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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 5, 2009 18:16:09 GMT
I was having an argument with a mate at school about this today, I reckon that one day, billions of years into the future, someone will run the 100m in 1 second. I honestly can't see why, with mutations in DNA and the like, this wouldn't be possible. 1000 years ago, when the record was nearer to 20 seconds, the thought of breaking 10 would have been absurd; now it's on 9.58. Obviously, it would take billions of years, but if we keep on having people knocking 1/10s off the previous record, I think we'll get there eventually!
What do you think?
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Post by lemonpiper on Oct 5, 2009 19:03:47 GMT
As it's gone from 10.6 secs in 1912 to 9.58 secs in 97 years I don't think it'll take that long although it will probably take some sort of mutation to achieve it.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 19:05:28 GMT
I can't agree with you at all.
Which selective pressures do you envisage making us, Homo sapiens (an organism without any real need for speed) into such freaks of nature? Even if we did become faster as a species, I think a second is pretty far fetched. One hundred metres per second? Think about it, that's just under two hundred and twenty four mph. Even if our energy systems could sustain that over one hundred metres without producing enough lactic acid to kill us, do you think our body would stand up to that?
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Post by lemonpiper on Oct 5, 2009 19:09:41 GMT
Not when you put it like that! 224mph would do away with the need for Ferraris and then where would rich people be without their status symbols?
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 19:15:51 GMT
Having just browsed some recent research on the subject of anaerobic respiration, it isn't the lactic acid that would kill us, not directly anyway. Its the Hydrogen ions released by rapid ATP synthesis that would cause the acidosis.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 19:16:34 GMT
Not when you put it like that! 224mph would do away with the need for Ferraris and then where would rich people be without their status symbols? They'd need to install the engines in themselves!
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 5, 2009 19:17:52 GMT
You wouldn't need the whole species to evolve to be fast mate, only one person to mutate to have the ability.
You'd need quite a big DNA change, but they would still be human!
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Post by lemonpiper on Oct 5, 2009 19:20:16 GMT
And as people are getting taller all the time that would seem more feasible!
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Post by Tyler on Oct 5, 2009 19:23:33 GMT
As the rules on false starts are being changed next year (straight disqualification) we may see less worls records going as they'd be more concerned with actually getting on with it?
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 5, 2009 19:23:49 GMT
Ha, I like it ;D Lad at my school who's near that now Seriously though, if Usain Bolt and whoever the fastest woman runner had a kid, then trained it up to be a runner, you'd have both nature and nurture, so they could more than likely break 7.5/7 secs! Continue that, and you could eventually get closer and closer to 1 second!
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 5, 2009 19:25:41 GMT
Straight DQs? Seriously?!
What a load of bull that is, how easy is it to move a split second too early?!
Straight DQ should be for doping FFS, not false starts!
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Post by lemonpiper on Oct 5, 2009 19:28:01 GMT
Tend to agree there Joe. Athletics was never my forte but it was all too easy to get over anxious.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 19:34:40 GMT
You'd need quite a big DNA change... Understatement of the century. Such a massive mutation won't happen in one generation. Mutants tend not to be born with superpowers like in the movies. They tend to be ill and unable to reproduce or born with Downs Syndrome. A mutation resulting in all of the changes necessary in our body to achieve such speeds is impossible, simply because one mutation is not enough. The chances of them all being produced, even over billions of years, is damn near unthinkable. As a species, we aren't tending toward athletic perfection. We've as good as eliminated any kind of 'survival of the fittest' evolutionary sieve.
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 5, 2009 19:42:40 GMT
Over billions of years, trillions and trillions of people will have lived... I don't think that there won't be a single one who won't mutate to have those abilities.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 19:46:30 GMT
Over billions of years, trillions and trillions of people will have lived... I don't think that there won't be a single one who won't mutate to have those abilities. Two hundred mph? Good luck classifying that as Homo sapiens, that's all I'll say, because it certainly wouldn't be able to breed with any human alive today.
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Post by lemonpiper on Oct 5, 2009 20:35:26 GMT
No man would be able to catch her for a start!
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 5, 2009 20:48:32 GMT
You might well give it a good roasting but the chances of viable offspring would be about the same as if you shagged an Orangutan
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 6, 2009 17:08:52 GMT
When does it become a different species, though?
Everyone has different DNA, some drastically different, they're still human.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 6, 2009 17:49:46 GMT
When does it become a different species, though? Everyone has different DNA, some drastically different, they're still human. Essentially, a species is a group of organisms that can breed and produce viable offspring with each other. For example: the domestic dog (Canus lupus familiaris), different breeds look very different but they are all members of the same species because their gametes can fertilise one another to produce a viable zygote. There's some mechanical isolation preventing reproduction between certain breeds (think a Great Dane trying to get jiggy with a Poodle) but in the main, domestic dogs can breed with each other. Further to that, the domestic dog can breed with the Gray Wolf (Canus lupus) because the domestic dog is simply a sub-species of the Gray Wolf. On the flipside, a Horse and a Donkey could breed, the offsprinf would be infertile though. Horses and Donkeys are separate. Yes, everyone has slightly different DNA, but the differences within our species are fairly insignificant in the grand scheme. We have a genome of roughly three million base pairs which contains an estimated twenty to twenty five thousand genes that actually code for proteins. There's a lot of scope for diversity but the amount of mutations required to produce such a human would be far more significant than the differences between my DNA and your DNA, for example. This is beside the point though, I'm not sure an organism could ever be capable of those speeds. A one second 100m would require an average speed of 100 m/s. Nerve impulses rarely get above that speed. How would you react to the gun? Then there are all the other difficulties I mentioned earlier.
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 6, 2009 18:07:24 GMT
Essentially, a species is a group of organisms that can breed and produce viable offspring with each other. For example: the domestic dog (Canus lupus familiaris), different breeds look very different but they are all members of the same species because their gametes can fertilise one another to produce a viable zygote. There's some mechanical isolation preventing reproduction between certain breeds (think a Great Dane trying to get jiggy with a Poodle) but in the main, domestic dogs can breed with each other. Further to that, the domestic dog can breed with the Gray Wolf (Canus lupus) because the domestic dog is simply a sub-species of the Gray Wolf. On the flipside, a Horse and a Donkey could breed, the offsprinf would be infertile though. Horses and Donkeys are separate. Yes, everyone has slightly different DNA, but the differences within our species are fairly insignificant in the grand scheme. We have a genome of roughly three million base pairs which contains an estimated twenty to twenty five thousand genes that actually code for proteins. There's a lot of scope for diversity but the amount of mutations required to produce such a human would be far more significant than the differences between my DNA and your DNA, for example. This is beside the point though, I'm not sure an organism could ever be capable of those speeds. A one second 100m would require an average speed of 100 m/s. Nerve impulses rarely get above that speed. How would you react to the gun? Then there are all the other difficulties I mentioned earlier. Where, then, would the barrier be? Because surely if we can continue to break the record, there'd have to be an 'unbreakable' point? I reckon that over millions and billions of years, the previous record would continue to be broken, due to minor mutations which get passed on.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 6, 2009 18:18:30 GMT
I'm not sure where the limit is, I think humans could get a little bit faster due to improved training techniques and understanding of nutrition. One second is just crazy talk though. Plus, as a species there isn't a selective pressure on us requiring speed. What we're seeing from the Jamaicans, Americans etc' is an effect of the slave trade. This will diminish with time among most.
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 6, 2009 18:27:50 GMT
1 second seems like crazy talk now, I'd agree, but I reckon it'll easily be down to 8 before Mr. Bolt's finished, then we'd only need one person to be better than him, who could push it down to 7ish, and if people keep on knocking off little 1/10s...
We don't need speed as a race, but that's going into Lamark's theory (You aquire characteristics as you need them); in our society, no person would be shunned by their mothers, and left to die because they can run fast, then they'd be more likely to breed due to their fame/status/riches, so the 'fast gene' (if it exists) could easily be passed on, surely?
And if Bolt were to have a son, he'd have nature and nurture if he pushed him to be a runner from an early age!
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 6, 2009 18:30:40 GMT
It's the 'thin end of the wedge' argument, if you can get to so many seconds now, it will gradually decrease and decrease over time!
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 6, 2009 18:43:38 GMT
1 second seems like crazy talk now, I'd agree, but I reckon it'll easily be down to 8 before Mr. Bolt's finished, then we'd only need one person to be better than him, who could push it down to 7ish, and if people keep on knocking off little 1/10s... We don't need speed as a race, but that's going into Lamark's theory (You aquire characteristics as you need them); in our society, no person would be shunned by their mothers, and left to die because they can run fast, then they'd be more likely to breed due to their fame/status/riches, so the 'fast gene' (if it exists) could easily be passed on, surely? And if Bolt were to have a son, he'd have nature and nurture if he pushed him to be a runner from an early age! If you're bringing Lamarckian evolution into the discussion then I can conclude, without meaning to be rude, that you don't know what you're on about. There is absolutely no truth in Lamarck's idea. The requirement for a species to adapt is not exclusive to Lamarck's theory either, it is in fact central to the theory that Darwin and Wallace proposed. The fact is, we don't need to be fast, therefore we aren't ever going to see the human species become freakishly fast without applying eugenics, even with that though, a second is absolutely ridiculous. You are right on the sexual selection front, athletes are very attractive to the opposite sex because of fame/money/athletic skill etc'. Doesn't mean the person they have a child with is fast though, and the offspring will acquire half of their DNA. Then we go into your nature vs nurture point and have to raise old Jean Baptiste Lamarck again, not to use his theory but to reaffirm that it is a load of horsecrap. To a certain extent, Usain Bolt's capability is down to bloody hard work! The training that he does will not have any bearing on any potential progeny.
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 6, 2009 19:03:29 GMT
I was using Lamark as a counter to you saying 'we don't need to be fast', I said 'no we don't, but saying we only gain characteristics when we need to is Lamark's theory', which, as you said, is a load of rubbish (they proved it wrong when they chopped a load of mice's tails off, but their offspring still had tails).
If Bolt were to have a kid with whoever the fastest female sprinter is (no idea TBH!), then it would be more than likely that they'd inherit the 'fast gene'; he clearly (from where I'm standing) has something in his DNA that allows him to run effing fast, he started running at 12, there's a lad at my school who started about the same age, but is never going to get anywhere close to 9.58 seconds.
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 6, 2009 20:14:09 GMT
I was using Lamark as a counter to you saying 'we don't need to be fast', I said 'no we don't, but saying we only gain characteristics when we need to is Lamark's theory', which, as you said, is a load of rubbish (they proved it wrong when they chopped a load of mice's tails off, but their offspring still had tails). If Bolt were to have a kid with whoever the fastest female sprinter is (no idea TBH!), then it would be more than likely that they'd inherit the 'fast gene'; he clearly (from where I'm standing) has something in his DNA that allows him to run effing fast, he started running at 12, there's a lad at my school who started about the same age, but is never going to get anywhere close to 9.58 seconds. The need to adapt is not just Lamarck's theory! Darwins theory is based on the need to adapt as well. It just doesn't happen over a single generation. The currently accepted theory upholds my point. We have no selective pressures pushing our species toward excessive quickness so unless there's a statistically impossible genetic drift toward excessive speed (this is still assuming that a one second 100m is physically possible), it ain't going to happen! Also, just leave the 'fast gene' idea well alone. If genetics were that simple every man and his dog would be biotech millionaires and we'd have engineered superhumans. I'm fully aware that Bolt was born with something special, its the fact that he comes from a gene pool that was selected for its athleticism (I'm not being racist, its just true) that accounts for that. The thing is, he would have got nowhere without hard work.
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Post by Desktop Hoggy on Oct 7, 2009 2:36:07 GMT
I would like to see a match official to determine a false start if runners are doing a 100 metre race in one second. There would be more time spent on officials decisions than the actual race. Come to think of it, it would be pointless having a 100m race because it would be impossible to see the race unfold. From starting off the block, the point of highest speed, any drop in speed to the finishing line.
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Post by JoeLatics on Oct 7, 2009 17:53:23 GMT
The need to adapt is not just Lamarck's theory! Darwins theory is based on the need to adapt as well. It just doesn't happen over a single generation. The currently accepted theory upholds my point. We have no selective pressures pushing our species toward excessive quickness so unless there's a statistically impossible genetic drift toward excessive speed (this is still assuming that a one second 100m is physically possible), it ain't going to happen! Also, just leave the 'fast gene' idea well alone. If genetics were that simple every man and his dog would be biotech millionaires and we'd have engineered superhumans. I'm fully aware that Bolt was born with something special, its the fact that he comes from a gene pool that was selected for its athleticism (I'm not being racist, its just true) that accounts for that. The thing is, he would have got nowhere without hard work. You were insinuating that you only get new genes when you need them, which isn't the case! You randomly mutate, and if it's useful, you pass it on to their offspring, they pass it on etc, and everyone else dies out. Lamark's theory was that the giraffe got its long neck because it was reaching for the higher leaves, which didn't happen, a giraffe mutated to have a long neck, then passed that on to their offspring, and all the other 'pre-giraffe's died out. I was using the "running gene" to stand for all the factors which would affect being able to run quickly. A single mutation for someone to get all the neccessary genes would let the person do it, I'm not talking about the entire human race being able to do it, I'm talking about a single person; it wouldn't need to get passed on!
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Post by hallmackem on Oct 8, 2009 13:07:33 GMT
The need to adapt is not just Lamarck's theory! Darwins theory is based on the need to adapt as well. It just doesn't happen over a single generation. The currently accepted theory upholds my point. We have no selective pressures pushing our species toward excessive quickness so unless there's a statistically impossible genetic drift toward excessive speed (this is still assuming that a one second 100m is physically possible), it ain't going to happen! Also, just leave the 'fast gene' idea well alone. If genetics were that simple every man and his dog would be biotech millionaires and we'd have engineered superhumans. I'm fully aware that Bolt was born with something special, its the fact that he comes from a gene pool that was selected for its athleticism (I'm not being racist, its just true) that accounts for that. The thing is, he would have got nowhere without hard work. You were insinuating that you only get new genes when you need them, which isn't the case! You randomly mutate, and if it's useful, you pass it on to their offspring, they pass it on etc, and everyone else dies out. Lamark's theory was that the giraffe got its long neck because it was reaching for the higher leaves, which didn't happen, a giraffe mutated to have a long neck, then passed that on to their offspring, and all the other 'pre-giraffe's died out. I was using the "running gene" to stand for all the factors which would affect being able to run quickly. A single mutation for someone to get all the neccessary genes would let the person do it, I'm not talking about the entire human race being able to do it, I'm talking about a single person; it wouldn't need to get passed on! I'm not insinuating that. I'm insinuating that there is no 'evolutionary sieve' that will lead to humans developing such speeds I'm perfectly aware mutation is a random process. My point is about populations, genes don't stick around unless they provide a beneficial phenotypic trait. Unless some statistically improbable genetic drift occurs then you aren't going to get the accumulation of mutations necessary to get humans anywhere near you're talking about. And no a single mutation wouldn't. A single mutation would probably lead to a faulty protein and a genetic deficiency. Super-speed isn't suddenly going to appear in a person, just like eyes didn't just appear in an organism. Even after all this, though, you're still ignoring the major point. Biomechanically and biochemically, a one second hundred metre sprint is as near as makes no difference impossible. There'd have to be a complete overhaul of the human body and evolution doesn't demolish and rebuild. It extends.
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