand that those characteristics may effect sports performance seems unjustified.

I think I have though of a better example. Esquimos. I have always heard that due to the extreme cold of their environment there was a selective tendancy toward short-stocky bodies that concieved heat better. And that now among esquimos there is now the a genetic bias toward that more compact body. On the other hand, Central Africans developed long-lanky bodies as a selective trait in order to diperse heat better. Now in a given sport, the lanky body or the stocky body may give an clear advantage.

109

From now on they will be called Inuit because it seems I cannot spell Eskimo :slight_smile:

110

And you would be quite right, except for one major fault. There is absolutely no evidence of there ever having been sufficient isolation to cause those superficial characteristics. It just appears that way based on phenotype. In actual fact any given skin colour and eye shape can be the result of numerous genes that simply produce the same physical appearance. The genes themselves however have evolved numerous times in numerous places and have no relationship to each other aside from the fact that they produce the same effect. Any given individual on the planet is equally likely to have any of these genes whether it is expressed or not. All populations have been mingling for millions of years and the genes have been distributed evenly in all populations. The only thing that people with black skin have in common is that they have black skin. There is no one ‘black skin gene’, rather there are several. Black skin isn’t therefore caused by isolation but rather from selection and mixing. For the sake of illustration I will say there are 700 distinct black skin genes. Any individual in Africa may have any one of these genes, or a combination of several. In the same way any individual in Africa may have any one of 700 ‘basketball genes’ or a combination of several. The odds of them all giving an advantage are pretty slim, and the odds of them all being tied to a ‘dark skin gene’ is even more remote. To add to this improbability it must be remembered that statistically any individual in Europe is just as likely to carry any given ‘dark skin gene’ or any given ‘basketball gene’. To have any significant influence on a racial level there would need to be an interplay between these genes to produce great basketballers, and that could simply never be mapped onto race.

Again there is no evidence I know of for a singular ‘stocky gene’ or a singular ‘lanky gene’. This has probably evolved numerous times in numerous places and any given Eskimo may carry any one or several types of any given gene that promotes stockiness. He will also probably carry any one or several of the genes that promote lankiness. I know it sounds weird, but that’s the way it maps out.
It’s interesting that you mention the compact Eskimo after the tall Northern Europeans. Someone can correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the northern European Laps thought to have historically had ties with the Eskimo’s?

111

Does that mean that in the human race, the Eskimoes have Lapped us?

112

But doesn’t the envrionmental factor that caused the black skin, ;direct sunlight causeing protective melanin to develop; also imply that other high solar exposure adaptaions; lengthening of the body structure; are very likely within the population?(sorry for that sentence I couldn’t figure out a better way to put it). It seems a logical conclusion that people with the genes for dark skin would also have the genes for heat dissipation, an therefore would have a( statistically distributed) advantage over the Inuit for some sports.

[quote]
All populations have been mingling for millions of years and the genes have been distributed evenly in all populations.

[quote]

This is the main assertion that I don’t understand. People with the ‘Asian look’ tend to have children with the ‘Asian look’ people with dark skin tend to have kids with dark skin. If Dikembe Mutombo and Iman had a kid I would assume it to have dark skin, and if Bridgete Nielson and Arnold had a kid I would assume it told have light skin. If Jet Li and Margret Cho had a kid I would expect narrowed occipital flaps(I doubt that the correct term, but I imagine you get the gist). If you dispute this then let me know. The fact that some characteristics are obvious with a fairly related population is clear. The fact that only those characteristics, and nothing related to body structure adapations, are carried within a population is poorly explained in all of the links I see and counter-intuitional.

P. S. Sorry if I seem like I’m trying to be pretentious but what the words I’m looking for aren’t very exatct, so I’m guessing to. find the closest scientific terminology for what I mean.

113

Did you not even READ my post? I mean you went so far as to QUOTE it, you must have read it. Try again- it says “MOST of the percieved advantages are cultural…”. Yes, there is far more variation between individuals than between races. BUT- some “races” (or populations as Col. likes to call them) do cleary possess some inherited genetic differences than other “races”. (NOTE- again, here by races we are ONLY talking about the small “population” sized “races”) The Watusi or Swahili (Note, from Oxford, “Swahili= a member of a bantu people of zanzibar and adjaacent coast”) or whatever tribe it is that is the tallest- clearly has a genetic hieght difference from the “pygmy”. The tallest Pygmy, AFAIK, is not as tall as the shortest (normal) Watusi. “Handful of races”? No, there would need to be dozens & hundreds of “races”. Maybe Col is right, and we should just not use the “R-word”- it seems to elicit strong feelings.

114

I think you’re confusing cause and effect here. Environmental factors don’t cause black skin, though they may enhance it. Genetics causes black skin and a black person who never saw sunlight would still have dark skin expressing itself in some way. The genetic mutations responsible for black skin may have been caused by solar radiation, but more likely by other radiations, chemical mutagens or just blind chance with no obvious cause.
As for other adaptations being higher within the populations, they would likewise be caused by numerous different genes that evolved numerous times when applied to the African people as a whole. The genes for elongated body structure would be the same as those found in other populations around the world and there is absolutely no evidence that any gene is found in significantly higher concentrations amongst Africans than amongst Europeans.
Believe it or not I can see where you are trying to go with this, but the problem is that the only truth about a group of black people is that they are black. The only truth about a group of tall black people is that they are tall black people. The only truth about a group of tall, fast, black people is that they are a group of tall, fast, black people and so on. There is no evidence for any group that you or I select sharing any common genes (except for extremely small interrelated populations). It’s that simple. If we select people for being black and fast runners we will of course get fast black runners, but there is absolutely no evidence that they will share anything else biologically. Area of origin doesn’t really come into it because you can’t say of any but the smallest populations ‘all those people are tall because they share a gene, therefore they might be fast because of a shared gene.’ There are no genes in a group of Africans that aren’t just as common in a group of Europeans. Any given gene for elongated body form is going to be just as common in Europeans as in Africans. Certain phenotypes may be more common amongst Africans but this is a red herring. They just look the same, they don’t share any obvious genetic heritage aside from being human.
Let me give you this analogy. If I said that more Europeans live in semi-detached dwellings than Africans you’d probably agree with me in the same way I’d agree with you that more Africans are black. If I the tried to say that because European populations are more likely to live in semi-detached buildings then they are also more likely to share a genetic predisposition towards shortness you’d quite rightly look at me like I was a loony. Even if Europeans were short it’s unrelated to where they live. Europeans are short for all sorts of reasons and come from short families all over the world. Many diverse people from all over the world live in semi-detached dwellings for all sorts of reasons. There’s no reason to suspect a genetic link, it’s purely a case of where these people live.
Well as strange as it seems the same is true of black Africans. They don’t share a genetic predisposition to being tall. Even if Africans were tall it’s unrelated to being black. Africans are tall for all sorts of reasons and come from tall families all over the world. Many diverse people from all over the world are black for all sorts of reasons. There’s no reason to suspect a genetic link, it’s purely a case of what colour these people are. Now I know that sounds like a genetic link, but there is no more genetic commonality between black Africans than there is between Semi-detached dwelling Europeans. Black Africans look they should be lumped together but in reality there is no more reason to do so than lumping together people who live in semi-detached homes.

The term is epicanthic fold.
Yes some characteristics are related closely to some populations, but the trouble is they aren’t caused by one gene. Yes two Asians will have an Asian appearing child, but the appearance may be caused by any one of dozens of genes and odds are both parents won’t have the same gene.
Imagine a population’s gene pool as a bag filled with marbles representing genes. There are 1000 different coloured marbles and each one represents a gene for eye shape carried by one individual. The reason for the high number of shadings is because this trait can be carried by many genes. An ‘Asian’ town has a bag to draw from I which all the marbles 100 different shades of red, representing the ‘typical’ Asian eye shape. A European town has a bag to draw from with nothing but blue marbles, again in 1000 different shades, representing ‘typical’ European eye shape. Now because of the way these genetics work to get an eye shape in our children that is distinctly Asian or distinctly European you need to draw 3 out of four marbles of the same colour representing a ‘carrier’ marrying a ‘carrier’. Eye shape isn’t simply recessive/dominant. These two towns represent the ‘pure’ Asian and European populations, although of course no such thing ever existed.
Now obviously the Asian town will always produce Asian eye shapes and Europeans European.
Next we make up two continents of 1000 towns each, one entirely European, one entirely Asian.
We take 100 red marbles out of the bag of one Asian town and put them into the bag of one European town, replacing them with blue marbles out of the Europeans bag. We then go to the next two towns and swap 100 marbles and so on.
Now we select one town at random and draw four marbles. Since we need 3 out of 4 of the same colour to get any given eye shape, what is the probability that an Asian town will produce an Asian child? Well he’s only got a 1 in 10 chance of selecting a blue marble, and he needs 2 of them for the child not to have Asian eyes, so roughly only 1 child in 100 will not be Asian. The same of course applies to the European town.
Now what shade of marble (gene) is present in the whole Asian continent that is not present in Europe? If the marbles were selected at random probability says none. And similarly no European genes are not found in Asia.
How isolated are the continental populations? Not very, they’re completely mixed. Does any town contain a shade of marble (genes) not found in other towns on the same continent? Probability says yes. Does any town contain a shade of marble not found on the other continent? Again yes.
Now this is the important part.
Is there any shade of marble that is significantly more likely to be drawn from an Asian town than a European one?
No. Any given shade of blue will only be selected once in every thousand draws. It doesn’t matter what colour marbles we’re dealing with the shades are what counts. Ie any given gene will only be present in every thousandth Asian sample. Blue number 14 isn’t clustered in any given European town. Only one in every 1100 Europeans will carry this gene. Less Asians may carry this gene it’s true, so perhaps only one in every 10,000 but that is the total limit. I’ve already addressed why attributing any disproportionate representations of any race in any field to this small a genetic variation is statistically unsound, but I will happily do so again. Remember also that if we swapped 200 marbles but did it over 2000 towns the probability of any given gene turning up in an Asian versus a European would be 1200:5000 and still allow only one child in 50 to be of a different race from the town he was born in. The more mixed the populations the less significant any genetic differences.

I hope that my illustration cleared things up a bit rather than making them murkier. There are some fairly serious generalisations there, but remember it is only an illustration, not an explanation of genetics.

Don’t apologise. I’m happy to explain to people who are willing to listen and think.

115

Ack. I’m sick of this. From now on, short answers that everyone can understand (hopefully).

Take some of the things that we use to define the “races.”
Black - dark skin, wide nose, curly hair
Asian - medium skin, epicanthic fold
White - pale skin, narrow nose

etc.

These phenotypic characteristics are polygenic traits. They also are somewhat advantageous – dark skin for increased UV protection, etc. Being polygenic, they have arisen several times in nature.

The nature of genetics dictate if two populations with completely different genetics intermingle, and one of them has an advantageous trait, over several generations, the heterogenous offspring of these will predominantly have this trait.

So, envision millenia of populations mixing. The genes between individuals are widely diverse, because the majority of them carry no kind of advantage. But, the advantages listed above are more propogated (due to Darwinian selection) in certain environments.

What are we left with? A group of people who share a certain advantage in an environment, but with widely varied genetics.

A lot of this is a big generalization (for instance that all of Africa is one environment, which it isn’t, or that Darwinian selection works faster than intermingling, which it doesn’t). But it works for explaining why skin color isn’t necessarily correlated to anything else genetically.

116

Many are descended from people who lived on the plains of Aftica and had to be able to run quickly and long distances.
They have good lung capacity and long legs. Obviously the descendents of forest dwellers (like pygmies) would not be good athletes. The Watusi’s are a good example of a tribe with great running ability.

117

Could you please read the thread before posting? Although the antecedants are obscure, we have to suspect…

118

Gotta push the god damned rock back up the hill again.

119

I have to admit that the sheer invective profanity and hatred directed at me has had an effect. Why do you carry so much hatred in your heart for someone who disagrees with you? Why do you feel it is neccessary to discredit me by attributing false statements such as comparing fucking dogs to humans, or false motivation when I clearly stated that the anecdotal evidence for asian height was diet based. Did you have to misrepresent me so that I would fit a stereotype of a racial bigot?

Before I continue, I wish to have clarified this contradiction you posted in the Eugenics thread you linked at 4:57 Chicago time 11/11/2000

I have spent hours reading the Genome Research links, and I have certainly learned a lot, and if I could get in line with the prevailing opinion since you got involved regarding the athletic superiority of blacks in the NBA,football, and track, my life would certainly be a lot easier. But that is not the case. I find the Genome researchers basically can say that that gene correlation for phenotypes is inconsistant and that we can’t demark group genetically but no researcher has outright claimed that the genetic evidence presently exists that rules out a genetic basis for specific athletic traits exhibited by those who share west African ancestry… In fact, with only one genome mapped, (whereby the scientists have just discovered that the genome involves 30,000 genes instead of 100,000 genes) the debate centres on the morality of directly applying ethnicity into continuing genetic studies.

What really blows me away is the following statement by Ajit Varki,M.D. , Profeesor of Medicine (list of titles), University of California as follows:

In light of the latest statements that humans are 99.9% similar to chimpanzees, forgive me for wondering if the geneticists can really be conclusive about any genetic relationship among human populations. How do we claim genetic coherence between humans and chimpanzees, but not between members of a long shared geographic history. At this stage, can genetics answer the question regarding the reason **498 of the top 500 **times recorded for the 100 meter sprint are held by athletes of primarily west African ancestry? Apparently not according to Professor Bengt Saltin of the University of Copenhagen, and the Copenhagen Muscle Research Institute. he says in Scientific American, Sept 2000

So where does that leave us?

I accept that I may be genetically more similar to an African than another Caucasian.

I accept that the obvious phenotypes we use to classify races are genetically incoherent.

I do not accept genetically distinct races.

However I still say that a phenotype for speed exists in a segment of the
west African population in far greater frequency than in other populations. To suggest culture as the answer is to claim west Africans, Carribean- Africans,poor African Americans and middle class African-Americans and African -Canadians, share a cultural common denominator. That statement can not stand on its own.

120

Sysyphus it is.

Greinspace you really are going around in circles. Could you stop it, I’m getting dizzy.

I have no hatred that I know of, merely a fair lack of respect for someone disseminating falsehoods and being wilfully ignorant on a board clearly dedicated to the fight against ignorance. I think Collounsbury just has limited patience for people who won’t accept the facts when they are stated, supported, explained and then restated. But he can answer for himself and will probably do so in The Pit.

That would be completely unnecessary you are doing a good job without any misrepresentation. I don’t believe you are a bigot. Your refusal to accept the facts does make you come across as one unfortunately.

And no one here has said that either. For crying out load Grienspace read the posts.
Science rarely rules out anything absolutely. If you read the posts you will notice several times when I have said that your cockamamie theory is actually possible, just that it is illogical, statistically and therefore scientifically unsound, and flies in the face of rather than being supported by the evidence. Allow me to paraphrase you: “I find the Genome researchers basically can say that that gene correlation for phenotypes is inconsistant and that we can’t demark group genetically but no researcher has outright claimed that the genetic evidence presently exists that rules out the Invisible Pink Unicorn being responsible for specific athletic traits exhibited by those who share west African ancestry”
The statement is true and highlights how your reasoning runs backwards from a pre-supposed conclusion. The point is not that the evidence rules out your theory but that it in no way supports it and that all the evidence to date counters it

The scientific debate does not centre on morality. The morality debate centres on morality, the scientific debate centres, I should hope, on the evidence to hand and how that should be interpreted. Until someone can find a way to quantify and isolate morality I find it difficult to believe that morality will ever enter into a scientific debate.

The shortest answer is geneticists and other scientists can rarely be conclusive about anything. Such is the nature of science. This in no way detracts from the fact that your theory is statistically invalid, scientifically insupportable, illogical and exists in contradiction to current knowledge rather than supported by it.
What is it about this that you failed to understand when I said it in every other post directed to you.

We don’t claim genetic coherence between humans and chimpanzees. Note that chimpanzees actually have more chromosomes than humans and are thus unable to interbreed. Proof positive of a lack of coherence irrespective of similarities.

Right back where we started. Prof. Saltin has already stated that he not only has no proof for his assertion but does not expect any to be forthcoming. He has a right to his opinion just as you do. On this board however he or anyone else would be expected to backup their assertion with facts, particularly when it demonstrates a notable ignorance of supported facts supplied by other posters and the worlds leading geneticists. Since he has already conceded that there is not and will not be any genetic evidence to support his assertion then trot out the logic he used to arrive at this conclusion in the apparent absence of any fact and let us examine it.
This is yet another argument from authority and not a valid debating tactic.

And I have still demonstrated that all the evidence goes directly against the concept of genetics being responsible. That theory is statistically invalid, it is scientifically invalid and it is logically invalid as it pertains to the known facts.
Re-stating your position every post doesn’t change those facts.
You have introduced no new evidence in this post, simply re-stated what was already clearly stated in the links Collounsbury has already provided.
Nor have you made any attempt at logically explaining why you believe as you do.
The only piece of new information is an attempt at an argument form authority that simply doesn’t was with me. I’ll paraphrase Carl Sagan for you: “The following are suggested as tools for testing arguments and detecting fallacious or fraudulent arguments …. Arguments from authority carry little weight (in science there are no “authorities”).

No, it is to claim that a range of cultural and environmental characteristics more common amongst ‘Black Africans’ have resulted in the observed data.
No need for a genetic common denominator, no need for a cultural common denominator. No place here for a common denominator because black people can’t be reduced to a common denominator. They are human and open to all the wonderful diversity of humanity. Humanity can’t be reduced to a common denominator, only vague generalisations that apply more or less to any given individual.