# If "there's no such thing as race," is there such a thing as gender? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 5, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779 "2012-03-05T03:43:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/181 "2012-03-07T03:24:28Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > It’s really not me embarrassing myself in this thread. Sadly, you don’t realize who IS being embarrassed in this thread. > > If I show a picture of a male with full frontal nudity, or I show a picture with a female with full frontal nudity, then most people are going to be able to say, with high confidence, that the picture is either of a male or female. In only a very small number of cases would the superficial inspection be wrong. The same can’t be said for a picture attempting to depict some nebulous concept of ‘race’, as you yourself have admitted in this post, because there IS no agreed upon definition of what ‘race’ is, or how it’s defined. I’m unsure why this seemingly simple concept is so difficult for you to grasp, or why you continue to think, in the face of pretty much universal disagreement from just about every other poster in this thread that there is some sort of equivalency between assertions of race and gender, but it seems you are bound and determined to continue down this path, despite the fact that it makes you look really silly. > > -XT It doesn’t matter how often the person viewing the picture would be wrong. The fact that it is possible for them to be wrong shows the point I am making. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/182 "2012-03-07T03:36:11Z")
[QUOTE=Rand Rover] It doesn’t matter how often the person viewing the picture would be wrong. The fact that it is possible for them to be wrong shows the point I am making. [/QUOTE] But it DOES matter that there IS a real, definable and solid definition of ‘gender’, and there isn’t one for ‘race’. And that this solid definition for ‘gender’ would work in approximately 99 out of 100 attempts to define the gender of a human based solely on observable genitalia, while attempts to define what ‘race’ a person is based on ANY objective observation would fail, since THERE IS NO AGREED UPON DEFINITION OF RACE. Even trying to put people into the ridiculous ‘black’, ‘white’, ‘asian’ and ‘hispanic’ categories doesn’t work, since I can show you pictures of a LOT of folks with dark skin who aren’t ‘black’, or lots of pictures of folks who look ‘asian’ who are actually native Indian, or Polynesian (or myriad other things), and a ton of pictures of blond haired and blue eyed ‘hispanics’. And if we go down to the genetic level there is even less commonality…while if we go down to the genetic level the concept of ‘gender’ definitions STILL HOLD UP IN NEARLY EVERY CASE. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/183 "2012-03-07T03:43:05Z")
> [@me](#): > > Each of those is an objective definition, right? > [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > No. > [@Rand Rover two sentences later](#): > > Each of their definitions by itself is objective This is why we can’t have nice threads. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/184 "2012-03-07T03:53:10Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > I didn’t accuse another poster of lying. I said that if he said something then it would be a lie. > > Just more proof that what I actually say doesn’t make a damn bit of difference–you people just read my posts, come up with whatever meaning you want, and then off the fuck you go. I am well aware of what you posted. Your attempt at plausible deniability is not plausible. The clear intent of your statement was that he was a liar. Your attempt to wiggle on that issue, (just like the straw man you used to begin this thread), is recognizable. You generally get away with your little Beckian game of “just asking questions” to entice other posters to play with you, but you will not be permitted to directly flout the rules regarding insulting other posters (or to accuse them of lying or of similar actions). [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/185 "2012-03-07T04:12:28Z")
So according to Rand Rover, this whole thread is about people claiming that there is no objective definition of race. But he is utterly unable to produce a single instance of anyone claiming that there is no objective definition of race. Not one. Not a single example on these boards or even on the whole internet. IOW, this whole thread is about something that simply doesn’t exist. It’s dedicated to attacking a strawman position that not a single person in the whole world has ever espoused. It took us five pages of wading through poorly written obfuscatory, coy, disignenuous and outright incorrect posts to find out what fucking point he was trying to make. And the point he was trying to make is that a strawman mischaracterisation of a position that nobody has ever held is wrong. Great, Rand Rover. You got us. You are quite right. Anybody who has ever asserted that there is no objective standard of race is wrong. Nobody ever \*has \*asserted such a thing, but if they ever do, you have pre-emptively proved them wrong. :rolleyes: Everything else that you have said is a load of shit of course. Race does not exist biologically, because there is no objective definition of race that is not perfectly self referential. Sex does exist biologically because there is an objective definition of sex. In fact there are several. That definition is \>99% accurate. The groupings produced by that definition contain individuals that share \>99% commonality of other features. There is no eye shape that is found in most Asians that doesn’t exist outside Asia. There are any number of objective definition of “white person.” And so on and so forth for very other point tht you have raised in this thread. The only accurate point that you have posted in this thread is that people are wrong in claiming that there is no objective definition of race. Unfortunately the only person who has ever made such a claim is you, when you claimed that there is no objective definition of “white person”. Nobody else ever said such a thing. So the sole point that you are correct on, simply proves that your other assertions are incorrect. Astounding performance. If anyone else wants to beat themselves to against a brick wall defending a position that they don’t hold, have at it. But since nobody in the entire world actually holds the position that Rand Rover is attacking, I can consider my job done now. So I’m outta here. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/186 "2012-03-07T05:07:57Z")
Brings to mind a movie _Europa, Europa_. It centers around a young Jewish lad in Nazi Germany, surviving by hiding his identity, which subterfuge is aided by the fact that he doesn’t “look Jewish”. He is strikingly Germanic in appearance, which prompts the scene: his teacher stands him in front of the class to point out his objective Aryan characteristics. The set of his eyes, his nose (of course), the shape of his skull, all of which add up to a perfect example of an Aryan _boychick._ So, to get to my quibble: its not that there are no objective criteria for race, its that those criteria are factually wrong. And the main problem with that is that sort of thinking allows someone to think that they harbor a perfectly reasonable opinion, based on sound objective criteria, when its all horseshit. Steven J. Gould lays this out clearly in his book _The Mismeasure of Man_, by now probably dated, but still highly recommended. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/187 "2012-03-07T05:42:09Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Brings to mind a movie _Europa, Europa_. It centers around a young Jewish lad in Nazi Germany, surviving by hiding his identity, which subterfuge is aided by the fact that he doesn’t “look Jewish”. He is strikingly Germanic in appearance, which prompts the scene: his teacher stands him in front of the class to point out his objective Aryan characteristics. The set of his eyes, his nose (of course), the shape of his skull, all of which add up to a perfect example of an Aryan _boychick._ > > So, to get to my quibble: its not that there are no objective criteria for race, its that those criteria are factually wrong. And the main problem with that is that sort of thinking allows someone to think that they harbor a perfectly reasonable opinion, based on sound objective criteria, when its all horseshit. > > Steven J. Gould lays this out clearly in his book _The Mismeasure of Man_, by now probably dated, but still highly recommended. Agreed. Unfortunately, while now all but a few morons desperate for a need to feel superior recognize that Eugenics was crap, this wasn’t always the case. A hundred years ago, the head of every Ivy League History Department, without a single exception believed in Eugenics. Now of course it’s relegated to the province of the pseudo-intellectuals desperate for attention or bitter white losers living in their mother’s basements wondering why they can’t find women willing to fuck them and desperately searching for some reason to feel superior to others. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/188 "2012-03-07T11:58:33Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Now of course it’s relegated to the province of the pseudo-intellectuals desperate for attention or bitter white losers living in their mother’s basements wondering why they can’t find women willing to fuck them and desperately searching for some reason to feel superior to others. Which, of course, has nothing to do with the topic of this thread, so let’s not dwell on this claim. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/189 "2012-03-07T14:33:27Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > If a person with XX chromosomes, a penis, and testes walks into Doctor Bob’s office and asks “am I male or female?”, Doctor Bob may say “you have XX chromosomes, so obviously you are a female.” That same person may walk into Doctor Sue’s office, and she might say “you have testes, so obviously you are a male.” I would hope nowadays any decent doctor would say “You’re intersex.” And then explain at length about false dichotomies and how they’re a logical fallacy… ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/190 "2012-03-07T15:35:35Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Which, of course, has nothing to do with the topic of this thread, so let’s not dwell on this claim. You mean Eugenics and scientific racism SHOULD have nothing to do with this thread. Rand has essentially admitted that he typed up the OP because he was upset at people constantly dismissing studies that purported to prove black people were stupid(obviously the studies phrased it differently). Since the point of the OP was motivated by belief in scientific racism I don’t see how we can say it “has nothing to do with the topic of the thread”. That said, I’ll heed your wishes and not mention Eugenics again. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/191 "2012-03-07T23:25:05Z")
Blake, hpu are still simply misunderstanding my point. I will try one more tome and then leave you to your confusion if that’s what you choose to do. Several people on this board have posted a picture of someone and asked me what race that person is. Their implied argument (implied because your average sdmb poster never actually makes an argument) is that race does not exist if I can’t tell them the race of every person they post a picture of. What I have argued in this thread is that, if these people were consistent, they would also belief that gender/sex does not exist because they cannot tell me whether every person I describe is a male or a female. The ultimate point with regard to racial groups is that they are not necessarily meaningless just because it takes human judgement to put people into each group. We could still discover interesting and useful things about people bu studying how other things about them vary in relation to which racial group they are in. And simply putting people into racial groups forpurposea of a study is not racist in any way because it does not necessarily mean that one group is inherently inferiorto another. So, your magical 95% confidence level has nothing to do with it. I am talking about the attitudes of the people who think race is a myth, not the actual science of the subject. There you go, continue to ignore and spout nonsense in response if you like. ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/192 "2012-03-08T00:08:21Z")
The attitudes of people you’ve made up and to whom you’ve assigned fictitious beliefs is a strawman. If you don’t want to discuss the science of these issues, there’s nothing to discuss. That’s why I’ve not bothered to post in this thread since the beginning, and as long as you persist in your false equivalence, I shall not do so again. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/193 "2012-03-08T01:27:14Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > So, if you think race is a myth, do you also think gender is a myth? Why or why not? All categories are social constructs. To be sure, there is stronger consensus about the line between {male humans} and {female humans}, than about the line between different races, but it does not follow that the concept of race is somehow invalid. I’ve asked the question many times: What are the criteria for deciding whether a set of categories is valid or not? Nobody has given me a satisfactory answer. Another question, perhaps more important, is what the consequences are if a category is invalid. Consider the following category, which I will call Category X: {Han Chinese between the ages of 19 and 20} + {Everyone Born in Southern India between 1980 and 1983} + {Everyone Living in the South Bronx whose last name ends with the letter “Z”} + {Everyone living in Samaria as of March 7, 2012} First of all, one can observe that Category X is completely arbitrary and puts lots of people together who are very far apart socially, culturally, linguistically, and genetically. Second the boundaries of Category X are very fuzzy. People could argue all day long about these boundaries, or even go to war over them. Is Category X scientifically invalid? Perhaps . . . I don’t know since nobody has ever given me satisfactory criteria. Similarly, one can define Category Y as {all people who were born in the Ukraine, Estonia, or Norway} Nevertheless, one can observe that the vast majority of people in Category X have brown eyes and that it’s a significantly higher percentage than people in Category Y. And it’s not unreasonable to hypothesize that that this fact is a result of genetic differences between people in Category X and people in Category Y. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/194 "2012-03-08T01:33:40Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > That said, I’ll heed your wishes and not mention Eugenics again. Please leave the disingenuousness out of this forum, as well. You make speak of eugenics to your heart’s content, but when you begin to make up insulting characterizations regarding some alleged believer in eugenics, you are outside the topic of this thread. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/195 "2012-03-08T01:45:34Z")
I’m going to make some arguments, some of which are what you’ve said they are and some of which are different. If you could tell me why you don’t credit my actual arguments – which I’m about to write out – maybe something will have come from this. > [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > BSeveral people on this board have posted a picture of someone and asked me what race that person is. Their implied argument (implied because your average sdmb poster never actually makes an argument) is that race does not exist if I can’t tell them the race of every person they post a picture of. I would say that because we don’t reliably identify the races of those people by using an objective standard, “race” is not a scientifically useful categorization, but instead an amorphous stand-in for whatever subjective unidentified criteria are used in that particular instance. I might phrase that as “race is a myth,” but I’d only mean it in the sense that I would say that “clutch hitting” is a myth: it exists to the extent that we define it into existence. Which we absolutely can do. I acknowledge that’s what you’ve been saying. It does not exist as its own biological property that we’re simply recording, is what I’m saying. > [@](#): > > What I have argued in this thread is that, if these people were consistent, they would also belief that gender/sex does not exist because they cannot tell me whether every person I describe is a male or a female. My response is that, because race doesn’t exist as an independent biological property, and sex does, I don’t have to believe the same thing about sex. I do believe the same thing about gender in the sociological sense, though. Specifically, I think that a very simple biological test will result in classifying humans into male, female, and intersex, with each of those categories being biologically distinct and unmistakable, and with the last category being biologically anomalous. You can do chromosome tests and examinations and put every person in A, male; B, female; and C, intersex, based only on those tests. That is ironclad. Specifically, it is not a social construct. As a result, I believe we can treat those groups as biologically distinct. > [@](#): > > The ultimate point with regard to racial groups is that they are not necessarily meaningless just because it takes human judgement to put people into each group. We could still discover interesting and useful things about people bu studying how other things about them vary in relation to which racial group they are in. And simply putting people into racial groups forpurposea of a study is not racist in any way because it does not necessarily mean that one group is inherently inferiorto another. I agree with all of this. Racial groups are not meaningless. We can discover useful things by studying which people belong to which group - but it’s the group that’s important, not the race. Since those groups are defined arbitrarily rather than biologically, what we we can’t learn is anything about _race_, because we were the ones who defined what race meant when we did the grouping. There’s no independently existing fact about any particular person that would put him or her in group A, B or C. It’s all perception. And the problem there is that when you tell me that you’ve determined that group A is slightly more (characteristic) than group B, _and attributed that difference to race_, that determination isn’t based on anything I can stick in my pocket and apply by race to the next population that comes through the door. If I say to you the next typical biological male to walk through the door has a bomb, and you can apply the test from above, you’ll nail it every single time. If I say to you that the next typical black person to come through the door has a bomb, and you’re supposed to identify him by race, _we are fucked_. So you’re absolutely right that someone can do a study and say “A/B/C people have less intelligence, and also here is how I identified who is A/B/C and who isn’t for the purposes of this study.” And the person who does that is not necessarily racist, nor are their results necessarily worthless. What we’ve learned from that study is just that people who belong to the group defined by that study have the characteristics described in that study. What I would ask you about that, considering the extent to which this is politically charged stuff, is what’s your comfort level with multiple different studies being used to say “here’s what we’ve learned about black people,” when there’s nothing at the center of it all to serve as a foundation for what “black” means. Generally speaking, wouldn’t you agree that if you’re trying to study a thing, the fact that the thing is defined entirely by perception kind of a major red flag? It’s not for nothing that people keep saying “what the fuck’s a black person?”. Because, honestly, what the fuck is a black person? ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/196 "2012-03-08T02:04:04Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > All categories are social constructs. To be sure, there is stronger consensus about the line between {male humans} and {female humans}, than about the line between different races, but it does not follow that the concept of race is somehow invalid. > > I’ve asked the question many times: What are the criteria for deciding whether a set of categories is valid or not? Nobody has given me a satisfactory answer. Another question, perhaps more important, is what the consequences are if a category is invalid. > > Consider the following category, which I will call Category X: {Han Chinese between the ages of 19 and 20} + {Everyone Born in Southern India between 1980 and 1983} + {Everyone Living in the South Bronx whose last name ends with the letter “Z”} + {Everyone living in Samaria as of March 7, 2012} > > First of all, one can observe that Category X is completely arbitrary and puts lots of people together who are very far apart socially, culturally, linguistically, and genetically. Second the boundaries of Category X are very fuzzy. People could argue all day long about these boundaries, or even go to war over them. > > Is Category X scientifically invalid? Perhaps . . . I don’t know since nobody has ever given me satisfactory criteria. > > Similarly, one can define Category Y as {all people who were born in the Ukraine, Estonia, or Norway} > > Nevertheless, one can observe that the vast majority of people in Category X have brown eyes and that it’s a significantly higher percentage than people in Category Y. And it’s not unreasonable to hypothesize that that this fact is a result of genetic differences between people in Category X and people in Category Y. Yep. And if constructing those two categories leads to a cure for cancer for Han Chinese teenagers, then that’s a good thing in my book. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/197 "2012-03-08T02:06:13Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > I think we all get your position. You’re saying that people should believe sex is a myth if they believe race is a myth, because sex, like race, can only be classified based on subjective criteria. > > We’re saying that your position is inaccurate because sex, unlike race, can be classified based on objective criteria. **Inbred Mm domesticus** (who probably knows a little bit about this, considering the name) has just provided a concrete example of such a criterion. > > In response to all of us who have pointed out that this difference exists, what are you saying exactly? I mean, I’ve read your previous posts - you’re reiterating your original point and saying we don’t understand how sex works. So why are we wrong about sex being determinable objectively? Why is it inaccurate to say that identifying (for instance) the defect just named above is an objective marker for sex, and that no similar process will work for race? [2004 Curt Stern Award winner](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1196366/) [Neil Risch](http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pgen.0010014). In his study a discordance rate between self-reported sex and markers on the X chromosome was actually higher that the discordance rate between self-reported race and the genetic cluster membership. > [@](#): > > In our own studies, to avoid coming up with our own definition of race, we tend to use the definition others have employed, for example, the US census definition of race. There is also the concept of the major geographical structuring that exists in human populations—continental divisions—which has led to genetic differentiation. But if you expect absolute precision in any of these definitions, you can undermine any definitional system. Any category you come up with is going to be imperfect, but that doesn’t preclude you from using it or the fact that it has utility. > > We talk about the prejudicial aspect of this. If you demand that kind of accuracy, then one could make the same arguments about sex and age! > > You’ll like this. **In a recent study, when we looked at the correlation between genetic structure [based on microsatellite markers] versus self-description, we found 99.9% concordance between the two. We actually had a higher discordance rate between self-reported sex and markers on the X chromosome! So you could argue that sex is also a problematic category. And there are differences between sex and gender; self-identification may not be correlated with biology perfectly.** And there is sexism. And you can talk about age the same way. A person’s chronological age does not correspond perfectly with his biological age for a variety of reasons, both inherited and non-inherited. Perhaps just using someone’s actual birth year is not a very good way of measuring age. Does that mean we should throw it out? No. Also, there is ageism—prejudice related to age in our society. A lot of these arguments, which have a political or social aspect to them, can be made about all categories, not just the race/ethnicity one. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/198 "2012-03-08T02:15:48Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Steven J. Gould lays this out clearly in his book _The Mismeasure of Man_, by now probably dated, but still highly recommended. Well, at least the bits that weren’t trashed in virtually every academic review or exposed as [made up nonsense](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/14/science/14skull.html). > [@](#): > > But Ralph L. Holloway, an expert on human evolution at Columbia and a co-author of the new study, was less willing to give Dr. Gould benefit of the doubt. > > “I just didn’t trust Gould,” he said. “I had the feeling that his ideological stance was supreme. When the 1996 version of ‘The Mismeasure of Man’ came and he never even bothered to mention Michael’s study, I just felt he was a charlatan.” ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/199 "2012-03-08T02:21:25Z")
As I understand that excerpt, the point is that people provided an answer to “what is your sex” that was belied by chromosome tests more often than a person self-reported an ethnic origin (European American, African-American, Asian or Hispanic) that didn’t match genetic testing; is that correct? I don’t mean this to be flippant, but so what? ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2012, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/200 "2012-03-08T02:22:39Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > All categories are social constructs. Only to the extent that science itself is a social construct. So unless you are seriously arguing that science itself is invalid, this observation is irrelevant n determining is race and sex are biologically valid.. > [@](#): > > To be sure, there is stronger consensus about the line between {male humans} and {female humans}, than about the line between different races, but it does not follow that the concept of race is somehow invalid. However it does follow that it is scientifically invalid. It may have social or economic or literary validity, but it ain’t worth shit scientifically if it can’t be measured at better-than-chance-levels. > [@](#): > > I’ve asked the question many times: What are the criteria for deciding whether a set of categories is valid or not? Nobody has given me a satisfactory answer. Really? That surprises me. Can you show us where you asked this question? Because the answer is quite simple,and I gave it above, several times. A set of categories is scientifically valid when they are detectable using objective criteria at better-then-chance rates, and when the the members of those categories share characteristics beyond the criteria used ion the categorisation. Or, in shorthand, a set of categories is scientifically valid if it is objective and logically valid. But the, any concept is only scientifically valid if it is objective and logically valid. > [@](#): > > Another question, perhaps more important, is what the consequences are if a category is invalid. Depends on how they are invalid. If the categories are subjective, then anything derived form those categories will also be subjective, and can’t be used to resolve anything about objective reality If the categories are logically invalid, then you won’t be able to derive any illogical conclusion form them. If the categories simply don’t exist, or they don’t work, then you can’t do anything with them at all. > [@](#): > > [Is Category X scientifically invalid? Perhaps There is no perhaps about it. Since you know that it is subjective, then it can not be scientifically valid. Science can only be applied to that which has an objective existence. > [@](#): > > Similarly, one can define Category Y as {all people who were born in the Ukraine, Estonia, or Norway} > [@](#): > > Nevertheless, one can observe that the vast majority of people in Category X have brown eyes and that it’s a significantly higher percentage than people in Category Y. No, one can not observe that. You just told us that category X is subjective, so how can you possibly say that people can observe anything about it. If it is subjective, then what you observe is not going to be what I observe. This is your first problem with your example. If the categorisation is subjective, then the group itself is necessarily subjective. Your Group X doe snot contain the same people as my Group X. IN fact your Group X may not overlap at all with my Group X. The groups may not contain any of the same people. As such, you can not say that “one” can observe anything at all about the group. You can say what \*you \*experienced in what \*you \*think the group is, but that is entirely personal. With a subjective group, I might construct an utterly dissimilar group, and observe exactly the opposite. So until you can provide an objective definition of Group X, you can not possibly make declarations about what “one” can observe. > [@](#): > > And it’s not unreasonable to hypothesize that that this fact is a result of genetic differences between people in Category X and people in Category Y. It’s not just unreasonable, it’s illogical and unsupportable. You have no idea what Group X actually is, or even if it exists, because it is subjective. There may not be any people at all in my Group X, while yours might contain over a billion people. How you can pronounce what it is reasonable to conclude about the characteristics of my subjective Group X when you don’t even know what the characteristics of my Group X are? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779.md?page=11)