[runald]

I haven't read the whole paper, but isn't one reason MMA wins because it has less restrictions on what moves you can do? Other martial arts have strict rules on what kind of moves you do, so a practitioner of Taekwondo will be at a disadvantage against MMA practitioner, for obvious reasons. This doesn't mean one martial art is necessarily better, they just have different rules. It seems silly to compare them that way.

Imagine a hypothetical new martial arts that allows all the moves of MMA, but with biting and eye poke allowed, so practitioners of this arts is at a definite advantage against MMA. Would you say that this martial art is any better?

[boppo1]

I think the generally accepted context most people evaluate martial arts in is "How well does it allow one to weaponize their body to defend themselves?"

In this context, some martial arts are dramatically better than others.

MMA + Eye-poking martial art: Yes.