"Racism"

[fredtoast]

(03-16-2018, 02:27 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: It shows that the idea of categorizing people along racial lines is much more arbitrary than we like to think it is.

But when I see that 80 to 90 percent of track athletes have black skin and are not dark skinned Asians it does not seem so arbitrary.  In fact it seems like there is some direct genetic reason for this.

[Dill]

(03-16-2018, 02:09 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: The problem with that is it assumes all black ethnic groups are homogenous. Sickle cell isn't a black gene trait, it's a gene trait for ethnicities from malaria stricken areas. In the US, most of our black population comes from those groups, but if we tried to make that claim for all black people world wide, we'd be incorrect. 

No one is arguing that genetic variation doesn't occur. The argument is "ethnicity is genetically relevant, not race". 

I think we are saying the same thing here.  Height is not a "black gene trait" even though lots of Africans from certain regions of Africa are tall. Fred wants to know why there isn't race if so many black basketball players are tall. Not my question.

A "race" of people with sickle cell trait would look outwardly like Greeks and Pakistanis and Sudanese. Hence our notion of race would not clearly apply at all.

[Dill]

(03-16-2018, 05:47 PM)masterpanthera_t Wrote: I don't really have much to add or refute with your post except for the bolded part. I suspect that you probably meant something else, but as worded, this statement is quite wrong, or at least in the most "common" way of understanding your sentence, the meaning is wrong. This sentence comes off as saying that classifying Dravidians and Somalians as members of the "black race" is accurate due to "culture", is correct due to them having the same "culture" or being more lenient, many "cultural" similarities. And that meaning couldn't be more wrong. There is a vast array of differences between Somalians and South Indians -- language, religion, ethnicity, food being some places to start with. If you intend to mean "cultural" in the sense that these are both different from the British "culture" and this "otherness" provides a commonality from a cultural perspective, then, that's a more accurate but quite a tangential point to make. 

I do agree that their varying shades of skin color are a very real thing.

LOL this a perfect example of why this stuff is so difficult to talk about.

You did grasp my basic meaning, just not how the claim works in my argument. Of course Dravidians and Somalians are different, and genetically as well as culturally. My point in saying British called both "black" was not to say this classification was accurate at all, for cultural or any other reasons. The whole point of all my posts taken together is to challenge the 19th century conception of race and the system of classification based upon it.

What you suppose was "tangential", that the British were perceiving otherness marked and grouped by difference from Britishness, is a clue to how racial categories in the 19th century were constructed. They mark the difference from Europeans more than any internally consistent classification of biological or cultural reality.

I'd bet we are on the same page on most everything here, though my argument might not have been clear.

[BmorePat87]

(03-16-2018, 05:55 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Not sure why you are accusing me of repeating a falsehood when all i did was ask a question.

Why are 80 to 90 percent of NBA players and track athletes black?

More specifically why are they African American and not dark skins Asians?

You linked it earlier to a claim about speed, which I suggested you ask yourself what ethnicity they were rather than what their skin color was.

Do you think their skin color is the reason why?

[fredtoast]

(03-16-2018, 07:04 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: You linked it earlier to a claim about speed, which I suggested you ask yourself what ethnicity they were rather than what their skin color was.

Do you think their skin color is the reason why?

No, but skin color is tied to the same genetic differences.

Here is my final word on all of this.  Just because the races have mixed does not mean that people can not identify certain races based on physical appearance.  And physical appearance is clearly a genetic difference.  So to me it seems silly to say that there are not genetic differences between the races. 

I can tell a dark skinned Asian from a dark skinned African.  The fact that there are dark skinned Asians and dark skinned Africans does not mean there are not other physical/genetic differences between them.

I posted the results from a study showing genetic differences between people of different "races" and then I am told that scientists do not believe in dividing people into different "races".  How is that possible?  How do scientists do all these studies of different races if scientists do not believe there are different races?

[BmorePat87]

(03-19-2018, 01:24 PM)fredtoast Wrote: No, but skin color is tied to the same genetic differences.

Here is my final word on all of this.  Just because the races have mixed does not mean that people can not identify certain races based on physical appearance.  And physical appearance is clearly a genetic difference.  So to me it seems silly to say that there are not genetic differences between the races. 

I can tell a dark skinned Asian from a dark skinned African.  The fact that there are dark skinned Asians and dark skinned Africans does not mean there are not other physical/genetic differences between them.

I posted the results from a study showing genetic differences between people of different "races" and then I am told that scientists do not believe in dividing people into different "races".  How is that possible?  How do scientists do all these studies of different races if scientists do not believe there are different races?

No one is saying there aren't genetic differences between races. I think the fact that you're confused about the arguments used in favor of race as a social construct  is what's causing the issue here. 

If I lump a bunch of ethnicities together because they share a similar skin tone, there will be some similarities between some of them. What scientists have said, however, is that there's no common gene cluster for being "white" or "black". This is because the genes that may give one person dark skin may be different from the genes that give another dark skin. 

To answer your final question: because no one says they don't exist, they say that they're a social stratification. Social constructs are still relevant in scientific studies. 

[Dill]

(03-16-2018, 05:57 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Okay Dill, just explain to me why 80 to 90 percent of DBs and track athletes have black skin?

And why are they of African American descent instead of dark skinned Asians?

That is a broad question.  My best shot--

Hundreds of years ago Portugese, Spanish, Dutch and British ships began raiding the West Coast of Africa--not India. Eventually, a settled trade in slaves following, extracting several hundred million West Africans of all sizes, including some very tall ones.

Then in the late 19th century, after most of the slaves were freed, White folks invented games like baseball, basketball and football, and revived Olympic events, which eventually became professional sports with integrated teams. 

In one sport, football, players for one position, DB were selected for quickness and agility. A lot of those selected also had black skin, but not all. And a lot of those with black skin were not selected. It was the genes which were being selected, not race.

If no one invented football and the slavers had raided the coast of China in the 19th century and ping pong became a US professional sport, then some might be wondering why "Asians" were superior athletes.  If they had raided India and cricket were our most popular sport, same argument, mutatis mutandis.

[Dill]

(03-19-2018, 01:24 PM)fredtoast Wrote: No, but skin color is tied to the same genetic differences.

Here is my final word on all of this.  Just because the races have mixed does not mean that people can not identify certain races based on physical appearance.  And physical appearance is clearly a genetic difference.  So to me it seems silly to say that there are not genetic differences between the races. 

I can tell a dark skinned Asian from a dark skinned African.  The fact that there are dark skinned Asians and dark skinned Africans does not mean there are not other physical/genetic differences between them.

I posted the results from a study showing genetic differences between people of different "races" and then I am told that scientists do not believe in dividing people into different "races".  How is that possible?  How do scientists do all these studies of different races if scientists do not believe there are different races?

Back in the 19th and 20th century, scientists did study "races" just as Aristotle studied sea and land creatures.

What scientists study now is genes. Here is an opinion piece on the subject, which teases out some of its political implications.

http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/science-genetics-reshaping-race-debate-21st-century

A landmark 2002 study by Stanford scientists examined the question of human diversity by looking at the distribution across seven major geographical regions of 4,000 alleles. Alleles are the different “flavors” of a gene. For instance, all humans have the same genes that code for hair: the different alleles are why hair comes in all types of colors and textures.

In the Stanford study, over 92% of alleles were found in two or more regions, and almost half of the alleles studied were present in all seven major geographical regions. The observation that the vast majority of the alleles were shared over multiple regions, or even throughout the entire world, points to the fundamental similarity of all people around the world—an idea that has been supported by many other studies (Figure 1B).

If separate racial or ethnic groups actually existed, we would expect to find “trademark” alleles and other genetic features that are characteristic of a single group but not present in any others. However, the 2002 Stanford study found that only 7.4% of over 4000 alleles were specific to one geographical region. Furthermore, even when region-specific alleles did appear, they only occurred in about 1% of the people from that region—hardly enough to be any kind of trademark. Thus, there is no evidence that the groups we commonly call “races” have distinct, unifying genetic identities. In fact, there is ample variation within races (Figure 1B).

......However, even if scientists agree that race is, at most, a social construct, any cursory search of the internet reveals that the broader public is not convinced of this. After all, if an Asian person looks so different from a European, how could they [i]not be from distinct groups? Even if most scientists reject the concept of “race” as a biological concept, race exists, undeniably, as a social and political concept.


[/i]

[fredtoast]

(03-19-2018, 05:31 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: To answer your final question: because no one says they don't exist, they say that they're a social stratification. Social constructs are still relevant in scientific studies. 

(03-19-2018, 06:19 PM)Dill Wrote: .....However, even if scientists agree that race is, at most, a social construct, any cursory search of the internet reveals that the broader public is not convinced of this. After all, if an Asian person looks so different from a European, how could they [i]not be from distinct groups? Even if most scientists reject the concept of “race” as a biological concept, race exists, undeniably, as a social and political concept.[/i]

Okay, so when I see scientific studies done by scientists and they break down the results among different "races" how do they do that?  What standard do they use to divide their study groups by race?

[fredtoast]

(03-19-2018, 06:19 PM)Dill Wrote: If separate racial or ethnic groups actually existed, we would expect to find “trademark” alleles and other genetic features that are characteristic of a single group but not present in any others. However, the 2002 Stanford study found that only 7.4% of over 4000 alleles were specific to one geographical region. Furthermore, even when region-specific alleles did appear, they only occurred in about 1% of the people from that region—hardly enough to be any kind of trademark. Thus, there is no evidence that the groups we commonly call “races” have distinct, unifying genetic identities. In fact, there is ample variation within races (Figure 1B).

So it would require region specific alleles to prove there are separate races, but when they find region specific alleles thye just say there are not enough?  How do they explain the existence of region specific alleles?

And I also disagree that there has to be one specific trait.  There are other dogs the same size a a German Shepard that are not German Shepards.  There are other dogs that have the same shape ears.  German Shepards come in the same colors as other dogs.  But despite all of these shared traits and variances within the breed I can still identify the breed of German shepard based on physical genetic qualities.

The fact that races have mixed does not mean there are certain people who I can look at and easily identify by race as being Asian, or African, or Hispanic.  These distinctions are physical and therefore genetic.

[Dill]

(03-19-2018, 07:06 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Okay, so when I see scientific studies done by scientists and they break down the results among different "races" how do they do that?  What standard do they use to divide their study groups by race?

Can you link one for me? Then I will know what you mean.

[Dill]

(03-19-2018, 07:17 PM)fredtoast Wrote: So it would require region specific alleles to prove there are separate races, but when they find region specific alleles thye just say there are not enough?  How do they explain the existence of region specific alleles?

And I also disagree that there has to be one specific trait.  There are other dogs the same size a a German Shepard that are not German Shepards.  There are other dogs that have the same shape ears.  German Shepards come in the same colors as other dogs.  But despite all of these shared traits and variances within the breed I can still identify the breed of German shepard based on physical genetic qualities.

The fact that races have mixed does not mean there are certain people who I can look at and easily identify by race as being Asian, or African, or Hispanic.  These distinctions are physical and therefore genetic.

The quoted passage does not say there has to be "one specific trait." It says "we would expect to find “trademark” alleles and other genetic features [plural]that are characteristic of a single group but not present in any others."

I can look at people and easily tell the difference between those with brown eyes and brown hair and those with blue eyes and blonde hair, though there are many "mixtures" as well--brown eyes and blond hair and blue eyes and brown hair and people with green eyes and light brown hair.  Would you say that people with brown eyes and brown hair are a different race from people with blue eyes and blond hair? These distinctions are physical and therefore genetic.

Curious that you speak of race mixing, as if there were originally pure races that mixed along the edges, rather than human varieties evolving from a single group.

So far as I can tell, scientists looking at genetic makeup of human groups are not really doing anything different than you are when looking at a German shepherd's traits. They do look for clustering and predominance of traits in groups. But they are looking at a larger collection of traits than size, ears and color. And what they see includes much more than the "surface." (Hence my repeated reference to fish and whales.) When they are done collecting, suddenly, the older, surface based traits, are no longer helpful for scientific grouping, just as biologists no longer classify animals as "flying, swimming, walking." Non-scientists still hold to skin color and other surface features for various reasons, not all of which are conducive to liberal politics.

Where is Beaker?

[BmorePat87]

(03-19-2018, 07:06 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Okay, so when I see scientific studies done by scientists and they break down the results among different "races" how do they do that?  What standard do they use to divide their study groups by race?

I'd read their methodology. I couldn't possibly answer that question for every single study.

[BmorePat87]

(03-19-2018, 11:42 PM)Dill Wrote: The quoted passage does not say there has to be "one specific trait." It says "we would expect to find “trademark” alleles and other genetic features [plural]that are characteristic of a single group but not present in any others."

I can look at people and easily tell the difference between those with brown eyes and brown hair and those with blue eyes and blonde hair, though there are many "mixtures" as well--brown eyes and blond hair and blue eyes and brown hair and people with green eyes and light brown hair.  Would you say that people with brown eyes and brown hair are a different race from people with blue eyes and blond hair? These distinctions are physical and therefore genetic.

Curious that you speak of race mixing, as if there were originally pure races that mixed along the edges, rather than human varieties evolving from a single group.

So far as I can tell, scientists looking at genetic makeup of human groups are not really doing anything different than you are when looking at a German shepherd's traits. They do look for clustering and predominance of traits in groups. But they are looking at a larger collection of traits than size, ears and color. And what they see includes much more than the "surface." (Hence my repeated reference to fish and whales.) When they are done collecting, suddenly, the older, surface based traits, are no longer helpful for scientific grouping, just as biologists no longer classify animals as "flying, swimming, walking." Non-scientists still hold to skin color and other surface features for various reasons, not all of which are conducive to liberal politics.

Where is Beaker?

This continued pattern of misrepresenting everything he quotes can only be explained as willful ignorance. 

You'd done your job. All he has is "most cornerbacks are black". 

[Beaker]

(03-14-2018, 02:27 PM)fredtoast Wrote: No one can watch track and field or the NBA and deny that genetically African Americans as a group are athletically superior to white people.  

Jimmy the Greek got labeled a racist and fired from CBS for pointing that out.

[StLucieBengal]

(03-21-2018, 01:57 PM)Beaker Wrote: Jimmy the Greek got labeled a racist and fired from CBS for pointing that out.

Don’t they have more muscle? It’s something like this but I do not remember.

[*PhilHos*]

(03-21-2018, 01:57 PM)Beaker Wrote: Jimmy the Greek got labeled a racist and fired from CBS for pointing that out.

Jimmy the Greek was the first thing I thought of when fred said that.

[fredtoast]

(03-20-2018, 08:07 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: I'd read their methodology. I couldn't possibly answer that question for every single study.

(03-20-2018, 08:12 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: This continued pattern of misrepresenting everything he quotes can only be explained as willful ignorance. 

The only people being "willfully ignorant" in this thread are the ones claiming that scientists don't divide people into groups called "race" when there are lots of studies out there by scientists who divide people into groups called "race".

Since you are the expert on how scientists define race why would i have to provide you a link to a study?  I have already posted one in this very thread.

There are lots of studies of race among scientists that concern examination of differences between groups with the goal of understanding human evolutionary history, and the relationship between our genes and our health.

How can you be such an expert of how scientists define race and be ignorant of all these studies?

How can you claim to know so much yet actually know so little?

[BmorePat87]

(03-22-2018, 04:59 PM)fredtoast Wrote:

Your response to me accusing you of engaging in strawman arguments is to engage in a strawman argument?

[Dill]

(03-22-2018, 04:59 PM)fredtoast Wrote: There are lots of studies of race among scientists that concern examination of differences between groups with the goal of understanding human evolutionary history, and the relationship between our genes and our health.

Hey guys, let's move away from imputations of willful misunderstanding. We can sort this out.

Fred, as I said above, genetic scientists do indeed examine difference between groups, and, as you say, with the goal of understanding human evolutionary history. 

But can you imagine NOT conflating that study of similarities and differences with a 19th century racial typology based upon surface features?