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Chuck of Occidentalist takes Jennifer Raff’s denunciation of Nicholas Wade’s A Troublesome Inheritance to the cleaners in her comments section. (Here is a collection of his recent comments.)
Darwin apparently originated the concept of l umpers and splitters. Both lumping and splitting are enormously useful for thinking about reality — and it’s even more useful to understand that you can do either depending upon the circumstances and your needs — but as the Troublesome Inheritance brouhaha shows a lot of people who think they are really smart can’t handle F. Scott Fitzgerald’s challenge of holding two ideas at once (e.g., lumping and splitting) and still function.
In general, Wade’s critics have a hard time dealing with complexity (in other words, they aren’t as smart as they think they are). Chuck deals extremely well with complexity (i.e., he’s really smart).
Here’s an interesting excerpt:
Raff: “Folk notions of what constitutes a race and how many races exist are extremely variable and culturally specific.”
Which is why the primary/major/continental level races/varieties of Berneir (1688), Linnaeus (1735), Buffon (1749), Kant (1775), Blumenbach (1795), Cuvier (1828), Coon and Garn (1955), Gill (1988), Risch et al. (2003), and Rosenberg et al. (2011) look remarkably the same: Why didn’t any manage to classify North Africans with other Africans or to classify South East Asians with South Asians? Of course, what you mean is that sociological races — ones defined by sociologists — are extremely variable and culturally specific. Which is why you should be criticizing those (e.g., “Asians Americans”). Or possibly what you mean is that biological and bio-anthropological race is a flexible tool that allows for nested classifications.
Pre-genetic anthropologists made a number of mistakes. For example, some assumed a closer relationship between the blacks of Africa and the similar-looking people of Melanesia and New Guinea than is genealogically true. But their general picture of the racial map of the world has been pretty good for hundreds of years.
Much of the conventional wisdom is just Stephen Jay Gould’s nasty inversion of Newton’s tribute to his predecessors. To Gould fans, “If Gould has seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of dwarves — unscientific, ugly, twisted, racist, anti-Semitic, evil dwarves.” To Gould’s followers, all glasses except his own were partly empty. The fact that many old scientists’ glasses were remarkably full was of little interest.
Chuck’s critique is pretty heavy stuff, so I’ll put most of it below the fold for those who are interested.
Chuck May 23, 2014 at 12:09 am
… Raff: “Groupings of people by skin color did not produce the same result as groupings of people by skull shape, nor of blood type.”
This is called the independent variation argument; it doesn’t stand up to multivariate analysis, a technique which, in practice, is hardly novel: Blumenbach (1795): “To this enumeration, however, I must prefix a double warning; first, that on account of the multifarious diversity of the characters, according to their degrees, one or two alone are not sufficient, but we must take several joined together; and then that this union of characters is not so constant but what it is liable to innumerable exceptions in all and singular of these varieties.”
Raff: ” it became apparent that human genetic variation does not divide humans into a few discrete groups….”
Ok, but what did early racialists actually argue?
Blumenbach (1795): “Thus too there is with this that insensible transition by which as we saw the other varieties also run together”
Darwin (1871): “But the most weighty of all the arguments against treating the races of man as distinct species, is that they graduate into each other, independently in many cases, as far as we can judge, of their having intercrossed”
Also, there is a non sequitur embedded here. One doesn’t need sharp boundaries to divide individuals into discrete populations. Rather, in absence of sharp boundaries more individuals will fall in an undefined region (e.g., zones of intergradation). …
Raff: “These observations have led the majority of physical anthropologists, human biologists, and human geneticists”
A while back, I looked through all of the published surveys which asked a variant of the question, “Do human biological races exist?” These surveys were mostly from the U.S, and Western Europe and didn’t include China and Russia, countries in which the reality of human races is overwhelmingly accepted. About 50% said “no”, 10% were undecided, and 40% said “yes”. The reasons given for rejecting races were silly, though: more variation within races, gene flow between populations, no pure races, etc. Clearly what was being rejected was not a typical concept of race, modern or historic (keep in mind that early pre-Darwinian racialists, being monogenists, believed that races (as opposed to species) were different inbred lineages of Adam, only several thousand years separated).
Raff: “Racial groupings differ from culture to culture. For example, although in the United States Chinese and Japanese peoples are usually viewed as one “race””
So, race is a polyseme and the different concepts lend themselves to different classification schemes. But Wade is dealing with a typical biological race concept in which races are understood to be subspecific natural populations (here “natural population” is an analogue of “natural classification” which is juxtaposed with “artificial classification”. So given this biological concept….
The last point touches upon a central problem with this critique. Either there are biologically valid concepts of race or there are not. But Raff wishes to have it both ways, so she can say that there are no races because there is no scientifically viable definition of them and because there are viable definitions of race and human populations don’t qualify as races by these. Well, which is it?
I can think of four prominent biological race concepts off of the top of my head: cladistic, evolutionary, population, and ecotypic. They are biological races seen from the perspective of different biological research programs. For a discussion of the former two, see the following defenses: Andreasen, R. O. (2004). The cladistic race concept: a defense; Hardimon, M. O. (2012). T he Idea of a Scientific Concept of Race. To note, the population genetic concept does not purport to be a taxonomic unit, but rather a conceptual tool for understanding human biological variation. This concept refers to breeding populations (sometimes also confusingly called genetic populations) retrospectively understood.
The evolutionary race concept is Mayr’s evolutionary — as in evolutionary taxonomy –based one; when formally recognized, that is, when given a trinomen, these are called zoological subspecies or “geographic races” (Mayr and Ashlock, 1991) (not to be confused with Mayr’s “microgeographic racees” or with geographically delineated races in general). While only Mayr’s formally recognized races (zoological subspecies) are taxonomic units, his lesser races are nonetheless biological units — in the sense that “demes”, “morphs”, “clines” or other taxonomically unrecognized biological constructs are — they are subspecific natural populations which simply have not differentiated enough to warrant, for pragmatic reasons, being assigned a trinomen. I simply can’t see how one can grant the taxonomic validity of formally recognized races without also granting the biological validity of non-formally recognize ones — as if races that failed to meet the vague conventional subspecies qualifying criteria couldn’t be thought about. This consideration brings to mind Kant’s reply, when his race concept was challenged on the grounds that it didn’t describe a formal taxonomic unit: “The fact that this word does not occur in the description of nature [i.e., in Taxonomy] (but instead of it that of variety), cannot prevent the observer of nature from finding it necessary with respect to natural history.”
The final concept is the ecotypic one: King and Stansfield (1990): “A phenotypically and/or geographically distinctive subspecific group, composed of individuals inhabiting a defined geographical and/or ecological region, and possessing characteristic phenotypic and gene frequencies that distinguish it from other such groups. The number of racial groups that one wishes to recognize within a species is usually arbitrary but suitable for the purposes under investigation” I find this conception to be somewhat vague (e.g., “Can forms be ecotypes?”). but apparently ecologists find it useful.
The point here is that there are a bunch of viable well vetted biological race concepts — in addition to bio-anthropological ones. They differ mainly in the way that species concepts differ (e.g., genetic species versus ecospecies), but they are related in that they generally — I don’t know about ecotypes — describe populations where members are arranged by genealogical and/or genotypic relationship, where what is of interest is overall similarity not just similarity in specific genetic characters such a specific chromosomes e.g., as in the male morph.
We need not worry about all these concepts though and their various operationalizations, since Wade focuses on the population genetic ones, which is very similar to Mayr’s evolutionary one in that the matter of concern is relative geneotypic similarity. Now, either “genetic populations” represent a viable biological construct or not. They obviously do — granted, the operationalizations are all over the place. And either these genetic populations can reasonably be labeled races or not. Again, they obviously can on a number of accounts. So we have our scientifically valid, viable race concept, which allows us to discuss human races. Now, with this as our basis, we can better examine your critique.
Raff: “To begin with, Wade can’t provide a clear definition of “race.” He tries to rely instead on loose associations rather than definitive characteristics”
Ok, but population genetic and evolutionary races are defined in terms of overall genetic similarity, not in terms of “definitive” characteristics. The situation is similar to that of twins. Twins are define by their coefficient of relatedness; this relatedness conditions character similarity; this character similarity can be used to diagnose twin status, but it doesn’t define it. Alternatively, ducks have wings; but they are not ducks because they have wings; rather, they have wings because they are of the duck lineage which has been subject to such and such evolutionary pressure. .
Raff: “With such a shifty, casual footing, it’s no surprise that Wade’s conclusions are unsound. He can’t keep the number of races straight:”
Ok, but everyone recognizes the nested nature of “genetic populations”. To quote Aulchenko (2010) again: “One can see that this definition is quantitative and rather flexible (if not to say arbitrary): what we call a “populations” depends on the choice of the threshold for the “much-higher” probability. Actually, what you define as “the same” genetic population depends in large part on the scope and aims of your study. In human genetics literature you may find references to a particularly genetically isolated populations, populations of some countries (e.g., “German population”, “population of United Kingdom”), European, Caucasoid or even general human population. Defining a population is about deciding on some probability threshold.
If you look at the old taxonomies, you will see that races will be prefixed with terms like “primary” or “major” or “continental” for this reason. This surely isn’t a novel point (see for example: Coon and Garn’s (1955): ” On the Number of Races of Mankind.”) Generally, you can’t determine a true number of races or a true classification because there is no way to determine a “true” level of genetic relatedness; you can only determine a specific number and a specific classification given a pre-selected grain of genetic focus. This, of course, holds for all natural populations. The shifty biologists talk about x kingdoms, y classes, z species — they classify Sailer as an animal then a mammal then a primate — they can’t keep there natural populations straight! Madness.
Raff: “He uses terms like “major race”, “race”, “subrace”, “group”, or “population,” but doesn’t provide any serious, objective ways to distinguish between these terms for arbitrary groupings of people arbitrary groups”
Except, cluster analysis.
Because, in biology, arbitrary groupings are ones that don’t indicate evolutionary relationship, thus overall genotypic similarity. Mayr and Ashlock (1991): “classification based on convenient and conspicuous diagnostic characters without attention to characters indicating [evolutionary] relationship; often a classification based on a single arbitrarily chosen character instead of an evaluation of the totality of characters.”
For example, Tibetans and Bolivian Amerindians have genetic adaptations to high altitude. But that doesn’t reflect close genealogical connections: they are different adaptations evolved separately.
What distinguishes (population genetic and evolutionary) races from other groupings is that they are not biologically arbitrary groups. Darwin (1859): “From the first dawn of life, all organic beings are found to resemble each other in descending degrees, so that they can be classed in groups under groups. This classification is evidently not arbitrary like the grouping of the stars in constellations’’ (or like forms or morphs). So there is a sense in which class and order are arbitrary groupings — as one could make an indefinite number of subdivisions or none– but there is a sense in which they are not, since members are arranged according to genetic similarity (genealogical for cadists and genotypic for evolutionary taxonomists).
I don’t see why this is difficult.
Raff: “The program was designed to partition individuals into whatever pre-specified number of clusters the researcher requests, regardless of whether that number of divisions really exists in nature.”
But seriously, how could the “number of divisions really exists in nature”? This is a genetic problem, of course. For example, how many particles does a carbon atom comprise? More importantly, no one ever claimed that some level of racial analysis was True — say, for example, in the way that it was once believed that species represented ontologically privileged level of analysis.
Raff: “The authors of the paper he relied on, as well as subsequent studies, showed that different runs of the program with the same data can even produce different results (Bolnick, 2008).”
Lumping and Splitting: they are both useful.
The best way to do this would be to use whole genome analysis to sort people by continental level races. Alternatively, you can look at the results from multiple studies using different loci. At the continental level, the five major races keep popping out.
Raff: ” Human biological variation is real and important….But Wade, and others who agree with him, have decided that certain patterns of variation—those which happen to support their predefined notions of what “races” must be—are more important than others.”
Well, this is what it’s all about them: what “we” should see as important. It’s funny that you don’t notice the asymmetry here. Wade and others don’t argue that seeing genetic diversity in terms of race is the only way of seeing it, but that it is one valid way. No one argues, for example, that “Only race exists!” (Please show me a counter example, if you can.)
Well, there’s Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli: “All is race; there is no other truth ,and every race must fall which carelessly suffers its blood to become mixed.”
Rather, the anti-race crowd — which you apparently fall into — argue that “Only non-race exists!” i.e., “Race does not exist!” This asymmetry is parallel to that between the environmentalists — “Only environment!” — and hereditarianism — “Genes too!” But of course, since you KNOW that you are right, since you know that “Only non-race exists!” you can’t help but seeing seeing pluralism i.e., “Race. too” as an imposition.
But we can go beyond that. It so happen that in biology, natural populations are deemed to be more important that artificial ones — they are given quasi privileged status. Hence, our taxonomic systems organize life by either genealogical (cladistics) or geneotypic (evolutionary taxonomy) similarity, and not by similarity in so called arbitrary character traits. There is a reason for this, of course, and it’s that such categories allow for more inductive inferences. If my “genetic populations” are based on similarity in two genetic characters, I have less inductive leverage than if they are based on evolutionary relationship and consequently similarity in terms of the whole genetic program. So, Wade and others have sound biological precedence for saying that race (qua subspecific natural population) is a generally more important grouping than others. It’s a well founded prejudice, no? And of course, we can make a similar argument for continental races relative to micogeographic ones. After all, these are the types of races that zoologists themselves privilege when it comes to other species. So there we go…
Here’s an excerpt from one of Darwin’s letters to Huxley:
“Grant that all structure of each race of man were perfectly known — grant that a perfect table of descent of each race was perfectly known. — grant all this, & then do you not think that most would prefer as the best classification, a genealogical one, even if it did occasionally put one race not quite so near to another, as it would have stood, if allocated by structure alone. Generally, we may safely presume, that the [phenotypic] resemblance of races & their pedigrees would go together” [comment: when he says "even if.." I imagine that he's referring to situation like negritos and negros.]
I lifted Darwin’s letter from Chuck’s comment for my recent Taki’s column.
Darwin largely established the modern view of natural classification, that based on descent. Though, he argued that “modification” should be taken into account (e.g., because of genetic divergence, birds shouldn’t be lumped with crocodiles). The evolutionary taxonomists — following Mayr — more or less reunderstand natural classifications to be based on genotype. Genealogy is back fitted:
“Once we accept the basic principle of biological classification, that organism are to be classified according to the information content of their genetic program, it is evident that [retrospective] monophyly must be required. Artificial taxa, containing descendants of different ancestors, would be unable to fill the demand one places on scientific theory, owing to the heterogeneity of the included genetic programs”
This genotypic understanding — which currently has less currency than the cladistic = genealogical only one — brings the classification principle somewhat back in line with Aristotle’s and forward in line with population genetic thinking. Of course, on the level of the individual organism, the genotypic and genealogical conceptions — both of which can be said to be “genetic” –produce the same, or at least very similar, results. And, on the population level, genotypic and Darwin’s “descent plus modification” also effectively act the same.
Regarding pre-Darwinian conceptions of race, my impression was that they were genealogical, too. During this time, some argued that human groups represented different species (polygenists), but most argued that they represented races in the sense of subspecific lineages (monogenist). The concept of race itself — largely developed by Buffon — was based on lineage (as in race de noble) and breed — so it should be a given that “race” was and is somehow associated with ancestry. There’s a lot of confusion on this, though, because anthropologists and sociologists hurriedly dig through the literature intent on debunking something and, in their rush, miss important disagreements such as the race/species one. So, they will say that race and species was used interchangeably, when, in reality, there was an ongoing race/species debate This confusion leads them to make all sorts of silly claims and to miss the whole point of the race concept.
Cochran has exactly the right idea. All the population structure critiques and counter critiques are beside the point, and it’s the observable differences in the phenotypes that matter. While I admire Chuck all the race-is-real or not-real arguments divert attention away from the important stuff.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566151
Some people seem predisposed to the notion that everyone everywhere is equal, that differences are only skin deep and they work very hard to fit reality into that basic assumption. For many there appears to be no measure of evidence that will dissuade them from this deeply held conviction. My weasel words are intentional here because I am one of those people, I grew up attracted, even addicted to the idea that we are all the same, but time and experience have painstakingly taught me to question that presumption. I’ve come to the understanding that it is possible to both love and value all humanity while also recognizing that people and groups have different capabilities shaped by their pasts. However due to those differences, it seems not everyone is capable of love and acceptance as well as acknowledgement of difference, most fall hard to one side or the other and the two battle it out constantly.
~S
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566205
I am afraid this is much too much fact content and reason to be accepted or understood by the know-nothing “there is no such thing as race” crowd.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566330
Steve, perhaps there is a corollary to your “Who, Whom” argument on this issue. “Who” is transmitting the message, and for “whom”? Quite simply, Nicholas Wade cannot be dismissed. He is an Etonian Oxbridge, so we don’t need to think too much to guess “for whom”. He is exactly the sort of person one wondering which way the wind blows should heed. Our masters are changing the tune, and Wade is the dipped toe. Heeding his message now will better prepare us for the big splash of the imminent Cannonball!
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566534
How about ‘geogeno’ for ‘race’?
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566598
I agree with pseudoerasmus here.
I think the problem with the race-is-real argument is not that it’s wrong — certainly it’s right — but the complexity of the case. In ideology, where’s there’s complexity, there’s obfuscation.
The most important take-away message from Wade’s book, in my view, is that evolution is “recent, copious, and regional”, and that that evolution applies to cognitive/emotional traits as well as others.
That presents a much simpler argument, and goes to the heart of the real dispute between the sides. If the other side concedes that emotional/cognitive traits aren’t exempt from evolution, and that different groups of people followed distinct evolutionary paths, so that group differences might naturally be expected to rise over, say, 2000 generations of separation, then what does it matter whether we talk about races or not?
The important assumptions of the argument are remarkably simple and hard to dispute. If one concedes that ANY cognitive/emotional trait is heritable, then even minuscule differences in selection on that trait, compounded over 2000 generations, can lead to substantial group differences in average value on that trait. I don’t how one gets around that point. One would have to assert that the populations on the different continents, though separated genetically, all were subjected to identical levels of selection. To believe in that is to believe in magic, or a Creator.
I can’t say I’ve ever seen an effective comeback to this sort of simple argument.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566612
To add to my previous comment, the problem for the other side gets worse the more cognitive/emotional traits which are conceded to be heritable, insofar as they are not perfectly correlated genetically, and the more subgroups one identifies who exhibit some genetic separation.
Each such permutation introduces still another “degree of freedom” into the equation, opening up another possibility whereby differing selection factors will result in different group averages on some trait. The probability of that taking place can, I’m sure, be demonstrated to be stupendously low under any reasonable set of assumptions.
And there’s the further point that most of these cognitive/emotional traits achieve social significance, and, in so doing, become subject to consideration as something upon which sexual selection may operate. This somewhat gets back to the point Sailer has made, that races or groups are “socially constructed” to proceed along their own biological paths. Unlike in other species, in human beings culture has everything to do with how mating choices are made. If in a culture warriors are greatly prized, and are prized as mates, then they will generally enjoy greater reproductive success; if instead being good at capitalism is greatly prized, then the wealth will enjoy greater reproductive success. Insofar as being a good warrior or being good at capitalism are in any way heritable, the group average will shift in that direction.
The overarching point here is that the existence and importance of culture in human beings is not evidence against group differences in cognitive/emotional traits. Rather, it is evidence of the opposite.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-566655
The “race is a social construct” crowd are sophists. I can look at a picture of Jennifer Raff and a picture of Rachel Jeantel and tell what genetic testing would confirm: they have fewer ancestors in common than they do with people who look like them. The sophists are literally arguing themselves away from what their own sense experience tell them. If they can do that, it’s doubtful anything you tell them can change their minds.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-567010
Interesting all the little connections between the debaters here. Razib Khan also blogs on Unz but appears to be more supportive of Raff, while Raff spent three years at the University of Utah in the same department as Henry Harpending, author of The 10,000 Year Explosion, and who, I suspect, probably sides with Wade. If only we could get the five of you – Wade, Raff, Sailer, Harpending, and Khan – in the same room.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-567309
The entirety of the racial flat-Earthers’ method seems to boil down to being unprincipled; set the bar for race higher than they set it for anything else. Lefties don’t need anything they believe proved, they just take it on faith*, common sense, etc. But for race, suddenly the bar becomes set very high indeed.
*Take everything they believe and subject it to the same “rigor” they subject race to, and they’ll have no ideas left to believe and no policies left to advocate, because none of the ones they hold are better-established than race.
Just look at their fanatical devotion to the dogma that race doesn’t exist, and the delusion of racial equality. Most of their worldview is shot through with these delusions, with enormous impact on our policies and spending, yet, they have absolutely no evidence at all for either.
I’m not sure I see the point of arguing with them any more, though it is fun to watch others rub their noses in it.
Cochran has exactly the right idea. All the population structure critiques and counter critiques are beside the point, and it’s the observable differences in the phenotypes that matter.
I tend to agree. But Colin The Lawyer Who Loves to Argue says, that makes it too fuzzy. I don’t see what’s fuzzy about Mud Huts vs. Man on the Moon, but maybe that’s just me.
I think the creepiest obtuseness-as-argument bit is how lefties keep asking “what difference does it make (you racist bastard)?” They dragged us into court and accused us of “breaking” blacks because, as all decent men know, racial equality (as opposed to: everyone knows God didn’t make man from monkeys), and demand we take on financial responsibility for blacks indefinitely. And then they ask “what difference does it make?” in that leading way, as if our interest in the subject could only be further evidence of our guilt.
Speaking of monkeys, I’m surprised no one mentioned the genetic similarity between humans and chimps in response to those who mentioned the genetic similarity between human races.
The “race is a social construct” crowd are sophists. I can look at a picture of Jennifer Raff and a picture of Rachel Jeantel and tell what genetic testing would confirm: they have fewer ancestors in common than they do with people who look like them. The sophists are literally arguing themselves away from what their own sense experience tell them. If they can do that, it’s doubtful anything you tell them can change their minds.
Consider the likelihood that a non-trivial number of them are advocating a cause they don’t believe in, for one reason or another. I used to like out-arguing atheist kids from my church simply because I like to out-argue people, even though I was secretly an agnostic myself. And, probably like them, I felt I was doing a good deed at the same time.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-567329
That Colin guy is relentless———-ly stupid.
He keep going on about the number of races being arbitrary, and therefore race does not exist. But that’s like saying that “extended family” and “nuclear family” are two different “races,’ and therefore “family” does not exist.
Well, yes, they are two different “races” but both are correct.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-567682
Hi Steve, I think these guys would have to be a “race” by your definition.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-568294
Candid Observer (June 5, 2014 at 1:46 pm)
> I think the problem with the race-is-real argument is not that it’s wrong… but the complexity of the case. In ideology, where’s there’s complexity, there’s obfuscation.
Simple but important observation.
A complex issue such as “race” involves evaluating incomplete, uncertain, and conflicting evidence. Inductive reasoning, deduction, pattern recognition, common sense, and other high-level tools will be called into use. As such, it is a major challenge for most people to figure out which interpretations are consistent with reality, and proceed from there.
“Race” of course is two things at the same time. A question of “what is” and a related one of “what should be.” People living out their religious (post-religious) convictions will have an especially difficult time with applying the tools of logic and science on the “is”, given its implications for moral questions and policy issues.
At one point, Colin The Lawyer Who Loves To Argue notes the high moral purpose of his quest to show that Race Doesn’t Matter and/or Doesn’t Exist. (Sorry, no cite for the particular passage within his encyclopedic commentary, I won’t take the time to re-read it now.) His position would be stronger without that revelatory remark.
The parallels between the self-described scientific anti-evolutionists of the 20th century and the Race-is-a-Social-Construct anti-evolutionists of today (e.g. Raff, Fuentes) are striking. Special pleading, argument from incredulity, and sophistry.
Four thoughts follow.
1. Evolutionary forces such as natural selection, mutation, and genetic drift affect all living things — bacteria, plants, mammals.
2. Biologists gain insights into inherited differences by inventing and using tools such as population genetics and genome analysis.
3. Human historical breeding populations show between-group differences in some traits that are heritable, e.g. nose morphology, lactose tolerance.
4. There is no reason to believe that in h. sapiens, certain heritable traits are unlike all other heritable traits in being exempt from evolutionary processes (and should be excluded from analysis with the appropriate tools). To the contrary, the importance of culture strongly suggests that those heritable traits that are culturally significant should be under more-intense selective pressure.
This is surely too complicated to sway those who hold firmly to an anti-evolution stance. But it should help to expose younger scientists and lay people to the inconsistencies and cognitive dissonance of the “evolution only from the neck down” dogmatists.
“Science advances, funeral by funeral.”
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-568526
The great (usually) unspoken fear of the Raffs is that if races exist it will be excusable for white people to prefer the company of people of their own race. The Raffs very much prefer it to remain inexcusable. That’s what it comes down to. Given this, one response could be that since Race Doesn’t Exist and yet it’s still okay for “blacks” to prefer the company of people who “don’t exist” in the same way as “blacks,” then it’s okay for me to prefer people who “don’t exist” in the same way as me.
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-569148
I think we need to do both: argue that race exists in a abstract manner and at the same time argue that concrte racial differences exist. Otherwise the race denialists can go on with their circle of argumentation. When we talk about racial differences they say there is no race in abstract manner and when we say race in a abstract manner exists they say, yes maybe, but there are no racial differences which matter.
By the way it always strucks me again that nearly EVERYBODY sees the world in a racial way, but most do not not admit it, and of course they have a completely different narrative than “racists”. In the morning I saw a TV show about women in Nigeria on a respectable, state-owned geman TV channel The show told us that 80 percent of all models on fashion shows world wide are white, and only 20 percent are black, which is of course unfair, and need to change, the future belongs to black models etc. The producers of such a show of course think that their only aim is to undo injustice and their world view is al about balancing things out. But what they don’t understand is that they have no neutral, balances, objetive world view, but they follow the strong narrative of westafrican expansion. This is because they do simply ignore east asians and south asians, they don’t waste a second of thought about them. And they can of course only imagine a world which is more westafrican in future than in present. I say westafrican, because the same people would also not waste thought about east asians or khoisan, no they are interesetd in bantus and other westafrican tribes. Actually having a lot of your women on international model shows is not something desirable, but thats no the point. In the same show some older nigerian women proudly presented her twerking skills, which is because of anatomical reasons something very difrent from what miley cyrus is doing. Any curious journalist could ask some interrsting questions about this phenomen, like: why can westafrican women move the respective body part in way no chinese person could possibly do, or why is it desirable for westeners today attractive to imitate westafrican body language (aka twerking) and even westafrican anatomal features (kardashians)? But journalists of state owned media in germany tend not to be curious…
http://www.unz.com/isteve/chuck-on-what-we-mean-by-race/#comment-570449