# Is race considered a thing?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [November 3, 2021, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746 "2021-11-03T19:49:31Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\
**Post date:** [November 6, 2021, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746/42 "2021-11-06T03:36:16Z")

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In what way has biological determinism been validated, and the points raised in _Mismeasure_ countered? That determinism included cranial measurements, etc.

_Guns_ looks at eight points, including ecosystems in light of staple crops and policies, etc., employed to either encourage, for example, exploration or otherwise (e.g., fragmented European states where people could move from one place to another to seek funding, and China, where long-range sea exploration was banned). How are these even mainstream stories or even singular, linear narratives?

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**Author:** ![GreenWyvern](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/greenwyvern/32/2834_2.png) [@GreenWyvern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreenWyvern)\
**Post date:** [November 6, 2021, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746/43 "2021-11-06T05:51:48Z")

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> [@ralfy](#):
>
> In what way has biological determinism been validated

It hasn’t been. Did I say it was?  
&nbsp;

> [@ralfy](#):
>
> How are these even mainstream stories or even singular, linear narratives

Diamond, Harari, Fukuyama, Pinker etc. assume a simple linear evolutionary progression from small, simple egalitarian hunter-gatherer bands → agricultural revolution → cities, hierarchy, kings, armies. This is basically the same fairy tale that Rousseau told in the 18th century, and it’s been repeated ever since.

Modern archaeology and anthropology have shown that it’s flat wrong.

There was a [good article in the New York Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/04/opinion/graeber-wengrow-dawn-of-everything-history.html) yesterday by Graeber & Wengrow that discusses this.

For a fuller discussion, I suggest you read the [free sample of _Dawn of Everything_ on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/Dawn-Everything-New-History-Humanity-ebook/dp/B08WCL3V7Q/). It’s a substantial chunk consisting of the first two chapters of the book, and it goes into all this in detail. You can read it online (Look Inside) or download the Kindle sample.

> “Graeber and Wengrow offer a history of the past 30,000 years that is not only wildly different from anything we’re used to, but also far more interesting: textured, surprising, paradoxical, inspiring . . . It aims to replace the dominant grand narrative of history not with another of its own devising, but with the outline of a picture, only just becoming visible, of a human past replete with political experiment and creativity.”  
> ―William Deresiewicz, _The Atlantic_

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**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\
**Post date:** [November 8, 2021, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746/44 "2021-11-08T02:01:14Z")

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Well, that was the point of _Mismeasure_: to discredit biological determinism.

_Guns_ doesn’t give a “simple lineral evolutionary progression.” Rather, it explains how multiple factors, especially environmental ones, affect the use of technology, etc.

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**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\
**Post date:** [November 17, 2021, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-race-considered-a-thing/953746/45 "2021-11-17T12:34:45Z")

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I just got my copy of _The Dawn of Everything_. GreenWyvern has hinted at starting a reading group for it.

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