Category: Competition

Aligning the Loops

February 19, 2023 By arne hendriks Off

A study published in the journal Biology Letters finds that the evolutionary advantages and disadvantages of being a specific height are unevenly distributed between the sexes. For women looking to pass on their genes it is better to be short as this is considered to…

Social Canines

October 1, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

Basically it was women who made us human. A female desire for less macho behaviour in male great apes and consequently a greater capacity for collaboration enabled our evolution, and the directional female choice for men with smaller canine teeth led the way. Canine tooth…

Human-sized Penguin

July 20, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

Global warming is causing many species of animals to shrink. That is why we’re intrigued by this counter-intuitive RESEARCH on prehistoric giant penguins. Most penguin species today are small to average sized flightless birds that live in the colder regions of the southern hemisphere. They…

3-Point Space & Time

May 29, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

Not long ago basketball was dominated by very tall men who positioned themselves near the basket to score, rebound, or discourage any opponent from getting to the hoop. The closer a player got to that hoop, the better, as shots from up close earned him…

Butterfly Goalie

January 18, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

When something grows, other things shrink in comparison. Sports are often an interesting discipline to investigate this simple principle and its effects. In ice hockey the relatively small size of the goal makes it effective for a goal tender to put as much of the…

Fóxì

January 5, 2022 By arne hendriks Off

‘Tang Ping‘ or ‘Lying flat’ can be translated as a resistance to participate in the tempo and demands of current neo-liberal society by doing very little or nothing. Fóxì, or Buddha-like, is a rather more frequently used word similar to tang ping. Buddha-like youth, also…

Miss Heightism

October 31, 2021 By arne hendriks Off

If your ambition is to be Miss France there are considerable discriminating parameters. You cannot have children, you cannot be married, tattoos are forbidden and you have to be at least 170cm tall. Selection on height is outright height discrimination and an example of the…

Mating Swarms

October 25, 2021 By arne hendriks Off

Selection on male body size is the result of four components of lifetime reproductive succes . 1. Daily mating success (how often do you get lucky). 2. Fecundity (number of offspring per mating). 3. Stamina (time remained within a situation of possible mating). 4. Longevity.…

Hard(en) Deceleration

May 3, 2021 By arne hendriks Off

According to Marcus Eliott, who has analyzed the biomechanics of hundreds of NBA players, Brooklyn Nets basketball player James Harden is pretty pedestrian by all traditional performance metrics. But when Harden came for a closer examination there were several areas in which Harden was an…

Suez-Maxed Out

March 30, 2021 By arne hendriks Off

At 07:40  on 23 March 2021, one of the largest containerships in the world, the Ever Given (400m x 59m x 21m) , was passing through the Suez Canal. After losing the ability to steer because of high winds the ship became stuck and blocked…

Trunkism

November 10, 2020 By arne hendriks Off

The growth of a tree trunk demands considerable investment and focus of resources. The competition for sunlight can lead to very differently formed trunks within the same species of tree. A comparison of two white oaks tells the story. The broad-crowned shorter oak grew as a…