# 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:** 11
**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, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/201 "2012-03-08T02:27:15Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > 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? The point is that criticisms of race categories being imprecise can also be levelled at other categories such as gender or age. That’s the point Risch is making. It doesn’t mean they’re invalid (sorry, you may not have been suggesting this). If you take the approach to race that is used in terms of other species then there are human races. Jerry Coyne had a well done [post](http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/are-there-human-races/) on this the other day. ---
**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, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/202 "2012-03-08T02:34:11Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > [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. And when you or Risch can provide a quote ofwhere someone has ever said that sex \*can \*be categorised based upon chromosomal markers, this won’t be a total strawman. Since nobody has ever made such a claim, it neatly refutes a position that nobody has ever actually held. What it doesn’t address at all is the genuinely expressed criticism that self-reported race is not in any sense objective. Self-reportage of race is the ultimate subjective classification scheme. As such, the fact that it correlates to something that is objective doesn’t change a damn thing. I think I can conclusively say that the people who self-report eating echida in the last week will also have a high degree of correlation to all sorts of biological factors. That doesn’t make “echidna eater” a biologically valid racial group. Or maybe you think that “echidna eater” is a race? ---
**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, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/203 "2012-03-08T02:47:56Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > The point is that criticisms of race categories being imprecise can also be levelled at other categories such as gender or age. No they can’t, because nobody has ever cliamed that you can categorise sex by looking at chromomal markers. You are criticising a classification scheme that nobody has ever used, saying that it is worse than the classification scheme that you do use, and concluding that this proves that your scheme has validity. It’s a blatant strawman. > [@](#): > > If you take the approach to race that is used in terms of other species then there are human races. Absolute rubbish. > [@](#): > > Jerry Coyne had a well done post on this the other day. Far from being well done, it’s a textbook example of of [begging the question](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question). The entire essay hinges on his assertion that “As we all know, there are morphologically different groups of people who live in different areas”. Coyne makes this assertion, and everything he writes thereafter hinges upon it being accepted. Well I have news for Mr. Coyne: we do not all know this. I do not know this. The foremost anatomists and geneticists ion the world do not know this. So how about you or Mr. Coyne \*demonstrate \*that there are morphologically different groups of people who live in different areas, rather than simply asserting that everybody knows to be true. You can start by naming these groups of people, and telling us how they are morphologically distinctive. We ask you to do this in every single race thread, and you utterly refuse to do so. You always keep coming back with the same BS claim that there are groups of people who are physically distinctive, yet your are utterly unable to tell us what they are. I think that’s all we need to know about these claims. ---
**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, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/204 "2012-03-08T02:51:43Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > I think I can conclusively say that the people who self-report eating echida in the last week will also have a high degree of correlation to all sorts of biological factors. That doesn’t make “echidna eater” a biologically valid racial group. > > Or maybe you think that “echidna eater” is a race? Not in any sense that it is ordinary used. Risch links it back to geographic ancestry. That is consistent with Coyne’s definition above from evolutionary biology: \*morphologically distinguishable populations that live in allopatry (i.e. are geographically separated). \* That is also consistent with Ernst Mayr’s _“The subspecies category has been defined as “a geographically defined aggregate of local populations which differ taxonomically from other subdivisions of the species.”_ ---
**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, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/205 "2012-03-08T02:56:01Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > example of of [begging the question](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question). > So how about you or Mr. Coyne \*demonstrate \*that there are morphologically different groups of people who live in different areas, rather than simply asserting that everybody knows to be true. > > You can start by naming these groups of people, and telling us how they are morphologically distinctive. We ask you to do this in every single race thread, and you utterly refuse to do so.. Risch refers to the classically proposed races of Sub Saharan Africans, Caucasians, Pacific Islanders, Amerindians, and East Asians. See: figure 1 in Risch et al (2002) [“Categorization of humans in biomedical research: genes, race and disease,”](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC139378/)and table 1 in [Gill (1998) “Craniofacial criteria in the skeletal attribution of race.”](http://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=1&cts=1331175320862&ved=0CCMQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.neiu.edu%2F~circill%2FF495Y.pdf&ei=NB9YT4dwga2JB460-KkN&usg=AFQjCNGzNYYzt0qbLqX2skOmyregzhErIg&sig2=XGcWxak4_QxxV9SzmzurYg) Also see this previous debate [thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13873340&postcount=332). ---
**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, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/206 "2012-03-08T03:00:32Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Not in any sense that it is ordinary used. Risch links it back to geographic ancestry. So Risch’s test did not correlate to race at all, rather they correlate to geographic ancestry, which you concede is no more race than “echidna eater” is a race. So, in short, that little excursion of yours provides no evidence at all that race has an objective basis. All it shows is that you can generate a genetic correlation to any subjective self-reported criterion you like, provided the criterion has some correlation to geographic ancestry, and regardless of whether there is any correlation whatsoever to race. > [@](#): > > That is also consistent with Ernst Mayr’s _“The subspecies category has been defined as “a geographically defined aggregate of local populations which differ taxonomically from other subdivisions of the species.”_ It is also consistent with the existence of unicorns. It doesn’t provide any \*evidence \*for the existence of unicorns any more than it provides evidence for the existence of geographically defined aggregate of local populations which differ taxonomically from other subdivisions. But it’s consistent with both. ---
**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, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/207 "2012-03-08T03:01:14Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > 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.. I think you should be telling that to the people who regularly assert that “race is just a social construct” – as if that should have some important meaning. > [@](#): > > Really? That surprises me. Can you show us where you asked this question? I will try if you assert that you are seriously skeptical that I asked the question. Keep in mind that this is not the only forum where I discuss these issues. > [@](#): > > 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. I’m not sure I understand your definition. Would you say that “The South” is a scientifically valid category? What about “The New York City Metropolitan Area”? What about “worms”? What about “tall people”? What about “overweight people.”? What about “heavy smokers”? > [@](#): > > 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. > > If it is subjective, then what you observe is not going to be what I observe. It might be close enough not to make a big difference in one’s observations. Different people might have different understandings of what exactly are “The South”; and “The North.” And yet it snows less in the South. And the difference is due to latitude. We can quibble over whether Tulsa, Alexandria, or El Paso should be included in “The South,” but it won’t make a difference. ---
**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, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/208 "2012-03-08T03:02:06Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > So Risch’s test did not correlate to race at all, rather they correlate to geographic ancestry, which you concede is no more race than “echidna eater” is a race. Re-read the definitions and post [above](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13873340&postcount=332). ---
**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, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/209 "2012-03-08T03:06:46Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Risch refers to the classically proposed races of Sub Saharan Africans, Caucasians, Pacific Islanders, Amerindians, and East Asians. And? Are you claiming that Sub Saharan African is a morphologically different group of people? Because if you are not making such a claim, this post is completely non-repsonsive. So I ask once again: Can you name these morphologically different groups of people? I’m not asking you to give us a list of races that someone else uses for some other purpose. I am asking you to give us the list of races that you claim to be morphologically different groups of people. I am also asking you to tell us how these they are morphologically distinctive. So, are you claiming that sub-Saharan Africans, Caucasians and East Asians are morphologically distinct? Because it is going to be trivially easy to prove that you can not distinguish them based upon morphology. ---
**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, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/210 "2012-03-08T03:07:55Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > So, are you claiming that sub-Saharan Africans, Caucasians and East Asians are morphologically distinct? > > Because it is going to be trivially easy to prove that you can not distinguish them based upon morphology. I’ve just provided you with a link to forensic anthropologist George Gill saying otherwise. ---
**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, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/211 "2012-03-08T03:29:03Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > I think you should be telling that to the people who regularly assert that “race is just a social construct” – as if that should have some important meaning. I \*am \*one of those people who keeps saying that race is just a social construct, and I have no idea what point you think you are making here. Race \*is \* just a social construct. It has no validity within the objective, rational framework of science because it is either subjective or irrational or, usually, both. That is the important meaning of “just a social construct”. > [@](#): > > I will try if you assert that you are seriously skeptical that I asked the question. I am genuinely surprised. If it’s going to take too much effort, don’t bother hunting it down, since it will hardly prove anything either way, but I am surprised > [@](#): > > Would you say that “The South” is a scientifically valid category? Of course it isn’t.You can’t even get agreementon whther “The South” comprises 11, 12, 14 or 16 states. You could certainly define “The South” in precise geographic terms if you wished, but without that it has no scientific validity, or even universally accepted list of states for inclusion. > [@](#): > > What about “The New York City Metropolitan Area”? Assuming that this is a statutory region, then yes, It will defined as the area defined within a polygon made up of a series of co-ordinates. As such it is perfectly objective. If it’s an informal designation then, no. > [@](#): > > What about “worms”? Definitely not, unless you define the term very precisely. Worms include members of at least 15 different phyla, including vertebrates and arthropods. There’s no commonality at all between them, whether evolutionary, anatomical or physiological. > [@](#): > > What about “tall people”? Definitely not, unless you define the term very precisely. > [@](#): > > What about “overweight people.”? Definitely not, unless you define the term very precisely. > [@](#): > > What about “heavy smokers”? Definitely not, unless you define the term very precisely. > [@](#): > > It might be close enough not to make a big difference in one’s observations. And it might not. But because it is entirely subjective, you can never know. > [@](#): > > Different people might have different understandings of what exactly are “The South”; and “The North.” And yet it snows less in the South. Once again, you can make that claim, but you can never establish that it is correct because you haven’t objectively defined what “The South” even means. You assume that it snows less in “The South”, but assumptions aren’t science. And you can guess that it snows less in The South, but guesswork isn’t science either. > [@](#): > > And the difference is due to latitude. We can quibble over whether Tulsa, Alexandria, or El Paso should be included in “The South,” but it won’t make a difference. Once again, you can make that claim, but you can never establish that it is correct because you haven’t even objectively defined what “The South” even means. This isn’t some semantic quibble here. It is the very core of what science is. You can’t possibly falsify a claim like "it snows more in “The South” when you don’t even know what “The South” means. And if you can’t possibly falsify it, it can’t possibly have any scientific validity. It doesn’t matter if you \*think \*you know what it means, or that you \*believe \*that I think it means the same thing. If you can’t tell me what it means so that I can replicate it, it has no scientific existence. ---
**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, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/212 "2012-03-08T03:39:52Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > I \* > Race \*is \* just a social construct. It has no validity within the objective, rational framework of science because it is either subjective or irrational or, It doesn’t matter if you \*think \*you know what it means, or that you \*believe \*that I think it means the same thing. If you can’t tell me what it means so that I can replicate it, it has no scientific existence. So you are saying the concept or races or subspecies, as debated in this [thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13873340&postcount=332) basically has no rational framework? If that’s the case your position would make a bit more sense, as opposed to those who simply say it doesn’t apply to humans. ---
**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, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/213 "2012-03-08T03:45:01Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > I’ve just provided you with a link to forensic anthropologist George Gill saying otherwise. WTF? 😕 Gil lnever even uses the term “sub-Saharan African”. He refers to American Negroes an Blacks, but never once to sub-Saharan African. More importantly, Gill says: > [@Gill](#): > > No single trait or even combination of traits can be considered diagnostic of race. Not only do more hybrid conditions exist than are defined by society, but race itself is simply not a qualitative condition… [Race] does not exist in absolute form So, since you claim that Gill says sub-Saharan Africans are morphologically distinct, I will ask you to quote where he says that. That’s gonna be hard since Gill states outright that there are no morphological traits traits or combination of morphological traits that are diagnostic of \*any \*race. But I want to see you squirm away for your claim. 😃 ---
**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, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/214 "2012-03-08T03:50:00Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > So you are saying the concept or races or subspecies, as debated in this [thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13873340&postcount=332) basically has no rational framework? No. Now cut the strawmen and answer the questions please. What are the names of these morphologically different, geographically distinct groups of people that you say exist? What are the morphological features that you can use to distinguish them? Where does Gill refer to sub-Saharan Africans? Where does Gill say that there is a combination of morphological traits that are diagnostic of a sub-Sharan African race? You’ve made all these claims. Now I want to see your evidence that backs it up. ---
**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 8, 2012, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/215 "2012-03-08T04:10:54Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > 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] Apologies. I wasn’t being disingenuous. I thought you were annoyed at my reference to Eugenics not to my characterizations of those who believe in it. ---
**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, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/216 "2012-03-08T04:21:45Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > No. Now cut the strawmen and answer the questions please.. It’s not a strawman. It’s a genuine question. Remember: “[t]he standard level for defining a subspecies is based on the ‘‘75% rule’’ (Amadon 1949, Mayr 1969). If you take the morphological features discussed by Gill you’ll see they tend to allow identification at well above 75% accuracy. So I’m not sure why you think it can’t apply for humans. Also, > [@](#): > > "in an attempt to provide formal criteria for subspecies classifications we offer the following guidelines: Members of a subspecies share a unique geographical range or habitat, a group of phylogenetically concordant phenotypic characters, and a unique natural history relative to other subdivisions of the species. (O’Brien and Mayr, 1991. Bureaucratic Mischief: Recognizing Endangered Species and Subspecies.)” Again - the craniofacial features outlined in figure 1 of Gill’s paper share a group of phylogenetically concordant phenotypic characters and share a unique natural history relative to other subdivisions of the species. You keep referring to sub-saharan africans. I took it that Gill was referring to that group in his paper? In any case, here are some other papers discussing morphological differences allowing classification from sub-saharan groups and other populations. > [@](#): > > compared to other world populations, Africans south of the Sahara Desert are distinct dentally — especially in their expression of nine high- and two low-frequency morphological features. This suite of traits was termed the “Sub-Saharan African Dental Complex” (SSADC). (Irish (2011) “Afridonty: the “Sub-Saharan African Dental Complex” revisited.” > [@](#): > > Assuming that phenetic expression approximates genetic variation, previous dental morphological analyses of Sub-Saharan Africans by the author show they are unique among the world’s modern populations. Numerically-derived affinities, using the multivariate Mean Measure of Divergence statistic, revealed significant differences between the Sub-Saharan folk and samples from North Africa, Europe, Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia and the New World, Australia/Tasmania, and Melanesia. Sub-Saharan Africans are characterized by a collection of unique, mass-additive crown and root traits relative to these other world groups. (Irish (1997). “Ancestral dental traits in recent Sub-Saharan Africans and the origins of modern humans” Relethford (2009) tells us: > [@](#): > > Using Howells’s six geographic regions and all 57 measurements, the overall rate of correct classification is 97% for male crania and 96% for female crania. Jackknifed classification rates are slightly lower but still very high (96% for males, 94% for females). Such high levels of classification would seem to suggest that dividing humanity (or at least that section of humanity represented by Howells’s samples) into six discrete regions is valid. (Race and Global Patterns of Phenotypic Variation) ---
**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, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/217 "2012-03-08T04:31:43Z")
So you can’s answer the basic questions being put to you: What are the names of these morphologically different, geographically distinct groups of people that you say exist? What are the morphological features that you can use to distinguish them? Where does Gill refer to sub-Saharan Africans? Where does Gill say that there is a combination of morphological traits that are diagnostic of a sub-Saharan African race? You’ve made all these claims. Now I want to see your evidence that backs it up. You can try to introduce red herring all you like, and try to spam your posts with meaningless “references”, But it’s nit escaping anyone;s notice that you are not answering these questions in any way at all. ---
**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 8, 2012, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/218 "2012-03-08T04:55:40Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > 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. What’s wrong with the “95% confidence” criterion? ---
**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 8, 2012, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/219 "2012-03-08T04:59:39Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > 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. “Han Chinese teenagers” is not a race by _anyone_’s definition. ---
**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, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779/220 "2012-03-08T05:00:30Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > So you can’s answer the basic questions being put to you: > > What are the names of these morphologically different, geographically distinct groups of people that you say exist? [/a] Discussed at 8:56pm above: “Saharan Africans, Caucasians, Pacific Islanders, Amerindians, and East Asians.” Also, previous [thread on the biological definition of race](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13873340&postcount=332). > [@Blake](#): > > Where does Gill refer to sub-Saharan Africans?combination of morphological traits that are diagnostic of a sub-Saharan African race? > [/a] He refers to blacks. Read from p301 on useful cranio-facial features to distinguish races. > [@Blake](#): > > You can try to introduce red herring all you like, and try to spam your posts with meaningless “references”, But it’s nit escaping anyone;s notice that you are not answering these questions in any way at all. You asked for morphological differences between these races/populations. I’ve provided you with some that allow correct classification to satisfy the sub-species criteria listed above. Here’s another: > [@](#): > > Sauer explained that in forensic anthropology race is assigned with high > probability on the basis of an algorithm that combines a series of measurements. According to him, it is taken for granted among forensic anthropologists that race is determinable from the skull and postcranium, and ‘‘if such a determination is not possible, the problem is usually attributed to the incomplete nature of the remains or mixed ancestry’’ (ibid. p. 109). > > Indeed, a quick look into the literature confirms this. For instance, a study that covered 17 populations over the world and that relied on 34 different measurements managed to assign 98% of the specimens to their correct major racial group (Brues 1990, 6). Another more recent study had a success rate of 80% in distinguishing between American Whites and Blacks, although it used just two variables. With seven variables, however, it reached the reliability of 95%, and with 19 variables the probability of correct classification rose to 97%. [Biology and Philosophy 25 (2010), 143-162.](http://www.ln.edu.hk/philoso/staff/sesardic/getfile.php?file=Race.pdf) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-theres-no-such-thing-as-race-is-there-such-a-thing-as-gender/614779.md?page=12)