It makes sense that an environmental-based hypothesis would be the most parsimonious explanation. It’s a lot easier to account for, say, socioeconomic differences between groups than genetic differences. It is a whole lot easier to conceptualize how environmental factors might affect outcomes than an unknown gene or set of genes–the expression of which is heavily inluenced by the environment anyway.
Identical twins raised in the same family experience different environments from the moment they are conceived, and of course we’re all familiar with how different their life outcomes can be. So why wouldn’t we try to discount environmental factors first when trying to understand the source of differences between totally unrelated individuals? Seems to me that environmental factors are the lowest hanging fruit. If you haven’t plucked all of them, then you have no business reaching for the higher ones.
“It’s the genes!” is a position similar to the “It’s the strings!” in physics. At this point in time, we don’t possess the technology or the research ethical standards to answer either question definitively. But we do have the ability, though twin studies and longitudinal studies, to make strong inferences about environmental factors.
I don’t think so. And as a matter of fact there are tribes that apparently have dominance in some sport in part due to genetics. Not going to list the sources yet again since I’m on my phone. But Google and Kenyan long distance ought to suffice.
Your problem is a political one. Your solution is to obfuscate with disingenuous standards of proof.
I suspect that genetic analysis of racial groups with regard to genes conferring “intelligence” would generate results that are hard to interpret anyway. I imagine we’d find something like this:
Members of Race A show a higher prevalence of genes conferring rapid processing speed, but also a higher prevalence of genes associated with learning disabilities and impulse control.
Members of Race B have a higher prevalence of genes conferring slow cognitive processing speed, but greater long-term memories and spatial abilities.
Members of Race C have a higher prevalence of genes conferring high creativity, greater working memories, and and high aptitude in abstract learning.
But in none of these groups are the “special” genes found in more than 20% of “conspecifics”. There’s also considerable overlap. For instance, the “high rapid processing speed” gene has a frequency of 15% in Race A. It has a 7% frequency in Race B and 10% frequency in Race C. Almost all the individuals possessing this allele live within 1000 miles of each other–suggesting that they are more closely related to each other than they are to their supposed conspecifics.
I guess results like this would be interesting to someone, though.
That’s not the argument and you know it. Some folks want to maintain an illusion for political purposes and use the facade of scientific rigor, while not applying the same rigor to their stance, to undermine the position of the opposition. It’s obviously transparent that the argument is not in good faith.
Neuroscientists are doubting free will yet still debate the utility of promoting the idea of such. That’s promoting a lie for a hoped for social benefit. That’s the same thing those people who don’t deny a genetic component yet demand absolute certainty to acknowledge it are doing. And when they can’t dismiss the facts such as with the Kenyan marathon runners they impugn the character of their opposition with veiled insults such as race realist or some goofy word like sciencetaster.
Eventually as genetic testing gets faster and computers get much faster the correlations will become more and more strong. And so will the intellectual dishonesty in denying them.
This is true (In regard to phenotypes and genotypes). This actually a goal of genomic science (but I think racist goal justification is not why this is happening or going to be the outcome).
I just want to make clear I was talking about new GWAS studies conducted with NGS, not some some racist fantasy that new technology will bear their ideology out–missed the edit window on my original post.
Sorry for any confusion about my stance on the science.
My hypothesis that genes play a role in outcome and that distribution of genes is such that all humans are obviously not clones? If research ever proved my hypothesis wrong I’d accept it and not be phased one way or the other. I won’t hold my breath in my hypothesis being disproved.
It’s abundantly clear Kimstu realizes the point of view of those who advocate the position that genetics plays a role. His standard of proof is hypocritical. Furthermore, the motivation is most likely political propaganda and not scientific knowledge.
Context clues.
Look, if BrightNShiny is correct in the assertion that the point of view of 100% culture is not held and is a strawman than that is a satisfactory state for me. I still find it fascinating that this is such a taboo topic.
Since the “100% culture” claim is clearly a straw man that has not been actually argued by anyone in this thread, (aside from by the towering straw people created by Salvor, then you may take comfort in your satisfaction.
Of course, the claim that a topic with 270 posts, (in the umpteenth thread on the same subject), is “taboo” is pretty silly.
To bring this thread back on topic - here are the responses to the OP question thus far:
“If one race has an athletic advantage, what would be so bad about that?”
Answer 1: “Nothing. There would be nothing bad about that.”
Answer 2: “It could be used to further racist agendas or people with racist motives.”
Answer 3: “It’s bad science, because race and genetics are still poorly defined.”
Answer 4: “It causes an outcry because it could lead to another discussion, one about race and IQ.”
You did not ask why the topic was controversial–a point that is self-evident. You asked why it was taboo. It is clearly not taboo or it would not be the topic of so many discussions.