Race is a human/social construct.

[Juniversal]

On the subject, race is a very foggy concept. If you define race as concrete, discrete and wholly unique population groups then it certainly doesn't exist. But if you define race simply as population groups that differ from others (by a fair margin) in phenotype and genotype in a fairly consistent and predictable way than you could reasonably say it exist. This definition then begs the question where do we draw the racial line? What degree of genetic and phenotypical difference is needed before a population group constitutes it's own race?


Are Asian Negrito's a distinct race? Phenotypically they appear African but genetically have little in common with modern African populations. What about New Guineans and Australian Aborigines? African pygmies? What about the Khoisan people? All are very genetically distinct from any typical "Caucasoid, negroid or mongoloid" population or even each other. Do they constitute their own racial groups even though most tend towards "negroid" phenotypically? Honestly i'm curious if we were to embrace the above definition where these groups would fall.


I certainly have no complete opposition to admitting race exist given the second definition but then other questions arise regarding the number of races and where you draw the line (what percentage of genetic difference before you label a population a distinct race, how important is phenotype as opposed to genotype, how does admixture fit into the equation and how does it effect the veracity of racial labeling, ect)?

 

[This is The End]

Of course race is a construct. Almost all classification systems are constructs. (I'm guessing that animal classification systems are fairly simple, like "edible/non-edible" and "will eat me/won't eat me".) Even Linnean taxonomy is a construct, and it is quite imprecise. Species get reclassified all the time and boundaries are quite blurry.

The real question is, "Is the construct of race useful?" Now we know that taxonomy is quite useful, helping us make some sort of order out of the biologic world. Is race useful in the same way?

Well, no, not in the same way, but it does have some utility. It helps when describing individuals. It is ridiculous to try to list all of the characteristics of a person when you can say "he looked Asian" and cover a lot of those characteristics. It also can be useful when making diagnoses or trying to decide what kinds of medications might be useful or dangerous, as these things may sometimes be strongly correlated with the "artificial construct" of race.

It is unfortunate, though probably inevitable, that people will use these same constructs to indoctrinate bigotry, but playing devil's advocate for a moment, if you wish your child to be bigoted (and many parents do) then race is a useful construct.

It is certainly true that because of the greater ability to travel, race is becoming less useful as a construct, but not completely outdated yet. I hope someday it will be completely useless. In the meantime, I will not toss out any useful construct simply because some people choose to misuse it for bigotry.

I tried to make that post 2 days ago, failed, and gave up.

Nicely put.

 

[Gazpacho]

On the subject, race is a very foggy concept. If you define race as concrete, discrete and wholly unique population groups then it certainly doesn't exist. But if you define race simply as population groups that differ from others (by a fair margin) in phenotype and genotype in a fairly consistent and predictable way than you could reasonably say it exist. This definition then begs the question where do we draw the racial line? What degree of genetic and phenotypical difference is needed before a population group constitutes it's own race?

Over and over in the historical record (on into the present), you can see that when people get around to drawing the "line" biologically, they do it on the basis of social factors, while pretending otherwise. It doesn't become accepted wisdom that differences are "racial" until there is a social difference behind them.

 

[Juniversal]

Over and over in the historical record (on into the present), you can see that when people get around to drawing the "line" biologically, they do it on the basis of social factors, while pretending otherwise. It doesn't become accepted wisdom that differences are "racial" until there is a social difference behind them.

Definately true in part. Regardless one thing is for sure. If we're to accept that race exist, condensing racial diversity into one of three categories ("black white or asian") is a vast oversimplification.

That being said there is immense overlap between most populations not to mention admixture within certain populations that further blurs the notion of race. In my eyes that makes talks of intelligence and IQ that often accompanies these discussions laughable. Someones life outcome represented as a two or three digit number decided by performance on a test as opposed to the culmination of good or bad decisions and perseverance.

 

[Jono]

That being said there is immense overlap between most populations not to mention admixture within certain populations that further blurs the notion of race.

The fact that we can approximate many levels and extents of ancestral admixture is not a blurring of the concept of any taxonomy applied to humans. If it was, it would have to be so for animals in general. On the other hand, many absolutes and ideas revolving around race depend on race or racial-related classifications to be not only simple, but inherently one-dimensional and often deterministic (which is of course false).

 

[Mark6]

I see your point here, but think about this: 1 in 5 "black" people in the United States have more genetically in common with Europeans than with Africans. How should we classify them? By their appearance, or by their DNA which says they're descended from Europeans?

Do you realize that a lot (possibly more than 50%) of American "blacks" have lighter skin than a typical Greek or Italian?

 

[Aurelian]

My View of Race: Construct - the value given to that construct or bias has consequences, though.

Additional Food for thought or debate: PBS's Race - The Power of Illusion

http://www.pbs.org/race/001_WhatIsRace/001_00-home.htm

 

[Juniversal]

The fact that we can approximate many levels and extents of ancestral admixture is not a blurring of the concept of any taxonomy applied to humans. If it was, it would have to be so for animals in general. On the other hand, many absolutes and ideas revolving around race depend on race or racial-related classifications to be not only simple, but inherently one-dimensional and often deterministic (which is of course false).

I think you're misunderstanding what i'm saying. I'm not saying that race doesn't exist because of admixture. I'm saying that admixture within certain populations obfuscates classification. For example how do you classify someone who is 60% sub-Saharan African and 40% European? How about the converse (60% European and 40% African)?


If you combine a tiger and a lion you get a liger. Wouldn't it be inappropriate to label any offspring simply as a "tiger" or a "lion" just because the preponderance of admixture lines? I'll admit it's not the best example because we're all members of the same species but you know where i'm getting at. At what point are you no longer "black" or "white"? Considering the degree of admixture on this side of the globe (many whites have native american ancestry, blacks have white [and sometimes native] ancestry and it pretty much goes without saying most latino's are going to be some mixture of the three).


It seems kind of silly to speak of race when so many of our genetic lines habitually cross. We certainly wouldn't treat a population of Ligers as if they're simply tigers or lions. And all human beings belong to the same species!! You wont find much "purity" in our species. We're pretty much all mutts. Not to say race doesn't exist as a result of the physical isolation that happened for 10's of thousands of years between populations but the lines are certainly being further blurred in the recent years thanks to transportation, migration and travel.

 

[Delvo]

Are Asian Negrito's a distinct race? Phenotypically they appear African

Their skin is dark and their hair isn't as relaxed as other Eurasians' hair is, but other than that, no, their hair isn't as curly as Africans', their cranio-facial proportions are more like non-Africans', and they have less body hair than Africans other than pygmies.

What about New Guineans and Australian Aborigines?

Yes, that's another one, one of the basic five long-established races. (They are indicated by green icons in the map I included earlier in this thread.)

African pygmies?

Little or no genetic work on them is available, but their phenotypic differences from non-pygmy black Africans, of which small size is just one of several, indicate that either they're separate from black people or they're a major offshoot from them, like the peoples of North & South America are from eastern Asians.

What about the Khoisan people?

They're another of the basic five.

...even though most tend towards "negroid" phenotypically?

They don't. Australoids' hair is much more relaxed and they have the world's biggest jaws & teeth and most protruding facial bones. African pygmies' skin is lighter and more red, they have little body hair, and their eyes and foreheads bulge more. The Khoi-San are the most phenotypically unique, distinguished from black people by more tightly coiled scalp hair that comes in peppercorn-like clumps, lighter & yellower skin, higher & more prominent cheekbones, an unusual body fat distribution, more drastic epicanthic folds than anybody else except eastern Asians, and limb muscles with shorter tendons and longer "bellies" (the fibrous part between the tendons that does the flexing).

These differences and more that I can't name are why physical anthropologists grouped the various "dark" races separately from black Africans long ago without the need to consult (and before the invention of) genetics.

Honestly i'm curious if we were to embrace the above definition where these groups would fall.

I certainly have no complete opposition to admitting race exist given the second definition but then other questions arise regarding the number of races and where you draw the line

The basic five that nobody seriously doubts or debates are Khoi-San (capoid), black, Australoid/aborigine, caucasoid, and eastern Asian. Sometimes the word "race" gets applied one more notch below that to offshoots within one of the above, such as the two groups from eastern Asia (one of which stayed there and the other of which went to North & South America), and two groups of caucasoids (xanthochroi and melanochroi), but those are usually just treated as the largest level of subdivision within a race; sub-races. Other offshoots within two of the main five (black and Australoid) are probably what African pygmies and negritos are, but if it turns out that they're more genetically distinct from blacks and Australoids, then that could be six or seven main groups instead of five.

It's not that more numerous divisions below that level aren't recognized; it's just that below that level, if an anthropologist is talking about an even smaller group within a group, like "Polynesians" (a subset of eastern Asians which itself is again divisible into three more groups of Polynesian tribes), context makes it obvious that (s)he's not talking about any of the other races, so there's no reason to bother bringing them up at all any more than there is to bother bringing up the colors of parrot feathers, so the word isn't generally used at such a low level.

 

[Juniversal]

Their skin is dark and their hair isn't as relaxed as other Eurasians' hair is, but other than that, no, their hair isn't as curly as Africans', their cranio-facial proportions are more like non-Africans', and they have less body hair than Africans other than pygmies.

Yes, that's another one, one of the basic five long-established races. (They are indicated by green icons in the map I included earlier in this thread.)

Little or no genetic work on them is available, but their phenotypic differences from non-pygmy black Africans, of which small size is just one of several, indicate that either they're separate from black people or they're a major offshoot from them, like the peoples of North & South America are from eastern Asians.

They're another of the basic five.

They don't. Australoids' hair is much more relaxed and they have the world's biggest jaws & teeth and most protruding facial bones. African pygmies' skin is lighter and more red, they have little body hair, and their eyes and foreheads bulge more. The Khoi-San are the most phenotypically unique, distinguished from black people by more tightly coiled scalp hair that comes in peppercorn-like clumps, lighter & yellower skin, higher & more prominent cheekbones, an unusual body fat distribution, more drastic epicanthic folds than anybody else except eastern Asians, and limb muscles with shorter tendons and longer "bellies" (the fibrous part between the tendons that does the flexing).

These differences and more that I can't name are why physical anthropologists grouped the various "dark" races separately from black Africans long ago without the need to consult (and before the invention of) genetics.

Just fyi when I said most I was particularly referring to the San, pygmies and to a lesser degree Negritos. I wouldn't include aborigines or most New Guineans. But my comment was in reference to what I and most would perceive when doing a knee jerk classification as opposed to classification through close phenotypic and genetic examination.

Simply put, at first sight the san, pygmies and certain negrito people (not all) appear black in the superficial sense. Remember there is a broad spectrum of phenotypes that does not disqualify someone from being labeled black, especially in the United States. Many of these groups were labeled as negroid before the racial labeling system was refined or was stream lined due to genetics. Much of the outward characteristics you named are easily drawn along ethnic lines as opposed to racial (particularly the pygmy characteristics [not related to stature] you named).

And I was actually aware of the capoid and australoid racial categories but they are rarely acknowledged in most modern race discussions where most boil race down to negroid, caucasoid and mongoloid. I actually wasn't aware of the permanence of these categories or if there were accepted as gospel by the greater scientific community.

 

[stevea]

He addressed Gauls as an "ethnic" group not a race. Both are very distinct.

Nope - the term is "generi", and "gens", race, not "ethnicam". He also refers the germans as a distinct race from the gauls for example.

Race was not an important factor pre-1600. After 1600 with the onset of slavery race was seen as a way to distinguish the new slave masters from the slaves. Thus maintaining control over a single population for a stable labor force. Without slaves the colonization of the Americas would've proven nearly impossible.

You obviously have a definition of 'race' that does not correspond with any conventional definition. And *seems* to only be based on skin color. As I said isolated groups expressing distinct phenotypes -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(classification_of_human_beings)

The concept of race is only useful when you use the term "haplogroup", which is only useful for medical remedies and ailments.

No - it's only common group phenotypes that a relevant to the definition of race.

Any further use for political distinction and social stratification are pointless.

It is politically unacceptable to discriminate on phenotypic traits of a group. It's certainly not "pointless" to discriminate on relevant phenotypes. If my group tends to have much higher rates of some disease - then it is completely rational for me to act or have tests based on this racial characteristic.

As an aboriginal could have sex with an Inuit and produce a highly healthy child which could in turn produce other children with other "races" of people who would also be healthy and able to mate.

Right - and this means we are all the same species - not the same race.

It has been proven countless times that all races with in Egypt have held power at one time or another. And that the "tonality" of race practically breaks down when talking about the ancient Egyptians. ...

If it's "proven" that as you said Ancient Egyptians were truly egalitarian - then where is the evidence ? Bloviating your opinion isn't an logical argument.

Unfortunately if you interpret historical fact as "head-in-the-sand-ism" then of course I cannot stop you from believing your own lies.

I was not referring to history and you don't seem to have any evidence for your historical diatribe, and are quite wrong wrt Caesar/history.

No - it's head-in-the-sand to ignore that sub-population of our species commonly express different phenotypic traits and some of these are very important, even to survival. Body build & adipose fat distribution wrt thermoregulation and climate for example. It's political correctness to ignore that sub-populations differ and in a few cases in important ways.

Then don't make those distinctions of race if you want a fair society and legal system at all. And yes it is the question.

No. We can still have political equality without playing "make-believe" about phenotypic differences.

Sorry if you don't understand, but making useful distinctions based on RELEVANT phenotypic expressions is completely reasonable. Fortunately there aren't many terrible important phenotypes. One may rationally choose to reproduce with someone less likely to carry a genetic disease. If you are recruiting football players you won't rationally spend your time interviewing Inuits. If you want to study sickle-cell disease you won't look for subjects among Amerinds.

Some phenotypes are fairly specific to sub-populations of our species. I never suggested any form of political discrimination was acceptable.

Once people start mixing a lot the usefulness of race nearly evaporates.

This is a direct result of the proper definition of race as subpopulations with distinct phenotypic expression.



You seem highly invested in your odd historical claims of Egypt and that race=skin_color=slavery. I suggest you think more broadly and with fewer preconceptions. That chip on your shoulder is taking a high toll.

 

[Jono]

I just recently found this one but I'm wondering if and to what extent it is relevant to the discussed theme; "race is or is not a biological but a social entity". One of the basic points raised is that human beings are supposedly more genetically diverse than dogs are, if looking at heterozygosity (humans 0.776, dogs 0.401).
http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/14/7/707.full.pdf

Also, differences between two seperate species of gorillas (G. berengi and G. Gorilla) are on the order of six times less than between african Bantu people and anglo-saxon british (drafted from here and here).

 

[Jono]

No. We can still have political equality without playing "make-believe" about phenotypic differences.

Sorry if you don't understand, but making useful distinctions based on RELEVANT phenotypic expressions is completely reasonable. Fortunately there aren't many terrible important phenotypes. One may rationally choose to reproduce with someone less likely to carry a genetic disease. If you are recruiting football players you won't rationally spend your time interviewing Inuits. If you want to study sickle-cell disease you won't look for subjects among Amerinds.

The other night my wife was watching an episode of CSI (the Las Vegas series) where there was a case of bone marrow donation from one sibling to the other, as the parents had given birth to a second child only for it to be a donator to the older child. This was the first time I had heard of the pickle about racially mixed children are more frequently left without donors as two parents of different racial properties could not donate to their child for that reason. So, I looked to see if I could find something less ficticious than a tv-series that addressed this and found this:

Multiracial people used to be referred to as “mixed blood” or “half blooded”. While those terms may be outdated and derogatory, when it comes to finding a bone marrow donor, it literally does come down to genetic mix.

Did you know that mixed-race people have especially difficult odds of finding a bone marrow donor in the event of leukemia or rare blood diseases? For mixed patients, their monoracial parents and relatives will not likely match them. Even among their siblings, the odds are only one in four of finding a donor. While multiethnic people are the largest growing minority group, they are also the smallest percentage in bone marrow registries. That’s why in 2009, a non-profit organization called Mixed Marrow was created to address that need.

And this:

Compared to organ transplants, bone marrow donations need to be even more genetically similar to their recipients. Though there are exceptions, the vast majority of successful matches take place between donors and patients of the same ethnic background. Since all the immune system's cells come from bone marrow, a transplant essentially introduces a new immune system to a person. Without genetic similarity between the donor and the patient, the new white blood cells will attack the host body. In an organ transplant, the body can reject the organ, but with marrow, the new immune system can reject the whole body.

It was, and is, a situation I had not previously been aware of at all since I had assumed their mixed racial ancestry would not make them less viable for parent-to-child donation. In a very real yet saddening way though, it does put Gould/Kamin/Lewontin's "race is just a social construct"-meme into further questioning.

 

[DC]

 

[Jono]

Not a bad presention actually. It does however linger slightly with the typical sociopolitical hang-ups on the semantics of the term "race" and the fact that there are overlaps (as there should be in any case scenario), still I think it is mostly a fair presentation.

 

[DC]

Not a bad presention actually. It does however linger slightly with the typical sociopolitical hang-ups on the semantics of the term "race" and the fact that there are overlaps (as there should be in any case scenario), still I think it is mostly a fair presentation.

for example?

 

[Tatyana]

Dr. John R. Baker the author of Race (1974) would disagree.

RandFan, where is your PhD?

In 1974 we were unable to analyse DNA.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...It was, and is, a situation I had not previously been aware of at all since I had assumed their mixed racial ancestry would not make them less viable for parent-to-child donation. In a very real yet saddening way though, it does put Gould/Kamin/Lewontin's "race is just a social construct"-meme into further questioning.

Only if you misunderstand some of the genetic concepts here.

We can tell how long a species has been on the planet by the amount of genetic diversity. The chimpanzee species has existed longer than the human species. That doesn't mean they diverged into multiple species. They are still all chimpanzees.

We can come up with a cluster of genes that a black or Asian is more likely to have. For example, if you see 10 of these 20 genetic markers you will find an individual with this skin color, facial features and hair type.

The human genome has about 3 billion nucleic acid base pairs. If you want to define race as having the tiniest of fractions of these genetic markers, you could. However, the vast majority of biologists do not identify race (aka sub-species) by such a tiny fraction of genetic markers. Adding to that arbitrary division if you should choose to call it 'race', is the problem of overlap and continuum of those genetic markers in the population.

The problem with bone marrow donation is the degree of genetic similarity that is required for a match. Children receive one of 23 chromosomes from each parent. Each of those chromosomes has hundreds to thousands of genes. The ancestral lineage of individuals contain all the genetic differences that are inherited down the line. So the further 2 people are apart in their ancestry, the less likely they are to have children who, by the luck of the 23 pair draw, are close enough genetically to make a blood type match allowing bone marrow exchange. Blood type matching goes well beyond A, B and O groups. Among those groups are a whole slew of additional sub-groups besides just RH + or -.

When you have children from very divergent family lineages the odds of a match go down. Races (social construct) can result in family lineages remaining far apart genetically. Then when that family lineages are mixed there will be rarer combinations in the offspring. But that doesn't go to supporting race or sub-species genetically unless the isolation of the two groups goes on for hundreds of thousands of years, not tens of thousands when the population is a large as the human population is.

If you had a small group, say 1,000 individuals, and you separated them into two groups and then isolated each group from the other, and subjected each group to very different selection pressures, you could end up with two different species maybe after a few thousand generations, maybe longer. Australian aboriginals come the closest to meeting these criteria and they were isolated for somewhere between 40-60 thousand years without really becoming that different genetically from the rest of us.

So even though separated lineage will tend to diverge further and further as genetic changes are accumulated but not mixed in each separated ancestry, you need the isolation to go on much longer than sub-groups within the human species currently have.


If you can spare an hour, this university lecture, "Genomic Views of Human History" by Mary-Claire King, a U of WA genetic researcher/professor, you will come away with a much better understanding of the genetic concepts involved.

 

[Wuglife]

The chimpanzee species has existed longer than the human species. That doesn't mean they diverged into multiple species. They are still all chimpanzees.

I know this is not central to your argument at all, but I think there are two different species of chimpanzees.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I know this is not central to your argument at all, but I think there are two different species of chimpanzees.

Bonobos and Chimpanzees are two different species. Both are great apes as are we.

Among chimpanzees are 4 subspecies.

SPECIES paniscus
SPECIES troglodytes

SUBSPECIES troglodytes
SUBSPECIES schweinfurthii
SUBSPECIES vellerosus
SUBSPECIES verus​