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ACEfanatic02 is right, your all using the extreme example of 'not an athletic bone in their body' when that represents a very very small minority
Like you said not everyone can be amazing but the majority can be very good

Interest and desire are more important than born talent. If you don't have those in your chosen subject your'e not going to produce anything good regardless of talent.

Hence my point, fully agreed with everything K0NG.

True, and that is why I indicated physical limitations. Why do you think boxing is divided into different weight groups, so no one has an advantage over another. This goes back to before written history. A stronger and smarter man will be able to hunt for food better than the other and defend himself, while the weaker man will starve to death. In:Cities, of course some people will still stay better than others, but if it is a mental and more artistic skill (like RCT), anything will be based on opinion. If it is a physical activity, you can judge that someone who can run 10 miles is better than someone who can run 5.

It depends on what you go for actually, for instance singing is a talent and can be taught but if you haven't got a steady voice or can't keep a note or can't get to the high notes you need, you can train your voice but evn then it'll sound forced because your voice isn't up for what you try, here is where a "given talent" comes in I think, to some people singing with a good tone and melody is as easy as speaking, this is a talent, you have people who love singing and practise hours a day but that will never be as good as someone who has a talent for singing I think...

this applies to a lot of other "talents" aswell, sometimes things just come by nature for some people, live with it.

So, you're saying that even the clumsiest, most awkward, un-athletic kid on the block can reach that 98th percentile if he/she puts in enough time and effort? No. Some people are genetically disposed to be more athletic than others. And some people simply don't have a "God-given" athletic bone in their body.

If you have a physical disability, perhaps not. But "lack of coordination" is lack of time spent; you develop coordination by doing things that require coordination. You build muscles by using them. So yeah, it might take someone *longer* to do something, but they can still do it, and the difference is not really that severe.

Or that the kid that can barely manage to put together a stick figure so that it's recognizable as something can be the next Picasso if he/she attends enough art classes and practices enough? Not gonna happen if they simply have no artistic abilities. Not every fat person overeats and not every skinny person starves themselves. It's genetics...simple as that.

If they care about getting good at art, enough to keep trying and failing and trying again, then yes, they will improve and eventually get good. Granted, art is a fairly difficult realm to define "skill" in regardless.

The only reason the myth of "talent" is so common is it gives you an easy way to write off not being good at things you don't care enough to spend effort on. Once again, there's nothing *wrong* with not putting in the effort to get good at something; it simply means you don't care enough about it to do so. But it's kind of insulting to say, for example: "Oh, he's good because he's *talented*. He was born with it, so I don't have to hold myself to such standards." When, in fact, said subject has worked his ass off to get where he is.

I cannot currently be arsed to go back through and dig up the links, but there is significant research to support me. Can someone show me evidence of talent as opposed to time and effort?

-ACE

People are born more skilled than others in areas based on genetics and heredity. If your family traces back to a mountainous region, you would have stronger legs to hike steep slopes. If it traces to a colder region, you would have thicker hair and skin, etc. Some people are more coordinated than others, some have larger brains or more muscle, and that doesn't mean some people aren't born with defects. It's not like people are born all the same.

well by accident I can relate to this very good.
ever since I started doing jiu-jitsu I'm trying to get to the top 2% (as you guys call it).
I've got pretty high at points. but I always noticed that even if I trained for 24 hours a week (thats a lot believe me ....) I still wasn't able to get closer to people who only trained for 10 hours a week. It was because their bodies where better shaped for it and they just had the talent and I didn't. I have to cope with a annoying handicap (this) which doesn't help me in all ways. The nice thing was when some rules changed and everyone had to start learning new things. That was the time I went beyont my oponents for the first time. Because I trained so much I was able to pick the new things up much faster then they did. but after a while they passed me again because when they learned it they where able to get me again.
At one moment I switched to another kind of combat (called fighting system). where I first did duo system. Here I wasn't doing it together with someone else and had only my self to blame if I lost. Here I learned how I could beat guys who where better then me. Everyone of them learned certain techniques from the best in the netherlands cause they all trained together (it was the dutch team I was up agains). but their was theire weakness. To beat them I studied them really carefully and noticed where theire good points where. In a match I made sure they wheren't able to use the favorite techniques and I kept changing style so they never knew what to expect from me again. All in All I did what they couldn't. I didn't train to be one fighter, I trained to be 4 or 5 different fighters and switched between them at random moments. This I was able to do because I still trained a lot more then they did. But this also didn't made me very popular cause I didn't use the normal establised ways of fighting. and therefore I've started many debates under referees etc because they had to discuss of the things I did where actually legal within the rules etc.

To come to the conclusion. If you dont have talent its possible to get high, but you wont never make it to the top cause the top can easily adept to you. And even to reach it you have to do things other wont do and put so much effort in it that you sometimes wonder if it is even worth it. If you reached the subtop you need to be happy and try to get good contact with the top and see if you can bend things or create possebilities for your own. in that way you might be able to get to the real top.

Not every fat person overeats and not every skinny person starves themselves. It's genetics...simple as that.

Hope your not linking genetics to "fat" and "skinny" as, well, it would be wrong. Blaming genetics for weight problems is the easy way out, everyones thyroid works essentially the same.

People are born more skilled than others in areas based on genetics and heredity. If your family traces back to a mountainous region, you would have stronger legs to hike steep slopes. If it traces to a colder region, you would have thicker hair and skin, etc. Some people are more coordinated than others, some have larger brains or more muscle, and that doesn't mean some people aren't born with defects. It's not like people are born all the same.

What? I never knew having strong legs or thick hair/skin was a skill, that's pretty interesting
So I guess I'm coordinated because I was born in a coordinated region then, right?

Can someone show me evidence of talent as opposed to time and effort?

Not sure if this is what you were asking, anyway...I pitched in high school and I enjoyed it while I was in a game competing, but never enough to do anything outside of what I absolutely had to. During the summer I was on a club team and I would only go to the games I pitched, once a week, and do nothing related in between. On the same team, the coaches son pitched and he loved it, would go to all 6 games a week, work on it with his dad in between, etc. Then after the summer I would take the fall/winter completely off from baseball and pick up a glove again for the first varsity practice in the spring, meanwhile he went to pitching coaches, seminars, etc. So we would come back and he would start out looking better than me but always within a couple of weeks of practicing with the team I would once again become better than him. Our senior year I was the number 1 starter from the beginning of the season to the end, he started out as the number 3 and didn't make it through 3 games as a starter
I'd call that at least some talent over effort. Not to say it was something I was born with, but I most likely developed it naturally some way. Which goes to say I don't believe you are born with talent, athleticism yes, but talent I believe you develop through actions in your early youth

Hope your not linking genetics to "fat" and "skinny" as, well, it would be wrong. Blaming genetics for weight problems is the easy way out, everyones thyroid works essentially the same.

Hope you're not taking that one line and quoting it out of context as an easy way in to thinking that you have a valid basis for some type of argument to post. "Not every fat person overeats and not every skinny person starves themselves" is a valid, scientifically proven statement. I personally know people (and I'm sure you do as well) that can eat and eat and eat, sit at a computer all day and never gain a pound. I also know people that diet and exercise like they're training for the Olympics and still gain weight. People's metabolism differs. But, that wasn't my point. It was just an example to further illustrate the statement preceding it.

Also, you're at least the 2nd person today to post in this particular thread using the term "the easy way out". Whether it's regarding someone giving up because they'll never be as good at something as someone else because of the other individual having more "God-given talent" or someone that, in all actuality, has a genetic disorder that causes them to be overweight and has no problem vocalizing that fact when given the opportunity, it often is, in fact, the truth. Of course, people that don't have the gumption to attain whatever it is they seek will also use that as an excuse for their inadequacies..but it often is more fact than fiction.

man i've been trying for years to be a fat guy and still haven't succeeded.

^Take the easy way out and have fat injected throughout your body. Of course, you probably possess the metabolism that would burn it off in no time at all. I've seen those wrists

haha dude it SUCKS!

plus, i got severe case of mono like two weeks ago and one of the symptoms is loss of appetite. so i lost like 8 pounds last week. its ridiculous

Sure, blame mono...take the easy way out.

hahaha i've never had it before man. all i know is that i wasn't hungry, and when i was, i was super pissed off because my throat hurt too much to swallow

Hope you're not taking that one line and quoting it out of context as an easy way in to thinking that you have a valid basis for some type of argument to post.

Actually no, when I see a "fat,overweight,cant lose weight" genetic statements I tend to correct it. And as for the people that train like "Olympians" and still cant lose weight they may have concern for a genetically linked thyroid disorder, however, thyroid disorders are rare, and even if there is a problem it would have been caused by your effect on your genetic code, not the genetic code effecting you. Works both ways as we are after all an open system.

watch biggest loser.
all them fat people work out like crazy and some may lose 15 lbs in one week, and some might lose 2 lbs.

Thats one week, takes much longer to actually effect metabolism speed. Besides are they doing cardio or strength exercises? And how many of them were actually athletes before? or how much did they weigh as children? Food diet as a baby?

who cares, they're fat. and thats all that matters in my scientifically ignorant eyes

Now go finish Sea World!