# Human races after all!?! --- What now? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 31, 2002, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723 "2002-07-31T17:25:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/61 "2002-08-02T13:03:56Z")
**lucwarm** , I personally would not defend the position that it must be a hard and fast line … there are lots of fuzzy concepts in which arbitrary distinctions are imposed upon a continuum of human variations … but it must be one of some pragmatic value. As a biologic concept, “race” is so fuzzy as to be _nearly_ meaningless. And is well replaced by more precise population distinctions that the data evinces. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/62 "2002-08-02T14:02:14Z")
OTOH … Our population geneticist friends tell us that African populations have the widest haplotype diversity. Consistent with the hypothesis that other human population groups were originated by migrations of small groups (with more limited gentic diversity) into other areas from Africa. It seems then to follow, to me, that the greatest variation about the mean for some variety of traits should be found in populations that have African origins. It further then follows that the variation which is high end of ability, the staistical far tail (ie the individual in the world who is the best at some particular ability, given equal environmental factors) would be more likely of African origin than of some group with less variation about the mean. This in no way has any positive predictive value. It does not imply that “given an African origin, indivual X is more likely more intelligent”, or what have you. But it does imply that for many traits the sigma outliers of the world (the Einsteins, the gold medalists, etc) are likely to found in those of African origin … given equal environments, cultures, and population sizes. ---
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/63 "2002-08-02T14:13:17Z")
**lucwarm** , I thought I too had answered the “hard and fast” thing. Your repeated asking of this quesion seems like almost a baiting: do you have some term which has both a fuzzy definition and enormous utility? The less precise a term is, the less meaningful it is scientifically IMHO. Take all of the terms we like to avoid in these debates: race, intelligence, athletic prowess, etc. – these all have little scientific utility because they all have fuzzy definitions. For a term to be scientifically useful for descriptions of variation, it is best to have a very precise definition (i.e. hard and fast line). It needs to be repeatable, quantifiable, and applicable to other data sets. I can’t see how you can have a term which is fuzzy and meets these criteria. **DSeid** : Your last bit certainly could be true. We have never claimed otherwise AFAIK. (see **tomndebb** ’s post about it in this thread, or IIRC the threads with **peace** or **grienspace** in the Pit of about a year ago). It is just that this advantage has never been adequately described. Environmental issues confound the whole picture, i.e. the whole East Africans/marathon running thing. Do East Africans marathon better because there is a prevalence of an allele which is advantageous for long distance running? Or is it that they are brought up at altitude running long distances, and that marathon running is an issue of near religious devotion in many societies there? We should be able to map genetic advantage if the statistical difference is large enough, but to my knowledge the questions have never been asked in a truly repeatable, scientific way. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/64 "2002-08-02T14:31:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tomndebb \* > Well, physical and mental abilities are going to have biological origins, so if we cannot categorize the groups, biologically, we have an immediate problem. If the differences are _identified_ by sociological methods, I am going to first look at sociological explanations for those differences. This is the crux of the issue on which I have posted repeatedly, in numerous previous threads - I am reluctant to argue it again here, unless something new turns up. (I failed to understand your subsequent post). My point here was only that whether you agree or not with the specific arguments (not you specifically - the anti-race camp in general) there should be a greater willingness to confront the various angles of the issue, as opposed to forcing the issue onto favorable ground and defending from there. JMHO, FWIW. > [@](#): > > _Originally posted by edwino_ > Your last bit certainly could be true. We have never claimed otherwise AFAIK This is a shocking assertion. ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/65 "2002-08-02T14:34:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \* > > 1. IIRC my disagreement with **tomndebb** was resolved. No need to rely on recollections - I’ve linked to the actual issue. (third post on this page) ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/66 "2002-08-02T15:27:12Z")
To put it a bit more sharply into focus: > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DSeid \* > But it does imply that for many traits the sigma outliers of the world (the Einsteins, the gold medalists, etc) are likely to found in those of African origin … given equal environments, cultures, and population sizes. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \* > **DSeid** : > > Your last bit certainly could be true. We have never claimed otherwise AFAIK. [ > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \*]([http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=1091731#post1091731](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=1091731#post1091731)) > In short : African-American athletes predominate in sports only because of a culture bias. Americans are good in sports because of good training. African-Americans per capita may focus on sports more often than other cultures due to a lack of role models, etc, but it is not my job to speculate on this – I am going to be a geneticist. As Collounsbury has said, there is no genetic advantage. Just one example. Not going to search for them all, but there are many, by you and/or others. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/67 "2002-08-02T15:31:01Z")
> [@](#): > > I’m not sure what you mean by “exist.” I do agree that race is a somewhat rough means of categorizing people. > [@](#): > > I’m not sure what you mean by “clearly,” but I agree that it is entirely possible that there is no simple genetic feature that corellates perfectly with race, as classically defined. Well, as the poster **lucwarm** said in another thread > [@](#): > > [But why not indulge me with a simple “yes” or “no” answer?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=2290155#post2290155) Dance much? And herein lies the problem with all these discussions. There are enough issues surrounding the subject that any “simple” question does need to be answered with clarifying and qualifying remarks. In your most recent posts you have indicated that you see the choice of language “affected” by political considerations and you demand that we acknowledge as much. Yet we have never denied the political/sociological/cultural/semantic aspects of the choice of words. We have been consistent in pointing out that there are populations of humans who can be identified biologically. We have been consistent in pointing out that the groups that can be so identified are not large enough to carry the word “race” _as it has been used in common speech in English for over 150 years_. We have noted that using the word “race” for those identifiable populations would cause confusion. We recognize that, because race has been used in political ways in the past, that confusion with identifiable populations would have political ramifications. This is a different statement than “Saying there is no race is just being PC” as some drive-by posters have claimed. This is a different statement than “there is no race” which _we have never said_. It is your habit to portray different answers at different times to different questions as “bait and switch” or as dishonest. I would submit that you are choosing to characterize different discussions as separate answers when they are actually different perspectives of the same answer. The dishonesty in this discussion is not ours. > [@](#): > > For what it’s worth, my biggest issue in the race debate has been expressed in this thread already. Frequently, somebody will observe a relationship between a physical ability and race and ask if that relationship might have a genetic component to it. The “no race” people seem to take the position that since “race is invalid,” such a component cannot exist. > > It seems to me that such logic is pretty clearly flawed. Those question have always been couched in terms of the old Three Races or Five Races. Those races do not exist in any way that you can make biological sense of them. The logic is not flawed because we are answering the question as it was asked, in terms of the non-existent Five Races. If someone asks the question “Why do Ashkenazim suffer a higher rate of Tays-Sachs than anyone else?” and one of us responded, “There is no ‘race’ and Tays-Sachs is prevalent in all people” you would have a point. The only occasion where something _similar_ has occurred was in the discussion between **grienspace** and **Collounsbury**. **Col** ’s initial points were that the initial claim from the sportswriter were not scientific and that one needed to establish specific guidelines to do a scientific examination. The discussion soon wandered into a lot of other areas, most of them acrimonious. **Col** will have to provide his own perspective on the issue, but I clearly recall **edwino** , **Gadarene** , and myself remarking at various times that _if a trait could be found_, we would accept the evidence. The problem being that while the numbers for sprinters in the last 15 years has been suggestive of some sort of relationship, there is countervailing evidence, as well: the fact that the North American sprinters come from a population with a great deal of genetic mixtures including European and North American; the fact that it is not clear exactly which African genetic populations were the ancestors of the North American sprinters; the fact that the African sprinters come from at least two separate genetic populations. As the questions and answers are delivered, here, however, you are the one doing the switching. ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2002, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/68 "2002-08-02T21:39:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IzzyR \* > \*\*One further question for **tomndebb** , **Tars** et al: When people say that we are 99% similar, what is the scale that is being used? IOW, by comparison, how similar are we to chimpanzees, frogs, etc. ? \*\* Here’s one link i found [http://ology.amnh.org/ologist/desalle/more\_quest10.html](http://ology.amnh.org/ologist/desalle/more_quest10.html) Its numbers are comparable with what i’ve seen (thought Chimps have varied from 98% to 99% the same, with 98.7% as the more common figure i’ve seen lately, and some older articles listed mice at only 85%, but i couldn’t find anything newer. That doesn’t mean much, as i can’t find a paper bag on google As for the specific “races” being genetically superior in certain areas issue, it is possible that certain populations might be slightly better for selecting for certain traits due to enviromental and cultural differences, but the supposed supermen of whatever skill would not be so far from the rest of the general population as to warrent separating them. If Micheal Jordan had a son that was good at basketball, we wouldn’t classify the Jordan’s as their own race (_Homo sapiens basketballus_), but just say the family has skills. Now you can expand family to tribes in some areas, and see how various places might have some skills. Culture will also play roles and give percieved attributes to certain people, that’s why the Chinese and Japanese are thought to be all good students studying to be doctors and kung fu masters by alot of people who don’t deal with them personally. that example probably sucks, but it is the best i can think of right now. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/69 "2002-08-03T02:25:54Z")
**Izzy** , I don’t see any conflict between **edwino** ’s agreeing with my statement and the past statement of his that you’ve quoted. 1. My statement “of African origin” is not synonymous with “the Black Race.” Let me illustrate. My next door neighbor is a corporate attorny who would self-identify as a “Black American.” His parents were born in South America. Is he of African origin? Well, I’m sure that some of his heritage traces back to various regions of Africa, and some is probably of Spanish or Portugese heritage and some perhaps of indiginous American people. (I really don’t know because we aren’t that close. He’s the type who resods his grass because of grubs and goes to the country club. I think that he looks down on the fact that half my lawn is prairie plants and wild flowers.) His appearence says little of the populations that have contributed to his make-up and less about his abilities or temperment. 1. I have said nothing about any genetic advantage. I am talking about variation about the mean. As likely to a disadvantage as it is to be an advantage. 2. There is, to the best of my understanding, no evidence that there any particular alleles associated with superior athleticism. My logical construct is sheer speculation. 3. I have artificially assumed that culture, opportunity, motivation, and population size are the same between population groups. Obviously this is not the case. The logic that I have used should also explain why the world’s very best concert violinists are of African origin … and perhaps, somewhere eking out a survival in Africa, is an individual who would be the very best violinist (or physicist, or whatever) if they had exposure, pushy parents, lessons, and weren’t too busy trying not to starve to death. But the environment is a powerful factor. And it more likely explains the predominance of the sociologic grouping called Blacks in American sports. ---
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/70 "2002-08-03T07:09:12Z")
First of all, **Izzy** I’m impressed that you are deep enough indebted in this debate to go back and read my posts. I am honored and humbled, even if I seem to disagree with myself. Certainly I am just a student, here and IRL, and my opinions have changed based on debates here and what I have learned IRL. There is bound to be some differences from what I stated 20 months ago and what I state today. But. as **DSeid** pointed out, I don’t think my two statements fully contradict. East Africans have won a bunch of marathons. There is a big jump in saying that there may be something prevalent amongst tribes who have historically lived in the high altitudes of the East Africa and saying that American blacks excel in sports. I believe there is no significant genetic difference between African Americans and other Americans besides obvious shared morphologic alleles determining skin color, nose shape, hair type, and a few other traits. These being the traits that define the description of “race,” the definition becomes circular. All the African Americans share is the some of the genes that describe them as African Americans. I will say that is a wider variance in haplotypes, leading to perhaps more alleles around. No study has been able to find this. And, as **DSeid** adeptly pointed out, if we saw a wider variance in alleles, we would see all types of prodigies out of Africa – not just athletic ones. The fact that we don’t argues for a large societal input into athletic prowess. As it does for concert violin, as it does for calculus. So, I conclude that in all probability, genetics does not play a very large factor. If someone were to propose to me with the fact that nearly all the top-class East Africans marathoners have a hypermorphic allele of glycogen synthase (or a haplotype profile, or whatever) which gives them supreme endurance, and that top-class marathon running is basically a nice selection for individuals who have this trait, then I would answer that these are answerable questions and propose some experiments. To the best of my knowledge the experiments have never been done, or have never been published as positive results. I would find it highly surprising and unique if it were the case, and I think it would cause a large splash in the medical, genetic, and sports world: how could you seriously devote your life to marathon running if you were genetically less fit to run marathons and maybe you should focus on the 10K. It is not outside a realm of probability, but it would be surprising and unique. We could perhaps test the genetic component of East African marathon running by looking at biometric measurements of families of top-class marathon runners. If we could find statistically significant trends in the biometric data, we could use this with haplotype analysis to find a linkage disequilibrium, which we could use to identify candidate alleles giving genetic advantage. OTOH, I still see no way to apply this to the question of genetic prowess in the black population in general, and I don’t see how it would be possible. ---
**Author:** ![lucwarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/71 "2002-08-03T11:21:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tomndebb \* > \*\* > Dance much? \*\* Not often. And if I change my mind on an issue, I’m happy to admit it. Now, my recent posts make pretty clear that I feel the “race doesn’t exist” position is ambiguous. So my answers to your questions are pretty reasonable. On the other hand, my questions to you (which you still haven’t answered) were very careful and fair paraphrases of your earlier statements. Earlier, you said this: > [@](#): > > Had you asked “Is it your position that any grouping for which you “can’t draw a hard and fast line” around groups does not exist as a biological reality?” I would simply have answered “Yes.” Earlier still, you said this: > [@](#): > > A “hard and fast” line would be a physical trait or series of physical traits found wholly (exclusively and completely) throughout a very large segment of the world’s human population. In other words, the traits or series of traits must be capable of being used to identify any member of such a “race” while not accidentally including members of other “races.” And I asked this: **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** That’s my question. Why won’t you answer it? (Of course you are free to ask for clarification if you find it ambiguous. But come on, it’s a simple paraphrase of your earlier statements.) \*\* > [@](#): > > And herein lies the problem with all these discussions. There are enough issues surrounding the subject that any “simple” question does need to be answered with clarifying and qualifying remarks. \*\* I think my question fairly paraphrases your most recent position; if you weren’t dancing, it should be fairly easy to say “yes” without qualification: **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** \*\* > [@](#): > > In your most recent posts you have indicated that you see the choice of language “affected” by political considerations and you demand that we acknowledge as much. \*\* I don’t believe I said anything about “choice of language.” I said that your position on race was affected by political considerations. I think you’re setting up a strawman here, but feel free to point out where I said something about “choice of language.” > [@](#): > > Yet we have never denied the political/sociological/cultural/semantic aspects of the choice of words. Where did I make an argument about “choice of words”? \*\* > [@](#): > > It is your habit to portray different answers at different times to different questions as “bait and switch” or as dishonest. I would submit that you are choosing to characterize different discussions as separate answers when they are actually different perspectives of the same answer. The dishonesty in this discussion is not ours.\*\* Then why won’t you answer my question? **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** > [@](#): > > \*\*As the questions and answers are delivered, here, however, you are the one doing the switching. \*\* Do you think I’ve misrepresented your position somehow? Where and how? I think that all the questions I asked in this post are very reasonable. I’ll repeat them, in case you missed them: **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** **Where did I make an argument about “choice of words”?** ---
**Author:** ![lucwarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/72 "2002-08-03T11:45:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \* > **lucwarm, I thought I too had answered the “hard and fast” thing.** Not really. Your last post on that point left some questions unanswered, IMHO. I’ll repeat a couple here. You previously said the following: > [@](#): > > Let me be very careful here. Racial groups are defined by a set of characteristics (let’s call this set of characteristics set A, which includes things like facial/nasal structure, skin color, hair type, epicanthic fold). Some posters insist on taking people of set A and reading into this another set of characteristics (set B) – athletic and intellectual abilities come up most often. Then, you said this: > [@](#): > > Now about my “hard and fast” thing. Genetic similarity is a very quantifiable thing. It is something that we can follow through population migrations, through generations, through population mixings. There is no scientific need to talk in nebulous terms about quantifiable data. There is no scientific need to talk in nebulous terms period. We have demonstrated over and over again that characteristics of set A have no correlation to the quantifiable genetic similarity. So set A becomes irrelevant to any conclusions we make to genes beyond set A. Especially to things like set B, which are mostly !set A. And I asked these questions: \*\*Ok, so you are saying that if you take two random individuals who share given traits in set “A,” their genetic distance, on average, will be little different from two individuals who do not share such traits? And are you saying that any biological grouping for which this holds is invalid? \*\* Would you mind taking a crack at them right now? \*\* > [@](#): > > Your repeated asking of this quesion seems like almost a baiting: do you have some term which has both a fuzzy definition and enormous utility?\*\* Of course I have a few “counterexamples” in mind. But the main reason I keep asking these questions is to demonstrate my points about unwillingness to be pinned down and the lack of a principled reason for the “no race” position. > [@](#): > > \*\*The less precise a term is, the less meaningful it is scientifically IMHO. Take all of the terms we like to avoid in these debates: race, intelligence, athletic prowess, etc. – these all have little scientific utility because they all have fuzzy definitions. > > For a term to be scientifically useful for descriptions of variation, it is best to have a very precise definition (i.e. hard and fast line). It needs to be repeatable, quantifiable, and applicable to other data sets. I can’t see how you can have a term which is fuzzy and meets these criteria.\*\* So you disgree with **Dseid** ’s comment above regarding the “hard and fast” issue? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/73 "2002-08-03T13:08:42Z")
> [@](#): > > And I asked this: > > Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group? You did not. You asked this: > [@](#): > > Is it your position that any grouping for which you “can’t draw a hard and fast line” around groups does not exist as a scientific concept? Now that you have reformulated the question in the terms that I had suggested, I will respond to your second version: “Yes.” (Which is what I had already indicated.) (That is my personal view and may not agree with **edwino** , **Dseid** , **Collounsbury** , **Gaspode** , or others.) (You do not have to repeat the question multiple times; simply changing the wording to eliminate the “BOO” effect from Quantum Mechanics or elsewhere is sufficient. Implying that I had not answered a question that I explicity said I would answer “yes” to is, however, a bit closer to dishonest debating tactics than honest discussion.) You claim that you have not talked about “choice of language.” That is correct; you have not used those words. However, your entire “bait and switch” claim and your claims of vagueness or shifting meanings are actually complaints about using specific words in specific contexts–that is “choice of language.” If you actually believe that there has been a “bait and switch,” it might be useful if you provided an example where someone declared “there is no such thing as race” and then changed the meaning of that statement. So far, the only “bait and switch” demonstrated was your subsititution of my words for yours when you implied I had not answered “your” question. ---
**Author:** ![lucwarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/74 "2002-08-03T14:16:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tomndebb \* > **You did not.** Yes I did. I’ll quote myself in context, if you like: > [@](#): > > Well, edwino’s original statement referred to “scientific concepts” not “biological reality.” So you are still trying to qualify his reasoning. > > Further, your original response was limited to “subdivision of humanity.” Now you’ve broadened your position, apparently, to all biologicial groupings. > > In any event, I think I can show that your latest position too has some “issues.” But let’s make sure I have things straight, ok? > > **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** (emphasis supplied) > [@](#): > > \*\* Implying that I had not answered a question that I explicity said I would answer “yes” to is, however, a bit closer to dishonest debating tactics than honest discussion. \*\* I asked the question; You didn’t answer it; I asked it again; You denied having been asked it. Who’s being dishonest? \*\* > [@](#): > > You claim that you have not talked about “choice of language.” That is correct; you have not used those words. However, your entire “bait and switch” claim and your claims of vagueness or shifting meanings are actually complaints about using specific words in specific contexts–that is “choice of language.”\*\* Oh quit weasling. Here’s what you said before: > [@](#): > > In your most recent posts you have indicated that you see the choice of language “affected” by political considerations and you demand that we acknowledge as much. Did I say anything like this or not? If I did, where did I say it? > [@](#): > > \*\*If you actually believe that there has been a “bait and switch,” it might be useful if you provided an example where someone declared “there is no such thing as race” and then changed the meaning of that statement. \*\* Agree. To support the argument I made previously, it would be helpful if I offered an example. I will try to wade through some of the old threads and come up with one. \*\* > [@](#): > > So far, the only “bait and switch” demonstrated was your subsititution of my words for yours when you implied I had not answered “your” question. \*\* Again, you are simply wrong on this point. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/75 "2002-08-03T14:32:45Z")
> [@](#): > > Again, you are simply wrong on this point. **lucwarm** , 08-01-2002 05:58 PM: > [@](#): > > Is it your position that any grouping for which you “can’t draw a hard and fast line” around groups does not exist as a scientific concept? **tomndebb** ,08-01-2002 07:08 PM > [@](#): > > Had you asked “Is it your position that any grouping for which you “can’t draw a hard and fast line” around groups does not exist as a _biological reality_?” I would simply have answered “Yes.” **lucwarm** , 08-02-2002 05:37 AM, restating the question to which I had already said I would provide a “yes” answer: > [@](#): > > Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group? **lucwarm** , 08-03-2002 06:21 AM, repeatedly while ignoring that I had already answered “yes” when I rephrased the question: > [@](#): > > **Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group?** ---
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/76 "2002-08-03T14:49:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by lucwarm \* > \*\* > Ok, so you are saying that if you take two random individuals who share given traits in set “A,” their genetic distance, on average, will be little different from two individuals who do not share such traits? > > And are you saying that any biological grouping for which this holds is invalid? > > Would you mind taking a crack at them right now? > \*\* OK. I believe that “set A,” the set of characteristics by which we describe races, has little bearing on genetic background. I believe that if you were to take two arbitrary people who share a set of these “racial alleles,” it would impart very little information about their genetic background. People sharing black skin and curly hair are the most genetically diverse on the planet. IMHO, genetically, “set A” has very little meaning to anything outside of “set A.” I cannot think of any biological situation where the entire group of people sharing alleles of “set A” (i.e. an entire race) would have any predictive value for the traits which are not in “set A.” I cannot think of a biologic situation where you would want to do this even. If I were to strain really hard, one could make an argument about partially penetrant phenotypes, syndromes, and other disorders which are kind of a nebulous array of symptoms. Together they may have predictive value. Take lupus – diagnosis of lupus is based on having 7 out of 11 features IIRC. Things like malar or discoid rash, arthritis, kidney findings. But while the symptoms are totally different, they share a common pathology – a specific set of autoantibodies. Other syndromes have other autoantibodies. Variant forms of the disease are based on the variable nature of the autoantibodies and a wide range of host factors complicating or mitigating the disease process. So you can have lupus without having the specific set of autoantibodies that they test for. Similar are contiguous gene deletion syndromes (CGDS): different deletions in overlapping regions cause different sets of findings. But both of these examples (lupus/autoimmune disease and CGDS) are based on a very definite pathology. That’s how science works – the clinician describes a syndrome, we look for the basic pathology so we can draw a hard and fast line. > [@](#): > > \*\* > Of course I have a few “counterexamples” in mind. But the main reason I keep asking these questions is to demonstrate my points about unwillingness to be pinned down and the lack of a principled reason for the “no race” position. \*\* So, I call. Show yer cards. Let’s see if you can produce a scientifically valid term without a hard, non-fuzzy definition. > [@](#): > > \*\*So you disgree with **Dseid** ’s comment above regarding the “hard and fast” issue? \*\* **DSeid** said that some of these terms have _utility_ (his words were “pragmatic value”). I totally agree – as I have said many times, race has utility for a clinician. I just don’t think that these terms are scientifically valid. IMHO. And because I know it will be asked of me: > [@](#): > > \*\*Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group? \*\* IMHO. Yes. You just have to wrangle with semantics. All cancer patients have unfettered cell growth but not all patients with unfettered cell growth have cancer. All cancer patients have unfettered cell growth which is prone to metastasis (except for basal cell carcinoma and a few others). All patients with unfettered cell growth prone to metastasis have cancer. At least as presently discovered. You get my drift. It is wrangling with semantics, a subject at which I am notoriously poor. ---
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/77 "2002-08-03T16:17:07Z")
_Genome Biology_, the journal which Neil Risch published his opinion column cited by the _New York Times_, allows its articles free but not its opinion columns. I ain’t going across the street to dig it up, either. But I am not throwing hundreds of previous papers out based on hypotheses presented in an opinion column in a third-tier journal. So, you propose that rare traits may be \>15% variant amongst broad populations on a particular continent? Let’s see the data. I could not find **Collounsbury** ’s PNAS cite – they do offer it free after the article is a couple of months old if you wish to read it yourself. If it is newer, or you want my particular comments, then if you could provide an author name I’d be glad to read it. Rereading the NYT thing, I really can’t see how arguing that 7.5% of Swedes carry a hemochromatosis mutation or that 10% of Ashkenazim carry a Tay Sachs mutation or that 20% of Europeans carry a cystic fibrosis mutation makes a white race. Sure, we can test for 50 traits which are found in 20 populations, and string them together to form a “race.” But I fail to see how this is relevant to anything besides the 50 traits we are talking about. It goes back to my hypothesis – there has been evolutionary selection on widely prevalent alleles. This includes not only dark/light skin but disease alleles – sickle cell trait gives malarial protection, some say CF carriage gives TB protection, European retention of lactose tolerance is an advantage to early dairy farmers (from the NYT). Apart from genes highly selected _by disease_ (which does not include intelligence and athletic prowess), I can see no other differences across humanity. ---
**Author:** ![lucwarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/78 "2002-08-03T19:47:59Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by tomndebb_ > > > [@](#): > > > > _Originally posted by lucwarm_ > > And I asked this: > > > > Is it your position that for each and every grouping that exists as a “biological reality,” there is a characteristic that is universal and exclusive to each group? > > \*\*You did not. \*\* (emphasis supplied.) From your most recent post, it seems you now agree that in fact, I HAD asked the question – your only quibble now is that, according to you, you had already answered it. Thus, your statement - “You did not” - was and is totally false. * * * > [@](#): > > _Originally posted by tomndebb_ > \*\*In your most recent posts you have indicated that you see the choice of language “affected” by political considerations and you demand that we acknowledge as much. \*\* I take it you’re retreating from this statement? ---
**Author:** ![lucwarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@lucwarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucwarm)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/79 "2002-08-03T20:12:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \* > \*\* > OK. I believe that “set A,” the set of characteristics by which we describe races, has little bearing on genetic background. I believe that if you were to take two arbitrary people who share a set of these “racial alleles,” it would impart very little information about their genetic background. > > People sharing black skin and curly hair are the most genetically diverse on the planet. > > IMHO, genetically, “set A” has very little meaning to anything outside of “set A.” > > I cannot think of any biological situation where the entire group of people sharing alleles of “set A” (i.e. an entire race) would have any predictive value for the traits which are not in “set A.” I cannot think of a biologic situation where you would want to do this even. \*\* This seems consistent with what you said before, (and thanks for responding to me), but I notice that you didn’t mention “genetic distance.” Fine by me, but just so I know we are on the same page, can you confirm you agree with what I said before? “Ok, so you are saying that if you take two random individuals who share given traits in set “A,” their genetic distance, on average, will be little different from two individuals who do not share such traits?” > [@](#): > > So, I call. Show yer cards. Let’s see if you can produce a scientifically valid term without a hard, non-fuzzy definition. Ok, I’ll give it a shot in a few days. In the meantime, can you confirm you agree with what I said before? > [@](#): > > IMHO. Yes. Thanks for indulging me. I’ll try to get you those “counterexamples” soon. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723/80 "2002-08-03T21:49:56Z")
A full discussion of “hard and fast” in science would be a major hijack, but is interesting in its own right. I’ve started [a new thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=128968) on it. In short, I don’t think that scientific concepts _are_ always so sharply demarcated. Fuzzy is often the best that we got and the fun is in trying to get the picture into sharper focus. And if a fuzzier categorization has more predictive utility then it is more scientifically valuable than an extremely fine categorization. “Race” is not valuable scientifically because it has little predictive (utilitarian, pragmatic) value (of either genotype or of most of the phenotype) and impedes the development of a more refined understanding of issues of scientific interest, not because of the lack or hard and fast. But please join me there, for the more general discussion. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/human-races-after-all-what-now/121723.md?page=5)