# Is there such a biological thing as a racial group? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 3, 2011, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007 "2011-04-03T03:39:48Z")\ **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:** [April 5, 2011, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/201 "2011-04-05T05:29:20Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Not in a Biology setting. > > What you have there is a philosopher trying to convince biologists to use his terms, not working much. It is just offering very weak support to a conspiracy theory. > And some astronomers still called Pluto a planet for a while, most are going now for the new definition of dwarf planet. > > And your insinuation still exudes “conspiracy theory”. Why not in a biology setting? You haven’t addressed my comments earlier where I provided you with the biological definition of race. All you’ve said is that it’s disputed. > [@](#): > > (1) A group or population of humans categorized on the basis of various sets of heritable characteristics (such as color of skin, eyes, and hair). > > (2) A descent from a common heritage, ancestor, breed or stock. > > (3) A tribe or family of people sharing a common breed or lineage. > > (4) A population of interbreeding species that develops distinct characteristics differing from other populations of the same species, especially as caused by geographical isolation. [Race - Definition and Examples - Biology Online Dictionary](http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Race) Groups or populations of humans can indeed be categorized on the basis of various sets of heritable traits. As I noted above - that’s why forensic anthropologists can identify a persons race from the skull and skeletal features. And genetically, there are quite clear clusters that individuals fall into. Members from those races/clusters are more closely related to each other than they are to members of other races/clusters. The clustering of course is a natural consequence of geographical isolation, inheritance and natural selection operating over the last 50k years since humans left Africa. [http://genomebiology.com/2002/3/7/comment/2007](http://genomebiology.com/2002/3/7/comment/2007) Also, it’s hardly a conspiracy theory to suggest that the term race is particularly loaded and people might prefer a term with less baggage like population. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/202 "2011-04-05T05:33:46Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > I know. You’ve been too busy assuming that anyone who says “race” must think it’s an objective concept. :rolleyes: It is an objective concept. It means something specific in biology (which is what this thread is about), and when you apply that biological term to the human species, we fail. Now, you want to use the term in a lose way, so that it might mean many different things depending on the context. And that’s fine. That’s precisely what make it, as applied to humans in that way, a social construct rather than a biological one. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/203 "2011-04-05T05:39:45Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Also, it’s hardly a conspiracy theory to suggest that the term race is particularly loaded and people might prefer a term with less baggage like population. That does not exclude the reality that the consensus is that: “\*Race is a biological term used to describe subspecies of organisms. \*The physical variation in humans, though perhaps seemingly great, is genetically minimal. \*During the history of humanity, populations have never been isolated long enough to become true biological races” Your conspiracy theory is that scientists are dropping the term just because it is a loaded term. That is not the case. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/204 "2011-04-05T05:44:53Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > It is an objective concept. It means something specific in biology (which is what this thread is about), and when you apply that biological term to the human species, we fail. > > Now, you want to use the term in a lose way, so that it might mean many different things depending on the context. And that’s fine. That’s precisely what make it, as applied to humans in that way, a social construct rather than a biological one. Can you explain what you mean when you say that it doesn’t apply to the human species? ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/205 "2011-04-05T05:46:25Z")
> [@athelas](#): > > Did you click the link? Did you see the genetic analysis that separated not “races,” but _individual European subpopulations_ into clearly distinct groups? First off the question was not “Name two European subpopulations and the genetic test that you can use to separate them.” The question was “Name two races and the genetic test that you can use to separate them.” Secondly… did you even read your own reference? The authors are not talking about race. > [@athelas' own refernce](#): > > This, however, does **not** mean that the citizens of each European nation represent miniature **races**. Thirdly, nobody in this thread has disputed that it is trivially easy to separate small subpopulations on the basis of genetics. In fact the smaller the subpopulation the easier this becomes. That is precisely why references to subpopulations have no bearing on the ability to separate races.As I have already mentioned, this is by far the easiest with sub-populations of family size. But a family is not a race, nor is a “European subpopulation”. The authors of that article note that their precision for even marginal significance is in fact national border + 700km. The precision for true significance is even tighter. Nobody in the history of the world has ever suggested that “Everyone within 700 km of France” is a race. How’s \*that \*for “an analysis of the post and paper in question”? Pretty much demolishes your entire position while highlighting that you not only don’t understand the difference between race and subpopulation, you did not even read your own reference. It is sad that you do not understand the difference between a subpopulation and a race. Nonetheless I ask you the question again, just to highlight the fact that you are unable to answer it: > [@](#): > > Name two races and the genetic test that you can use to separate them. We are \*\*not \*\*asking you to name two European subpopulations and the genetic test that you can use to separate them. We do not care about European sub populations. Now can you answer the question or were you making it up when you said that you could do so? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/206 "2011-04-05T05:49:08Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > That does not exclude the reality that the consensus is that: > > “\*Race is a biological term used to describe subspecies of organisms. > \*The physical variation in humans, though perhaps seemingly great, is genetically minimal. > \*During the history of humanity, populations have never been isolated long enough to become true biological races” > > Your conspiracy theory is that scientists are dropping the term just because it is a loaded term. That is not the case. Where is your evidence that populations aren’t become “true biological races”? What do you mean by “genetically minimal”? Also, in terms of the definition from biology online there plainly are different human races for the reasons set out above. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/207 "2011-04-05T05:56:02Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Well, if there is such a thing, I’m not talking about it, and it’s existence doesn’t affect anything I’ve said. If all you care about is that definition of race, then you win, and we’ve been talking at cross purposes. Since the whole point of this thread has been to explore whether or not “there is such a thing,” the fact that you admit that you have not been talking about that indicates to me that you are either posting without any effort to understand the thread or you are trolling. Either way, you need to stop this “talking at cross purposes” in which you have been engaged. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/208 "2011-04-05T06:07:44Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > First off the question was not “Name two European subpopulations and the genetic test that you can use to separate them.” > > The question was “Name two races and the genetic test that you can use to separate them.” East Asian and African. You can see the discussion of how they are separated here. > [@](#): > > Genetic cluster analysis using structure was performed, allowing, sequentially, for k=2, 3, 4, or more clusters (Pritchard et al. 2000). The results can be summarized as follows. When k=2 clusters was specified, the Chinese and Japanese emerged as a combined cluster; when k=3 clusters was specified, the African Americans separated from the whites and Hispanics; when k=4 clusters was specified, an additional cluster was formed that was nearly exclusively Hispanic (99.8%). All but one of the Hispanic individuals analyzed were included in this new cluster. The four-cluster results are given in table 2, with crossclassification by SIRE. Our sequential cluster results are completely consistent with what we observed from the genetic distance measures and from figure 1—namely, that the East Asians are the most distant from the other groups, followed by the African Americans, and then the Hispanics… > > A recent study (Rosenberg et al. 2002) examined 377 autosomal microsatellite markers in 1,056 individuals from a global sample of 52 populations and found significant evidence of genetic clustering, largely along geographic (continental) lines. Consistent with prior studies, the major genetic clusters consisted of Europeans/West Asians (whites), sub-Saharan Africans, East Asians, Pacific Islanders, and Native Americans. It is clear that the ability to define distinct genetic clusters depends on the number and type of markers used (Risch et al. 2002). Reports that document inability to define distinct clusters generally used only a modest number of markers and, hence, had little power to detect clusters (Romualdi et al. 2002). Studies with larger numbers of markers appear to show strong evidence of clustering (Stephens et al. 2001; Rosenberg et al. 2002). > **[Genetic Structure, Self-Identified Race/Ethnicity, and Confounding in...](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1196372/)** > > We have analyzed genetic data for 326 microsatellite markers that were typed uniformly in a large multiethnic population-based sample of individuals as part of a study of the genetics of hypertension (Family Blood Pressure Program). Subjects ... ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/209 "2011-04-05T06:20:32Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Groups or populations of humans can indeed be categorized on the basis of various sets of heritable traits. No, they can not at a racial scale. If you want to dispute this we will play a little game. You can list say your races and the “sets of heritable traits” that allow you to categorise them, then I will post a dozen or so pictures of people in each race, and you can then categorise them according to those traits. You will not get better than 90% accuracy, guaranteed. > [@](#): > > As I noted above - that’s why forensic anthropologists can identify a persons race from the skull and skeletal features. Cite for this please. And I don’t mean anthropologists working with assumptions of underlying population, I mean any anthropologist who claims that she can identify any skull from anywhere in the world with no other information whatsoever. Because this claim is bollocks. > [@](#): > > And genetically, there are quite clear clusters that individuals fall into. Yes, and as your own reference notes “commonly used ethnic labels are … inaccurate representations of inferred genetic clusters” and “Hispanics…did not form a distinct subgroup, but clustered variously with the other groups” and “clusters identified by genotyping… are far more robust than those identified using geographic and ethnic labels” and “individuals cluster with other members of their \*\*regional \*\*group” So according to your own reference such clusters do not correspond to race as used by anybody in the entire history of the planet. They produce clusters group people according to their geographical proximity, of course, but not with any correspondence to any racial scheme ever used by any human being in the history of the planet. Such clusters group, for example, such classically Australoid people as [these](http://img224.imageshack.us/img224/1755/out01568yb.jpg)[Khmer](http://seshu.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/tulasi_munda.jpg)in the same cluster as classically mongoloid Japanese. Meanwhile other classically Australoid people such as the [Australian](http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_krdp4nRiWZ1qa4nsdo1_400.jpg)[Aborigines](http://en.epochtimes.com/news_images/2008-1-30-52981433_aborigine1.jpg) are grouped with the Polynesians. Well, since you have told us that these clusters are “races”, and since you have told us that races can be categorized on the basis of various sets of heritable traits, how about you do it for us. Tell us what sets of heritable traits you can use to separate those two women from the Pacific Islander Aboriginal race form the two women of the East Asian Khmer race? And you still haven’t answered my earlier question: Are you are seriously arguing that somebody can be biologically french? ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/210 "2011-04-05T06:26:23Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > So you are arguing that if two geographically disparate groups have “externally visible” “distinct and measurable differences” in addition to other difference that are not “externally visible”, that is evidence that the two groups are biological racial groups? > > Is that a correct summation of your argument? Not even remotely. My argument (at least this particular part of it) is as follows. (1) Different populations clearly have different characteristics when it comes to various external things like skin color, hair, eyes, etc (2) Therefore I suspect they also have different characteristics in other things (and I asked if anyone knew for certain how true this is… people have snidely responded that I’m making an assumption here, which is true, but no one has actually either disagreed or provided evidence otherwise) (3) Therefore it is entirely possible that one or more populations might be disproportionally likely to produce (for example) world class sprinters (4) Most populations are sufficiently physically similar that their members would tend to fall into the same “race” (5) Therefore, even if a particular race is made up of multiple populations, even populations that are in fact very dissimilar biologically, it is possible for there to be a disproportionate representation of a particular “race” among top sprinters, for biological reasons (6) So if in fact you think it’s NOT due to anything biological that so many of the world’s top sprinters are “black”, I think there’s a burden of proof on you to explain why that might be. Which in fact you might be able to do. The point I’m trying to make, however, is that I think “well, ‘black’ is a race, and race has no biological meaning, therefore your claim that there’s something biological to so many top sprinters being ‘black’ is false” is at best oversimplified. Obviously there’s a ton of gaps there because I’m not claiming I can prove anything. I’m simply claiming that “there are biological reasons why so many top sprinters are black” can not instantly be laughed out of court and dismissed as false due to the fact that it contains both the word “biological” and the word “race”. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/211 "2011-04-05T06:31:23Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > If a system of classification is essentially arbitrary, and also has no real practical purpose in the world, then it is pretty much meaningless. There are gray areas. As I said earlier, classifying people by the last digit of their SSN is utterly and completely unrelated to biology. Classifying people by really precise genetic studies of their heritage and of what population they descend from is clearly directly related to biology. It is far more precise than classifying according to “race”, and would generally be more accurate and useful for any purpose that one might also wish to use “race” for. It also generally avoids centuries of baggage and bigotry. But none of that means that “race” is completely 100% UNrelated to biology in the same way that SSNs are. Go back to the very first post in this thread to see precisely what I mean. And remember, I’m not arguing FOR just about anything at all… certainly not that scientists should start using “negro” and “oriental” as labels for people or anything along those lines at all. I’m just arguing that “race” is not 100% devoid of any correlation with anything at all biological. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/212 "2011-04-05T06:33:17Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Since the whole point of this thread has been to explore whether or not “there is such a thing,” Actually the title of the thread is unfortunately misleading, at least as far as my intent as the OP is concerned. A better title would be: “Race is 100% biologically meaningless – I claim that statement is overbroad”. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/213 "2011-04-05T06:36:14Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > East Asian and African. You can see the discussion of how they are separated here. You are joking I hope. This study does not in any way claim that it is able to genetically separate out an east Asian race from the global human population. Nowhere does it ever make such a claim. You are gratuitously misrepresenting the reference. The authors state quite plainly that the study only pertains to “major ethnic groups living in the United States” and note that “this is not surprising… since [there is] enough genetic differentiation between these groups to produce robust clustering” 1, 400 people from two countries Everybody was either Chinese, Japanese, Hispanic, Negro or European. Nobody at all from the nations bordering China and Japan. No Mongolians. No Indochinese. No Russians. No Tibetans. No Indians. No Koreans. Since you claim that this test will allow you to separate out “east Asians” from “Indics” and “Australoids” and “Asian Russians” please demonstrate how. Because I am calling you out. I claim that you are deliberately misrepresenting your reference and posting in bad faith. I claim that that paper does not at any stage claim or imply that there exists a genetic test that will separate an “East Asian” race out of the entire human population. If you are unable to quote where that paper makes a claim of a genetic test that will separate an “East Asian” race out of the entire human population then we will know you for exactly what you are: an unreliable, disingenuous poster who misrepresents sources either out of dishonesty or an inability to comprehend the science. I await your reply. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/214 "2011-04-05T06:40:19Z")
Max, while I know that you are reading the thread, can you please answer my questions? Specifically I would like you to tell me which nationalities comprise your “Asian” race, and why. This is the third time I have asked you this question, and you seem to be unable orr unwilling to answer it, despite the fact that you have repeatedly claimed that such as Asian race is self evident. There are numerous other questions that you have also not addressed. If you wish people to take the time to respond to you, you must demonstrate that you are poisting in good faith. Ignoring repeated calls for clarification is not indicative of such. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/215 "2011-04-05T06:47:21Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > No, they can not at a racial scale. If you want to dispute this we will play a little game. You can list say your races and the “sets of heritable traits” that allow you to categorise them, then I will post a dozen or so pictures of people in each race, and you can then categorise them according to those traits. You will not get better than 90% accuracy, guaranteed.? You could also play a game where you walk down the street and notice people of with substantially east asian, european or african racial ancestry. I bet you’ll do just fine. > [@Blake](#): > > Cite for this please. And I don’t mean anthropologists working with assumptions of underlying population, I mean any anthropologist who claims that she can identify any skull from anywhere in the world with no other information whatsoever. I said looking at the skull and skeletal features. Just as our definition of race from biology online suggests, you look for a heritable set of traits. Ousley S et al (2009) Understanding race and human variation: why forensic anthropologists are good at identifying race. Am J Phys Anthropol 139:68–76 Konigsberg LW et al (2009) Estimation and evidence in forensic anthropology: sex and race. Am J Phys Anthropol 139:77–90 > [@Blake](#): > > Yes, and as your own reference notes “commonly used ethnic labels are … inaccurate representations of inferred genetic clusters” and “Hispanics…did not form a distinct subgroup, but clustered variously with the other groups” and “clusters identified by genotyping… are far more robust than those identified using geographic and ethnic labels” and “individuals cluster with other members of their \*\*regional \*\*group” > > So according to your own reference such clusters do not correspond to race as used by anybody in the entire history of the planet. They produce clusters group people according to their geographical proximity, of course, but not with any correspondence to any racial scheme ever used by any human being in the history of the planet. Did you read the 2005 paper? The genetic clusters correspond almost perfectly with peoples own self identified race/ethnicity. Yes, hispanics included. > [@](#): > > The MDS places the Hispanic group between the white cluster and the East Asian cluster, which is consistent with this being an admixed group with European and Native American ancestries and with Native Americans being closer, genetically, to the East Asians (Calafell et al. 1998). Anyway, I have to go to play some sport. I’ll respond to your comments further tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/216 "2011-04-05T07:30:34Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > It is not clearly defined in geographical, morphological, political, social or historical terms either. Asian is a near meaningless term. You know that, which is why you steadfastly refuse to answer my simple question about which nationalities are considered part of your Asian race. First of all, please dial down the condescension and hostility. Thanks. There are in fact a bunch of questions you’ve asked which I have no answer to. I absolutely admit that I can’t tell you a single certain biological or genetic trait that links all people considered “Asian”. I’m not sure if anyone can. I have never claimed that such a thing exists. And frankly I don’t think you’re really responding to the claims or the points I’m trying to make. So I’m going to start over fresh one more time and try to discuss things from the ground up, which does in fact mean ignoring some the questions you asked in your last post. Many of them in fact I can not answer, as mentioned earlier, and some are just way off the thread of the relevant discussion. If there are any that you really want me to answer, I will do my best if you ask again (politely), but please try to consider the actual argument I’m making here. (1) We all agree (I think) that there are many populations of humanity (FAR more than there are generally thought of being ‘races’). They tend to share a common geographical origin, and they members of these groups share both genetic and morphological (assuming that word means what I think it means) traits. There is no way to precisely count or enumerate them, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. (2) That said, plenty of people fall into gray areas between these groups due to interbreeding. Other people are members of these groups by descent but just don’t look much like their parents and relatives. (3) “Races” are groups of these populations, and groups of individuals, all lumped together, usually due to vaguely arbitrary physical traits, most commonly (historically) skin color (4) Members of the same population will USUALLY, although not ALWAYS, end up in the same perceived “race”. (And this is probably way more true for some populations than others… I’m sure there are populations 99% of whose members would be classified as “white” and others whose members vary far more greatly.) (And yes, “usually” is a weasel word, but it’s basically just statistics. If you pick someone at ranodm from a randomly chosen population anywhere in the world, and pick another random person from that population, then have random Americans give their best guess as to their race, there will be a correlation far greater than chance between the answers you get.) There are two interesting questions from here: (A) If one agrees with me up until now, then races are made up at least partly of groups of people from the same population. And the populations themselves have a biological meaning. So does this all by itself is arguably enough to give the race biological meaning. It certainly means the race isn’t purely orthogonal to biology the way SSNs are. If in fact a single population shares some fairly unique biological trait, and that population is part of a single race, then there is a biological correlation between that race and that trait… even though it’s only because of a definable subset of that race. If I’m given a list of 1000 words, then group them into 26 groups based on their starting letter, then randomly lump those 26 groups into 6 groups with no rhyme or reason, I have not alphabetized the words. But neither are my groupings totally unrelated to the alphabet. (B) The other interesting question is whether the grouping of populations into races is itself completely orthogonal to biology. For the “traditional” Western races, it’s clearly motivated by a small number of superficial traits (particularly skin color) and by historical and cultural considerations. And there are plenty of examples of populations within the same race that are in fact not particularly genetically similar. But again there’s a statistics question… if we pick some definition of the traditional “classical” races, 7 or 8 of them or whatever, and assign as many of the world populations as we can to those 7 or 8 races, and then use genetic analysis to see how closely related the populations we’ve assigned to the same race are, will the results be statistically better than chance? Certainly sorting by traditional race will be far from perfect, assuming “perfect” is the most genetically accurate and meaningful groupings possible based on actual historical migrations and so forth. But will it do a better job than just eeny meeny miney moeing them? > [@](#): > > At this stage you need to explain what it is that you actually mean when you say that race is “biological”. Do you mean that it has a biological basis? That it has a biological manifestation? That it maps onto biological traits? Because you could mean any of those, and appear to mean all of them in different posts Reasonable question. As I’ve attempted to explain, I’m mainly disagreeing with the claim that race is 100% biologically meaningless. So I’m trying to come up with ways of looking at things where there is a connection between race and biology, as I was doing above. That’s all the claim I’m making, not that biologists in everyday life should suddenly start using traditionally-defined races in their research (which they shoudn’t), or that I can objectively define one or more races in purely biological terms (which I can’t), or that anyone can prove that the traditional 7 or 8 races are the most accurate way to sort people into large groups biologically (which they’re not) – but that the race of a person, while clearly largely a product of history and culture, is not always 100% totally and completely unrelated to any fact about that person’s biology/genetics. > [@](#): > > and once again I ask you to provide a reference for your claim that “Asian” is or has been considered a race by any reputable source is the whole world. I’m not sure what you mean by “reputable source” here, since you could easily argue that no reputable source recognizes the concept of race at all. But are you seriously claiming that in traditional American/Western categorizations, “Asian” is in fact NOT (in some contexts) a word used to describe a race? (Ie, not meaning “someone who lives in or comes from Asia”, but meaning “the more polite version of Oriental”)? Honestly, that seems like such an outlandishly bizarre claim that I want to be 100% sure I know exactly what you mean before I respond to it. > [@](#): > > The point I had hoped that you would take away is the fact that national boundaries are self-evidently subjective, cultural, plastic and non-biological. If nationality correlates with your genetic methodology, how can the _exact same_ methodological results be used to support the contention that race is not subjective, cultural, plastic and non-biological? > > I really do need to have your response to this issue. I honestly don’t think we disagree about anything here. If a particular island’s are a reasonably-genetically-distinct population, that population (which may or may not be one that would be viewed as being part of a particular race) is the population from that island. If that island then is colonized, then that population is the population from that island, who are subjects of some empire. If that island then wins independence, then the inhabitants of that island are still members of the same population they always have been (well, modulo interbreeding with the colonizers) and are also now the national population of a nation state. So in the last case, for that particular population and nationality, there’s a very strong correlation between a genetic/biological population and a nationality. Which doesn’t mean there always is. Sometimes there is a strong correlation between a single population and a nationality. Sometimes multiple populations make up a nationality. Sometimes parts of multiple populations do, sometimes there’s almost no connection. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/217 "2011-04-05T07:38:45Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > Specifically I would like you to tell me which nationalities comprise your “Asian” race, and why. Obviously I was busy typing while you were typing, but I will answer as best I can, and the answer is… I do not have a precise and comprehensive answer, and never claimed I did. I know that when I walk down the street there are lots of people I look at and say “that person clearly does not look Asian” and some people I look at and say “that person clearly looks Asian” and some people where I’m not sure. I could then ask each of those people what country their great grandparents were born in (or some such question to get a “national origin”), and count them all up. If I did that, I’d end up with a bunch of countries, each with a score indicating how “Asian” looking I thought its inhabitants were. I’ll happily speculate some if you like (China and Japan would be near the top of list, Ireland and the Ivory Coast near the bottom), or I can go to [this page here](http://www.geekologie.com/image.php?path=/2011/02/10/average-faces-full.jpg) and sort the average female faces, but what’s that going to prove? Certainly I can not, and never claimed I could, list a certain fixed number of countries such that all inhabitants of those countries (even correcting for recent immigration) are Asian and all inhabitants of other countries are not. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 7:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/218 "2011-04-05T07:46:11Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > You could also play a game where you walk down the street and notice people of with substantially east asian, european or african racial ancestry. I bet you’ll do just fine. And I bet that you will not. Once again, I challenge you to play the game. I will post a dozen pictures of people. Some will be east Asian, some will not. You note which ones have substantially east Asian ancestry. Since you believe that you will do just fine at this game, why won’t you take me up on it? > [@](#): > > I said looking at the skull and skeletal features. Just as our definition of race from biology online suggests, you look for a heritable set of traits. > > Ousley S et al (2009) Understanding race and human variation: why forensic anthropologists are good at > identifying race. Am J Phys Anthropol 139:68–76 > > Konigsberg LW et al (2009) Estimation and evidence in forensic anthropology: sex and race. Am J Phys Anthropol 139:77–90 Well we now have incontrovertible evidence that Chen is either posting dishonestly or is unable to understand the reference that he himself posts. Chen has just claimed that those papers show that anthropologists working with no assumptions of underlying population identify race from skeltal remains. Then we read the papers: Ousley states quite clearly that he can only separate “American whites and blacks” due to the limited number of racial types with the American population. He goes on to note that that he finds"differences among groups within continents" and that “if biological races are defined by uniqueness, then there are a very large number of biological races that can be defined, **contradicting the classic biological race concep** t of physical anthropology.” So far from Ousley being a reference that supports the idea that anthropologists can identify race from skeletal remains Ousley says exactly the opposite: that skeletal remains can not be assigned to any existing racial groups. Konigsberg notes that anthropolgists are \*only \*able to identify race through skeletal remains if they use make use of underlying population data. They stress repeatedly the “extreme importance of an informative prior in any forensic investigation” and notes that racial identification hinges on “how to use prior information both in estimation and in the presentation of evidence application” . Konigsberg et al concentrate heavily on one sample, known as “Mr. Johnson.” They note that they were only able to idnetify Mr Johnson after **rejecting the most likely racial groupings based upon the physical evidece** : “Knowing this, is it reasonable to assume that the remains are as likely to be from a descendant of 26th–30th Dynasty Egyptians or Easter Islanders (both samples are contained within the Howells’ data) as from relatively recent Americans? We argue here for using the 2000 US census data.” “The analysis… does not take into account the fact that the skull was found in eastern Iowa and is therefore unlikely to be that of an Easter Islander, or the descendant of Easter Islanders.” So the two references that Chen provided say exactly the opposite of what he claims. Both references note that skeletal remains do not correlate well to any known racial groupings, and that anthropolgists can only possibly assign a race to skeletal remains by making use of prior knowledge of the regional population. Just to show how ridiculous Chen’s claims are, Mr Johnson was a white man from Iowa. According to the skeletal remains his most likely racial groupings were, in order, Easter Island Polynesian, Ancient Egyptian and Japanese . That’s pretty hilarious considering that Chen tried to use this paper to support the claim that anthropolgists can assign race based solely on skeletal remains. Por mister Johnson was Polynesian, African and East Asian based on his skeletal remains. So I think that I have proven conclusively that Chen is either totally unable to understand what his own references say, or that he is deliberately and dishonestly misrepresenting them in the hopes that nobody will bother to read them. > [@](#): > > Did you read the 2005 paper? The genetic clusters correspond almost perfectly with peoples own self identified race/ethnicity. Yes, hispanics included. No, once again you have totally misrepresented the article. But I have had enough of playing this game. You have proven three times now that that you are either totally unable to understand what your own references say, or are is deliberately and dishonestly misrepresenting them. I have no interest in debunking every disingenuous, bad faith usage of a citation that you make. I will leave others to decide on your personal honesty and credibility when it comes to references. From now on I will respond only when you use direct quotes from articles. When you simply claim that an article says something the default assumption will be that you are misrepresenting it, as you have now been conclusively proven to have done four time. If you start misrepresenting quotations I shall once again prove that you are doing so and then simply post a reference to this post for the enlightenment of other posters. That way everyone can see for yourself the way that you disingenuously misrepresent references. That will give them all the information they need to judge your trustworthiness and honesty. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/219 "2011-04-05T10:00:08Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > Well we now have incontrovertible evidence that Chen is either posting dishonestly or is unable to understand the reference that he himself posts. > > Chen has just claimed that those papers show that anthropologists working with no assumptions of underlying population identify race from skeltal remains. Then we read the papers: > > Ousley states quite clearly that he can only separate “American whites and blacks” due to the limited number of racial types with the American population. He goes on to note that that he finds"differences among groups within continents" and that “if biological races are defined by uniqueness, then there are a very large number of biological races that can be defined, **contradicting the classic biological race concep** t of physical anthropology.” > > So far from Ousley being a reference that supports the idea that anthropologists can identify race from skeletal remains Ousley says exactly the opposite: that skeletal remains can not be assigned to any existing racial groups. > > Konigsberg notes that anthropolgists are \*only \*able to identify race through skeletal remains if they use make use of underlying population data. They stress repeatedly the “extreme importance of an informative prior in any forensic investigation” and notes that racial identification hinges on “how to use prior information both in estimation and in the presentation of evidence application”.. > > So the two references that Chen provided say exactly the opposite of what he claims. Both references note that skeletal remains do not correlate well to any known racial groupings, and that anthropolgists can only possibly assign a race to skeletal remains by making use of prior knowledge of the regional population. Heh, except that the definition of “uniqueness” or purity is a complete strawman (as discussed previously). Go back and read the biology online definition above and you’ll see Ousley & Konigsberg’s findings in fact support the existence of biological races/populations. **Ousley finds shows there is a success rate of 80% in distinguishing between American Whites and Blacks, using 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%**. Also, you didn’t mention this: > [@](#): > > Results from Howells (Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology others using \*\*craniometric and molecular data show strong geographic patterning of human variation \*\*despite overlap in their distributions… > > \*\*Further, our results show that humans can be accurately classified into geographic origin using craniometrics even though there is overlap among groups. \*\* Konigsberg et al noted that it is sufficient to use as few as 13 characteristics to have the posterior probability of the correct classification attain the value of 99%. see p156 Biol Philos (2010) 25:143–162 [http://www.ln.edu.hk/philoso/staff/sesardic/Race.pdf](http://www.ln.edu.hk/philoso/staff/sesardic/Race.pdf) ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007/220 "2011-04-05T11:38:11Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Actually the title of the thread is unfortunately misleading, at least as far as my intent as the OP is concerned. A better title would be: “Race is 100% biologically meaningless – I claim that statement is overbroad”. Then you should have asked for the title to have been changed a long time ago. If the OP is not even going to say what you mean, it is going to go nowhere and cause a lot of confusion and anger. You let it sit this long, if you want thqt different discussion, open a different thread. [/Modding] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-a-biological-thing-as-a-racial-group/577007.md?page=12)