Does race exist?

[Mindmaster]

Race really doesn't exist in a true sense... For example, in ancient Africa "the cradle of civilization" all colors and shades we see now were present. 10,000 - 5,000 B. C. E., we were all the same folks, and in much closer proximity. Thus, race is and remains a tool to create divisiveness and manipulate and torment people. One must understand that the desire to be with people that look just like us doesn't indicate anything on the long term only that in recent history (really only the last 2,000 years) we are mostly interested in similar folks. We all genetically arrive from the same place, and any contrary argument is merely an attempt to desperately hang onto the illusion for nefarious reasons. We don't assign "races" to populations of other animals do we? We have species of certain animals which have different colorings, markings, and certain hair or fur types and patterns and we rightly consider them the same species but merely different populations.

Race is really an attempt to convince others that certain groups are different and possibly inferior and no longer members of Homo Sapiens, but the fact of the matter is the blood of the ancient black colored individuals is in the modern white folks -- its all a matter of choosing an arbitrary time for the cutoff... If you go back 200,000 years we're as mixed as a mud pie... You go back to 2000 B.C.E this is where the real divisions start however the real notion that blacks, browns, tans, and whites shouldn't get together is a product of Monotheism - most of those early movements start teaching the us vs them... the real origin of the race differences..... Before that, all humans are human and everyone is acceptable provided they suit your fancy.

However for me, and for science are in completely agreement that the lineage of our blood is traceable back to the 200,000 year mark and beyond then it is clear we are all homo sapiens and the matter is simple - we've selected colors and shapes that appeal to us, but our ancestry is the same... Race is a lie.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Race really doesn't exist in a true sense... For example, in ancient Africa "the cradle of civilization" all colors and shades we see now were present. 10,000 - 5,000 B. C. E., we were all the same folks, and in much closer proximity. Thus, race is and remains a tool to create divisiveness and manipulate and torment people. One must understand that the desire to be with people that look just like us doesn't indicate anything on the long term only that in recent history (really only the last 2,000 years) we are mostly interested in similar folks. We all genetically arrive from the same place, and any contrary argument is merely an attempt to desperately hang onto the illusion for nefarious reasons. We don't assign "races" to populations of other animals do we? We have species of certain animals which have different colorings, markings, and certain hair or fur types and patterns and we rightly consider them the same species but merely different populations.

Race is really an attempt to convince others that certain groups are different and possibly inferior and no longer members of Homo Sapiens, but the fact of the matter is the blood of the ancient black colored individuals is in the modern white folks -- its all a matter of choosing an arbitrary time for the cutoff... If you go back 200,000 years we're as mixed as a mud pie... You go back to 2000 B.C.E this is where the real divisions start however the real notion that blacks, browns, tans, and whites shouldn't get together is a product of Monotheism - most of those early movements start teaching the us vs them... the real origin of the race differences..... Before that, all humans are human and everyone is acceptable provided they suit your fancy.

However for me, and for science are in completely agreement that the lineage of our blood is traceable back to the 200,000 year mark and beyond then it is clear we are all homo sapiens and the matter is simple - we've selected colors and shapes that appeal to us, but our ancestry is the same... Race is a lie.

I don't think you get the point of my race debate thread. No one's arguing that there's different subspecies of human in existence today. To use a crude analogy, we would all agree that domesticated dogs are members of the same species (Canis lupus familiaris) but we would agree that there's different "breeds" of dogs. That's much like what is found in humans in terms of variation. Accepting that there's biological variation within the human species does not, in of itself, lead to racism. Scientific racism is pseudoscience.

 

[metis]

In anthropology, "race"may be used but not typically the way probably most people use it. If I were to use it, I would have to explain the context.

If any here are in science, they well know that defining terms is a very tedious but necessary pain in the butt.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

There aren't that many left. I mean, relative to size of the rest of the population, it's such a miniscule portion. Takes a bit for significant changes to happen.



This is the problem with ethnicity and race. It's an arbitrary distinction. Are we talking black people or are we talking Congonese. It's my presumption that you could find a great amount of genetic difference between two isolated groups. You could find a great amount of genetic difference between any two given people, even genetic twins.

Anyway, my source:

"The fact that, given enough genetic data, individuals can be correctly assigned to their populations of origin is compatible with the observation that most human genetic variation is found within populations, not between them. It is also compatible with our finding that, even when the most distinct populations are considered and hundreds of loci are used, individuals are frequently more similar to members of other populations than to members of their own population. Thus, caution should be used when using geographic or genetic ancestry to make inferences about individual phenotypes."

Genetic Similarities Within and Between Human Populations

I'm not sure how it is arbitrary. Is it not true that genes tend to cluster on populations and that these clustered genes make this populations distinct? Your article is saying that more accurate classification becomes possible as more loci are considered. So, essentially, that study agrees with me.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

In anthropology, "race"may be used but not typically the way probably most people use it. If I were to use it, I would have to explain the context.

If any here are in science, they well know that defining terms is a very tedious but necessary pain in the butt.

How would you define it? Since you're an anthropologist, your input in this thread is especially welcomed.

Also, which branch of anthropology are you involved in?

 

[fantome profane]

How would you define it? Since you're an anthropologist, your input in this thread is especially welcomed.

Also, which branch of anthropology are you involved in?

I think what happens is that if a scientist or researcher uses the word "race" in a specific study or specific paper, then that word is defined in that study for the purpose of that study. And outside of a specific context the word has little or no meaning.

 

[metis]

How would you define it? Since you're an anthropologist, your input in this thread is especially welcomed.

Also, which branch of anthropology are you involved in?

I started out in physical but moved to cultural before my undergrad studies were completed.

As far as your question is concerned, I personally do not use the word "race" in the human context other than to say there's only one race-- the human race-- although that's really an illogical statement. There's simply too many landmines one may step on the minute we use that term in the human context. And yet there are times I used the word "racism". OK, so I'm not always logical.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Biologically and anthropologically their is today only one race of humans.
From there it's labeling differences, much like how we label the differences in different breeds of dogs (who are also just one race), and from there we add a lot of social constructs to it.

Oh, we stopped.

Evolution never stops. Not until all life is dead.

 

[dust1n]

I'm not sure how it is arbitrary. Is it not true that genes tend to cluster on populations and that these clustered genes make this populations distinct? Your article is saying that more accurate classification becomes possible as more loci are considered. So, essentially, that study agrees with me.

The arbitrariness is to take any particular cluster on populations, and their clustered distinct genes, and to call it anything. It's useful for certain purposes... you can trace lineage and past migrations and so fourth through it, mutations in the Y chromosome, and mitochondrial DNA, neither which have anything significant relation to race. The ones that you usually see that say your 63 Nordic, 7 East Asian, etc, do so my mapping the statistical prevalence of certain points over the entirety of the genome of multiple populations that exist now.

Which is sort of what I was getting at in my very first reply when I said your definition in the OP means I can take any group of DNA identifiers and call that a race. I have multiple sclerosis, which for the most part has been narrowed down to a couple heavily correlated genetic markers. Can I call people who have multiple sclerosis a race unto themselves?

By the way, I didn't use that source to demonstrate one can't make classifications on the prevalence of this or that gene. Anyone could do that. Male, Boy, err.. XXY female, XXY, male, XXYY, etc... I used my source to demonstrate that genetic diversity is far greater (somewhere on the tune of 80% of it) in the middle of a given human group than between many, many groups on the planet. It would be interesting to know what the two most genetically different people are known in existence.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Evolution never stops. Not until all life is dead.

Ok, but for humans its probably so slow that we only observe significant evolution over 100s of thousands of years though I'm not an anthropologist.

 

[dust1n]

Ok, but for humans its probably so slow that we only observe significant evolution over 100s of thousands of years though I'm not an anthropologist.

I guess it depends on what counts as a significant change, but to get an idea of some of the potentail pacing:

"Stearns' team examined the vital statistics of 2,238 postmenopausal women participating in the Framingham Heart Study, which has tracked the medical histories of some 14,000 residents of Framingham, Mass., since 1948. Investigators searched for correlations between women's physical characteristics — including height, weight, blood pressure and cholesterol levels — and the number of offspring they produced. According to their findings, it was stout, slightly plump (but not obese) women who tended to have more children — "Women with very low body fat don't ovulate," Stearns explains — as did women with lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Using a sophisticated statistical analysis that controlled for any social or cultural factors that could impact childbearing, researchers determined that these characteristics were passed on genetically from mothers to daughters and granddaughters.

If these trends were to continue with no cultural changes in the town for the next 10 generations, by 2409 the average Framingham woman would be 2 cm (0.8 in) shorter, 1 kg (2.2 lb.) heavier, have a healthier heart, have her first child five months earlier and enter menopause 10 months later than a woman today, the study found. "That rate of evolution is slow but pretty similar to what we see in other plants and animals. Humans don't seem to be any exception," Stearns says.

Douglas Ewbank, a demographer at the University of Pennsylvania who undertook the statistical analysis for the study, which was published Oct. 21 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), says that because cultural factors tend to have a much more prominent impact than natural selection in the shaping of future generations, people tend to write off the effect of evolution. "Those changes we predict for 2409 could be wiped out by something as simple as a new school-lunch program. But whatever happens, it's likely that in 2409, Framingham women will be 2 cm shorter and 1 kg heavier than they would have been without natural selection. Evolution is a very slow process. We don't see it if we look at our grandparents, but it's there."

Other recent genetic research has backed up that notion. One study, published in PNAS in 2007 and led by John Hawks, an anthropologist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, found that some 1,800 human gene variations had become widespread in recent generations because of their modern-day evolutionary benefits. Among those genetic changes, discovered by examining more than 3 million DNA variants in 269 individuals: mutations that allow people to digest milk or resist malaria and others that govern brain development."

Human Evolution: Are Humans Still Evolving? - TIME

 

[Kerr]

EDIT:

According to the definition in the OP, though, race exists (I confess I answered the title and then read the OP, because I'm smart that way, so I have tried to edit my response ). But I think it's a bit ambigious, since it would for example imply a person with red hair is of a different race then someone with brown hair. After all, hair color is a biological variation within the human species and you can divide people up based on it (which I assume is what you mean byy "quantify"). Or... I'm completely missunderstanding something, which is very possible.

 

[Glaurung]

I was under the impression that the relevant science more or less states that 'race' is not much more than mere phenotypic expression, rather than a real genetic difference. But I confess I don't know a whole lot about this.

 

[Mycroft]

Yes

 

[metis]

I was under the impression that the relevant science more or less states that 'race' is not much more than mere phenotypic expression, rather than a real genetic difference. But I confess I don't know a whole lot about this.

Exactly. Plus if one looks at random skeletons and studies blood-types, it is impossible in most cases to determine "racial" differences.

 

[Wirey]

NASCAR Drivers, Standings & News : NASCAR Sprint Cup Series | NASCAR.com

Races exist. Case closed.

 

[TurkeyOnRye]

Oh, we stopped.

On the contrary; we continued to evolve after leaving Africa. That is a fact. For instance, as humans left Africa and settled into northern latitudes, paler skin became advantageous to survival.

 

[Wirey]

On the contrary; we continued to evolve after leaving Africa. That is a fact. For instance, as humans left Africa and settled into northern latitudes, paler skin became advantageous to survival.

Plus we're taller, and more disease resistant, and our pinky finger is shrinking due to absence of requirement, and probably a whole host of others.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

But there's many groups of humans that have been geographically separated from other groups for thousands of years. There's still tribal groups who haven't made contact with the outside world yet.

But you aren't just talking about them, are you? People move around and interbreed all over the world. Isolated pockets are the exception, not the norm. For the vast majority of humanity, you only have to go back 1000-2000 years to find a common ancestor between any two random people on the face of the Earth. We're all distant cousins.

The biggest problem for the concept of race: What's the criteria for where one race ends and another begins?

For instance, what's the race of someone whose ancestors have all lived in Scotland as far back as he has records? Highlander? Scottish? British? Northern European? Caucasian? All of these have been put forward as "races" at different times. How do we tell which one is correct?

With species, there are objective measures: if two fertile individuals could create fertile offspring, then they're the same species; if they can't, they're different. What's the objective measure to tell us whether a group of people constitute a race?

 

[columbus]

Race is really an attempt to convince others that certain groups are different and possibly inferior and no longer members of Homo Sapiens,

This is really the point.
Modern science has demonstrated that phenotypes of humans are extremely superficial differences. But the "melanin challenged" Northern Europeans did not know this.
During the millennia between the rise of humans and the dawn of history people had spread out around the globe. They developed some minor, but obvious, physical differences. They also began developing cultures that were different. Then the pale northerners made some dramatic technology advances, especially in weapons and navigation.
That allowed them to dominate the world. Being at an extreme end of the color spectrum they came to associate melanin with inferiority. This was a self-reinforcing illusion, when they did outrageous things like stick a flag in a beach and claim everything for some European monarch and enforce the claims with cannons and smallpox.
So, in a might makes right world, race got confused with culture. And there are still plenty of people who find that illusion convenient.
Tom