Europeans Taller than Americans....

[rklenseth]

A German scientist has come up with a study which shows that from being the tallest nation in the world for 200 years, the average American is now less tall than his European counterpart.
In a study that has taken him 20 years, Professor John Komlos says that the tallest people in Europe, the Dutch, with an average height of 6 feet 1 inch are a good 3 inches taller than Americans. The average Brit is apparently half an inch taller than the average American
"Statistically speaking, tall people are more likely to go on dates, to earn more [about £450 more per inch per year], to live longer - in short, to be more successful."


http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.j ... wstop.html

I read this on another forum and thought that it would be funny to post here.

[kroner]

yeah, i heard about that. i also heard that no groups of people besides african pigmies are genetically predisposed to be tall or short. every population has the same opportunity to be tall, it just depends on diet and lifestyle. many europeans now live healthier than americans.

[The Hunter]

Yep. The Dutch are the talles ppl fow quite a while now, while they used to be the shorties of NW europe. Scientists say it's our diet, rich in dairy products. But how abt the Japanese? If I remember the average used to be 1.5 metres not long ago, now close to the 1.70's. If that isn't a race to the "top"?

[Meh]

What we lost in heigth we gained in girth.

[rklenseth]

A lot of American eat/drink dairy products too. Milk was the only thing my mother use to allow me to drink back when I was a child and I ain't tall. I definitely have strong bones but the tallness not so much.

[Bran-Muffin]

I used to drink alot of milk as well, i eat a large variety of cheese everyday. Im a short sob strong bones but short, only weak bones i have are in my hands... to many broken knuckles from hitting.


When i say used to drink milk means im on a diet cause im a short fat sob, some people say im not but they lie.

[kroner]

unfortunately lifestyle is only the sole determinant of height in populations, not individuals... sorry guys.

[The Hunter]

Thats good. When I was 15 I'd drink a whole dozen 1 liter milk cartons.
Thanks Kroner. You explained why I'm still a 5.9 ft midget instead of a 10 metre tall giant.

[Meh]

There is also the case of immigration patterns.

I was the tallest in the extended family until some of the ones a few years younger grew up.

On one side of the family the realtive hung pictures on the same level as the light swtiches becuase to them that is eye level.

I would guess that the influx of immigration from places with less nutritional avaiability is higher here than in Europe. And if immigrations would stop in a few generations it would normalize. Not that immigration should stop.

We are not getting shorter in our family but taller. Is anyone's family on the whole getting shorter?

Didn't we talk about all this before?

[Spectrus_Wolfus]

i think that bit about genetic's not determining height is a crock it's not to often you see a single person in a family whi tower's over the rest of them without some sort of genetic heritage to tallness. if if your lil brother is tall and the rest of you are short. see if the milk man around the time he was conceived is tall or not

[rklenseth]

Well, my father is like 5'5" but my father's younger brother (my uncle) is almost 6'7". Though my grandfather is about that height too. My grandmother on the other hand is about 5'1".

[Meh]

Oh...

Forget it.

There is so many factors it' hard to explain.

We might as well dicuss the weather.

[rklenseth]

And so you're saying that there are a bunch of happy milk men in Holland?

[Meh]

Sorry Sho is going to get me for editing now....

I think that the end result has more to do with immgration than anything else.

And the anything else there is quite alot of.

Food may be the same place to place but what foods are acutally the norm to eat and the preperation is different.

There is variation from person to person. But only in rare circumstances are those those vartions so dominate as to be fully carried in several genrations.

The full effect of immgration, vitamins and iodinized salt, and fast food makes the whole thing rather soupy.

[kroner]

i think that bit about genetic's not determining height is a crock it's not to often you see a single person in a family whi tower's over the rest of them without some sort of genetic heritage to tallness. if if your lil brother is tall and the rest of you are short. see if the milk man around the time he was conceived is tall or not

populations man, populations! of course genetics is a factor for individuals and individual families.