Racism is baseless

[Dancing David]

I tend to agree. Population density was extremely low, almost laughable by today's standards. I imagine there were groups who thought they were alone in the world and entirely unique. In other cases, people may have totally flipped out when they discovered another tribe, and then been overcome more by curiosity than fear after the initial shock. I wonder, too, if Nature wouldn't favor the behavior of seeking out strangers for mating to avoid inbreeding. Interbreeding among sapiens and Neanderthals may also have been aided by this sort of thing.

On the other end of the spectrum, the first continent to experience high density has also been the most extremely violent, Europe. It's often been said that most wars are over privileged access to resources.

It would seem trade was not uncommon however as there are places hundreds of miles from the sea coast in the neolithic that had sea shells.

 

[Dancing David]

That's good by one hand. But take into account that those people receive their high education from the United States, hence their language is plenty of Anglicisms and their thinking is heavily influenced by the USA. From Ecuador to Tierra del Fuego it's a different thing.

I would not be surprised, plus they were my father's cohort, as a post modernist anthropologist he probably chose his companions for their views as well.

 

[Dancing David]

The highlighted seems to contradict the evidence on hunter-gatherers which do not live in resource-deprived contexts yet are also non-aggressive, such as the earlier mentioned !kung.



I know that, I have not argued anything of the sort that H-G's were aggressive. On the contrary, I am using H-G's as a counterargument against the notion of humans being genetically predisposed to the things people have claimed them to be, including aggression.



As far as I know the evidence suggests that H-G's displayed a whole range of social behaviours, from non-violent to warlike, from egalitarian to hierarchical, and sometimes a single group switching between these. Define "having records".



As far as I know the evidence suggests that agricultural societies were not necessarily more prone to abundance of food resources, and in at least some cases were more prone to food shortages than H-G's.

Aggression does seem to go along with resource accumulation, hence why the use of a "moar is better!" statistics (nevermind sampling bias or anything) is so flawed since - given that we are doing a "genetics vs cultural" debate - H-G's are the relevant cultural context and they physically couldn't engage in resource accumulation even if they wanted to, because they have to carry "their" stuff around all the time.



Whose idea? Theirs?



That doesn't mean there's no good evidence against the "genetically predisposed violence/hierarchy/warfare/..." hypotheses.

I think you and I are in agreement and that I mis read what you were posting, I apologize. We really don't know much about H-G societies prior to the written records and those are somewhat suspect.

I agree that they seem to have traits which would suggest that humans avoid conflict, which they discussed back in my classes. As almost all mammals that engage in conflict (with members of their own species) do so in a non-lethal fashion. Most competition of breeding may be showy but is generally non-lethal.

 

[arthwollipot]

The "willie nillie" is damaging in the case of use of the term "race" ....when minorities are asked to self identify their "race" on tests, they do worse than on a test where that identifying question is not asked.

Not quite. There was a landmark study in which people who were both Asian and female were asked to do a maths test. Where they were primed by calling attention their gender, they did worse on the test. But where they were primed by calling attention to their Asian-ness, they did better on the test. This showed that stereotypes can be leveraged in either a positive or a negative way and it all depends on how it is done.

Some doubts have been raised on the test - some variables were perhaps not controlled for - but the result has been replicated at least once in a separate study.

 

[lomiller]

I don't mean subspecies, which is what I think Denosovians and Neaderthals are.

I mean race. It would be more equivalent to

Genus: Canis
Species: lupus
Subspecies: familiaris
Race/Breed: greyhound (or beagle, or german shepherd, etc.)

Still no. It fits below subspecies where there is no formal or rigorous definition for what said races actually are but they don’t correspond to breeds in domesticated animals either. See the American Association of Physical Anthropologists statement on race.

http://physanth.org/about/position-statements/biological-aspects-race/

Partly as a result of gene flow, the hereditary characteristics of human populations are in a state of perpetual flux. Distinctive local populations are continually coming into and passing out of existence. Such populations do not correspond to breeds of domestic animals, which have been produced by artificial selection over many generations for specific human purposes.

Other noteworthy parts of the statement:

There is great genetic diversity within all human populations. Pure races, in the sense of genetically homogenous populations, do not exist in the human species today, nor is there any evidence that they have ever existed in the past.

Generally, the traits used to characterize a population are either independently inherited or show only varying degrees of association with one another within each population. Therefore, the combination of these traits in an individual very commonly deviates from the average combination in the population. This fact renders untenable the idea of discrete races made up chiefly of typical representatives.

 

[lomiller]

And that's what I was talking about. Once you go below "Species" in taxonomy there's not really a single "right" way to sub-divide any more.

Race, subspecies, breed, strain, etc are all used willy-nilly both by lay people and more "officially" without a lot of rhyme or reason to the point that the terms are essentially meaningless.

Exactly. But there is one difference with "race", people think they know what it means and it carries a lot of baggage so it's use tends to just lead to confusion.

 

[lomiller]

The problem is not races as a concept being wrong but the Anglospheric taxonomies being wrong. That is what the fellow poster above couldn't understand regarding the Basques.

Correction In English “race” is:
a) Wrong in the colloquial sense of the word because it has the taxonomy wrong
b) Meaningless in the taxonomic sense of the word because it exists in a realm below sub-species where there are no formal definitions only ad-hock ones.


You are also wrong on the language and usage of the term. In English, especially in scientific papers, terms other than race would be used to describe Basque. Most likely ethno-cultural group since it’s primarily a cultural group not a biological one.

 

[lomiller]

To unpack that a little: You don't have a problem with the fact that races exist, but only that racists think they differ in some particular qualities that they don't actually differ in.

I agree. But there's no need to suggest that the races don't exist in order to make that point.

There is no formally defined biological category of race, nor any clear way to develop one which lines up with the colloquial meaning of the word.

Insomuch as you can come up with your own ad-hoc groups below sub-species, you could come up with your own groupings and call them races, but this is both disingenuous and confusing which is why it’s avoided in almost all real scientific discussion. Only where the colloquial definition may correlate to something meaningful does the term get used. (As always correlation doesn’t equal causation)

How can races exist without a meaningful common description of what a race is?

 

[aleCcowaN]

<more he says, she says ... edited out>


Are you suggesting that it is impossible to find an example of an aggressive society meeting a non-aggressive society, and the non-aggressive society becoming aggressive as a result even though this result is clearly not due to everyone starting to bang each other and mixing their genes?

What I meant in the beginning of this part of my dialogue with you -before you started to waltz it out towards whatever you fancied- is that the type of research you were asking was impossible.

I've got nothing to do to show you wrong. Make a well-defined claim and provide evidence.



Absolutely nothing. People were asserting ******** about substituting chimps for early humans and it went flying off from there.

You have to do nothing, indeed, nor are able to. You have constantly evaded any suggestion that you should quantify what "being violent" and "not being violent is" before starting to preach whatever your pretty soul tells you.

I mean, if that ever gets its own thread because here it's an OT.

From the very beginning I spotted a lot of people here speaking their arses off about politics and loitering within the "Science ..." forum posting without any scientific content or merit, when in fact they were doing "Social Issues ..." in the wrong place. There's a reason no forensics in Amanda Knox's is discussed here.

If you didn't get it caveman1917, you only have show here a personal opinion on social topics in a confused way and that's not something that may worry or interest me.

 

[aleCcowaN]

I would not be surprised, plus they were my father's cohort, as a post modernist anthropologist he probably chose his companions for their views as well.

Well, what I wanted to be understood is that I perceive most anthropologists everywhere don't feel the need to take this race thingy into a battle. There are lots of local issues that probably contaminate the discipline in every country. For instance, in mine there's always a leftist bias towards dealing with European colonization as imperialism, and in the end, to treat Native Americans as people entitled restitution and lots of money in a constant stream, and White people as guilty ones who should pay rent for living here. It's the intellectual base of Indigenism, an ideology in the extreme right of which Chavism in Venezuela is the most complete example, in spite of the convenient Socialist folklore.

 

[lomiller]

Are you sure about what you're saying? There are lots of genetic variabilities among close groups because they are useful to survival either because they provide useful services or some variability that could trigger changes in the whole population if environmental conditions changed.

This is incorrect. There are some exceptions but the vast majority of human adaptively to their environments is cultural. The biggest contributor to differences in frequency of alleles in human populations is likely founder effects and genetic drift not evolution or adaption to environment.

Actual useful mutations that help adapt to environments are distributed on clines based on environment, location where the mutation occurred and sometimes cultural practices.

 

[aleCcowaN]

...There was a landmark study in which people who were both Asian and female were asked to do a maths test. Where they were primed by calling attention their gender, they did worse on the test. But where they were primed by calling attention to their Asian-ness, they did better on the test. This showed that stereotypes can be leveraged in either a positive or a negative way and it all depends on how it is done.
...

This doesn't goes against what you have said, but a lot of such studies are being cited here in an, at least, irresponsible way. All of it looks like something published in the social and scientific section of a gossip magazine.

I personally doubt of the quality of such studies, if they do exist.

 

[mijopaalmc]

The problem is not races as a concept being wrong but the Anglospheric taxonomies being wrong. That is what the fellow poster above couldn't understand regarding the Basques.

It's not that I didn't understand that some people refer to Basques a race; it's that I was verifying you were using "race" in a different way than other posters and therefore equivocating.

 

[aleCcowaN]

Correction In English “race” is:
a) Wrong in the colloquial sense of the word because it has the taxonomy wrong
b) Meaningless in the taxonomic sense of the word because it exists in a realm below sub-species where there are no formal definitions only ad-hock ones.

A bit contradictory, but, I may agree on the bulk. It's a good departure.

You are also wrong on the language and usage of the term. In English, especially in scientific papers, terms other than race would be used to describe Basque. Most likely ethno-cultural group since it’s primarily a cultural group not a biological one.

You're applying there the wrong taxonomies of your cultural group the same as a previous poster. How are the Basque going to be a race if they are Spanish (or French, or whatever). The differences are biological: I already told the blood type and the miscarriages when they breeded with people of other races. I don't know what blood type my great grandmother was, and no stories were passed down to me -how could people have spoken about this?- but the family story is consistent with having lost several babies or children, what wasn't so rare in 1875-95. My grandfather was RH+ and so I am. But my aunt died from Parkinson, which is a hereditary treat in Basques (also this). I have to consult a neurologist myself as I have some of what may be hints of an early onsetting Parkinson (a little stiffness the first fraction of a second when I start to move )

Of course, on the linguistic usage, you can assimilate the term to whatever you want. I am not able to object that, only to point out how misleading it could be.

 

[aleCcowaN]

Are you sure about what you're saying? There are lots of genetic variabilities among close groups because they are useful to survival either because they provide useful services or some variability that could trigger changes in the whole population if environmental conditions changed.

This is incorrect HUGE NON SEQUITUR There are some exceptions but the vast majority of human adaptively to their environments is cultural. The biggest contributor to differences in frequency of alleles in human populations is likely founder effects and genetic drift not evolution or adaption to environment.

Actual useful mutations that help adapt to environments are distributed on clines based on environment, location where the mutation occurred and sometimes cultural practices.

I wonder why posters here like to take my words and place them adjacently to theirs for inexplicable purposes.

If you want to delve into what you're saying you could cite any studies involving identical twins grown in different cultures, then you'll have how much is genetic and how much is cultural.

There are gradients in the distribution of genetic material? Paint me shocked! What about hypolactasia, or sickle cell disease protecting against malaria? What about Darwinian Fitness? What about the "Denisovan" EPAS1 allele that made Tibetan high-altitude adapted? What about transparent eyes (blue)?

Do you exclude epigenetics as a whole? Because the only thing I see here is an edited version on Anglospheric reasons to remove the term race from Anglospheric anthropology in order to have some apparent effect on Anglospheric sociology, what should be indifferent to me if it weren't sold every minute worldwide.

I wonder if someone here considers to be wrong the existence of a group who gathers just to breed among them in order to perpetuate and consolidate certain genetic treats and rejects doing that with groups outside their cluster.

 

[aleCcowaN]

It's not that I didn't understand that some people refer to Basques a race; it's that I was verifying you were using "race" in a different way than other posters and therefore equivocating.

I disagree. I was using race in the way it is used in English. It was you who never have thought of Basques as a race. There could be 3 races, or 10 races, or 20 races but, why should one of them necessary tens of millions of members? I only see there "it's quite a small group to be called a race" and that's not the case. Notice that I'm not talking of a Galician race or a Sicilian race or a Nahualt race. Not about a French race either and not even a Germanic race because there's not such thing -I think-: I'm talking of a Basque race.

 

[mijopaalmc]

aleCcowaN-

As long as you continue to use "race" in a way that it is clear that no one else in the threads is using our, you are equivocating--especially since the examples of allele frequency differences within the Basque ethnic group are not what define the Basque ethnic group.

 

[lomiller]

I wonder why posters here like to take my words and place them adjacently to theirs for inexplicable purposes.

The most likely reason appears to be you are not actually saying what you want to say. If you were trying to say something different I still don’t know what that would be, what you wrote however is wrong and looks to represent a fundamental misunderstanding of how humans adapt to their environment. Our adaptation to new/changing environments is primarily cultural, evolutionary adaptation happens at a MUCH slower pace.

 

[lomiller]

I disagree. I was using race in the way it is used in English.

No, you aren’t.

 

[Pup]

Still no. It fits below subspecies where there is no formal or rigorous definition for what said races actually are but they don’t correspond to breeds in domesticated animals either. See the American Association of Physical Anthropologists statement on race.

http://physanth.org/about/position-statements/biological-aspects-race/

Partly as a result of gene flow, the hereditary characteristics of human populations are in a state of perpetual flux. Distinctive local populations are continually coming into and passing out of existence. Such populations do not correspond to breeds of domestic animals, which have been produced by artificial selection over many generations for specific human purposes.

That pretty much fits with what I said. Everything is too much in flux today among humans for a race to be identified.

Pure races, in the sense of genetically homogenous populations, do not exist in the human species today, nor is there any evidence that they have ever existed in the past.

I'm curious about that. I've bolded today, because I agree with that. But have they never existed in the past? Animals obviously reproduce much faster than people, but I've read of "purebred" cows produced within a human lifetime in the 19th cenutry, which is what I've researched. Someone brings a purebred bull to the US, starts breeding it to our cows, and in the person's lifetime, they have a (somewhat inbred) herd of purebred cows that fit the general 19th century parameters for purebred, no DNA tests, but quarts of milk per day, appearance, etc.

So how many generations would this take in humans? Would an isolated group of humans that immigrated to an isolated area of Africa or South/North America or Europe or Asia, or Australia, and stayed there, never have enough generations to meet the qualifications of a breed? What are the qualifications?

For that matter, what are the qualifications for a German Shepherd or greyhound? I bet it's extremely open-ended, everything from "looks good to me" to a DNA test, and even then, different evaluations of the test because you have to have something greyhound and non-greyhound to compare it to.

In other words, unless there's a widely-agreed-on definition of how many isolated generations form a race, I doubt that one can say humans have or have never formed a race.

If one wants to prove that humans don't have races, then you set the parameters higher to prove that humans are an even mixture of traits.

If you think that a group with a tendency toward certain diseases, a tendency toward certain muscle groups, a certain set of skills, a tendency toward certain allergies and resistances to other diseases, all clustered to a geographically isolated group, then you set the parameters low enough to capture them as an identifiable group, but call them something other than a race, because you don't want to be called out as a racist.