> neither of these are true because your mother's womb is all of environment, diet, not (your) genetics, and not controlled by a twin study. > you're welcome t

> neither of these are true because your mother's womb is all of environment, diet, not (your) genetics, and not controlled by a twin study. > you're welcome to invent some kind of intervention study where you edit one twin's genes and not the other though. And yet all of these criticisms are just saying we don't have a way to perfectly isolate the genetic effect. These studies still provide evidence for the impact of genes on whatever they are studying, even if the conditions in the mother's womb are also factor. The position that "everything but genes explains the observed differences" is the irrational one given the evidence. > The other issue is that genetics don't typically make you better/worse in general, they make you more adapted to an environment. I'm not sure why you are bringing this up? I didn't say anything about being better/worse in general (whatever that means)? I am talking about being able to run a 4 minute mile on Earth's surface (1 atm, 15-30 celsius, etc.) > Though I remember hearing about this tribe of long-distance runners, who adapted to their lifestyle not through genetic traits but cultural ones And yet, it's trivial to find papers mentioning how more genetic analysis is required, but there is evidence for genetic adaptation: "The only genetic analysis carried out specifically in Tarahumara runners showed a striking enrichment in genes related to the production of the extracellular matrix of tendons and muscles in a gene ontology analysis (41). This genetic profile could provide the mechanical advantages for the foot strike that we mentioned above." "Remarkably, it has been found that physical training in hypoxia can upregulate NKC activating molecules (52). And indeed, the activator gene, KIR2SD5, has a differential expression among the Tarahumara (19)." https://www.germanjournalsportsmedicine.com/archiv/archive-2021/issue-2/why-are-the-tarahumara-amerindians-in-mexico-such-powerful-mountain-runners/ https://www.germanjournalsportsmedicine.com/archiv/archive-2... > The best examples of genetic traits that do differ in humans are ones we got from elsewhere; humans really are extremely closely related for a species and haven't had much time to invent a lot of them. You are talking about traits such as Tibetan adaptation to high elevation - something which requires genetic variability and selection pressure - whereas I am simply talking about the fact that there is genetic variability at the individual level that impacts performance. Absence of a large number conserved genetic traits in specific populations, does not imply "human genetic differences are irrelevant at the individual level". I am not claiming Norwegians as a whole have developed the "superhuman middle-distance running trait". There likely has been no (or little) selection pressure to do so, so the "trait" does not exist as something that is conserved in a specific population. What exists is a lot of genetic variation that allows for some individuals (such as Jakob Ingebrigtsen) to be significant outliers when it comes to running a mile race. Because. of. his. genes.