Do you think bowling is a sport or an entertainment activity?
 

I relate to bowling more as an energetic engaging sporting activity; its entertaining because watching myself improve my game is a huge motivator & good fun :-) but had this conversation with one of my friend & still we have not reached at any answer, what you guys have to say?

It can be either, depending on whether you bowl for amusement, or bowl competitively. Competitively doesn't necessarily mean pro, there are lots of people that bowl on league teams, strictly amateur, but seriously compete.

Softball, golf, swimming, bicycle riding, etc, are the same, in that some do it just for entertainment, and some compete at it.

neither.

Aw casi, you know you bowl over the boys, for sport. ;)

I bowl for dollars.

Bruce, I was all ready to jump up and down and pontificate loudly, but illogically at high volume saying BOWLING IS A WANK, but you've completed disarmed me.

It's a game.

My personal reasoning on this has been:

To be a sport, it has to involve two elements:

1. Athletic skill
2. Competition against another person to achieve an objectively measurable goal

Therefore, bowling is a sport to me. Gymnastics and figure skating are not: there is competition, but the competition is decided by the subjective judgement of a third party.

At this point I'm sure somebody is saying, "What about football? It's got referees! Does that mean you think football isn't a sport?" Not at all. There are objective standards for deciding the game. Did the football cross the plane of the goal line? Did the player put his foot down out of bounds? These are specific standards. The refs are there to rule on whether the standards have been met, not to pass aesthetic judgment on how well they are met. It's entirely conceivable to imagine a football game with no referees where the teams make their own calls.

Sure, bowling is a sport: just like soccer is.

:bolt:

I think it's a sport if you treat it as such. I don't bowl myself, but I see bowling sometimes on tv and those people are serious!

I'd like to add that you have to get out of breath at some points. So bowling is a sport to some people, but not most.
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That would rule out Olympic ski jumping. There is an increase in heart rate as they go down the jump, because they are excited, but they aren't panting and gasping for breath. Is Olympic ski jumping not a sport?

Yes, unless you're from Jamaica, then it's entertainment.

It's not a sport unless there is widespread gambling

That is astute. It means the game is of enough interest to have spectators, and that the outcome cannot reliably be known before the event.

Does it count as a sport if you can do it while drinking beer and in air conditioning?

Hockey?

AND the jukebox playing in the background.

That's a tough one. IMHO, it is no more a sport than playing darts, golfing, or figure skating. In all three, the competitors practice their form, and the results are based on how well they execute that form, by a judge, or how close their projectile comes to it's target, or how long they jump.

There's a lot of grey area, though. Pole vaulting, long/high jump, weight lifting?

I don't know. Maybe instead of saying that the competitor has to get out of breath, I'll say that there has to be at least X amount* of physical exertion.

*purposely left vague

If they do it for money, wouldn't be a profession, rather than sport?

Entertainment. If you drink beer while you're doing it (company picnic softball is also not a sport), it's entertainment, not sport.

If you really want to make a determination, look at your cable lineup. Sports have their own cable channels. No 24 hour Cable Bowling Network, not a sport.

No, but there is poker and putting on the best poker face seems to be great sport.

btw,, why the cheesy sunglasses!

It's the only way to hide your lyin' eyes. :cool:

"Recreation", "amusement" and "entertainment" feature highly in the Oxford Dictionary definition of sport ...and sex is the first example of sport, so I guess we're all going with our own definitions here....

For me, a sport needs to involve a reasonable amount of physical exertion. So darts wouldn't count. But it's widely televised and gambled on in the UK. (Let's face it though, you can bet on anything and there are some people who will. Bowling, borderline. )

I feel like there should be an element of competition.

Sports in my mind are related to physical fitness, so I sort of want to say if you can do it well without being physically fit, then it's not a sport. I wouldn't call gymnastics or shooting (or bowling) a sport.

And I sort of agree with the "definable goals" approach. But I disagree that they're not there in freestyle figure skating. You just need more referees. Whether they should be there is a different matter -figure skating was more fun when the judging was more subjective.

If you don't think gymnastics is a sport, you haven't seen it done right. Or there is some other British meaning for the word.

It's in the Olympics, it's a sport. So shooting is a sport, even if a fat guy can do it.

There's even more to it than just picking up an innate sense of whether someone is lying. When you see something you're interested in or excited by, your pupils dilate a bit. It's an evolutionary thing. In theory one could have enough control over their body to defeat the instict, just like some people can beat a lie detector test. But sunglasses are easier and more reliable. They have the players spread out around such a large table these days that I suspect it would be hard for another player to see something that subtle anyway.

Yeah, that's what I meant. :lol:

Spectator sport, if you're watching the right bowlers.

We're arguing semantics. (Which is cool.. this is The Cellar.)

I'd never say it isn't awesome, beautiful display of athleticism, or that the gymnasts aren't highly skilled, etc.

But when it comes right down to it, the "winner" is determined by the opinions of judges on who did the best job. And for me, that means it's not a competition. Which--again for me--is an important dividing line between things lie gymnastics and figure skating on the one hand, and running or basketball or, yes, bowling, on the other.

Winners determined by judges... AKA "blood sports"

Dog shows
Cat shows

Divorce courts
Presidential elections

Okay, perhaps the essential quality of sporty-ness is related to the amount of sweat generated (the AC breaking down in the bowling alley doesn't count) rather than how the winner of the contest is determined. Although being British, I suppose you could add in a factor related to bookmaking, which probably isn't big for gymnastics. ;) (that was meant as a joke, not the snarky comment it sounds like when you read it)