The virtue of being short

Not sure what to make of this article except that Ray said larger body frame AND smaller brain-to-body ratio increase risk of cancer and other degenerative diseases.

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archi ... ve/390117/

I guess there may be an optimal height depending on the climate, altitude, availability of food, etc.

I would love to be a foot shorter (I'm 6'5") for the longevity and ergonomic benefits. I wonder what precautions very tall people can take to slow or avoid degenerative disease. Any thoughts? I would guess that optimizing bone and soft tissue health (with fat solubles and minerals), blood volume and circulation would be important to ensure that the extremities farther from the heart are being well nourished.

Everyone is optimal for the environment/context they've grown up in. If their body thought they could've been 'better' it would have done that.

If we're talking about in an evolutionary sense, there is no 'optimal' nor ending to evolution. Development goes on and on so long as environments are changing, and my how are modern environment is changed, changing, and could be so much more beneficial in the future.

@Brian
Even more concern for a high nutrient:calorie ratio. Everyone ought be concerned with this, but the bigger you are the easier it is to consume lots of calories without all the requisite nutrients to support the larger body.

The brain-to-body ratio thing interest me a lot (cephalization). Turns out females have a slightly bigger ratio than males. Infants/children also have greater ratios. These things I think factor into their better health and also even certain personality differences (i.e. neoteny with connection to brain/body ratio).

Society really must come to grips with this terrible excessive height epidemic that seems to be marching civilisation towards stupidity and early death. It will inevitably spell the downfall of the welfare state (such as it is). Parents must be help accountable for irresponsibly allowing their children to grow so tall. Some of them let their children grow to obviously very unhealthy heights - they obviously don't care about them, or are unable to take proper care of them, and should probably have them taken into state care. Not only does it obviously lead to increased stupidity and mortality, but it also predisposes people to unnecessary spine issues and social isolation - I mean, some of them are so tall they can't even walk through doors normally, let alone sit in airline seats.

Education campaigns in schools to discourage children from eating food that will make them grow would seem the obvious first step.

And we could advertise the ideal height ranges, so people know they need to address it this defining health issue. Tentatively, open to review by experts from the orthopedic profession, here are some draft ranges:
ideal height 1.3-1.6m,
moderately tall: 1.6-1.7,
excessively tall: 1.7-1.8,
morbidly overtall: >1.8m?)
Perhaps consideration should be given to subsidising leg-shortening surgery.

I mean, it's clear that being too tall is bad for health, so if only we can prevent as many children as possible people from growing above the ideal height, and intervene for those that fall (or rather rise) through the cracks by helping them lose height, that'd all be good, right?

Maybe people were just stockier in earlier times and now it´s as if their faces and bodies have been "stretched". Makes me think of Weston A Price´s research of changes happening to primitive people when they changed their diet from one higher in fruits, vegetables, animal fats, to one with large quantities of white flour, sucrose and vegetable oil (thus deficient especially in the macro minerals and fat soluble vitamins): http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200251h.html#ch9