SPECHES
No one knows what the future will hold, maybe a
bright era of peace and understanding, or maybe a
dark destiny of fear and hate. Here are three
scenarios envisioned by skaters of different fates.
GENE GENIES-Michel Gumowski
"My esteemed colleagues,
what I am going to present
today challenges all known
concepts in the world of
genetics. A hushed din of
shi-pers arose from a guth-
ering of top scientists and
physicians. Dr. Rosen, a
Twenty two year-old wun-
derkind, continued with his
presentation. "Since the
publishing of Darwin's theo
ry of natural selection, it has
been generally understood
that, through natural selee-
tion and adaptation, genetic
produces the most successful
form of a species. It has also
been believed that this attain
ment of species perfection
takes generations to occum As
early as the rise of Hitler, it
was thought that selective
breeding could produce a su
perior race. As scientists, we
know that we too can affect
this evolutionary development
through manipulation of
DNA. However, this manipe
lation of life raises moral and
ethical questions
"I have always been fasci-
nated by how an individual
who leads a physically chal-
lenging lifestyle can alter his
body structure. Through con
tinued activity, bone and
muscle mass increase, and the
individual becomes superior
to less active individuals
However, this state only re-
mains as long as the individu
al is active, and then only the
ability not the actual physical
state, is passed on to the off-
spring. This is also affected by
the physical state of the sub-
ject's mate. In other words, we
could produce genetically su
perior humans if we imposed
strict standards on which con
ples should procreate, but
morally and ethically humans
must be able to choose their i
own partners, to intermingle
and meld, in order to let nat-
ural improvement occur."
The hushed conversations
stopped as the audience fo
cused their complete attention
to De Rosen "The pastion
now pose is this: What would
happen if two individuals.
with identical, physically-
challenging lifestyles were to
join through natural selec
tion? Would this result in a
physically superior offspring.
who, for the first time, ex-
hibits the increased bone.
mass and increased muscle
teme formally attainable only
through physical activity?"
The din rose again as the a
diener pondered the radical
nature of this point. Even if
this evolutionary change
could occur. the numbers.
would be so small that on the
grand evolutionary scale they
would be insequential and
still require generations to ef
fect the total population.
years old. 10. 14" "Hello, I am Steven, I am four and
my 10 is 110. And I'm Beth, five-and-a-half. IQ.
145. The assembled group marveled at the children's
poise and enunciation. A call came from the audience "Dr.
Rosen, you have found some gifted children. But of what
consequence? You yourself were gifted what makes
them more unique than you?"
Dr. Rosen nodded, and the curtains opened to reveal a
variety of wooden structures. He huddled with the chil
dren and sent them off. "What you see before you are
skateboard ramps. As you can see by their size and
shape they are quite challenging, and yet these children
perform on them like seasoned professionals."
All eyes turned to the ramps. Four of the children
beaded for the highest ramp, while Steven started skating
the smaller floor ramps. Without fear, Mike, Larry Trisha
and Beth dropped in on the towering halfpipe. Each was
capable of pulling six-foot ollies, a height nearly twice
their size. Inverts and varials were done to perfection
Steven, while excellent for his age, fell two times for every
une fall of the other four After twenty minutes of intense
skating, Dr. Rosen continued his presentation to the
awestruck crowd. "As you can see, these four children
skateboard with power, balance and skill well beyond.
their chronological ages. They have an ability to concen
trate that usually only develops with time and experience.
Their bodies, as you can see, take tremendous punish-
ment with no apparent injury. In fact. I have made ar
rangements for those interested to participate in physical
on the children, Steven, however, who is the product of
only one skateboarding parent, exhibits more tendencies
of the avenge child his age. He does have a greater see
of balance, yet lacks the confidence of the other children.
These five children were selected from one daycare center
located near my research facilities. If four are present in
only one daycare center, how many are present in the
hundreds of daycare centers in this city? I have only
scratched the surface, in order to pope your interest. If I
am correct, we, in our lifetime, are seeing a major and
obvious change in the human species as we know it. We
have been given an opportunity to see 'natural selection
in action, not over centuries, but years."
"Colleagues! Please, please,
let me continue!" exclaimed
Rosen. "For your edification."
he continued, "Thave brought
five subjects, four who exhibit
this trait, and one as a con
trol. De Rosen left the podically superior athletes through the years: Jim Thorpe.
um and returned with five
small children. "Four of these
children have parents who
participated in the same ac
tivity. The fifth had only one
parent who participated in
said activity
One by one, the children in-
troduced themselves, "I'm
Mike, I'm four-and-a-half
and my 1.Q. is 138." (Inci-
dentally, 150 is csidered gr
mis). In Lany I'm five and
141 is my LQ" "Trisha, four
"De Rosen, a question if I may. There have been physi-
Jesse Owens, Mark Spitz Nadia Comaneci BrSmith,
Hong-der Ling, Boris Boshefsky and many more who are
participating in our current 2016 Olympics. Why have
these traits never occured before?"
"It is my belief, Dr. Jackson, that these athletes chose
mates who were not physical matches Their off-pring.
like young Steven, exhibit only partial traits of their ath-
letic parents. Because of the parents' genetic mix, the
children received only half the genetic potential for physi-
cal prowess. These four children have parents who were
and still are avid skateboarders. I also believe that the
children were conceived at the time their respective pur-
ents were at the peaks of performance, thereby passing
on an improved set of genetic coding Cage)
64 THRASHER MAGAZINE
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HARRY HE