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Post by fascinating on Dec 4, 2014 10:30:12 GMT 1
"Your argument is bizarre". What is my argument? I had no wish to make an argument as such. I am asking you, who uses the word "race", to TELL ME WHAT YOU MEAN BY THE TERM. It is YOU that is using the word so YOU tell ME what you mean by it. In the original discussion I mentioned, in passing, that there is no recognised scientific definition of the word, and I quoted the Encyclopedia Britannica article which backs up what I said. Now if you regard EB as rubbish, fine, all you have to do is provide some link from some reputable source somewhere that there is scientific backing for the concept of "race". This you have failed to do, though I do note that, at long last, you have done a search and managed to pull up something that you think backs up your case. So let's look at that. Nowhere in the part you have quoted does it give a definition of race, so we aren't much further forward. However it does treat seriously the traditional concept of race - treats it seriously, it does NOT unequivocally accept "race" as a useful term in science, because while "Clustering of individuals is correlated with geographic origin or ancestry [and] are also correlated with some traditional concepts of race" it is nevertheless the case that "the correlations are imperfect because genetic variation tends to be distributed in a continuous, overlapping fashion among populations". So traditional concepts of race are NOT backed up by science. However "ancestry, or even race, may in some cases prove useful in the biomedical setting" - meaning that, if you want to treat people using medicine, it MIGHT be helpful to use this unscientific idea of "race" BUT for better ("more accurate and beneficial") treatment of disease, direct assessment (ie without using the idea of race) of the genes that are associated with disease should be practiced.
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Post by fascinating on Dec 4, 2014 10:34:43 GMT 1
No, you just keep repeating your dogma. I am asking for evidence to back up your dogma. You don't provide any. I have provided to back up my case about "race" being an unscientific concept. You have not provided any credible scientific evidence that race is a scientific concept. Even PA has come up with something, though it doesn't really back up his case. You have come up with nothing beyond your own dogma.
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Post by Progenitor A on Dec 4, 2014 11:17:08 GMT 1
"Your argument is bizarre". What is my argument? Your argument is that the concept of race is a 'social construct' and has no scientific validity I am asking you, who uses the word "race", to TELL ME WHAT YOU MEAN BY THE TERM. It is YOU that is using the word so YOU tell ME what you mean by it. I have told you many times .... at long last, you have done a search and managed to pull up something that you think backs up your case. It shows that there is scientific recognition of ancestry and race; it also shows an understandable guardedness about the subject, a hedging for obvious reasons So let's look at that. Nowhere in the part you have quoted does it give a definition of race, so we aren't much further forward. I have already given a definition of race However it does treat seriously the traditional concept of race - treats it seriously, it does NOT unequivocally accept "race" as a useful term in science I agree. I would not expect other than equivocation on the subject - it i riddled with taboo "the correlations are imperfect Name any scientific hypothesis where correlations are perfectbecause genetic variation tends to be distributed in a continuous, overlapping fashion among populations". Of course it does! The correlations can never be perfect, nevertheless distinct patterns arise and to deny those patterns is unscientific bonkeresness So traditional concepts of race are NOT backed up by science. Your words of contention that go against the drift of the synopsis However "ancestry, or even race, may in some cases prove useful in the biomedical setting" - meaning that, if you want to treat people using medicine, it MIGHT be helpful to use this unscientific idea of "race" Again you flaunt your prejudice - the synopsis says nothing of the kind - you insinuate that to use the genetics of race and ancestry is some sort of mumbo-jumbo - that is not what the article says at all and nowhere does it say such genetic research is unscientific Your use of 'scientific' is bonkers - if you disagree with an hypothesis then it is 'unscientific' - you talk of it as if the 'scientific method' is some sort of infallible holy grail - it is not it is a methodology and that mthodology can be, is applied to the concept of race whether you like it or not!
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Post by fascinating on Dec 4, 2014 11:50:59 GMT 1
There is no scientific definition of "race" as applied to humans.
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Post by Progenitor A on Dec 4, 2014 14:25:51 GMT 1
There is no scientific definition of "race" as applied to humans. You mean that scientists cannot discriminate between races from genetic/DNA testing? Well they can and they have done so! That taxonomy defines races whether you like it or not A race is a large group of people that share common characteristics; those characteristics are instantly visible in many cases, and genetic testing confirms that taxonomy Biology is almost all taxonomy - that is the methodology that Linnaeus used- that is the mechanism from which Darwin arrived at his conclusions Why you reject the taxonomy of races I simply do not know, but I suspect it is an emotional reaction, perhaps for the best of reasons
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Post by mrsonde on Dec 4, 2014 15:12:39 GMT 1
"Your argument is bizarre". What is my argument? I had no wish to make an argument as such. I am asking you, who uses the word "race", to TELL ME WHAT YOU MEAN BY THE TERM. It is YOU that is using the word so YOU tell ME what you mean by it. In the original discussion I mentioned, in passing, that there is no recognised scientific definition of the word, and I quoted the Encyclopedia Britannica article which backs up what I said. It doesn't "back up" what you said at all. It's abundantly evident from that absurd self-comtradictory article that it was written by no scientist - certainly not a geneticist. A social scientist poerhaps - my confident guess would be an anthropologist at best and a sociologist at worst: both disciplines were thoroughly infected by the sort of Winchian/Marxist neo-Kantian drivel I've already referred to. The recognised scientific definition of the word is the one I've already given you. You are constantly asking me to educate you on this, that or the other; I'm often obliging enough to accede, but to apparently no effect whatever. I have taken the trouble to direct you to where you might start to learn what a "scientific definition" refers to; as far as I can tell, you have done nothing whatever with the information, and you're still as clueless about the question as when you first asked it. You may consult the thousands of pages about genotypic analysis and population migration off your own bat, can't you? Problems with reading, is it? Alright - I happened to catch a mildly intriguing prog on the telly the other night about a history cold case - a dozen and more skeletons were found down a well in, err, Norwich I think it was. DNA analysis dated them to the 13th Century. It also showed they were related to each other, including many children, who had been thrown on top of the adults (who showed the expected bone impact fractures), and also showed that they were definitely Jews, thanks to a specific gene marker that occurs in 90% of all Jews but in no other race. Conclusion - an anti-semitic persecution cull, as was not uncommon in the 13th Century. Howling mob with pitchforks and braziers, the local authorities turning a blind eye. Now, you might object for some reason you've yet to impart that like every other genetically related group of people the Jews are not a "race" - but according to the scientific definition I've given you several times you have no grounds to do so whatever. In that case, kindly provide a reputable source that defines what you recognise when you correctly identify exemplars of what you insist is a cultural invention (or "intervention", whatever that means.) If we're all able to so thoroughly learn this cultural concept, that has no structural grounding in reality, at an age I would suggest when we've barely learned to talk if not before, then there must be somewhere a clear definition of this concept - in something like a Janet and John book, presumably - else how are we all able to learn it so well? Where is it? These clearly laid-out definitional criteria that would enable a five-year old to correctly distinguish a Zulu from a Chinese, for example? Yes it does, to the extent it's dealing with the question - which is purely in terms of its applicability in terms of medical diagnoses of racially specific diseases (of which there are many, of course.) As they are between and within families. On the contrary. The fact remains that, for instance, sickle cell anaemia affects primarily those of African origin; that for instance Huntington's Disease primarily affects Europeans rather than Africans of Asians and is effectively unknown in Australian or Amerindian aborigines; that two of the enzymes that break down alcohol are commonly lacking in Japanese people (and one of them in many Jewish people), though not in the aboriginal Ainu; that certain variants of colour blindness are quite common in Andean Indians but virtually unknown elsewhere; and so on and so on. These are diseases not caused by cultural factors, they're not social inventions, they're very specific genetic faults shared by a large number of specific populations in and from the same geographical origin - because they're ancestrally related. That's what "race" means. It's perfectly "scientific", and, in its structural definition, even if still not fully elaborated, perfectly precise. It doesn't say "unscientific idea". If it was "unscientific" how on earth do you suppose it could be useful? That is "using the idea of race". That's what the word means!
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Post by mrsonde on Dec 4, 2014 15:20:44 GMT 1
No, you just keep repeating your dogma. I am asking for evidence to back up your dogma. You don't provide any. I have provided you conclusive evidence. Address that evidence before I bother furnishing you with yet more. No you haven't. You've managed to find a sociologist who parrots your unscientific view, that's all. I could do the same - dozens of them. It was the standard orthodoxy in 1970s Anglo-American sociology and anthropology. Refute the evidence I have provided you, don;t keep simply chanting nah, nah, nah. Nothing to do with dogma. You need to learn what that word means as well as "scientific". Answer the evidence put to you. How are you able to correctly identify members of different races (irrespective of what country they were born in, these days, or what culture they might have)? What is it that you think all those scientists analysing ancestral provenance are identifying? How are they able to identify the place and time - usually with great precision - of a person's origin simply by analysing his genetic code (no information about cultural influences required, thankyou)/ Answer this evidence and the questions it rasies that totally refute your dogmatic position before you demand yet more.
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Post by fascinating on Dec 4, 2014 16:11:39 GMT 1
Progenitor A said Why you reject the taxonomy of races I simply do not know, but I suspect it is an emotional reaction, perhaps for the best of reasons
You see, that shows to me how you misunderstand my whole approach in this debate.
Can we a take a deep breath and try to cool this rather overheated debate and, hopefully, throw some light on it? As I have said before, mature adults ought to be able to reach a mutual understanding of their respective positions in an argument, even if they ultimately end up by disagreeing (and even then the disagreement should be friendly).
Now you say that I reject the taxonomy of races. Well, I don't.
Decades ago (but not very many decades) I remember reading books which showed the races of mankind, with a map showing, I think, 3 races in total (could be wrong about that) each occupying separate areas of the globe, each with their own different facial characteristics neatly illustrated.
I also have bird books, again not that old, that refer to different varieties of birds, within species, as "races".
I am not offended by the application of the word, either to humans or to birds. The only problem I have with using the word "race" for varieties of birds is that the word is no longer used in science for birds, they are now called "subspecies". My understanding of a subspecies is a group of the same species that has become geographically separated from the other subspecies, so that they do not interbreed, and therefore form certain characteristic forms or behaviours.
What about humans? In fact I would rather that humanity was neatly divided into separate subspecies or races and that modern science backed up the theories of many years ago of there being three races, each one of us belonging to them.
Unfortunately, I cannot find such evidence. When I look it up, all I find are statements that the idea of race does NOT have scientific backing. Now I merely say to you; if you can find something from a reputable source that science has a definition of what a race is, please point it out to me, I would be really grateful. I do insist that the word "race" must have a scientific definition (just as "species", "subspecies" have definitions). Or at the very least, show me a scientific paper that even uses the word "race" that is SCIENTIFICALLY meaningful. But let's leave that to one side for a moment.
Now, of course, the science of genetics can place people into ancestral groups. I have never disputed that. But there is no science which I can find which enables us to determine, scientifically, which groups can be called races. You might want to believe that the groups are synonymous with races, but that is watering down the meaning isn't it? If I studied a subspecies of bird with a large population, over an extensive area, I would be able to identify many ancestral groups, but that does not mean I can state that the subspecies has many "races" can I? Or are you saying that I could?
Even so, despite the fact that I see no scientific basis for the word "race", that does not mean I object to the word "race"! If a brown man says he is of Asian race, or a muddy pink man says he is of the white race, or a president who is the colour of milky coffee says he is of the black race, who am I to argue? I merely point out that I cannot find any such divisions being accepted by mainstream science.
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Post by fascinating on Dec 4, 2014 16:29:33 GMT 1
Just to add, it does seem to me, PA, that with most debates you decide to see things in terms of left v right. Thus you decide that it is a left-wing view that there are no races, and since you hate the left, you spend your time debating so that, at all costs, you have to win against your left-wing opponent. I say that we do not need to decided if something is left or right, all we need to know is what is correct, and what is not correct.
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Post by jean on Dec 4, 2014 18:38:47 GMT 1
If this were true, it would be a very important truth to have established, would it not? It would mean that some remedial action might be demanded to help the situation. If what were true? Do you mean the hypothesis you have distilled out of Watson's ramblings - something like Black people's intelligence is not the same as white people's intelligence?(If you have a preferred formulation, could you supply it before we go any further?) In order to test this hypothesis, or whatever version of it you prefer, we need a definition of race that will enable us to set boundaries that will precisely delineate black people from white people.There are all kinds of problems with this. I haven't much time, but I will try to list a few. How, exactly, do you decide SCIENTIFICALLY, which race someone belongs to? You do a DNA analysis, exactly... But because many of these genes are quite evident in the phenotype, and the human brain is very adept at recognising such differences, mostly it's just a matter of looking... It's the question we have to answer before we even begin. I'm not surprised you swerve away fairly smartly from offering DNA analysis as the way to establis race, because it is quite problematic: ...L. Luca Cavalli-Sforza, a pioneer of genetic anthropology...has probably spent more time trying to classify human groups by genetic analysis than anyone else. In his massive book The History and Geography of Human Genes, he groups people into geographic and evolutionary clusters--but, he writes, ''At no level can clusters be identified with races.'' Indeed, ''minor changes in the genes or methods used shift some populations from one cluster to the other.''
Geneticist Steve Jones makes this point by looking at blood. ''We would have a very different view of human race if we diagnosed it from blood groups, with an unlikely alliance between the Armenians and the Nigerians, who could jointly despise the...people of Australia and Peru,'' who generally lack type-B blood, Jones writes in The Language of Genes. ''When gene geography is used to look at overall patterns of variation,'' he writes, ''color does not say much about what lies under the skin.''...Easy! And how very scientific!Only it isn't, of course. ...you would have no difficulty distinguishing racially identifying features from a line-up of a dozen or so typical members of categorised races. No need for a list therefore, is there - we already share a common visual checklist without having to verbalise it... Then again, I could give you a line-up of blonde, blue-eyed people and dark-haired, brown eyed people and you'd have no difficulty in assigning each individual to the correct group. But I wouldn't call those groups races. Would you? Add to that the fact that some people who identify as Black don't look very black at all...it's beginning to look as if Watson's project isn't going to get off the ground.
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Post by jean on Dec 4, 2014 18:51:35 GMT 1
You're not a geneticist, I presume. Nor, I believe, are you.
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Post by Progenitor A on Dec 4, 2014 19:05:13 GMT 1
Just to add, it does seem to me, PA, that with most debates you decide to see things in terms of left v right. Thus you decide that it is a left-wing view that there are no races, and since you hate the left, you spend your time debating so that, at all costs, you have to win against your left-wing opponent. I say that we do not need to decided if something is left or right, all we need to know is what is correct, and what is not correct. I have made no mention of 'left' or 'right' in this discussion. However, you have a point and you are right (albeit possibly left)-the discussion does tend to polarise between a (tacit) left and right view, with the 'left' generally denying the existence of race (for clear ideological reasons, but at the same time, quite unconscious of the inherent contradiction, they are invariably virulently 'anti-racist' - how on earth one can be 'racist' (or 'anti-racist') simultaneously denying the existence of race is quite beyond me! It is also quite evident from the usual weasel comments of such alumni of the left (god help them!) as Jean, that she regards my position on the existence of race as clear evidence of my racism - what other interpretation can be put on her posting crude racial pictures with the comment 'you will like this'. I simply ignore her in that mode (that is most of the time)
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Post by mrsonde on Dec 4, 2014 20:12:35 GMT 1
Decades ago (but not very many decades) I remember reading books which showed the races of mankind, with a map showing, I think, 3 races in total (could be wrong about that) each occupying separate areas of the globe, each with their own different facial characteristics neatly illustrated. You could equally claim there is one race; or seven; or one hundred, whatever. It depends on your specifications: your resolution. This is perfetly normal in a "scientific definition." And whose theory was that, pray? As it happens, there is just such a modern theory, and it's as least as well evidenced as the Out-of-Africa hypothesis, so you're in luck. From whom? And what on earth do you take this ridiculous phrase to mean? The "idea of race" is not a theory, as you seem to believe. It's a category concept. It has "scientific backing" if it refers to a spatio-temporal structural form - as it quite self-evidently does. No, first you give some coherent reason why you disagree with the definition I and Nay have already given you many times - just a good reason, there should be no demand that you "find a reputable source", however you might adjuicate such a quality, or for what purpose - if the argument is false, it doesn't matter how many "sources" you can find for it, reputable or not. That's how science works. And, incidentally, that's how "debate" between "mature adults" works too. You need to give some account of what it is you're demanding. Because it seems to me that you have been given a perfectly scientific definition, and you've simply rejected it out of hand for reasons you seem unable to recount. What do you take a "scientific definition" to be? Then we'd have a better idea of what the hell it is you're seeking, and why you aren't satisfied with the one you've already been given (seeing as you won;t tell us yourself - apart from some absurd inappropriate analogy about gender.) Does a desert have a scientific definition? How many are there in the world? How large is it? When does a bit of dry scrubland become a desert, scientifically speaking? Where exactly do you draw the boundaries? Is a "river" a scientific concept? How many in the world are there? How large does it have to be? When does a stream become a river, and a river an estuary or a delta or a channel? Is the Solent a "river" and if not why not? Is a "cyclone" a scientific concept? How many, how large, what exactly are its boundaries? Is a "planet"? On what basis is Pluto now not a planet, but it was, scientifically speaking, twenty years ago? Is a "galaxy" a scientific concept? How large is it? How many stars, exactly? Where does it start, and where does it end? Does a "society" have a scientific definition? How many, how large, where are its boundaries? A "family"? "Kinship"? How about a "magnetic field" - where does it end, how strong does it have to be before it qualifies, how many "lines of force" must it have? Is an atom, or a molecule? How many are there? How large are they? How distinct must they be to qualify? As for normal everyday categories, your objections make absolutely no sense applied to them either - which is why you apparently seem very confused about language in general, not just "science". Does "chair" have an exact definition, and if it's not "scientific", what's the critical difference? Wittgenstein's favourite example was a "game". Whatever it is you're demanding, it strikes me that it very likely doesn't exist, and can't exist, and is simply an inappropriate question formed out of a muddle about what categories are. That's a doddle - the last time I did that was in a discussion on this board about the origins and DNA racial markers of native Americans, proving fairly conclusively that they're the result of European migration as much as Asian. It wasn't so long ago that I gave a flurry of links to papers about the DNA analysis of the Jewish race, showing conclusively that they originate from 13 original families and, even further back (not far, less than the last Ice Age), four particular women. Nay has just mentioned the papers by Hans Eysenck concerning the racial differences in IQ test results - should take you five seconds to find a reference to them. But tell me - why should anyone else have to do the work that you want done, for your peculiar satisfaction? And why don't you provide links to scientific papers arguing your case, with presumably alternative proposals for different words for what would certainly be the identical concept? Yes, they're called races. No one has ever proposed there is or can be such a determination - not scientifically at any rate. Back when the Bible was taken as evidentiary, perhaps. Just as there is no science which enables us to determine, scientifically, which patches of sand can be called deserts. No. It might be watering down whatever it is that you falsely suppose the meaning to be - but who knows what that is? Some fanciful claims from outdated children's books, apparently. You do know that Britain no longer rules the waves and has a sacred duty to uplift the savages under our care, don't you? How many grains of sand does a desert have to have? How much water a river? It's the same scientific basis for the word "family" - just larger, involving many extended genetic relationships. The family becomes a clan becomes a tribe becomes a people becomes a race. Look a little then. The racial make-up of Obama was closely chewed over for years. The various migration patterns of the various subdivisions of Europeans - the "white race" - has been very thoroughly analysed through DNA tracing for decades. The same goes for all the other "races".
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Post by mrsonde on Dec 4, 2014 20:14:45 GMT 1
You're not a geneticist, I presume. Nor, I believe, are you. I'm not the one denying the genetic basis of racial differences, am I, and proffering a reason for it that I have no methodology to judge the matter!
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Post by mrsonde on Dec 4, 2014 20:45:12 GMT 1
That's right. On what ground do you term this perfectly coherent hypothesis "ramblings"?
Well, we have one. I've given it several times. It is confirmable with a simple DNA analysis, if the colour of skin doesn't do it for you.
What??!
What are you talking about? What "swerving away"?
"Clusters" are the races!
What he can possibly mean by "methods" is anyone's guess - it certainly has no effect on the constitution of genes, or their given arrangement. Minor changes in the genes of course shift populations from one cluster - racial grouping - to another (or can do, depending on exactly what changes - most have no discernible effect at all.) That's the whole point.
But we don't, and there's no reason we should is there? That's like saying things would be different if we "diagnosed" racial identity from the length of hair. As for Jones, never mind his habitually outspoken political allegiance - he himself ruefully admits that our understanding of genetics is now virtually at the beginning again, and nearly all that we thought we knew at the turn of this century is in the round defunct.
Yes, typical left-liberal deconstructionist nonsense. This man is an expert on snails and as far as I've ever been able to tell, that is, from what he actually says, (I have read this, and two of his other books) nothing else.
Very scientific, that "much". Fortunately, no one is claiming very "much." Just that the colour of skin, for example, is generally part of that cluster of differences that define racial groupings (unlike blood groups, or anything else totally irrelevant to the subject.) Part of that cluster are specific genetic mutations like sickle cell anaemia. Not "much" if you don't suffer from it, as he certainly won't.
Yes, it is. Repeatable, confirmable, falsifiable.
Really? You never did respond as to how you'd fare in my hypothetical line-up test. You're saying you'd fail, are you? Couldn't identify an African from a Chinese from a Norwegian? Oh well. Fortunately, that's irrelevant, because the test is a statistical one, and the vast majority of people would pass it easily, whatever your shortcomings.
No, as I told you before the two other times you threw this complete red herring. It's as irrelevant as Jones' "blood groups".
How someone "identifies" themselves is irrelevant too. What "project" are you referring to? That some people of African origin don't look black would derail no sort of project at trying to deterimine racial differences in intelligence at all. Other far more problematic issues might, and have done, of course.
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