
Dutch men confirmed as world's tallest - redcalx
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-36888541
======
Phemist
As a tall Dutch man who has been dragged into this conversation a lot, it is
interesting to note that only 150 years ago, the Dutch were the shortest
nationality in Europe. To me this means that nutrition has a massive effect on
growth. In fact, regular food in Dutch supermarkets is supposedly the most
cost-effective fresh food on the planet, ie quality/freshness vs price. I
wouldnt be surprised if the growth in relative length of the Dutch correlated
with the increased centralization of commerce through the port of Rotterdam
(and thus provide access to lots of fresh produce quickly, compared to
countries "down the rivers".

~~~
leg100
Personally, I find the Dutch diet to be pretty unadventurous and poor.
Sandwiches predominate, with not a lot of variety in cooking. This may well be
irrelevant to the OP; nothing but cheese sandwiches and sour buttermilk may
well be the perfect diet for growing tall.

As for the Rotterdam argument, I suspect fresh food would have to be flown in
rather than shipped, which takes weeks.

~~~
lawnchair
Dutch food is the worst. The Dutch think of eating as a chore. When was the
last time you went out for Dutch food? There's a reason the answer is never.

~~~
spiderfarmer
How many countries the size of the Netherlands do have a typical cuisine
that's recognized around the world?

~~~
leg100
Jamaican, Greek, Lebanese, hell even Belgian (mussels and frites!)

Size is no excuse.

~~~
spiderfarmer
So just 4? My point is there are not many countries that have highly
recognizable cuisines.

------
chrischen
> "Tall people tend to have a longer life expectancy, with a reduced risk of
> heart disease. On the other hand, there is some evidence that they are at
> greater risk of certain cancers, such as colorectal, postmenopausal breast
> and ovarian cancers."

This is actually false. When controlled for childhood nutrition, shorter
people have much higher life expectancies Source:
[http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/201...](http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/07/height_and_longevity_the_research_is_clear_being_tall_is_hazardous_to_your.html)
(among other sources)

~~~
vacri
That article is all over the place. Centenarians in Japan are 4 inches shorter
than 75-year-olds? No mention of controlling for diet during upbringing, nor
that a human shrinks as they age. The taller half of Europe has fewer
centenarians per capita than the shorter half? No mention of climate, which is
more troublesome to the elderly in northern Europe. Scandanvians have more
heart disease than Iberians? No mention of dietary control. Sardinian soldiers
who reach age 70 live a little longer if short? What about if they don't reach
age 70? What if more short Sardinian soldiers die in their 60s?

There isn't much in the way of apples-to-apples comparison in that article.

~~~
throwaway13337
Here is a list of studies from the nih with the same conclusion:

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1071721/](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1071721/)

The research is clear - controlled for other factors, shorter people live
longer.

~~~
lostlogin
To those that have this cited to them regularly (and always by short people) -
the correct response is "yeah, but you're living longer whilst short"

~~~
Swizec
I may be short, but at least I can fully extend my legs on economy flights.

Beat that, tall person.

~~~
haar
I'm 6'8 and my girlfriend is 5'2\. Usually I find our arguments to be the
opposite way round in that "you have it better", e.g. My girlfriend needs a
stool to reach the top shelf of the cupboards, but I have to time my steps as
to not hit my head on door frames.

I think the worst one was learning to drive and then the many frustrating
trips trying to find a car I could fit in.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
Once you can reach that tall cupboard the returns start diminishing fast.
Pros/Cons are very lifestyle dependent.

------
emmelaich
I have a fun bit of anecdata. My wife and I are not Dutch but our son was born
in Amsterdam. He was over 6' (183cm) when he was 13 and is now about 6'5 at 17
years old. I never reached 6' myself, and only a few cousins/uncles have.

One thing the Dutch do is give doses of vitamins particularly D to all
children for the first few years.

It's vital for the darker skinned citizens (Moroccans/Algerians) but probably
pointless for the 'average' white Dutch person.

My standard joke to Dutchies is that they grow tall to compensate for the fact
that much of the Netherlands is lower than sea level.

~~~
findyoucef
Hey there I'm Algerian. I find height to be an interesting topic in Algeria
because a lot of people grew much taller after france left algeria, so i think
environment and nutrition are big factors. My mom, her sister, and her brother
were all born in the early 50s during the war and french rule and they were
all relatively short. 5'0 5'2 and 5'7 for my uncle, while her other two
siblings a sister and brother who were born after the war were much taller. My
aunt was 5'6 and my uncle 6'0, and now his son is 6'5.

~~~
erelde
I think people grew taller generally after the 60s ? Richer nutrition globally
certainly, lots of meat (also leading to earlier puberty I seem to remember) ?

~~~
timje1
Earlier puberty normally results in a shorter adult - since kids tend to grow
slowly before puberty and stop once it finishes.

------
rejschaap
I always find it funny that being tall is seen as positive. There is actually
a lot to say for being short. Cars and houses could be smaller, we'd need less
food. Is there really anything a 4 foot person can't do as opposed to a 6 foot
person? We just need a frame to carry our brains around. Of course there is
some tail-end of the distribution stuff like professional basketball and sumo
wrestling. And there is the fact that we didn't optimize the world for small
people. But I think there is good case for smaller people.

~~~
avar
The article is discussing taller populations, not individuals. Within
populations being tall tends to be a proxy metric for general prosperity, so
of course it's a positive.

Aside from that there seem to be intrinsic advantages to being tall. Taller
people have bigger bodyparts, including bigger brains, and there's a
correlation between larger craniums and higher intelligence[1].

This doesn't seem to be a very thoroughly studied subject though, but it
really should be. If there's anything we could be doing to increase the
average intelligence of human species that's going to pay dividends down the
road.

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_and_intelligence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_and_intelligence)

~~~
rejschaap
"Within populations being tall tends to be a proxy metric for general
prosperity"

Which is something I object to. In the past obesity and skin color were also
linked to propserity. In some countries they still are. We shouldn't accept
such nonsense.

~~~
avar
You object to consistently having plentiful nutrition from infancy on the
scale of nations over large time spans being strongly linked to prosperity?
That's essentially what the tall = positive statement is about.

Few things are as well established as strong correlations for prosperity. You
might as well say "I reject reality and substitute my own".

~~~
rejschaap
I do reject your concept of realitiy and I do think everybody is substituting
their own.

Other than that I think being tall is great, but being small is better. Our
nutrition has improved quite a lot through the years. And I hope it will
continue to do so. I say let's start with cutting all growth hormones from our
meat and milk and see where that brings us.

------
tmsbrg
I wonder how much the negatives of being short are caused by lower self esteem
due to simply what people say and think about heights.

I'm one of the shortest people in the country with the tallest people in the
world, the Netherlands. My height is 164 cm (aside: why do people tend to give
their heights in imperial units? Does anyone get that?). I actually never had
a problem with my height or felt bad about it when I was younger. I felt bad
about plenty of other things about myself. I remember in elementary school a
medical inspection where the inspector told me I'll always be short, and asked
me what I thought of it, as if I'd be depressed about it. I didn't get her at
all. But whenever there's discussion about it online, it's things like people
saying women prefer taller men, or people who are 10 cm taller than me saying
they hate being short, and people like that inspection woman that do trigger
the insecurity part of my brain.

I think it's completely irrational though. As other people have posted, I
think the link between health, intelligence and height is one of correlation
instead of causation. And I know women's preferences are often much more
diverse and different than what people tend to say and think. But still it
triggers that insecurity. And I know that can really be a bad thing in itself.
Maybe that's the real "shortness" problem people tend to have?

~~~
gakada
It's all relative. As the paper shows, 164cm is average male height in some
countries. The average person is only a plane ride away from being either a
short or tall person. Unless they are Dutch.

Women certainly don't want to date men who are shorter than they are. So it
_is_ a definite inconvenience to be shorter than the average woman in your own
country.

~~~
colmvp
Yup.

Just sit at a cafe and note every couple you see and count how many women are
taller than their male counterpart. I'd be willing to bet you that if I did in
my area, I'd find 0. In fact, in all my years of living and traveling I've
only seen ONE couple that had a short guy (less than five foot six) with a
tall woman (six foot tall+).

Or look at dating profiles on match.com and see what women want in terms of
eligible heights. You're extremely likely to find women want guys who are
taller than they are. In fact, it's not uncommon for a short women to want at
minimum guys who are close to a foot taller than they are.

And then look at movies and show and see how often couples have the women
taller than the man. It's not often.

------
intrasight
My understanding is that both the tallest and the shortest men are in Africa,
and this is due to that continents having the highest genetic diversity - only
a small subset of the human genes left Africa.

~~~
has2k1
I don't think it matters much the "small subset of human genes left Africa".
More crucial is that the African landscape is quite varied and not too harsh.
Almost everywhere south of the Sahara a small tribe could eke out a living.
And yet, the environment wasn't too friendly to readily encourage population
growth that lead to civilisation(s).

Such forces lead to genetic drift (and therefore variation) and also makes
tribal formations unavoidable. The phenotype(s) of these tribes are then the
embodiment of that genetic drift. When it comes to height, you end up with the
Pygmy tribes in the Congo basin and the Dinka along the Nile basin.

~~~
dnautics
> I don't think it matters much the "small subset of human genes left Africa".

That is exactly wrong. Bottlenecking _is_ the reason why diversity outside of
africa is dramatically lower than the within the continent.

[http://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jou...](http://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1003309)

"The pattern of genomic variation in contemporary southern African populations
thus resulted from unions between the most diverse genomes found within Africa
to the least differentiated as represented by populations impacted by a severe
founder effect (bottleneck) associated with the out-of-Africa dispersal"

~~~
has2k1
Given time, a hash enough environment is going to select for phenotypes
despite the quality of the genetic variation. That has to happen or the group
dies off [1]. That is the point of the phase "I don't think it matters much".
I expect a refutation of that statement to be along the lines of, "here is
information that shows that the difference in genetic variation between the in
Africa and outside of Africa peoples is so big (or the latter have very low
variation) that there are marked differences in adaptability to different
environments".

[1] The reason for extinction may well be very low genetic variation.

------
pvaldes
There is an endless supply of vitamin D in the sunny Italy or Spain. I don't
think that vitamin suplements have a real effect here.

Using the same reasoning, we could find a link between legally smoking
Cannabis and being taller.

------
amelius
I guess upon reading this, there will be a lot of tall women moving to the
Netherlands, making the difference even bigger.

~~~
guard-of-terra
In my anecdotal experience (which I nevertheless tend to value more than
"obvious" trivia everybody carries around),

Tall women don't prefer taller men.

Well, maybe they do in principle, but it doesn't seem to affect their choice
at the end of day. Most of really tall women usually go with average height
men.

~~~
amelius
What women settle for may not be what they prefer.

Hence perhaps you should limit your study to really attractive women.

~~~
guard-of-terra
I don't care terribly much what they prefer.

Much more interesting question is what they settle on. That's what determines
selection.

~~~
amelius
Perhaps you should re-read this subthread from the top :)

------
johan_larson
I wonder what the results would look like aggregated by ethnic group rather
than nationality. Some African groups (such as the Maasai and Dinka) are known
for having really tall people, but they don't have countries of their own, so
they disappear when averaged with their shorter countrymen.

------
kofejnik
Dutch are ridiculous, as a 6'3" man I'm barely above average when visiting
Amsterdam

------
timwaagh
dutch parents stuff milk down the throats of their children. the kids dont
like it as the stuff often tastes bad but they keep doing it anyway. 'melk is
goed voor elk' (milk is good for everyone) and 'joris driepinter' (joris
drinkes three glasses a day) are common folklore here. You get milk with your
breakfast and again at school. we don't have school provided lunch in primary
school, but we did have school provided milk. I suppose it is good for one
thing though: I'm like 6'2 ish and sometimes i actually feel a bit short.

~~~
spiderfarmer

      "Stuff milk down the throats of their children"
    

You must have had some bad parents. It's true that milk is often served for
breakfast, but so are tea and orange juice.

    
    
      "we did have school provided milk"
    

Shows your age. That's a seventies thing.

~~~
toothbrush

        >> "we did have school provided milk"
        >
        > Shows your age. That's a seventies thing.
    

Not only. I was in school in the Netherlands in the early nineties, and had
"schoolmelk".

~~~
talideon
I think practically everywhere in Europe did that in the '80s and '90s. We'd
get milk and yoghurt in primary school in Ireland back then. Don't know if the
practice continued past '95, though.

------
donkeyd
I am a just above average Dutch man, but when I lived in the US I felt like a
giant, it was interesting.

------
yiyus
And yet, they cannot get together 5 of them who know how to play basket.

Why the country with the tallest men (and exceptionally good sport equipment
all over the country) does not have a good basketball team?

~~~
erwinvaneyk
The Dutch Basketball league (including amateur of all ages) has about 40,000
players. It just isn't popular.

~~~
yiyus
But it is quite popular in almost every other European country and the
conditions here look perfect to me: tall people, good installations, a weather
that usually favors indoor sports, a very active population willing to
practice any sport... I see people following the NBA, I see sport shops where
basketball equipment is no less present than in any other country, I see
baskets in schools and high schools like everywhere. And I have even seen
quite some people playing. Certainly more than playing volleyball, and the
Dutch volleyball team is a very good one.

Of course football is the big thing here, but other countries like Spain or
Italy where football is huge also have top basketball teams.

Thank you for the number of players data, but I still wonder what are the
reasons that basketball is not bigger in the NL.

------
DominikR
I'm curious why Eastern European countries make up a majority of this top 10
list both for men and women. Is there something uniquely different about their
diets?

~~~
guard-of-terra
On Balkans they eat a lot of meat. They're kings of meat. Mostly in grilled
form. Was awesome.

Serbian women are also spectacularly beautiful. While men are mostly "meh"
(can't appraise them much, tho)

------
KaiserPro
Ik ben een lang nederlander

