Slashdot Mirror
Amputee Sprinter Wins Olympic Appeal to Compete
Dr. Eggman writes "Oscar Pistorius, a 21-year-old South African double-amputee sprinter, has won his appeal filed with the Court of Arbitration for Sport. This overturns a ban imposed by the International Association of Athletics Federations, and allows Mr. Pistorius the chance to compete against other able-bodied athletes for a chance at a place on the South African team for the Beijing Olympics. He currently holds the 400-meter Paralympic world sprinting record, but must improve on his time by 1.01 seconds to meet the Olympic qualification standard. However, even if Pistorius fails to get the qualifying time, South African selectors could add Oscar to the Olympic 1,600-meter relay squad."
...to all athletes that have to drag their lower legs at each step, and not having the benefit of springlike limbs.
Although it might sound rude, but people with non-natural body part should not compete with other "able-bodied" athletes. This is almost the same as using enhancement drugs. One thing for sure, able-bodied runner could sprang their ankle. This athlete is immune to that. There are other unfair advantage(s) for this and other able-bodied athletes. He should be allowed to compete, but just not on the same ground. Maybe start another league of Olympics specially designed for amputees?
...the engineering team that actually created his legs? Geez. How many body parts can I have replaced before I cease to be a full-human athlete? I guess I could just have a brain wired up with an android and qualify?
I dont like where this is going years down the road.
The guy was 11 months old when his legs were amputated below the knee. Regardless of whether these J blades give him a slight edge or not (personally I am not a sports person oddly enough!), he deserves a chance to compete based on his determination if nothing else!
He is a great role model for other disabled persons in his way - just as Stephen Hawking is in his.
Awful UID - but I have been here ages...
clearly these artificial limbs store kinetic energy in a radically different way. the biomechanics are obviously different. he's using different muscle groups. watch a video of him, and he clearly starts off slower than everyone else, and then speeds up a lot faster than everyone else: he's running on springs
god bless the guy, he's a phenomenal athlete. but he shouldn't be allowed to compete with runners with real feet. he's playing checkers when everyone else is playing blackjack. what he is doing is just not the same sport as what the other guys on the track are doing. and so he shouldn't compete with them. not because he doesn't deserve to just because he doesn't have feet, but simply because he's playing a different biomechanical game
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
At the same time, he's fighting against a lot of people who pretend that all the other athletes compete on a level field. Between genetics, economics, training resources, secret drugs and unethical (or illegal) techniques - and plain old luck - that myth is hopelessly naive and misleading.
As I see it, this is about strength of mind and will more than about strength of body. That's what separates the real champions from the rest. The Olympics serve to remind us what is best in us. This example would touch millions of people, far, far more than someone shaving another three hundredths of a second off the 100 meter record or whatever.
His legs were amputated. He should not be amputated from the idea he's still 100% human.
Here's what's wrong with someone who "just takes some amphetamines":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_at_the_Tour_de_France#Tom_Simpson_dies_in_the_Tour
Drug taking is mostly illegal because of the seriously negative side effects of many of the performance enhancing drugs.
If drugs were allowed, I can imagine seeing "suicide winners" appearing. People prepared to push the doping so far that they'd keel over and die on the finish line. Who wants to compete with that? I like winning, but I'm not really prepared to die because I've overridden a bunch of my body's built-in self protection mechanisms.
Comparing prosthetic limbs to drug-taking doesn't really seem like comparing apples to apples, but there are some parallels. If prosthetic limbs are allowed and they become so good that only people with them can win, how many people will be prepared to "cripple" themselves to win, and is it fair on those who don't want to chop off a leg or two? I don't think it is.
Like there are categories of physical ability in the Paralympics now, and weight classes in boxing, martial sports, etc, I think that everything should just be categorised, and "able-bodied" just becomes another category. If prosthetics continue to improve, "able-bodied" might not even be the best performing (i.e. fastest) category in all sports. If you want to move into the "faster" category, sure, go ahead and chop off a leg, but you can't compete against non-prosthetic-endowed athletes any more.
Nailed it, didn't I? Be honest now...
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
...if they're letting regular athletes compete in the disabled categories as well. After all, what's good for the goose...
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
the issue isn't this guy.....the issue is the precedent it sets. /. should be completely onboard with the olympic committe. In 50 years we WILL have cyborg legs....should that be allowed in the olympics?
I want a separate olympics.......an entertain me monkey olympics.
Laser eye surgery doesn't fundamentally change how you see, but these prosthetics fundamentally change how he runs. What do you do when new prosthetics are developed that increase performance X%, just allow him to upgrade while the rest of the field sticks there thumbs up their asses?
Lets keep things in perspective, track and field is a sport about human performance, this ruling just introduced engineering into track and field as a major factor. I find this far more preposterous than the use of steroids, at least steroids are just hormones increasing performance through biological means and hence still 'human performance'.
And what are you trying to imply is the 'purpose of such games'? Good will, giving everybody a chance, blaah blaah? The purpose is a fair competition amongst the best the world has to offer. The keep time for a reason, the test for ban substances for a reason, the call false starts for a reason. That's right not everybody gets a chance to compete and only one gets the gold.
Look, I wasn't born with legs that can run at Olympic sprinter speeds either. Why should this guy get a free pass when I don't just because he was born with a birth defect? Envy? Maybe (probably) but I was a pretty good athlete many moons ago (yes a few of us are here on Slashdot... save your insults) and I would have liked a shot at the Olympics too. While he's not cheating (I greatly admire what he's accomplished) I think there is a double standard here. Most of us are not born with the ability to be Olympic athletes. That's supposedly the entire point. Perhaps not anymore?
But people with glasses don't see better than people without glasses and so far it doesn't seem like they ever will, whereas prosthetics have already shown the ability to improve a person's performance, perhaps not (yet) against top athletes, but very certainly in comparison to an average human being.
That point was long lost when the artificial chemical enhancement took over to push the limit of what the human body can achieve.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
All that is true, but he (Roosevelt) could not have gotten away with hiding his condition without the help and support of the mass media. ALL of the mass media.
Granted, the mass media was much smaller then, but there were ample photographs of Roosevelt in his wheelchair. The newspapers decided not to publish them. All the newspapers.
It wasn't a conspiracy, that's just the way things were. It would have been considered rude and disrespectful to point out a man's frailties. This same attitude contributed to the disqualification of the one-legged high jumper in the olympics. It was a blatant flaunting of a disability, regardless of the fact that he could still compete. It wasn't "humble" in a time when humility was more important than being "cool" is today.
His prosthetics are actually less efficient than human legs for running so they confer no advantage. If you want to know more try searching the New Scientist archive. They have a good article on this at http://technology.newscientist.com/channel/tech/mg19426055.200 although I think you need to subscribe to see it.
To quote from the article "Most prosthetic leg specialists say such concerns are ill-founded, for now at least. The prosthetic legs, which are made by the Icelandic company Ossur, act like springs which store energy as the foot is pushed into the ground, and then return much of it to the runner, just as tendons do in a natural ankle. However, unlike natural legs, the Ossur prosthetics lack the muscles to generate their own power, and so provide much less energy overall than natural legs, the experts say."
I think there is a case for banning amputee runners from using power assisted prosthetics or prosthetics that were unnaturally long but I think that would be an obvious move that could be made even without the expert opinions of