Reading your link, it looks like they want to end racism by abandoning the colloquial meaning of "race" and instead having people say something like "obvious physical differences between collections of people caused by historic genetic isolation of their ancestors".
Racism is baseless
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Reading your link, it looks like they want to end racism by abandoning the colloquial meaning of "race" and instead having people say something like "obvious physical differences between collections of people caused by historic genetic isolation of their ancestors".
The Sparrow
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Evidence?
I mean no insult, but I'm honestly puzzled that I need to provide any since I thought this was commonly known and evidence is easy to find via Google. Picking a mental health disorder at random, here is an article from Nature on the genetic basis of schizophrenia:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v511/n7510/full/nature13645.html
Doubtless there are environmental causes a well, but if the above is anything like true, it is presumably theoretically possible to have different predispositions for the condition in different populations.
This particular condition isn't really the point though. Is anybody honestly going to argue that there can be in principle no genetic basis that could cause different rates of particular mental and behavioural issues in different populations?
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I agree that there's no objection from first principles, but in general I would expect whatever mechanisms have led mental illnesses to fail to be selected out of the gene pool in one population to be at play in other populations as well. I don't think there's any evidence of differences in the rates of genetically caused mental illness from one population to another.
I don't remember all the details (I'll have to look it up) but I read a textbook* a while ago that talked about the various mechanisms that lead to traits that are not selected for persisting in the population. The most obvious being just that the mutation arises again and again. A common example is that a negative trait might be linked to a positive trait that is selected for (like sickle cell anaemia). The latter could potentially be the sort of think that you are looking for if a mental illness was linked to a local environmental condition. But again I don't know that there's any evidence of such a condition actually existing.
*E O Wilson's original "sociobiology", it's pretty interesting.
I don't remember all the details (I'll have to look it up) but I read a textbook* a while ago that talked about the various mechanisms that lead to traits that are not selected for persisting in the population. The most obvious being just that the mutation arises again and again. A common example is that a negative trait might be linked to a positive trait that is selected for (like sickle cell anaemia). The latter could potentially be the sort of think that you are looking for if a mental illness was linked to a local environmental condition. But again I don't know that there's any evidence of such a condition actually existing.
*E O Wilson's original "sociobiology", it's pretty interesting.
caveman1917
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Genetic similarity is not the same as social similarity. What social traits do you think they have in common with early hunter-gatherers?
Resource Unpredictability, Mistrust, and War: A Cross-Cultural Study
Ember & Ember said:
All I'm trying to show here is that if one is going to positively assert that there is no genetic component to particular population issue, then one has to at least make an argument. Look at another population isolated in another sense, there are some well known genetic disorders in Ashkenazi populations at far higher rates than elsewhere. Clearly such things do happen. If I am understanding the OP correctly, then this is the viewpoint being proposed for the racist, though I am not clear what grounds the OP has for attributing this viewpoint. Nothing in the OPs story implies a claim of a genetic cause on the part of the racist, so it's kind of hard to get a handle on.
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macdoc
Philosopher
Chimps are tribal and territorial. Hierarchal. Share food resources in their group, cooperate in hunts, have "cultures" that differ depending on food resources a long list.
They will chase or even kill another group or individual not of their group in their territory.
Here you go
http://www.janegoodall.ca/about-chimp-so-like-us.php
I am 100% behind the effort to establish personhood and human rights akin to what we provide children and guardianship to those responsible for their welfareetc
more
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6505691.stm
( Shutit ....you are complete blinkered on this and should perhaps wander elsewhere as I'm beginning to think you have an agenda here
)
Racism is a construct with no basis in science as there are no "races" of humans. The concept belongs in the same "human misconception"category as phrenology....thoroughly discredited.
No one disputes the genetic variations of human subpopulations.
They will chase or even kill another group or individual not of their group in their territory.
Here you go
more
http://www.janegoodall.ca/about-chimp-so-like-us.php
I am 100% behind the effort to establish personhood and human rights akin to what we provide children and guardianship to those responsible for their welfareetc
more
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6505691.stm
( Shutit ....you are complete blinkered on this and should perhaps wander elsewhere as I'm beginning to think you have an agenda here
) Racism is a construct with no basis in science as there are no "races" of humans. The concept belongs in the same "human misconception"category as phrenology....thoroughly discredited.
No one disputes the genetic variations of human subpopulations.
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The Sparrow
Graduate Poster
Ok, that could support a genetic relationship to certain kinds of mental illness, but hardly makes a statement about the character traits of the population as a whole. You said
"There appears to be a genetic basis for many types of mental illness, alcohol dependence, and a host of other things."
Care to support the alcohol comment? Because I have 'googled' quite the opposite. And what host of other things are you speaking of?
This is important as that is exactly the kind of "data" that gives some folks justification to treat other races as inferior.
Showing that certain populations are at higher risk for schizophrenia says nothing about a particular individuals character trait in that population.
And frankly that is what lies at the heart of racism. Assigning character traits to an individual BASED ON HIS PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS. A broad brush painting.
Yes, it is not a terribly unreasonable hypothesis that there could be differences, but is there evidence for "negative" traits.
We're talking about an explicit and exclusive genetic component that leads to negative behavior.
Make no mistake, I hear too often, "Indians are drunks", not poor people are drunks, or country people are all drunks. Or in case of the gentleman in the opening post, we need to thin those indians out. Not we need to thin those poor people out, or we need to thin those protestant people out.
This is an erroneous implication that genetically there is something wrong, inferior, or generally caustic about "indians", and they all stereotypically have these traits.
In general terms, sure it is possible, why would genetics limit itself to determining hair colour or the height of cheekbones. We're talking about and overall set of negative traits. First Nations folks lived for thousands of years in North America without needing Europeans to "fix" them. I struggle to see how, if they were genetically predisposed to negative traits, they survived so long and have such a rich history.
Hell, culturally they have a much better religion that treats the earth with much more respect than the European Christian mentality has.
caveman1917
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So pretty much the opposite of early human hunter-gatherers then.
Do you understand the difference between genetic similarity and social similarity?
Bikewer
Penultimate Amazing
It just occurred to me that much of this has gone to the incidence of "war" among different peoples... but the OP was about racism.
Although this "fear of the other" that I mentioned as existing among very primitive humans might have become a contributing factor for conflict.... It might also simply manifest as fear and distrust... The elements of racism.
We see this a great deal even to the present day, reinforced as I said earlier by differences in culture. Disparate peoples may live together in apparent harmony, but there is often a simmering undercurrent of distrust that can manifest very quickly and with little cause.
Although this "fear of the other" that I mentioned as existing among very primitive humans might have become a contributing factor for conflict.... It might also simply manifest as fear and distrust... The elements of racism.
We see this a great deal even to the present day, reinforced as I said earlier by differences in culture. Disparate peoples may live together in apparent harmony, but there is often a simmering undercurrent of distrust that can manifest very quickly and with little cause.
caveman1917
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The study I referenced earlier found "fear of the other" indeed a predictor for war-like behaviour among hunter-gatherers, however it's a pretty weak predictor compared to resource shortages.
macdoc
Philosopher
Pretty much the same actually ....perhaps you should read a little further instead of trying to assert your view into the article.
The writer of your article has an agenda that might coincide with the bonobos but certainly does not coincide with chimps or hunter gatherers where warfare was endemic...both symbolic and real violence.
The New Guinea highland tribes practiced cannibalism well into modern times.
We are closer to chimps in many ways than bonobos ( more is the pity ) as we are murderous and violent as opposed to bonobos who settle disputes sexually.
This is a good over view.
http://hraf.yale.edu/ehc/summaries/hunter-gatherers
Bonobos are not genetically pre-disposed to violence, humans and chimps are.
And men far more than women
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080130/full/451512a.html
and some subpopulations with a specific gene distribution more so yet.
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caveman1917
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Feel free to show where the article states that hunter-gatherers were hierarchical.
ETA: you failed to answer my question though. If you do understand the difference between genetic and social similarity, then why do you think you can make claims about social arrangements of early humans based on DNA similarity with certain other species?
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Crazy Chainsaw
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caveman1917
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We are also genetically similar (>50% equal DNA) to bananas, maybe we should draw social conclusions from that as well.
Crazy Chainsaw
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Fear of the other is intensified by resource ahortages the Klingon Empire ran out of blood wine, so they attacked the Romulan Star Empire to steal Romulin Ale.
Or did the Romulan's attack the Klingons for the blood wine?
Crazy Chainsaw
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We are at war with bananas, eat one and their allies the mosquitoes will attack you.
Every living thing fights for life, the whole of nature is warfare.
crhkrebs
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There seem to be differences in how alcohol is metabolized.
"The findings suggest that it is unlikely that Native Americans carry a genetic variant that predisposes them to alcoholism. Certain variants of ADH and ADLH do have a protective affect against alcoholism in some Native American people; however, these findings do not explain the high incidence of alcoholism in the tribes that were studied."
https://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/arh301/3-4.htm
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OK, I Googled "genetic basis of addiction" and got this as the top hit:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3506170/
"For example, peer influences and family environment are most important for exposure and initial pattern of use, whereas genetic factors and psychopathology play a more salient role in the transition to problematic use.2"
"Evidence from family, adoption, and twin studies converges on the relevance of genetic factors in the development of addictions including SUDs and gambling.7–13 Weighted mean heritabilities for addictions computed from several studies of large cohorts of twins are shown in Fig. 1.14 Heritability is lowest for hallucinogens (0.39) and highest for cocaine (0.72)."
and it goes on and on in a lot of boring detail. So that's addiction in general.
Here's the first link I came to doing a similar search on alcohol addiction:
http://www.medicaldaily.com/genetic-basis-alcohol-dependence-240850
Again, I'm not arguing that every single one of these genetic links will pan out, but it seems to me that you have yourself in a position where you must argue that none of them can possibly pan out. From the perspective of the argument you were seeking in the OP, I don't think that that is a winning debate strategy.
In that case, you have an easy job. If the person you are arguing with believes that every single indigenous person in Manetoba is an alcoholic, then you can clearly refute them. The key thing in such an argument would be to get them to explicitly say that. If they have a negative opinion of indigenous people in general, but acknowledge that there are plenty of individuals who are different, then that strategy will not work. It wasn't clear from your original post
Why wouldn't there be traits that you regard as negative? For one thing your judgement and the judgement of natural selection are not necessarily the same. For another there are clearly negative traits that are associated with, some, populations. This only matters if you are trying to construct an argument that there can be no such negative genetic component. You have a much much easier argument if you just try to show that nobody has done the studies in this specific population, and hence the racists views are unevidenced assumptions rather than categorically wrong.
People talk imprecisely. Racial groups and cultural groups often map to the same people. One could say Indians are drunks and mean the racial group, or the cultural group.... probably most of the time it maps to the same people. Your poor people comment intrigues me. You seem to be saying that if there was a clearly identifiable group of poor people for whome poverty, lack of work, lack of education, alcoholism, high birth rate, low life expectency and family breakup were endemic and handed down generationally, people wouldn't view them negatively. I'm not at all sure that that is the case. In the UK at least, such people living on welfare in housing provided by the government are quite often the subject of negative attitudes.
That is more like the sort of argument you should make. Having said that, the world in which they are living in now is completely different with different stresses, availability of alcohol, food, and welfare. It doesn't seem obvious to me that a culture and a cluster of genetic traits that suited one environment must necessarily suit another.
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jaydeehess
Penultimate Amazing
I live just east of the Man./Ont. border, so conditions here are basically the same.
The first time a black kid was in any school I was in was in High School. The only adult was the Latin teacher at the other high school in town.
I lived less than a mile from Cecelia Jaffrey Residential School and recall when one boy, Chanie Wenjack, ran away and was found dead of exposure a few days later. It was the first time I ever thought about it. I was 10 at the time.