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Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
11/13/09
Great article though. True fairness in competition is pretty impossible though. The best they can do is categorize people into very roughly equal groups and have them compete amongst themselves.
The carbon fibre legs are an incredible piece of technology though. The sensation of running on them is pretty hard to imagine and one I've always been oddly curious about. #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
11/13/09
Simona Halep an up and coming tennis star with DD breasts had a reduction so that she could play with less interference:
[www.theregister.co.uk] #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
And what I meant is that you should not use a myth to prove you point of view. #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
Amazons are a part of Greek mythology. They supposedly prevented the growth of the right breast by cauterizing it while young. The author had the side mixed up, but it is most assuredly a true part of the mythology.
11/13/09
The word Amazon is of unknown origin, however a folk etymology popped up which explained the word as being a deriviative of the preface "a-", meaning "without", followed by "mazos", meaning "breast". This folk etymology was supported by the folktale that Amazons cut off one breast to facilitate archery. However, this is most likely a story designed to discourage women from taking up archery. This speculation is supported by even the most casual observation of modern day female archers who are more than capable of using the bow with all breasts intact.
Source: [www.whoosh.org]
The image that says with most people is that of single-breasted women. Sounds like a shocker doesn't it? But a recent survey indicated that single-breasted women with a quiver of arrows slung on their shoulders epitomize the women warriors of the Amazon. According to myth, the Amazons were an all-female society of fierce warriors who supposedly lived in the area north of the Black Sea about 700 years before the fifth century BC. Supposedly they cut off one breast to make shooting a bow and arrow easier. But this has never been proved even in the myths. The word Amazon itself has some connotation with breasts.
Source: [www.buzzle.com] #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
I'll politely disagree with you second claim. [en.wikipedia.org] #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
I think you are reading about the wrong amazons.
11/13/09
11/13/09
11/12/09
11/13/09
11/13/09
(See her TED presentation if you don't know what I'm talking about.) #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
The compromise seems pretty simple: if you willing to amputate limbs to increase athletic performance, there should be no restrictions to your competing. The frustrations one would encounter using a wheelchair everywhere else in the world should be seen a sacrifice far exceeding the proverbial getting up early in the morning to work out. Those 'fortunate' enough to be born without limbs (and in wheelchair racing having lower extremities is a disadvantage having to with weight and chair design) would be the same as a basketball player fortunate enough to be born tall. Or with exceptionally acute vision. Wade Boggs' hitting skills were mostly attributed to that fact.
The cultural exclusion is fascinating -- these athletes are seen less than normal and more than human simultaneously. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
Thank you. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/12/09
Imagine how bad that would hurt?
And how it would affect the scores of divers... #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/12/09
That said, I'd like to consider Lance Armstrong for a moment. Comparing him to, well pretty much any other human, when it comes to cycling is apples to oranges. His heart, lungs, and pretty much all the rest of him are physiologically amazing and optimal for his sport. So if saying a prosthesis makes you so distinctive that you can't legitimately be compared to your peers, why isn't that true of Lance. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/12/09
11/12/09
In swimming, dive caps are simply part of the game, and you can't exactly penalize someone for shaving their head bald to reduce drag, It's only natural that someone would try to make swimsuits that create less drag than bare skin, but the public never really anticipated the benefits of muscle compression (they also never anticipated how making a swimming pool significantly deeper and wider would make it a "fast pool", but you never heard that mentioned by people who were calling for a ban on full-body suits).
As for the blades, I believe it is legitimately possible to develop an artificial leg that _will_ provide an unfair advantage over a natural leg, but I've yet to see any conclusive proof that the blades succeeded. Regardless of what the facts are, blades _look_ like they'll make you faster, and they're lighter than natural legs as well. You know, nevermind the fact that blades require the application of external force to work, as compared to how natural legs can generate their own force.
The real issue in whether or not blades will ever be accepted in track competitions is that there's no way to prove whether Runner A can run faster with blades than with natural legs. You can't simply swap them with each other and do comparative time trials. Maybe if there's ever a case where genetic twins run track and consistently finish with similar times, and one of them ends up getting blades after a double-amputation and _still_ finishes with times that nearly match the other twin... #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
I'm personally stuck on the notion of keeping separate classes of athlete, "natural" (for lack of a better, more PC term), and "enhanced". This would allow the first category of athletes to compare their abilities with others based on genetics, physical development, and mental determination, with only a minor influence of technology through training methods and nutrition. The enhanced class of athletes would be measured on all of the above criteria, but with an added emphasis on technology and the ability of a competitor to successfully adapt to their enhancements. Indeed, I imagine it would be very similar to the Paralympics are today, but I can easily imagine such enhanced athletes outperforming "natural" competitors due to technological breakthroughs outpacing genetic evolution over time.
To imagine this taken to a further extreme, could we not have whole new sports in the future that are in fact cannot be participated in by un-enhanced humans? We can see the beginnings of such a divergence with the invention of Murderball and wheelchair racing in the past decades as modifications of current sports. Hell, I can see myself getting more excited to watch the Cyborlympics than the Olympics if the events are cool enough.
Regardless of the simple effect of these developments on the world of sports, these new technologies will undoubtedly give not only "disabled" humans, but all of humanity the ability to hack their bodies to be more than nature ever intended, and I can't wait. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/13/09
Okay, so, should blade-runners (heh, I _so_ had to do that, and it's all the better for being topically appropriate) be in the Paralympics or your "Cyborlympics"? #oscarpistorius
11/13/09
I'd always understood that they were banned because the fans wanted the crack of the bat, not a ping. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
Thank you, Aimee, for this fantastic and obviously deeply thought out, article. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
There's a difference between carbon fiber legs and LASIK vision and techy swim suits: techy swimsuits are removable off the field, so it doesn't mess with the athlete's individual lives. LASIK is not removable, but it improves the quality of life for people who need it in every area, not just golf.
What "enhancements" like carbon fiber legs and steroids do is ask athletes to make an immoral choice, whether to permanently screw their body off the field so they can get an advantage on the field. Although steroid users enjoy better strength in sports, they sacrifice on their general health off the field. Similarly, carbon fiber legs present the moral choice of selective amputation to athletes in general, if they haven't been forced to do so otherwise, in order to run faster - but they are then forced to go through all of the smaller coordination problems and little things like annoyances at the airport. What people are scared of, I think, is the moral implications of what society has become if we allow ourselves to do this, rather than understanding that there are more important things than athletics.
I personally think you should be allowed to compete with them, because you weren't given this choice, it was forced on you. But at the same time, I think naysayers would stop whining if carbon fiber attachments could be made to the bottom of athletic shoes to give a similar "advantage". #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
I'm not competitive, but there's always the voice in the back of my head saying I have no business doing this. I've run around 20 of 'em now. But then I think about my incredibly shitty eyesight, and to carry that "no business" thought further, before the invention of corrective glasses, I surely would have walked myself off a cliff or been eaten by a bear before I turned 20. So, naturally speaking, I have no business being alive at this point. Which, for me, renders the whole train of thought moot. Hooray for inventions of enablement!
Back to mile 17. My knees were griping a bit. My left ankle was a little tweaked. I had impressive blisters on my toes. A guy with Cheetahs passed me on the left by hopping onto and back down from a 10" curbed median....and freakin' disappeared into the distance.
Inwardly, "no blisters on HIS toes...".
Gave me something to think about for the next 9 miles.
I have no answers. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/12/09
11/12/09
One question though: Why is the page's title crediting Oscar Pistorious? Shouldn't Aimee get the credit for her own incredible article? #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
Tiger's disability was impaired sight. While sight has some stuff to do with how golf is played, the main hunk of golf is fine motor control. Just like in archery, sure you have to see the target, but just seeing the target does not greatly improve the motor skills used to shoot the arrow.
Not only that, but Lasik surgery has no barriers to entry. Anyone with impaired vision (up to a point) can go and get Lasik. While replacement limbs do not allow people to do that. Only a small minority of athletes can get limbs, and if a new limb comes out, they can upgrade overnight and be better in the morning (just like with the swimwear). Those things can be regulated (elasticity of limbs, drag coefficient of suits, etc.) which is what needs to be done.
Tiger's vision simply brought him *up* to the level of vision of his competition. Unless he had a super surgery that allowed him to zoom in and perfectly measure distances, then he did not exceed the level of sight of his competition or his competition could achieve with Lasik. Two people with Lasik will (most likely) both see the same... 20/20. But with things as suits and limbs, different companies have different levels of performance of their products. The company where you get your swimwear greatly influences your performance in the race.
It is also a Quality of Life issue. Tiger's quality of life suffered due to his vision impairedness in "every day activities". While I imagine having no legs greatly reduces your quality of life, I doubt that wearing cheetah legs during "every day activities" improves it more so than other types of legs. Just like with suits. Wearing one of those shark suits in everyday activities wont increase the quality of life. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
Please note: 20/15 #oscarpistorius
11/12/09
11/12/09
11/12/09
Sports are not about sight, smell, or hearing. While those things enhance how well you play, sports are judged on muscle memory, muscle performance, and motor skills. #oscarpistorius
11/12/09