Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage • Hacker News Board

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#41

Post by Someone » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 1:03 PM UTC

staunch wrote: post #16

phpnode wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Possibly diet. Obviously it's anecdotal but all of the Dutch people I know consume far more dairy products than those from the UK. Edit: Turns out the Dutch are the third biggest consumers of milk per capita in the world[0], looking at the list of "tallest" countries on wikipedia[1], there seems to be a great deal of overlap at the top of the two lists. I wonder if a secondary factor could also be related to vitamin…

Over 2,000 years ago Julius Caesar described the people that lived where The Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany are today. > They do not live much on corn, but subsist for the most part on milk and flesh, and are much [engaged] in hunting; which circumstance must, by the nature of their food, and by their daily exercise and the freedom of their life (for having from boyhood been accustomed to no employment, or discipl…

There is discussion about the truthfulness of "de bello Gallico". Some historians even call it propaganda (http://www.researchgate.net/publication/242303564_Julius_Cae...). He likely will have exaggerated the strengths of his enemies.

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#42

Post by mcv » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 2:10 PM UTC

rambambam wrote: post #21

I'm a Dutch young man of 6 feet and 3 inches tall. First of all, I don't believe the claim in the beginning of the article stating that the average height of Dutch men is above 6 feet. I remember reading an article a couple of years back saying the average height for Dutch men is about 5 feet and 11 inches. To me, that looks more like it, but my opinion and experience are not based on proper research, so who knows. T…

I think the 6 feet is the average height of young Dutch men. Older generations are shorter, but the last generation to reach adulthood is really well over 180 cm in height.

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#43

Post by mcv » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 2:12 PM UTC

I've always wondered if the amount of milk and cheese we consume might be a factor. But I expect there's more countries where those things are popular in large amounts.

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#44

Post by staunch » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 5:17 PM UTC

Someone wrote: post #41

staunch wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over 2,000 years ago Julius Caesar described the people that lived where The Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany are today. > They do not live much on corn, but subsist for the most part on milk and flesh, and are much [engaged] in hunting; which circumstance must, by the nature of their food, and by their daily exercise and the freedom of their life (for having from boyhood been accustomed to no employment, or discipl…

There is discussion about the truthfulness of "de bello Gallico". Some historians even call it propaganda ( http://www.researchgate.net/publication/242303564_Julius_Cae... ). He likely will have exaggerated the strengths of his enemies.

It was unquestionably propaganda, Caesar paints himself in the best possible light most of the time, but there is no one who questions the overall historical accuracy. Most of Caesar's military and political life is confirmed by many other sources and pieces of evidence.

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#45

Post by staunch » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 5:34 PM UTC

DonQuixote1000 wrote: post #33

staunch wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over 2,000 years ago Julius Caesar described the people that lived where The Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany are today. > They do not live much on corn, but subsist for the most part on milk and flesh, and are much [engaged] in hunting; which circumstance must, by the nature of their food, and by their daily exercise and the freedom of their life (for having from boyhood been accustomed to no employment, or discipl…

Call me stupid but I thought corn was native to the Americas. I guess something is getting lost in translation.

Also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maize

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#46

Post by gumby » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 7:27 PM UTC

curtis wrote: post #14

I have wondered if epigenetic effects ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics#Transgenerational_... ) from the 1944 Dutch famine ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Dutch_famine_of_1944 ) could have resulted in a substantial positive impact on Dutch height for several generations following the famine. It seems likely that eastern Europeans suffered much more extreme privations than the Dutch did in this time period…

Actually this is a good guess: kids who had the bad luck of being in the wrong trimester during the height (depth?) of the famine had a might higher prevalence of schizophrenia.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9708024

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#47

Post by kazuya » Sun, Jun 28, 2015, 11:36 PM UTC

jules wrote: post #40

throwaway9789 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a fellow short guy this definitely an issue I face too. In a way you have to appreciate the honesty of these women who make completely categorical statements that they will not consider anyone below their own height, or even anyone below the average male height (so roughly 50% of males) or sometimes even setting their minimum heights well above the male average. Height is simply a major factor of male attractivene…

For what it's worth I think the importance put on height is primarily a US phenomenon. That's not to say that it's unimportant elsewhere, but not as exceptionally important as in the US. It's one of the factors among many.

It's not only in US. We've had the phrase 'three highs' (三高) in Japan, about height, income, and education, though people openly express this are getting downplayed these days. Not sure how it matters in the dating market.

Re: Natural Selection May Help Account for Dutch Height Advantage

#48

Post by narag » Mon, Jun 29, 2015, 2:25 AM UTC

curtis wrote: post #26

Someone wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes this such a popular area of research is not that they are taller, but that they overtook everybody else in no time: "In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, people of European descent in North America were far taller than those in Europe and were the tallest in the world. [...] In the late nineteenth century, the Netherlands was a land renowned for its short population" ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik…

So one question is, if you normalize nutrition, what's the intrinsic height difference between populations? You are correct that the speed at which the Dutch have overtaken other nearby populations is kind of surprising. A nutrition differential could make that much difference, but it seems like general nutrition shouldn't differ much at all between the Dutch, the Belgians, the French, etc. Another possibility is jus…

I don't think it's a matter of natural selection:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics