What do athletes contribute to Society?

[CarsonPalmer]

Darth Servo, remember, this was the Great Depression, and the government was building almost everything they could find an excuse to build just to provide jobs. You are correct that building football stadiums would not be a good idea now.

Just a question, now. If a a professional sports team offered a deal to the local government, say 50% of costs of building a new stadium in return for 50% of team profits, would this be a wise thing for the government to accept?

[Darth Mortis]

I must point out that there are "good" role models in sports. For instance, Lebron James of the Cavs, my home team, just signed on and started a company to rebuild the bad area's of Cleveland. And trust me folks, I live right by Cleveland, this was no small task. I applaud him for his continued work in the lower income regions of Ohio.

[Darth Wong]

I must point out that there are "good" role models in sports. For instance, Lebron James of the Cavs, my home team, just signed on and started a company to rebuild the bad area's of Cleveland. And trust me folks, I live right by Cleveland, this was no small task. I applaud him for his continued work in the lower income regions of Ohio.

I wouldn't call Lebron James a particularly good role model. Like many athletes, he used sports to get out of the ghetto, providing yet another high-profile example of the message that good grades won't get you where you want to go. He then pounded this message home by skipping college entirely and going straight to the NBA.

Sure, now that he has megabucks, he can spend some of it fixing up the shithole area where he grew up, but I would hardly call him a good role model in general.

[Stravo]

I must point out that there are "good" role models in sports. For instance, Lebron James of the Cavs, my home team, just signed on and started a company to rebuild the bad area's of Cleveland. And trust me folks, I live right by Cleveland, this was no small task. I applaud him for his continued work in the lower income regions of Ohio.

I wouldn't call Lebron James a particularly good role model. Like many athletes, he used sports to get out of the ghetto, providing yet another high-profile example of the message that good grades won't get you where you want to go. He then pounded this message home by skipping college entirely and going straight to the NBA.

Sure, now that he has megabucks, he can spend some of it fixing up the shithole area where he grew up, but I would hardly call him a good role model in general.

Mike, what about the kids who aren't smart? We know there are plenty of them. By saying that the only way out that's admirable is through good grades and turning our nose up at other methods such as athletic ability aren't we sending a negative message to these kids? If you aren't smart you can't be a good role model? I don't know if I'd be willing to go that far.

With Lebron he could have gone down the route of many atheletes that got out of the hood and simply forgot about it and never looked back. He didn't.

[Darth Wong]

Mike, what about the kids who aren't smart? We know there are plenty of them. By saying that the only way out that's admirable is through good grades and turning our nose up at other methods such as athletic ability aren't we sending a negative message to these kids? If you aren't smart you can't be a good role model? I don't know if I'd be willing to go that far.

What, those kids can't become plumbers or auto mechanics or bus drivers? The reality here is that athletics is an absolutely horrible route for a kid to pursue as a way out of the ghetto, and for the vast majority of kids (regardless of how smart they are), it's an unproductive way to focus your time and effort. It's quite literally like encouraging kids to play the lottery; in fact, the odds are probably similar.

With Lebron he could have gone down the route of many atheletes that got out of the hood and simply forgot about it and never looked back. He didn't.

Goody goody gumdrops for him. It still doesn't make him a good role model; it makes that one particular aspect of his life story good, but let's take an analogy. Suppose Lebron James never became a basketball star, but instead, he spent all of his time doing small jobs to earn money which he spent on lottery tickets. Now suppose he actually won, since that does happen to some people (in fact, more often than people make it to the NBA). Now he takes some of his winnings and spends them to renovate the shithole neighbourhood where he grew up. That's great, but does this make him a good role model for kids?

[Stravo]

Mike, what about the kids who aren't smart? We know there are plenty of them. By saying that the only way out that's admirable is through good grades and turning our nose up at other methods such as athletic ability aren't we sending a negative message to these kids? If you aren't smart you can't be a good role model? I don't know if I'd be willing to go that far.

What, those kids can't become plumbers or auto mechanics or bus drivers? The reality here is that athletics is an absolutely horrible route for a kid to pursue as a way out of the ghetto, and for the vast majority of kids (regardless of how smart they are), it's an unproductive way to focus your time and effort. It's quite literally like encouraging kids to play the lottery; in fact, the odds are probably similar.

I think the issue I have with poo pooing athletics as a way out is that there is a feeling in those kind of neighborhoods (And I grew up in one) that any way out is a good way out. You just want to get out period.

Athletics have often been the only way out for alot of these kids (i.e. scholarships, etc) and I have no idea why the poor kids in these neighborhoods don't go the way of plumbing or a trade job. I have no answer to that because it frankly never occurred to me.

Of course that doesn't really address the issue of whether someone is a good role model doing that - I concede that point.

[Lusankya]

A better example of a good role model would be Steve Waugh (former Australian cricket captain), who set up a charity to help children in India. As far as anyone can tell, his motives for that were purely altruistic - while on tour, he decided that the children there didn't live in very good conditions, and decided to do something about it.

Or perhaps, by DW's standards, James Hird (captain of the Essendon AFL team), who portrays himself as a nice guy and has a degree in Civil Engineering. Seeing as he's developing a career in the media, he probably won't use the degree for much, however he does have it, and actually studied alongside playing footy. He's also quite good-looking, which didn't hurt him. The AFL was probably very annoyed a few years back when their golden boy had to take most of a season off because he broke his face.


ROAR!!!!! says GOJIRA!!!!!

[Darth Wong]

A better example of a good role model would be Steve Waugh (former Australian cricket captain), who set up a charity to help children in India. As far as anyone can tell, his motives for that were purely altruistic - while on tour, he decided that the children there didn't live in very good conditions, and decided to do something about it.

Lebron James' charity is genuine too. You're completely missing the point.

Or perhaps, by DW's standards, James Hird (captain of the Essendon AFL team), who portrays himself as a nice guy and has a degree in Civil Engineering.

Yes, that would be a much better example; someone who did athletics but also worked hard in school and had a solid fall-back position if athletics didn't work out. Unfortunately, it would be something of an understatement to say that he's the exception to the rule, and would be even more dramatically so in America.

[Master of Ossus]

Terrifying.

What's especially bad is the apologism in the few comments that the article has received.

David Beckham has never exactly been celebrated for his intellect, but even his greatest critics will be surprised by his latest confession: he can't understand his six-year-old son's maths homework.

The England captain made his remarks when doing an interview with The Mail on Sunday's Live magazine.

He admitted that when Brooklyn asked for help with a school assignment recently, he was baffled - and had to turn to his wife Victoria for assistance.

"Their homework is so hard these days," said Beckham. "I sat down with Brooklyn the other day - and I was like, 'Victoria, maybe you should do the homework tonight.'

"I think it was maths, actually," he said before adding in less-than-textbook English: "It's totally done differently to what I was teached when I was at school, and you know, I was like, 'Oh my God, I can't do this.' Brooklyn was like, 'Please do it with me,î and I'm like, 'I'll read your book with you.'"

Beckham also admits that unlike many of his England team-mates, he has no pre-match 'lucky' routine - because he wouldn't be able to remember it from week to week.

"I find that if I follow a routine ... it gets to the stage where you are thinking, 'Right, was it the left side ... the left boot I put on first, or the right side?' There are so many things that can go through your mind."

Brooklyn, who will be seven next month, attends £1,200-a-term Runnymede College in Madrid, an exclusive British school that follows our National Curriculum, and is being primed to take his first key-stage tests in maths and English this summer.

These include "counting and using numbers to at least ten in familiar contexts", "talking about and creating simple patterns" - presumably not including the 4-4-2 formation - "beginning to understand addition as combining two groups of objects" and one concept at least that David should be familiar with from his day job: "using everyday words to describe position".

Typical homework tasks for Brooklyn's age group include working out shoe sizes from foot lengths, calculating the cost of two items on sale for 3p each and measuring spoons.

Runnymede - whose past pupils include Rebecca Loos, who made a series of "kiss-and-tell" allegations about Beckham shortly after he arrived to play for Real Madrid - admits only candidates who have scored 110 or more in an IQ test and prides itself on stretching its pupils.

But whether it can do the same for their parents is another matter.

Of the seven comments on the article, six of them attack the reporter or pass off Beckham's poor performance and point out his soccer skillz. Here's a typical example:

I am disgusted by David Thomas’ article and his ridicule of David Beckham. There is absolutely no justification in making anyone a figure of derision especially when they freely admit to being unable to do something, regardless of how simple others may feel it is. It is this attitude that prevents many people, who would like to improve their education, but do not, as they are afraid that others will ridicule them and label them as stupid. I work in a primary school where the ethos is to treat each other with respect, and not allow anyone to be bullied whatever their academic ability.

- Maggie Haile, Thamesmead,London. UK

[Darth Wong]

Terrifying.

What's especially bad is the apologism in the few comments that the article has received.

Not surprising; people give athletes a free pass on every goddamned thing there is, so why should rampant stupidity be an exception?

Here's a typical example:

I am disgusted by David Thomas’ article and his ridicule of David Beckham. There is absolutely no justification in making anyone a figure of derision especially when they freely admit to being unable to do something, regardless of how simple others may feel it is. It is this attitude that prevents many people, who would like to improve their education, but do not, as they are afraid that others will ridicule them and label them as stupid. I work in a primary school where the ethos is to treat each other with respect, and not allow anyone to be bullied whatever their academic ability.

- Maggie Haile, Thamesmead,London. UK

You're supposed to grade them based on their academic ability, you stupid bitch. If Beckham were in your class, your job would be to give him a failing grade because he doesn't get the material.

[Big Phil]

Beckham's a moron - how is that news? You've heard him speak, haven't you? I'm surprised the guy is able to use three-syllable words...

[General Brock]

Athletes maintain the culture of play. It wasn't that long ago in Victorian times that there was a debate over whether sport and exercise was beneficial and desireable, as it was seen to detract from work and worship, and encouraged the idle intermingling of gender and class. Sport was also becoming the refuge for the practice of gentlemanly values hard-learned from a more bloodthirsty era but out of syc with industrial capitalism.

The contributions of athletes and athleticism and value of sport science is usually qualitative though, not quantitative like discrete inventions and scientific breakthroughs.

Today, there is no question of the value of exercise in daily life, or the social worth of values like sportsmanship and meritocracy. Pro athletes are the technicians who carry their art to the highest level, and as coaches and exemplars provide experienced guidance to amateurs.

If athletes disappear, including their coaches and officials, lost is a body of knowledge that cannot be easily re-invented and a unique and useful perspective of human psychology and health. Imagine trying to re-learn horse riding from scratch, or golf. If athletes never were, neither would things like running shoes or high performing bicycles, because it was athletes who demanded these things. Athletes didn't invent indoor plumbing and electricity, but the contributions of sport to quality of life predate those inventions, while demands of sport demand invention and new applications of inventions.

Theraputic exercise systems such as mitzvah and are based on warm-ups derived from the Western theatre, dance, martial arts - and sport. This isn't knowledge that can be easily developed from modern scratch, as they were discovered in a more physically demanding era. It was living knowledge transmitted from practicioner to practicioner, with subtle nuances that can only be quickly understood through experienced guidance.

Is the irresponsible behavior of an athlete indulged because of deference to the athlete, or is it a desire to preserve and promote the notion of privilege? A $120 million dollar contract to play sport is part of a culture of entrepreneurial success, a system of agents, lawyers, businessmen and assorted flunkeys.

I wouldn't heap all blame for the abuses of the sport industry on athletes; they don't often have the education and power to hire, fire, or trend-set the way their agents, owners, and media moguls do. They are just the most visible elements of an entertainment system run by unscrupulous businessmen and financiers, from whom come 'anything to win, anything to PWN' values, in contrast to the noble 'fair play' character of modern sport as it was initially founded by athletes.

[Darth Wong]

The contributions of athletes and athleticism and value of sport science is usually qualitative though, not quantitative like discrete inventions and scientific breakthroughs.

That's a convenient way of avoiding direct comparisons. But anyone who says he would rather give up electricity than televised football would be fourteen different kinds of blithering idiot.

Today, there is no question of the value of exercise in daily life, or the social worth of values like sportsmanship and meritocracy. Pro athletes are the technicians who carry their art to the highest level, and as coaches and exemplars provide experienced guidance to amateurs.

What a steaming pile of bullshit. Individual exercise is in no way contingent upon the existence of "elite" athletes, and professional athletes generally do not furnish us with stellar examples of sportsmanship. If anything, they act like spoiled brats and will bend and twist any rule they can in order to win.

If athletes disappear, including their coaches and officials, lost is a body of knowledge that cannot be easily re-invented and a unique and useful perspective of human psychology and health.

And just how valuable is this "body of knowledge" to society?

Imagine trying to re-learn horse riding from scratch, or golf. If athletes never were, neither would things like running shoes or high performing bicycles, because it was athletes who demanded these things. Athletes didn't invent indoor plumbing and electricity, but the contributions of sport to quality of life predate those inventions, while demands of sport demand invention and new applications of inventions.

And high performing bicycles are not of particularly great value to society. Nor are high-end running shoes. This is the mother of all circular arguments: you are saying that sports is useful because it demands invention of things designed to help with ... sports.

Theraputic exercise systems such as mitzvah and are based on warm-ups derived from the Western theatre, dance, martial arts - and sport. This isn't knowledge that can be easily developed from modern scratch, as they were discovered in a more physically demanding era. It was living knowledge transmitted from practicioner to practicioner, with subtle nuances that can only be quickly understood through experienced guidance.

What a load of bullshit; modern physiotherapy has been developed through medical science, not athletic achievement. We had athletes for thousands of years without developing these modern techniques, which didn't come along until SCIENTISTS got involved.

Is the irresponsible behavior of an athlete indulged because of deference to the athlete, or is it a desire to preserve and promote the notion of privilege? A $120 million dollar contract to play sport is part of a culture of entrepreneurial success, a system of agents, lawyers, businessmen and assorted flunkeys.

Totally irrelevant to the fact that it's a disgustingly bad role model for kids, and that the contributions of this overpaid athlete to society are in no way comparable to his payment.

I wouldn't heap all blame for the abuses of the sport industry on athletes; they don't often have the education and power to hire, fire, or trend-set the way their agents, owners, and media moguls do. They are just the most visible elements of an entertainment system run by unscrupulous businessmen and financiers, from whom come 'anything to win, anything to PWN' values, in contrast to the noble 'fair play' character of modern sport as it was initially founded by athletes.

You are full of shit. Sports were initially founded by kids who wanted to have fun, not premiere athletes. The very notion of the elite adult professional athlete is a massive perversion of what these sports originally were. And if you're talking about the classical athletic events like track and field or javelin, those were founded as sports for the purpose of developing skills used in warfare, not sport for its own sake.

[Durandal]

Beckham's a moron - how is that news? You've heard him speak, haven't you? I'm surprised the guy is able to use three-syllable words...

For Christ's sake, he said "teached". I thought British people were automatically supposed to be smarter on account of their accents.

[DesertFly]

I remember hating sports for taking the time slots of good TV shows from when I was a little kid(I used to watch shows like Vetenskapens Värld or World of Science on SVT and En Cellsam historia, a cartoon kids show about the body in which blood cells and antibodies and such where characters, show it to your kids parents). I still hate televised sports in all their shape and form.

I know exactly what you mean. I cannot abide watching sports in any form. Going out and playing a round of football or basketball or baseball with some of my friends or a school team is one thing, watching overpayed men running around is another. I can even stand high school and college football, to an extent. At least with them there's a chance that it's my friends out there running around. But even then I dislike watching it. As for pro sports, I feel that they are a waste of time and money that could be better spent on other things. If they were to disappear tomorrow, I think I would do a little happy dance, then continue with my daily routine.

[CarsonPalmer]

In regards to sports spurring medicinal advances, I would think, and this is pure conjecture on my part, that sports provided the spurs for certain advances. I also think it is unfair to assume by default that a someone who is a professional athlete is automatically a spoiled brat. Again, I ask that if the owners are making millions of dollars off the athletes, isn't it fair for the players to ask for a slice of the pie?

[Darth Wong]

In regards to sports spurring medicinal advances, I would think, and this is pure conjecture on my part, that sports provided the spurs for certain advances.

This is like the argument for warfare, and it's just as specious. It may demand advances but it does not actually cause them. And in most cases, the advances forced by sports have precious little application elsewhere.

I also think it is unfair to assume by default that a someone who is a professional athlete is automatically a spoiled brat.

Why? They're treated like gods from a young age, idolized, and paid an absurd amount of money to pay a child's game for part of the year. The system is virtually designed to produce spoiled brats.

Again, I ask that if the owners are making millions of dollars off the athletes, isn't it fair for the players to ask for a slice of the pie?

Again I ask WHAT FUCKING PART OF THE QUESTION YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND, MORON. The whole pie is much too fucking large relative to the value of sports in society. Arguing about how the crooks should divvy it up is completely ignoring the point at best, and a blatant attempt at a thread hijack at worst.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

I wonder. Would it be relevant to this topic to point out potentially how mass-sports system are used in relation to the power-structure in society? Would that count as a type of "contribution" to society, even if it could be negative consequence?


For instance, when I was in sociology, we briefly discussed how mass entertainment in general, not only sports, can be used as a form of light control and propaganda to manipulate youth, keep people occupied and away from important decisions, and to waste time and effort on nonsense, all the while producing profits for corporations that sell the mesmorized fans sports equipment, memorabilia, and "future images."

As an example, Mr. Wong mentioned that, in the United States, there is a distinct atmosphere of anti-intellectualism. "Elites" and academics are discouraged, I gather. I wonder, though, if it is partially cultivated by sports, and if sports are encouraged instead of academics to keep people in certain strata ingnorant and occupied, but still profitable. In sociology, we were introduced to an odd phenomenon in which sports impact social-stratification and are used to manipulate. Many people in lower socio-economic status are brought up in a simulacrum in which their reality is constructed often around sports and their products. They are taught to idolize sports-figures; many are convinced that to succeed is to be like that athlete. Meanwhile, certain corporations like this to happen, because it keeps people profitable and stupid; profitable because they are stupid and easily manipulated by harnessing the power of the emotional, hope-giving sport they were inculcated to focus attention on.

Taking advantage of the years of inculcation in sports-idolizing and the low educational level, the businessess frequently juxtapose the "athletic idols" with their product, implying that if the child gets these products, he will be like the famous athelete and succeed more. This emotional ploy gets the children to buy these products and use them to achieve the athletic dream, when money and attention could be better spent elsewhere.


Supposedly, this cycle helps contribute to a maintenance of poverty and profits, while the fanatical devotion to sports keeps people ignorant and unacademic, which the kids care about the sports instead of the books. Of course, this is a gross simplification of the real theory. I don't have the texts with me now.

[Surlethe]

I wonder. Would it be relevant to this topic to point out potentially how mass-sports system are used in relation to the power-structure in society? Would that count as a type of "contribution" to society, even if it could be negative consequence?

Contribution is generally a positive term; if you're going to point out negative consequences of sports, then understand that you're only reinforcing the case that science is more valuable than sports.

As an example, Mr. Wong mentioned that, in the United States, there is a distinct atmosphere of anti-intellectualism. "Elites" and academics are discouraged, I gather. I wonder, though, if it is partially cultivated by sports, and if sports are encouraged instead of academics to keep people in certain strata ingnorant and occupied, but still profitable.

I think you may have causation backwards; is there any evidence that sports are encouraged to keep people poor instead of interpreting the correlation to say poor people tend to be more interested in sports than academics?

Taking advantage of the years of inculcation in sports-idolizing and the low educational level, the businessess frequently juxtapose the "athletic idols" with their product, implying that if the child gets these products, he will be like the famous athelete and succeed more. This emotional ploy gets the children to buy these products and use them to achieve the athletic dream, when money and attention could be better spent elsewhere.

Sure; this is simply the sort of fallacious marketing that we see everywhere. Appealing to irrelevant authority is nothing new in the economy, and it's yet another reason why marketing to children should at least be discouraged.

Supposedly, this cycle helps contribute to a maintenance of poverty and profits, while the fanatical devotion to sports keeps people ignorant and unacademic, which the kids care about the sports instead of the books. Of course, this is a gross simplification of the real theory. I don't have the texts with me now.

The description makes sense, but I don't know that there's some sort of mass conspiracy by corporations, athletes, and the government to perpetuate the cycle by encouraging impoverished people to love sports.

[Darth Wong]

The description makes sense, but I don't know that there's some sort of mass conspiracy by corporations, athletes, and the government to perpetuate the cycle by encouraging impoverished people to love sports.

It may actually be noteworthy that in the 1960s following the success of the civil-rights movement, the American government encouraged inner-city black youth to take up sports, ramping up spending on urban sports programs and facilities and scholarships. One might interpret this as simply a mistaken and misguided attempt to help, but there are quite a few in the "black community" who have interpreted it as a deliberate attempt to keep black kids away from academic success by enticing them them away from the books. Given the politics in play at the time (after all, the people in charge had just lost a battle to keep black kids segregated), it's not that outlandish.

[Surlethe]

It may actually be noteworthy that in the 1960s following the success of the civil-rights movement, the American government encouraged inner-city black youth to take up sports, ramping up spending on urban sports programs and facilities and scholarships. One might interpret this as simply a mistaken and misguided attempt to help, but there are quite a few in the "black community" who have interpreted it as a deliberate attempt to keep black kids away from academic success by enticing them them away from the books. Given the politics in play at the time (after all, the people in charge had just lost a battle to keep black kids segregated), it's not that outlandish.

That's really interesting. Employing sports seems a very subtle method of social control; perhaps I'm used to the current administration (which has been in power for as long as I've followed politics), but the level of manipulation seems to be beyond bumbling politicians. It also seems that if such spending were malevolent, there would have been clear signals of motivation and major scandals as people retired, documents were declassified/leaked, memoirs were published, etc.; but on the other hand, the American public is notoriously apathetic, games have been used to control the masses for centuries, and if they really did want to improve the inner cities, isn't establishing and funding schools the way to go?

[Darth Wong]

That's really interesting. Employing sports seems a very subtle method of social control; perhaps I'm used to the current administration (which has been in power for as long as I've followed politics), but the level of manipulation seems to be beyond bumbling politicians. It also seems that if such spending were malevolent, there would have been clear signals of motivation and major scandals as people retired, documents were declassified/leaked, memoirs were published, etc.;

What documents would there be? Funding? That was all in the open. Racist motivations and beliefs behind those decisions? Let's face it, in governments which had only recently stopped overt racial segregation, that's virtually a given, and it's not going to generate scandal when it's revealed. It might not necessarily have been a conscious plot; it may well be that white racist bureaucrats simply decided that their new mandate to encourage black success should obviously revolve around sports, since "everyone knows" that blacks are no good at anything which requires heavy thinking. It wouldn't surprise me at all if this was their thinking.

but on the other hand, the American public is notoriously apathetic, games have been used to control the masses for centuries, and if they really did want to improve the inner cities, isn't establishing and funding schools the way to go?

As far as they're concerned, funding sports was funding the schools.

[General Brock]

Darth Wong wrote:

That's a convenient way of avoiding direct comparisons. But anyone who says he would rather give up electricity than televised football would be fourteen different kinds of blithering idiot.

I prefer to avoid competition between the two. The practice of sport enacts social ethos in terms most people can relate to, and is an affirmation of a desired social reality. Science is something only the enactor and a specialized audiance can appreciate, such as the electrical engineers and businesspeople who made the discovery of electicity useful to people, or other scientists.

Scientists and athletes both benefit society, and science informed the development of modern sport as it did all other modern human endeavor. Without science, sport as we know it could not exist, but sport would exist. Without sport, science has one less human frame of reference to study.

On the extreme side, a bratty overpaid athlete may be unpleasant, but he or she isn't making possible WMDs that could render every positive development of science moot.

What a steaming pile of bullshit. Individual exercise is in no way contingent upon the existence of "elite" athletes, and professional athletes generally do not furnish us with stellar examples of sportsmanship. If anything, they act like spoiled brats and will bend and twist any rule they can in order to win.

When someone breaks the rules and acts badly, it is news becaue it is seen as alien to the sport, whether it is spun as cool or a betrayal or simply worthy of scorn.

Individual exercise benefits from people knowlegeable of exercise. For complex exercise, there are athletes specialized in its expression, and there are those who do it very well, either as technicians or instructors or both. For every tennis brat on TV, there are hundreds of professionals and semi-pros making a living, supplementing incomes, or volunteering time to give lessons and demonstrations, improving the quality of life for many. The entertainment of athletic activity is not passive; for most, entertainment comes from participation. The reason you see sport on TV is because it is a stable and predictable demographic, not an overwhelmingly large one.

An Olympic race walker is not needed for a walk around the block, nor a sprinter needed to guide a jog in the park. Seeing elite athletes gives an athletic example to be followed, and their experience provides data, not only on body mechanics, but things like nutrition and psychology, and this information contributes to the body of knowledge on human health and well being, benefitting even those with no interest in exercise.

Elite performance caps a system of endeavor, providing a frame of reference for judging genuinely competant practicioners as well as beneficial refinements and advancements in the complex exercise. It is all there waiting for the individual praticioner to take it up.

And just how valuable is this "body of knowledge" to society?

That would depend on the value of the sport and sporting recreation to society, how it is used, if it is used at all, to socialize people. Wushu is China's national sport; some consider it an important part of their heritage, and a great way to stay fit, and some do not.

It's movements and rules of competition are unique and could not be re-invented without living practioners to impart this knowledge, and a large number of them in competitive/cooperative practice to ensure quality. Does China need this body of knowledge? Well, it has certainly become a source of income for many elite athletes and it keeps people healthier in a preventative way, useful since medical care has been desocialized.

Society also needs positive guiding philosophies, and this is usually part of the study of wushu and the other 'martial' arts. The martial arts in China is less popular than the practice of hockey in Canada, on a percentile basis, but like hockey, most people know what it's about, or supposed to be about.

And high performing bicycles are not of particularly great value to society. Nor are high-end running shoes. This is the mother of all circular arguments: you are saying that sports is useful because it demands invention of things designed to help with ... sports.

Quality of life. An old ten-speed from the 1960's is a perfectly adequate bicycle, but a lighter, affordable titanium framed mountain bike designed to maximize an athlete's mechanical efforts also works better for people who cycle to and from their workplace, and certainly preferable to the singly-geared bicycles that were first invented. Running shoes can handle punishment that would destroy conventional leather shoes, and are ergonomically designed as well as stylish. The first Aididas running shoes were designed by an athlete, for athletes using science applied to his experience as an athlete. These things benefit a large number of people, yet would not necessarily exist economically had the demands of sport not been placed on the technology.

Sport generates market demands and information. In a free market economy, that contibutes to the demand for trained scientists and the wealth to fund them in other endeavors as well. While some scientists have made identifiable and profound contributions to society, most will never get that honour, but work in fields like chemistry and metallurgy making the little advancements that make better bicycles and shoes possible. Others can hope for a corporate grant to their universities by such generators of surplus wealth as Aididas.

What a load of bullshit; modern physiotherapy has been developed through medical science, not athletic achievement. We had athletes for thousands of years without developing these modern techniques, which didn't come along until SCIENTISTS got involved.

Modern physiotherapy is a rather soft medical science. They don't always understand why some things do or do not work with patients, and physiotherapists, massage therapists, and chiropracters all have their share of 'miracle workers' and quacks and are a bit rivalrous. Medical science standardized existing physical therapies and developed new techniques, and gave it the name 'physiotherapy', however the concept of focused exercise and external manipulation to ameliorate injury predates modern science.

Totally irrelevant to the fact that it's a disgustingly bad role model for kids, and that the contributions of this overpaid athlete to society are in no way comparable to his payment.

Its a living, and an overpaid athlete is not on the same level of disgusting as some of the other financial inequities that exist in society that are much harder to explain to a kid. Overpaid athletes don't even lay deliberate plans to be overpaid; it is a pipe dream, but still undertaken with the positive premise: work hard to realize success. There is something to be learned in their failings as well.

The contributions of the athlete to society are relevant human examples of inspiration, motivation, and simple entertainment. That's not something one can easily put a price tag on, but the service can be delivered in such a way that the relatively small individual contributions by individual fans add up to one big pot. Ty Murray's autobiography is entertaining and interesting. At ~$30, hardcover, multiplied by several thousand other readers, minus publishing and other attendant costs, and Ty Murray probably turned as healthy a dime as he ever did at a rodeo event. A scientist can publish a discovery - but the system has limited rewards, because that paper is of use to a considerably smaller readership. Of course, Someone like Stephen Hawking is an exception. Very few scientists patent their discoveries; some discoveries can't be and some scientists don't have the knowlege, inclination, or resources to look out for their legal rights.

You can't blame the athlete for the system. If you can use the athlete's experience to explain to a kid how to deal with why life isn't fair, why some things are the way they are, and not something else, then that is a valuable lesson on getting along in society. Most complaints simply seem envious, or jealous, and not at all constructive.

Some individual athletes get a lot of money, but most don't. A far larger slice of the economic pie goes to research and development than sports. The lack of recognition and remuneration of the individual scientist may well reflect the importance of the scientist versus the athlete.

An athlete is 'safe' to entrust with the power of wealth, lacking the power to effect society except through celebrity in a controlled sport media. Scientists need to be kept on a tighter leash, or something unprofitably decisive might be done about smoking or global warming. There was a recent scandal at health Canada, where scientists alleged pressure was placed upon them to pass dubious drug patents. Scientists at the department of Fisheries and Oceans are under pressure to keep silent about problems with the B.C. salmon fishery due to salmon farm pollution.

You are full of shit. Sports were initially founded by kids who wanted to have fun, not premiere athletes. The very notion of the elite adult professional athlete is a massive perversion of what these sports originally were. And if you're talking about the classical athletic events like track and field or javelin, those were founded as sports for the purpose of developing skills used in warfare, not sport for its own sake.

Modern sport, as a philosophy and social institution, is characterized as it was formalized by persons of leisure; the aristocrats and new bourgeois class that arose during Britian's Industrial Revolution and matured during the Victorian era.

They were not elite athletes, but they were athletes, and exemplars of sport did arise from them. The nouveau riche adopted some of the manners of the aristocracy. A separation between professional and amateur sport did develop, with pro sports catering more to the masses, and amateurs to educated elites. The sport movement was generally unified by the ideal of sportsmanship, which changed the way sport was played by society.

During classical times, sport was recreation and a showcase for individual military skills, and anything goes contests like pancration were popular; great for spectacle and motivation, bragging rights as to which city state (or rich athletic sponsor) could field the better man. However, the classical sports lacked a team elemnt, and the emphasis on individual rather than team achievement wasn't considered a useful military attitude.

Chariot racing, the most popular of classical sports, was sport for sport's sake; the chariot races continued well after chariots became obsolete in the battlefield. It had no value apart from visceral thrills.

Modern sportsmanship emphasizes civilized behaviour;

* playing fair
* following the rules of the game
* respecting the judgment of referees and officials
* treating opponents with respect

The Wiki goes: "conduct and attitude considered as befitting participants, including a sense of fair play, courtesy toward teammates and opponents, a striving spirit, and grace in losing."

Those values are also came to be expected in daily, non-sporting conduct, and were probably as useful to instill in suddenly urbanized masses converted from field workers to factory workers as they were in university undergrads entering the dawn of industrial capitalism. Anything goes did not go, and standardized, fair and civil rules for play and conduct of play became entrenched in the public mind as normal and desireable, not just for sport, and not just for kids, since these early athletes were grown men and women.

Scientists are above unethical antics, and it seems to be becoming common. Not long ago in the Globe and Mail, a premed student related his experiences at a prominant Canadian college. Apparently, competition for grades is so intense, some students have resorted to extreme methods of cheating. Mentioned was the removal of a library reserve magazine articles, cut right out of the publication, so that other students cannot easily complete their assignments. This is quite a step up from cheat notes. Furthermore, the administrative body is aware of the goings on, but discreetly accepts it as part of the competitive process, and, this has happened elsewhere.

The dominant media sport spin believes sportsmanship isn't workable, and ethical athletes aren't cool - even when they succeed.

They can't change what sport means to most athletes and to society at large. This should be obvious, since everyone still knows what sporting and unsporting behavior is. The neo-Spartan chic of defying the positive moral expectation, rather than living up to it, and calling it good because it comes with some material success, comes from outside sport and athletes are not the problem.

[Darth Wong]

I prefer to avoid competition between the two.

That's because one is vastly more important than the other and you're too dishonest to simply admit that.

When someone breaks the rules and acts badly, it is news becaue it is seen as alien to the sport, whether it is spun as cool or a betrayal or simply worthy of scorn.

Don't be ridiculous. Half the unsportsmanlike conduct you see on the field is not even penalized.

Individual exercise benefits from people knowlegeable of exercise. For complex exercise, there are athletes specialized in its expression, and there are those who do it very well, either as technicians or instructors or both. For every tennis brat on TV, there are hundreds of professionals and semi-pros making a living, supplementing incomes, or volunteering time to give lessons and demonstrations, improving the quality of life for many.

What the fuck makes you think we need televised sports for any of this shit?

Elite performance caps a system of endeavor, providing a frame of reference for judging genuinely competant practicioners as well as beneficial refinements and advancements in the complex exercise. It is all there waiting for the individual praticioner to take it up.

That's a really long-winded way of saying that elite athletes give you something to shoot for, asshole. Big fucking deal. I'm going to snip the rest of your similarly worthless attempts at distraction through sheer volume.

Quality of life. An old ten-speed from the 1960's is a perfectly adequate bicycle, but a lighter, affordable titanium framed mountain bike designed to maximize an athlete's mechanical efforts also works better for people who cycle to and from their workplace, and certainly preferable to the singly-geared bicycles that were first invented.

You honestly think that multi-geared bicycles were invented because of elite athletes?

Running shoes can handle punishment that would destroy conventional leather shoes, and are ergonomically designed as well as stylish. The first Aididas running shoes were designed by an athlete, for athletes using science applied to his experience as an athlete. These things benefit a large number of people, yet would not necessarily exist economically had the demands of sport not been placed on the technology.

Bullshit. People would still run and jog without elite "athletes" in competition. Your entire incredibly long-winded argument is based upon the obscenely obvious false-cause fallacy that developments in medicine and personal exercise equipment were triggered by the existence of elite athletes rather than advances in science and manufacturing.

Modern physiotherapy is a rather soft medical science.

And sports is supposed to make it better?

The contributions of the athlete to society are relevant human examples of inspiration, motivation, and simple entertainment.

Inspiration to do what, exactly? Oh yes, more sports. Your argument is continually circular.

Modern sportsmanship emphasizes civilized behaviour;

* playing fair
* following the rules of the game
* respecting the judgment of referees and officials
* treating opponents with respect

No it doesn't.

Scientists [aren't] above unethical antics, and it seems to be becoming common.

Hardly relevant to your ridiculous assertion that the contributions of science and sports to society are comparable, or your obvious attempts to pretend that sports is much more important than any other kind of entertainment such as Michael Bay movies or pornography.

Your incredibly long-winded stream of bullshit never once justifies your claim that sports is of great benefit to society. All you do is throw up circular justifications, falsely equate sports to exercise, and practice your skills at excessive verbosity, most of which I couldn't be bothered to even quote because it has nothing whatsoever to do with the point.

[Patrick Degan]

Scientists and athletes both benefit society, and science informed the development of modern sport as it did all other modern human endeavor.

Crap. Sports, when they're not simply a recreational activity for the weekend warrior, are nothing but bread and circuses for society at large. They're nice, but as has been said before in this thread, if every professional athelete vanished off the face of the Earth tomorrow, the sports leagues may be thrown into total disruption, but eventually a new crop of athletes would be taking their place. That science has had its impact on sport simply demonstrates which of the two endeavours is the far more valuable.

Without science, sport as we know it could not exist, but sport would exist. Without sport, science has one less human frame of reference to study.

Sport —even as we know it— existed quite nicely without extraordinary technological intervention until only the last fifteen years or so. And I doubt science would be hard-pressed to devise a human frame of reference to fill the niche if professional sports didn't exist.