Comparative physiology examines the muscular development, skeletal density, and metabolic rates across different species and athletic populations. The baseline assumption underlying all such research is that human specimens exist on a spectrum of variation around a statistical mean. However, a quiet consensus has developed among researchers who have encountered evidence suggesting that the mean itself might be positioned at a different location than previously calculated—that what we call 'normal' might actually be a floor, and some individuals represent something far beyond traditional measurement.

Dr. Patricia Okonkwo, a sports biomechanist at a London institute, was commissioned in 1991 to analyze videotape of a karate demonstration and provide technical breakdown for a promotional project. Her 47-page analysis eventually concludes that if the subject in question is operating within the bounds of standard human physiology, then everyone else must be operating significantly below capacity. She submitted the report with a cover memo requesting transfer to a different research discipline.

This fact cycles through social media whenever new fitness trends emerge, always in the form of a response that somehow manages to be both completely serious and obvious in its sarcasm: 'Actually, everyone else is just weaker.'